Aboard the Schmetterling

The launch had been Herr vonHedwig’s wedding gift to his bride, and they had had many adventures, and created many fine memories in it. When they could afford a larger ship, and had commissioned the Schöneluft, he insisted she keep it as hers alone, so if she ever decided to fly away from him, she would have the means. She laughed, and threatened to burn it on the spot. It was called the Schmetterling.

The Schmetterling was tethered to the larger ship by a thick hemp rope. Madame stood on the metal access platform, clipboard in hand.

“There you are, darling!” she said. “Here, allow me.”

Handing him the clipboard, she grasped the end of a retractable wooden gangway under the platform, ran across the rope to the launch, and fastened the gangway in place.

He crossed, chuckling. “I’ll wager you don’t let the children see you take such risks.”

“Oh, no, our children are dangerous enough without that sort of encouragement. We always wear safety harness when I’m teaching them to walk a rope.”

They climbed into the gondola, releasing the tether and gangway and securing the hatch. The interior was snug, and built for two. A curtained bed nook was built into the aft wall. Along the port side was a galley, along the starboard, lab equipment. The control panels and wheel up front were dark wood, smooth with wear. A small vase of flowers was built in to the console, between the inclinometer and the gyroscopic compass.

“Do you mind flying her, love?” Madame asked. “I’d like to keep my eye on the landscape.”

“Not at all.” He engaged the engines, which coughed a few times, then purred, and then he pulled a cord hanging from the ceiling. Three short blasts sounded, signaling their departure from the Schöneluft.

Anchoring near the folded rock formation Gerhardt had discovered, they descended by rope ladder, and explored the area on foot, taking ice samples with an auger of Herr vonHedwig’s design. As the afternoon waned they followed a crevice into the fold of the mountain. The terrain was difficult, and they were glad of their climbing poles and crampons.

Madame stopped frequently, captivated by a feature of geology or an unexpected lichen, but her husband kept one eye on the topography, and the other on the sky, tracking the position of the pale sun.

“Good Lord!” He heard her exclaim. “There’s a cave here.”

“Is it deep?”

“I can’t tell without going in. Shall we?”

“I would rather not negotiate this landscape after dark, but we have time for a look, I think.”

“That’s the spirit! I believe I put a lantern into your pack.”  The lantern she retrieved offered a pale golden light, derived from phosphorous algae – not as bright as kerosene, but long-lived, safe, and odorless. Madame grew the algae in tanks in her greenhouse.

The cave was dry, and narrow at first; they had to creep through sideways for the first forty yards. The passage widened enough for them to walk normally just in time for them to descend a rubble-strewn cascade, a most irregular stair and slope combined. As ever, when in the throws of discovery, these intrepid explorers forgot the late hour, and pressed on, wherever adventure would lead them.

This story began with On Grandmothers. The previous episode is A Research Date and the next is The Cave.