Читать книгу The Begum's Millions - Jules Verne - Страница 14

3 A News Item

Arriving at the fourth meeting of the Association of Hygiene Conference, Dr. Sarrasin could see that all his colleagues greeted him with utmost respect. Until then, Lord Glandover, Knight of the Garter, who held the office of president of the association, had scarcely deigned to notice the French doctor’s existence.

This lord was an august personage,¹ whose role was limited to declaring the meeting open or closed and to mechanically grant the floor to the speakers listed on the paper placed before him. He kept his right hand habitually in the breast of his buttoned frock coat — not because he had fallen from his horse — but just because this uncomfortable posture was used by English sculptors in their bronzes of men of state.

His wan and beardless face, daubed with red spots, and topped with a brownish green wig raised pretentiously in a cowlick over a forehead that appeared hollow, seemed as comically aloof and ludicrously stiff as one could possibly imagine. Lord Glandover moved as one piece, as though he were made of wood or cardboard. Even his eyes did not seem to roll beneath their arched sockets, except by intermittent jerks, such as the eyes of a doll or a dummy.

During the initial presentations, the president of the Association of Hygiene had offered Dr. Sarrasin a greeting that was both protective and condescending and which could have been interpreted this way:

“Greetings, Mister Nobody! … You’re the one who labors on these little insignificant machines to earn a meager life? … I must surely have sharp vision to perceive a creature so distant from me in the hierarchy of human beings! … You may remain in the shadow of My Lordship. You have my permission.”

This time, Lord Glandover addressed him with the most gracious of smiles and pushed his courtesy so far as to point out an empty seat on his right. Moreover, all members of the association had risen when he approached.

Rather surprised by these tokens of such flattering attention, and saying to himself that no doubt the blood-cell counter had appeared to his colleagues a more worthy discovery than they had at first supposed, Dr. Sarrasin took the seat that was offered him.

But all his illusions as an inventor vanished when Lord Glandover leaned down toward his ear with such a contortion of cervical vertebrae as might result in a severe torticollis for His Lordship and whispered:

“I hear that you are a man of considerable property? They say that you are worth twenty-one million pounds sterling?”

Lord Glandover seemed very sorry at having treated so lightly the flesh-and-bone equivalent of such a large sum of money. His whole attitude seemed to reflect, “Why didn’t you let us know? Frankly, that was not very nice! To expose people to such misunderstandings!”

Dr. Sarrasin, who did not feel “worth” one penny more than at the preceding sessions, wondered how the news had already been spread when his neighbor on the right, Dr. Ovidius from Berlin, told him with a false and lifeless smile:

“Why you’re right up there with the Rothschilds! The Daily Telegraph carried the news! All my compliments!”

And he showed him a copy of the paper, dated the very same day. One could read in it the following “news item” whose editing plainly revealed the author:

“A Monstrous Inheritance. The famed estate in abeyance of the Begum Gokool has finally discovered its legitimate heir through the capable hands of Messrs. Billows, Green and Sharp, solicitors, 93 Southampton Row, London. The fortunate proprietor of the twenty-one million pounds sterling, deposited at present in the Bank of England, is the French Dr. Sarrasin, whose fine paper given at the Conference in Brighton was reported in our pages three days ago. Through great labor and despite impediments that would merit an entire novel in themselves, Mr. Sharp has managed to establish without any possible doubt that Dr. Sarrasin is the sole living descendant of Jean-Jacques Langévol, baronet, husband by second marriage to the Begum Gokool. This soldier of fortune was, it seems, born in the little French town of Bar-le-Duc. All that remains for him to do before taking possession of the estate are some simple formalities. The request has already been lodged with the Chancellor’s Court. It has been a curious chain of circumstances that have come together to bestow on a French intellectual not only a British title but also the treasures amassed by a long list of Indian rajahs. Lady luck could not have made a more intelligent choice, and we must be thankful that such a large fortune should fall into hands that will know how to put it to good use.”

In a rather singular reaction, Dr. Sarrasin was vexed to see the news publicized. It was not simply because of the many importunities which his experience with human nature led him to foresee, but he felt humbled by the importance people seemed to be attributing to this event. He seemed to have been diminished personally by the enormous size of his capital. He felt deeply that all his work, his personal merit, were being buried in this ocean of gold and silver, even in the eyes of his colleagues. They no longer saw in him the tireless researcher, the superior and subtle intelligence, the ingenious inventor — they saw the demi-billionaire. Had he been a goitrous inhabitant of the Alps, a besotted Hottentot,² any one of the most degraded specimens of humanity, instead of one of its superior representatives, his value would have been considered to be the same. Lord Glandover had used the word: he was “worth” henceforth twenty-one million pounds sterling, neither more nor less.

This concept sickened him, and the association, watching with a quite scientific curiosity about what made up a demi-billionaire, noted not without surprise that the doctor’s face was veiled in a sort of sadness.

However, it was but a passing weakness. The grandeur of the goal to which he had resolved to dedicate this unexpected fortune suddenly came to the doctor’s mind, and it reassured him. He awaited the end of the lecture which Dr. Stevenson from Glasgow was giving on the Education of young idiots, and requested the floor to make an announcement to the gathering.

Lord Glandover granted it to him immediately, by preference over Dr. Ovidius. He would have granted it to him even if all the intellectuals of Europe had protested as one against this favor! And here are the eloquent words that he addressed to the president and the members:

“Gentlemen,” said Dr. Sarrasin, “I was planning to wait a few more days before informing you of the unusual good fortune that has befallen me, and the happy consequences that this event could have for science. But, the fact having now become public, it would be unseemly for me to not place it immediately in its proper light. Yes, gentlemen, it is true that a considerable sum of several hundred million, at present deposited in the Bank of England, seems to have become my legal property. Do I need to tell you that I do not consider myself, in these circumstances, other than a trustee of science? (Profound reaction.) It is not to me that this capital lawfully belongs, it is to Humanity, it is to Progress! (Various movements. Exclamations. Unanimous applause. The whole association rises, electrified by that declaration.) Please, don’t applaud, gentlemen. I do not know a single man of science, truly worthy of the name, who would not have done in my place what I hope to do. There may be some who think that, as in many human actions, I do this more out of self-pride than devotion to the cause. (No! No!) It matters little! Let’s just consider the results. I make this declaration, then, definitively and without reserve: the half-billion that chance has placed at my disposal, does not belong to me, but to Science! Do you wish to be the governing body who oversees its expenditure? I do not have sufficient confidence in my own wisdom to claim that I should dispose of it as an absolute master. You are my judges, and you are the ones who will decide on how we can best use this treasure!” (Hurrahs. Great excitement. General delirium.)

The association rises to its feet.³ A few members, in their exultation, stand on tables. Professor Turnbull, from Glasgow, seems on the verge of apoplexy. Dr. Cicogna, from Naples, has lost his breath. Lord Glandover alone keeps the worthy and serene calm which is appropriate for his rank. He is perfectly convinced, moreover, that Dr. Sarrasin is joking, and has not the slightest intention of carrying out such an extravagant project.

“If I may, however,” continued the speaker, when he had obtained a bit of silence, “if I may suggest a plan that would be easy to develop and to perfect, I propose the following.”

Here, the assembly, having recovered its composure, listens with rapt attention.

“Gentlemen, among the many causes of sickness, suffering, and death which surround us, there is one in particular to which I believe it quite reasonable to attach a major importance: it is the deplorable hygienic conditions in which most humans are placed. They mass together in cities, in buildings often deprived of air and light, those two indispensable agents of life. Such human agglomerations become veritable centers of infection. Those who do not meet death here find that their health is seriously affected; their productive strength diminishes, and society thus loses great sources of labor which could be applied to the most useful ends. Why, gentlemen, shouldn’t we try to remedy this situation with the most powerful means of persuasion … by example? Why shouldn’t we gather together all the power of our imagination to design the plan of a model city along rigorously scientific principles? … (Yes! yes! that’s true!) Why shouldn’t we then devote the capital that we have to building that city and presenting it to the world as a practical illustration of what all cities ought to be?” (Yes! yes! — thunderous applause.)

The members of the association, in an ecstasy of contagious enthusiasm, shake each other’s hands, crowd around Dr. Sarrasin, raise him up, carry him in triumph about the room.

“Gentlemen,” continued the doctor when he had succeeded in returning to his place, “we will invite all the people of the world to this city which each of us can already visualize in our imagination, which may be a reality in a few months, this city of health and well-being; we will share its layout and the details of its design in all languages; we will invite to live there all honest families whom poverty and lack of employment might have driven from overpopulated lands. Also those — you will not be surprised at my thinking of them during these times — who have been forced into cruel exile due to foreign conquest will find a good use for their skills with us and an application for their intelligence, while bringing us a moral richness that would be a thousandfold more precious than gold and diamond mines. We will have large schools for our youth, who will be raised according to wise principles capable of developing all their faculties, moral, physical, and intellectual, thus preparing healthy generations for the future!”

It is impossible to describe the enthusiastic tumult which followed this talk. The applause, the hurrays, the “hip! hips!” continued for more than a quarter of an hour.

Dr. Sarrasin had barely managed to sit back down when Lord Glandover leaned over him again and murmured into his ear, with a wink.

“Sounds like a fine investment! You’re no doubt counting on the revenue from the rents and town taxes, right? It’s a sure thing provided it is well launched and sponsored by some well-known names! Why, all the convalescents and invalids will wish to live there at once! I hope you’ll hold a nice lot in reserve for me, won’t you?”

The poor doctor, annoyed by this stubborn insistence on giving a covetous motive to all his actions, was going to reply to His Lordship when he heard the vice president call for a vote of thanks by acclamation for the author of this philanthropic proposal which had just been submitted to the assembly.

“It would be,” he said, “the eternal honor of the Brighton Conference that such a sublime idea had been born here — an idea that required no less to conceive it than the highest intelligence joined to the greatest heart and to an unprecedented generosity. And yet, now that the idea has been suggested, it seems astounding that it has never before been put into practice! How many billions have been spent on insane wars,⁴ how much capital dissipated in ridiculous speculations that could have been consecrated to such an attempt!”

In conclusion, the speaker proposed that, in just homage to its founder, the city should be named “Sarrasina.”

His motion was approved by acclamation, but a second vote was necessary at the request of Dr. Sarrasin himself.

“No,” he said, “my name has no relevance here. Let us be careful not to deck out the future city with any of these appellations which, under pretext of deriving from Greek or Latin, bestow a pedantic effect to the thing or person who bears it. It shall be the City of Well-Being,⁵ but I ask that its name be that of my country, and that we call it France-Ville!”

They could not refuse the doctor the satisfaction that he was due.

France-Ville was henceforth founded, at least in words; and soon — thanks to the minutes of the meeting which were to close the sessions — it would exist on paper as well. They passed immediately to a discussion of the project’s general articles.

But we will now leave the association with this practical business, so different from the usual concerns reserved for these meetings, in order to follow, step by step, the fate of the aforementioned article published in the Daily Telegraph along one of its innumerable itineraries.

From the evening of the 29th of October, this notice, textually reproduced by the English journals, began to circulate through all the districts of the United Kingdom. It appeared especially in the Hull Gazette, at the top of page two in a copy of that modest journal that the Queen Mary, a three-masted ship loaded with coal, brought on November 1st to Rotterdam.

Immediately clipped out by the diligent scissors of the editor-in-chief and sole secretary of the Netherlands’ Echo and translated into the language of Cuyp and Potter, the article arrived on November 2nd on the wings of steam to the Bremen Chronicle. There, with no change in content, it was given new garb, and it was not long before it was published in German. One must wonder why the Teutonic journalist, after having written at the top of the translation: Eine übergrosse Erbschaft (A Colossal Inheritance), had no qualms about resorting to a shabby subterfuge which took advantage of the credulity of his readers by adding in parentheses: “From our Special Correspondent in Brighton”?

Whatever the case, becoming thus Germanized by right of annexation, the anecdote reached the editor’s desk of the imposing North Gazette, who gave it a place in the second column of page three but suppressed the title, which seemed too charlatan-like for such a serious person.

On the evening of November 3rd, after having passed through these successive transformations, it finally entered into the thick hands of a hefty Saxon manservant in the office–living room–dining room of Professor Schultze of the University of Iéna.⁶

As highly ranked as was such a fellow in the hierarchy of beings, he did not seem like very much at first glance. He was a fairly tall man of forty-five or forty-six years; his squared shoulders indicated a robust constitution; his forehead was bare, and the little hair he had kept on the back of his head and temples resembled light flax. His eyes were blue, that vague blue that never betrays one’s thoughts. No gleam escaped from them, and yet they made you feel uncomfortable as soon as they fastened upon you. Professor Schultze’s mouth was big, equipped with a double row of formidable teeth which never lose their prey, enclosed between thin lips whose principal purpose seemed to be counting the words that passed through them. His appearance was obviously disturbing and off-putting for others, a state of affairs which visibly satisfied the professor.

At the noise that his servant made, he raised his eyes to the fireplace, looked for the time of day on a lovely Barbedienne clock, singularly out of place in the midst of the common furnishings that surrounded it, and he said in a voice that was more stiff than stuffy:

“6:55! My mail arrives at 6:30, at the latest. Today you’re twenty-five minutes late bringing it up. The next time that it is not on my table at 6:30, you will leave my service at 8:00.”

“Does Monsieur wish to dine now?” asked the servant before withdrawing.

“It’s 6:55, and I dine at 7:00. You’ve known that for the three weeks that you have been in my employment. Keep in mind that I do not change my schedule, and never repeat an order.”⁷

The professor set his newspaper on the edge of the table and continued working on an article that was to appear two days later in the periodical Annalen für Physiologie (Annals for Physiology). There would be no indiscretion in revealing that this article had for its title:

Why Are All Frenchmen Stricken in Different Degrees with Hereditary Degeneration?⁸

While the professor pursued his task, the dinner composed of a large plate of sausages and sauerkraut, flanked by a gigantic stein of beer, had been discreetly served on a round table by the corner of the fireplace. The professor set down his pen to eat his supper, which he savored more than one might expect of a man so serious.⁹ Then he rang for his coffee, lit a great porcelain pipe, and returned to his work.

It was near midnight when the professor signed the last sheet, and immediately passed into his bedroom to take a well-deserved rest. It was not until he was in bed that he finally opened his newspaper and began to read it before going to sleep. At that very moment when sleep seemed near, the attention of the professor was attracted by a foreign name, that of Langévol, in the article relating to a colossal inheritance. He sought to recall what memory this name might evoke in him, but he failed. After a few minutes given over to this vain research, he tossed the newspaper aside, blew out his candle, and was soon producing a sonorous snoring.

By some physiological phenomenon that he himself had studied and explained with great results, however, this name of Langévol pursued Professor Schultze well into his dreams. So much so that, waking up the next morning, he was surprised to find himself mechanically repeating it.