The Map of the Sky (Trilogía Victoriana #2)(24)

The patient never fully regained consciousness. For four days he perspired, writhed around on the bed wracked with fever, and called loudly for Litina. On the eve of his final day on Earth, which had subjected him to so many humiliations, Symmes opened his eyes and found Reynolds, who had not strayed from his bedside for a moment. The ex–army officer managed a hoarse whisper. All my efforts have been in vain, he told Reynolds. Litina will never know I was the victim of a conspiracy, that I truly loved her and have gone on loving her ever since I fled her world. Reynolds watched him, his heart brimming with a compassion that was as remarkable as it was profound for a life that could have ended with dignity had it not been cut short by madness. Almost instinctively, he clasped the dying man’s hand and vowed to him, in that room reeking of medicines and mortality, that he would reach the center of the Earth if it was the last thing he did and pass on Symmes’s message to Litina. As a final gesture, Symmes was able to muster a smile of gratitude; moments later his eyes glazed over, and his mouth opened in a desperate attempt to breathe in air that was no longer his. Reynolds discovered that the saddest thing in the world is to see a man die wearing the forlorn expression of someone who has failed to fulfill his dreams.

Ridding himself of Symmes in this way left a bitter aftertaste, yet there was no point in tormenting himself about it for the rest of his days, as a more sensitive soul would doubtless have done. And so the explorer decided to consign it to the place in his memory where he stored all his other shameful deeds and to carry on with his plan, as if the ex–army officer’s death would have happened even without his intervention. And so, unencumbered at last, Reynolds resumed giving lectures up and down the East Coast, papering the walls with illustrations by Halley, Euler, and others, just as he had done when Symmes was still alive. Given that his private expositions appeared to have failed, out of desperation Reynolds began to charge a fifty-cent admission fee for his public talks in an attempt to drum up funds for the expedition Symmes had never made. But he soon realized the gesture was more idealistic than practical and decided it was time to set his sights higher. He went from city to city proselytizing, knocked on office doors with redoubled vigor, but received only rejections. Then it occurred to him to turn America’s inferiority complex with regard to its European fellow nations to his advantage: he attempted to sell his polar expedition as the most important patriotic exploit ever undertaken. Thanks to what he instantly considered as a well-earned stroke of luck, his strategy caught the attention of John Frampton Watson, a wealthy businessman who was willing to fulfill Reynolds’s dreams. Watson’s money attracted a host of other powerful backers, who between them formed an intricate network of interests. Overnight Reynolds found himself scrutinized from behind the scenes by an alliance of powerful forces that were poised to celebrate his success—or to pounce on him if he failed. And so, amid wild cheers, the Annawan set sail from New York Harbor in search of the polar entrance to the inner Earth, while the press hailed the dream that had poisoned Symmes’s life as the Great American Expedition.

? ? ?

AND YET, HERE THEY were now in a place that did not seem to belong to the world, where the crowds’ wild cheers no longer rang out, surrounded by a silence akin to oblivion. And as if that were not enough, something completely unexpected had happened, the consequences of which Reynolds was still unable to fathom. They had arrived in the Antarctic with the aim of finding the passage to the center of the Earth and had instead chanced upon a monster from the stars. Although at that moment fear blurred everything, Reynolds could not help beginning to play with the not entirely implausible idea that this accidental discovery might also crown him with glory and bury him under a pile of money. Did not the majority of important discoveries happen by chance? Did Columbus not stumble upon the New World when he was searching for a sea route to the East Indies? Indeed, the fate of great men seemed to be ordained by forces as powerful as they were mysterious. All of this could not be mere coincidence, he told himself. He was destined for glory, to go down in History, and he was determined to succeed come what may.

Reynolds tried to stay calm. Now more than ever he needed to study every possibility open to him. This much was obvious: if they managed to capture the demon and take him back to New York, it would cause a stir the like of which had never been seen before. The implications for humanity of the existence of other beings in outer space were incalculable. If the creature and its machine really came from there, as Peters claimed, they gave Man the opportunity to reconsider his place in nature and might even change his idea about the meaning of life. Like it or not, Man, that arrogant ruler of the universe, would have to acknowledge that Earth was just another planet in the vast firmament. In short, he would be forced to realize how terribly insignificant he was. Unquestionably, the monster from the stars would be an earth-shattering discovery, although, of course, they had to capture him first. But was that possible? All of a sudden another idea occurred to Reynolds: what if the monster from the stars was not an evil being, as everyone assumed, but had traveled to Earth on a peaceful mission? Would it be possible to communicate with him? Reynolds had no idea, but perhaps he ought to try, for it would be a far greater achievement than simply taking his head back to New York. The first ever communication with intelligent life from another world! What marvels a creature like that might reveal to the human race! And how Reynolds would be remembered for centuries as the instigator of such a miracle! The explorer had to stop his imagination from running away with him. All of this remained to be seen. First they had to find a way home, for what use would there be in freezing to death with the knowledge that other worlds existed, even if they had taken tea with a creature from one of them?