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.
• • •
A ND 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 thatpossible? 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
• • •
A ND 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 thatpossible? 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
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