"But how were
you able to build this wonderful Nautilus in secret?"
"Each part of
it, Professor Aronnax, came from a different spot on the globe and reached me
at a cover address. Its keel was forged
by Creusot in France,
its propeller shaft by Pen & Co. in London, the sheet-iron plates for its hull by Laird's in
Liverpool, its propeller by Scott's in Glasgow.”
Jules Verne - 20,000 Leagues Under The Sea
The following letter is taken
from the Hobson memorial collection, and is reprinted in this abridged form
with the kind permission of the New
York Historical Society.
July 1863
Dear Sirs
Here as requested are my most
recent findings relating to the redoubtable Captain Nemo, as he seems now to be
known. I am saddened to report that as we had suspected, Nemo is constructing a
formidable weapon of some sort. One can only presume that his sole aim is to
spread chaos throughout the further reaches of the Empire.
Myself and Wilson followed Nemo
to Scotland, where, after an extended stay in Glasgow – a most filthy
metropolis – he travelled west, following the course of the mighty Clyde down
to the towns of Greenock and Port Glasgow. The Clyde
is a dampened warren of shipyards, and Nemo seemed to have business at each and
every one of them. It was late upon the 23rd before he finally took
lodgings at Greenock. Wilson and I retired to
a nearby hostelry and thereafter took it in shifts throughout the night to
watch for any sign of his leaving – there was none.
The following day, Wilson resolved to make
enquiries around the dockyards and coffee houses, while I myself once more
followed Nemo.
On this day – 24th May
– the Captain travelled down to Gourock – a small coastal resort. I must confess after the gloom of preceding
weeks, I found this trip a not unpleasant diversion. The town is littered with
tearooms and bric-a-brac shops where one may purchase picture postcards of
“Sunny Gourock” or tobacco tins varnished with similar questionable legends. A
croquet lawn was sliding slowly into disrepair near the seafront, but I spied a
number of bowling greens up upon the hill. What business you ask, could a man
such as Nemo possibly have amidst such Imperial pursuits?
I watched him meet a gentleman in
one of the smaller tearooms; at the moment of their meeting Nemo gave the man a
small parcel which was most gratefully received. Throughout their conversation,
Nemo did not eat and drank only boiled water while the other gentleman consumed
almost an entire sweet trolley. I struggled to hear them over the constant chatter
of what seemed to be an annual woman’s guild outing for tea.
I heard Nemo cursing the East
India Company – which trades and employs locally – and some more of the
anti-imperial ranting we have come to expect from him. I also heard the other
man mention something about land in Ireland. One phrase however, stood
out “Watt’s discoveries”. Previous intelligence has suggested that Watt’s
engine experiments at Wheal Crane were at least partially infiltrated by a
Frenchman lately of Nemo’s acquaintance. This was all some years ago of course,
but at the time there was certainly some feeling within the growing scientific
community that Watt was withholding certain of his discoveries for reasons
unknown. Could Nemo have uncovered Watt’s secrets?
Nemo thanked the gentleman, took
possession of a small envelope and left without once glancing in my direction.
The gentleman then took his leave and was most enthusiastically waved off by
the ladies present. From their conversation upon his departure I would take him
to be a local dignatory of questionable repute. Common company then for a man
such as Nemo.
Wilson’s findings, while more definitive than
my own, scarcely seem credible. He had travelled first to Port Glasgow and
spoke there with two men currently engaged in a “special commission” at the
East Yard. The shipbuilding industry is very strong here, owing to the
reputation of Clydeside workmanship, there are at any one time scores of
commissions underway across the yards, of which there are more than half a
dozen. Sometimes it is not whole ships or vessels which are under construction,
but parts to be transported to other yards in Liverpool, Hull
or London. It
is such a commission in which these men are involved. You may recall that prior
to our own investigations, Nemo was also sighted at Saint Nazaire in France. Here
too, a number of “special commissions” were being financed. The yards at Saint
Nazaire were in fact developed and financed by Scott’s, and have direct links
with several of the Clydeside shipyards. It could be that Nemo is using both
yards in the construction of his weapon.
What is unusual about this
particular arrangement is that the work is being undertaken in seclusion using
certain materials and minerals which the men – not short on experience – have
never before seen. Only those workers engaged in the commission are allowed on
site and they are not permitted to discuss it with their peers. No one, save Mr
Reid himself is aware of the customer. Most are of the opinion that they are
working on a secret weapon to be used against the Kaiser. I am not sure where
this fanciful rumour originates, but it was certainly not well received by some
nearby German workers also enjoying refreshments. Wilson was forced to buy everyone a drink in
order to calm the waters a little.
However, no amount of drink nor
bribery could convince these men to describe the object in question. By its
very lack of definition it seemed to me all the more worrying. I resolved
therefore that Wilson and I should make a visit to the yard at a less reasonable
hour.
It was Wilson’s
conversations in Greenock which truly stretch
credulity. He found his way into the company of a number of seamen recently
returned from a whaling expedition. As is natural on such occasions, the
conversation turned to tall tales and fish stories. Wilson having travelled so extensively and
being such a consummate liar can easily hold his own in such situations. The Captain told a rather typical story of
buried treasure. What was most interesting about this tale however, was that it
concerned a pirate born here in the town of Greenock. You may be aware of the hubbub at
the turn of the last century at the trial of one William Kidd, a privateer who
protested that he had been raiding French ships on the orders of the crown. Naturally
the man was hanged for his crimes. The inevitable romance of such notoriety led
to any number of claims and counter claims regarding the location of Kidd’s
ill-gotten gains. A dozen treasure maps emerged for every island in the South
Seas and after the inevitable failure of some high profile expeditions, Kidd’s
gold was consigned to legend; precisely the sort of tale exchanged by ships
Captains.
This particular Captain’s claims
were predictably extraordinary. It seems that the first mate on his last voyage
had previously served with a crew who had recovered most of Kidd’s treasure.
They doubtless would have recovered the entire booty were it not for a portion
of the map being missing. The mate was
convinced that the remainder of the loot was on the same island, but refused to
return it for fear of a recent spate of “supernatural goings on”. The skies
above the island glowed green, lightning flashed from the ground up towards the
clouds, ships instruments would lose north and mens hair would literally stand
on end. Apparently the waters around the island were also populated with
glowing sea serpents. Canny Captains and superstitious sea-dogs alike stayed
well clear of this mysterious island.
A typical convenience then,
buried treasure hidden on an island no one will explore. What interested Wilson
most, was the Captain’s claim that Kidd’s treasure map had been passed by the
man himself to a friend in New York and thence to Ireland, before finally
turning up in the town of Greenock. Here, apparently, it still resides.
All this would have sounded like
so much stuff and nonsense were it not for one crucial detail; Wilson had been able to locate a local family
claiming ancestry from Kidd. Half of this family had recently emigrated to Ireland, the rest remaining in Greenock.
Wilson spoke to
the head of this family later in the day. Peterson worked in one of the Greenock yards. As soon as Wilson began to question him about Kidd, he
became most angry and distressed. It seems that an heirloom relating to the blaggard
Kidd had recently been stolen from Peterson’s house along with a number of
other small items of personal worth. Wilson
singularly failed to convince Peterson he was not involved in the theft and
thus was unable to ascertain what exactly had been stolen.
I thought of the little envelope
I had seen given to Nemo. Was this a missing fragment of the map? Was Nemo
financing his experiments with pirate gold? Or, was I witness to nothing more
unusual than the bribing of a local official?
Wilson was adamant that there was at least
some truth in the tale he had been told. We could not ignore the possibility
that Nemo had found Kidd’s gold. Moreover, it does not seem unreasonable to
suppose, that the island which was once home to Kidd’s buried treasure, now played
host to Nemo’s mysterious experiments – for his scientific dabblings could
surely account for the strange elemental forces observed around the island.
As evening fell, we made our way
towards Port Glasgow. Wilson
had chartered a small boat to meet us by the dockside for our return journey.
We weaved our way through the clutter of yards towards a large workshed at the
centre of the East Yard. Wilson and I were both armed, feeling sure that the
workshop would be guarded. And yet the entire yard was deserted. Still, we saw
no reason to draw attention to ourselves and so we carefully crept into the
shed. And there, bold as brass, was the man himself.
“Good evening gentlemen” said
Nemo “I’ve been wondering how long it would be before you formally introduced
yourselves to me.”
I made some feeble protest about
not knowing what he was talking about, but the Captain dismissed me out of
hand.
“Nonsense,” he said “you’ve been
following me for weeks. I was almost inclined to ask you to join me for tea
this morning.”
His arrogance was indirect enough
to be misconstrued as charm, and though he smiled Wilson and I were under no
illusions, our lives were in most severe peril.
“I suppose you’d like to know
what’s under this tarpaulin,” he gestured.
I saw little point in pretending
any further, I simply hoped he would as ever feel the need to explain himself
and his grandiose schemes. I was not disappointed.
“Very well!”
He drew back the tarpaulin in
typically melodramatic fashion. Beneath, was a vast gleaming propellor. I have
never in my life seen a craft so large as to require such propulsion.
“Magnificent is it not!” beamed
Nemo “Truly the most remarkable ever built!”
Naturally, I asked him what it
was for.
“Why a boat of course,” he smiled
“Whatever else could it be for? A marvellous airship?
The cooling mechanism of an
enormous cannon perhaps? No, the truth is far more straightforward. And far
more spectacular.”
At this point, two of Nemo’s
nefarious thugs emerged from the shadows behind us.
“Now gentlemen. You’ve seen quite
enough for one evening I think.”
I protested and found myself
instantly on the receiving end of a cudgel.
As Wilson lunged towards Nemo, a shot rang out
and I recall no more.
I awoke in one of the dockside
taverns having been roused with a most severe whisky. I had been found in the
yards bleeding profusely from a wound at the back of my head. After a short
spell in hospital, I returned to the yard in Port Glasgow to try and uncover
the truth of what had happened. Needless to say, Nemo’s Propellor had gone,
three gentlemen having transported it to an unregistered steamer the day
previously. I took the commissioning and payment records for the piece and have
enclosed them with this letter for your further investigation. I would be
surprised if they lead us any closer to Nemo, indeed the yard owner Mr Reid
felt sure the commissioner was a Mr Ratcliffe. It was some days later before Wilson’s body washed up
on shore.
In all honesty, I do not know
whether he wished us to see and hear all that we supposed we had discovered,
whether every story, every movement was engineered by Nemo simply to confuse
and obfuscate. Or, amidst all the subterfuge was there sown some grain of
truth? His work is done. I am confused. But I fear we will not have long to
wait before the Captain makes his move.
I have decided to stay for a
short time in the little resort of Gourock before venturing back down to the
ministry. If required, I may be contacted at the above address if any further
clarification of my story is required. I trust too that Wilson’s widow will be most generously
rewarded for the bravery of her husband.
