In order to secure to myself the priority of
prophecy, I must point out that this story
was written in 1903.
Gustav Meyrink
On Friday, at midday, Dr Kunibald Jessegrim poured the strychnine solution gently into the stream.
A fish rose to the surface, dead, floating belly upwards.
You’d be as dead as that, by now, said Jessegrim to himself, and stretched, glad that he had emptied away his suicidal thoughts along with the poison.
Three times in his life he had looked Death in the eye in this way, and each time he had been locked back into life by a vague premonition that there was still some great deed, one wild, grand act of revenge waiting for him.
The first time he had wanted to put an end to it all was when his invention had been stolen, and then again ten years later, when he had been hounded out of his job because he had never given up pursuing the thief in order to expose him, and now, because — because — Kunibald Jessegrim groaned aloud as thoughts of his overwhelming misery welled up once more.
Everything had gone, everything he had depended on, everything that had once been dear to him.
And it was that blind, narrow-minded, baseless hatred of the crowd, driven by slogans to oppose everything that did not conform to dull mediocrity, that had done this to him.
To think of all the things he had undertaken, had thought of and suggested!
He had scarcely got going before he had to stop in the face of a ‘Chinese wall’ — the generality of obstinate humanity, and the cry of ‘but…’
‘The Scourge of God’ — yes, that’s the solution, Dear God Almighty make me a destroyer, an Attila! and the fury blazed up in Jessegrim’s heart.
Tamburlaine, Genghis-Khan limping across Asia, and devastating the fields of Europe with his Golden Mongol Horde, the Vandal Kings, who found peace only on the ruins of Roman art — all these were of his kind, powerful brothers in barbarism, born in the same eagle’s nest.
A monstrous, limitless affection for these creatures of Shiva grew in him. He felt that their dead spirits would stand by him, and another type of existence flashed into his body.
If he had been able to look into a mirror at that moment these miracles of transfiguration would no longer have presented a mystery.
Thus it is that the dark powers of nature surge into our blood, profoundly, and of a sudden.
Dr. Jessegrim was possessed of extensive knowledge. He was a chemist, and he found it easy enough to succeed.
In America such people get on well. It is no surprise that he was soon making money — a lot of money.
He had established himself in Tampico in Mexico, and made millions out of a lively trade in mescal, a new anaesthetic and social drug, whose preparation he had developed.
He owned four square miles of estates around Tampico, and the huge reserves of oil beneath them promised to multiply his wealth beyond measure.
But that was not the object for which his heart yearned.
The new year was approaching.
‘Tomorrow is January 1st 1951, and those lazy creoles will have yet another reason for spending three days on the binge and dancing their fandangoes,’ thought Dr. Jessegrim, looking down from his balcony at the tranquil ocean below.
‘And it’ll be hardly any better in Europe. The papers will be coming out in Austria about now — twice as fat as usual, and four times as stupid. A picture of the new year as a naked boy; a new calendar full of women in diaphanous clothes and holding cornucopias; notable statistics: on Tuesday at 35 minutes and 16 seconds past 11 it will be exactly 9 thousand million seconds since the inventor of double entry bookkeeping went to his eternal (and well-deserved) rest — and so on.’
Dr. Jessegrim sat and went on staring at the glassy sea, shimmering so strangely in the starlight, until midnight struck.
Midnight!
He took out his watch and wound it slowly, until his fingertips felt the resistance of the winder. He pressed gently against it, and then more strongly … there, a slight click and the spring was broken. The watch stopped.
Dr. Jessegrim laughed a mocking laugh. ‘That’s how I shall twist your springs too, you …’
A frightful explosion rocked the town. It echoed from far away in the south; the old seafarers reckoned its source would be found somewhere near the great peninsula between Tampico and Vera Cruz.
Nobody had seen any signs of fire, nor was there any indication from the lighthouses.
Thunder? At this season? And under a clear sky? Impossible. Probably an earthquake therefore.
Everyone made the sign of the cross. Only the landlords of the shebeens fell to cursing, for all their customers had deserted the bars, and had run to the hills behind the town where they told each other fantastic tales of their escape.
Dr. Jessegrim took no notice: he went into his study humming a little tune: farewell, my land of Tyrol …
He was in a superb frame of mind as he fetched a map from the drawer and pricked it off with a pair of dividers, referring to his notebook and taking pleasure in the way everything fell into place. As far as Omaha, possibly even further to the north the oil-fields stretched, there couldn’t be any dispute about that any more, and he knew now that underground the oil must be present in great lakes, bigger even than Hudson Bay.
He knew it: he had worked it out, he had spent twelve whole years on the calculations.
According to his view the whole of Mexico lay across a series of caverns under the earth, which in large measure, at least in so far as they were full of petroleum, were all interconnected. His life’s work had been gradually to blast away any remaining dividing walls. For years he had employed armies of men at the work: what a mint of money that had cost!
All those millions he had made in the medical business had gone into it.
And if just once he had struck oil it would all have been in vain. The government would have stopped him blasting — they didn’t like it anyway.
Tonight was the night when the last walls were to go: those against the sea, on the peninsula, and further north near St. Louis Potosi. The explosion would be automatically controlled.
Dr. Kunibald Jessegrim pocketed his few remaining thousand dollar bills, and drove off to the station. The express to New York left at four in the morning.
What else was there left to do in Mexico?
He was right: there it was in all the papers — the verbatim telegram from along the Mexican Gulf coast, abbreviated according to the international cable code:
‘EXPLOSION CALFBRAIN BERRYMUSH’ which approximately translates as ‘Seasurface completely covered in oil; cause unknown, everything stinks. State governor.’
This interested the Yankees enormously, as the occurrence was without a doubt bound to make a great impression on the stock exchange and to push up the value of petroleum shares. And property dealing is the best part of life, after all!
The bankers of Wall Street, when questioned by the government about whether the event would cause a rise or a fall in the exchange shrugged their shoulders and declined to make a prediction before the cause of the phenomenon should be discovered; and in any case if the market reacted contrary to reason there would undoubtedly be a great deal of money to be made.
The news made no particular impression on European sentiment. In the first place they were covered by protective tariffs, and in the second place they were in the process of bringing in new laws, which involved the planned introduction of voluntary triennial numeric enforcement, together with the abolition of men’s proper names, which was intended to stimulate patriotism and encourage a better attitude towards military service.
Meanwhile the oil was busily spewing out of the subterranean Mexican Basin into the sea, just as Dr. Jessegrim had predicted, forming an opalescent layer on the surface that spread further and further, and which, carried by the Gulf Stream, soon seemed to cover the entire ocean.
The shores were devastated and populations withdrew inland. What a shame about those flourishing cities!
And the sea took on a fearfully beautiful quality: a smooth surface, extending into infinity, glinting and shimmering in all sorts of colours, red, green and violet, and then again a deep, deep black, like images from a fantastic starscape.
The oil was thicker than petroleum customarily is, and in its contact with the salt water seemed to undergo no other change than that it slowly lost its smell.
The expert opinion was that a precise investigation of the cause of this phenomenon would be of great scientific value, and since Dr. Jessegrim’s reputation (at least as a specialist in Mexican petroleum reserves) was well established, they lost no time in seeking his opinion as well.
This was brief and to the point, even if it did not deal with its subject in quite the expected way.
‘If the oil continues to flow at the present rate, the entire oceanic surface of the planet will, by my estimation, be covered in 27-29 weeks, leading to a total cessation of rainfall in the future, since there will no longer be any opportunity for evaporation. In the best case it will only rain petroleum.’
This frivolous forecast aroused violent disapprobation and yet it appeared with every succeeding day to gain in probability, and as the invisible springs showed no signs of drying up, but on the contrary seemed to be augmenting in quite extraordinary fashion, a panic terror began to overcome the whole of humanity.
Every hour brought new reports from the observatories of Europe and America — even the Prague Observatory, which had so far contented itself with taking photographs of the moon, gradually began to focus on these new and extraordinary phenomena.
In the Old World nobody was talking about the new military proposal any longer, and the author of the draft law, Major Dressel Ritter von Glubinger ab Zinkski auf Trottelgrün sank into oblivion.
As always in confused times, when the signs of disaster stand ominously in the sky, the voices of discontent, who are never satisfied with the status quo, could be heard as they dared to question hallowed institutions.
‘Down with the army, wasting our money! Waste, waste waste! Build machines, think of ways to save mankind in its desperate plight from the threat of petroleum!’
‘But that won’t do,’ warned the more circumspect. ‘You can’t simply put so many millions of people out of a job!’
‘What do you mean, out of a job? The troops only need to be paid off. Everyone of them has learned something, even if it’s only the most elementary trade,’ came back the reply.
‘Oh yes, that’s all very well for the men — but what are we to do with the officers?’
Now that was a significant argument.
For a long time arguments swayed back and forth, with no party gaining the upper hand, until the encoded message came via cable from New York: ‘HEDGEHOG POUNDWISE PERITONITIS AMERICA’, meaning: ‘Oil flow increasing, situation extremely dangerous. Wire by return whether the smell is as bad with you. Regards. America.’
That was the last straw.
A poular demagogue, a wild fanatic rose up, mighty as a rock against the breakers, hypnotic, spurring the people on to the most ill-considered actions by his oratory.
‘Away with these games! Let the soldiers go, and make the officers useful for once. Give them new uniforms if it makes them feel better — bright green with red spots, if it’s my choice. Send them down to the beaches with blotting paper to mop up the oil, while the rest of us think of a way out of this frightful mess.’
The crowds shouted assent.
The counter-suggestion that such measures could hardly have any effect, and that it would be better to use chemical means found no favour.
‘We know, we know all that,’ came the reply. ‘But what are we going to do with all those redundant officers, eh?’