Captain Nemo_ The Fantastic History of a Dark Genius - Kevin J Anderson [97]
Fergusson loaded both of his rifles then looked in dismay at the pachyderms. He didn’t shoot because he had no way to retrieve his prize. But then, as the anchor dragged through the herd, its hooks snagged on something. With a lurch, the balloon jerked to a halt.
“Ah, we’re caught,” Fergusson said. “Now we can --”
The balloon began to move again, tugged along as if by a locomotive. Hearing a loud bellow, Nemo looked over the basket to find that the hook had caught on the curved tusk of a huge bull elephant. Tangled, the beast trumpeted with its long trunk and thrashed its head from side to side, which only set the sharp grappling hook tighter.
Furious, the elephant charged across the plain, dragging the Victoria along. Thinking of practical matters, Caroline secured the loose equipment to the wicker walls of the basket. Normally, the breezes gave them a gentle ride, but now the three were yanked about as the maddened creature stampeded, first in one direction, then the other.
Within moments, Dr. Fergusson regained his senses enough to pick up his first rifle. He leaned over the basket, pointed the barrel at the elephant below, and let loose a shot. Against the thick hide, however, the bullet did little damage other than spurring the elephant to a greater frenzy. As the beast ran, the balloon bobbed along behind it like a fish on the end of a hook.
Fergusson shot his second rifle, saw that the bullet struck the elephant squarely in the back of the head. He reloaded and fired again and again, until at last the animal slowed to a plod, bleeding from numerous wounds. With a great wheeze of pain and exhaustion, it dropped in its tracks.
Nemo and Caroline were both sad for the magnificent creature, but Fergusson saw it as no more than another set of descriptions to be entered into his logbook. They winched the balloon closer to the ground, and the doctor leaped over the side without even bothering to use the ladder. Enormous vultures and ravens circled around, waiting for the feast.
Nemo and Fergusson spent an hour poking and prodding the carcass, measuring, estimating weight, making notes. Then they stored both of the elephant’s tusks, each worth a fortune in ivory, inside the balloon’s basket.
From her lookout above, Caroline sketched the scene and added more poignancy to the dramatic flight of the elephant than pure scientific analysis required.
iii
In misery, Jules Verne sat alone in a bistro by the river Seine. The waiter served him a bottle of cheap wine, strong cheese, bread, and poached fish with a mushroom cream sauce. At any other time, he would have savored every morsel; now, though, the future loomed like a yawning chasm, and made him lose his appetite.
The bistro owner presumed the red-bearded student was celebrating his graduation, though Verne’s lack of enthusiasm suggested otherwise. “No, Monsieur,” he answered the grinning man’s question. “This is most definitely not the happiest day of my life.”
At the Paris Academy, Verne had reviewed every legal detail he’d learned in the past several years. The dry words crawled across the pages like listless insects, and he stared until his eyes burned and his head ached. He remained uninterested in the law -- but he didn’t dare face the consequences of letting his father down. . . .
When he received his grade and discovered that his score was sufficient for a diploma (by a scant few points in his favor), Verne realized that he no longer had any escape. His dismal future had been set. Not as a literary genius, not a world-explorer, not a brave adventurer . . . but a small-town lawyer.
As he watched a pleasure boat go by on the Seine, he took a forkful of fish and chewed. Now that he was certified as a practicing attorney, his father would expect him to settle down in Nantes and, over time, take over the family trade. Proud of