Sixteen
“Time for your Sunday lessons, lad,” Captain Grant said, interrupting Nemo from another afternoon of swabbing the sun-washed deck. Naturally, the young man didn’t complain.
At sea, the ship was its own country. On board, the captain became peacemaker and disciplinarian, judge and jury, physician, expert seaman, businessman, and any other role he chose. For an eager pupil like Nemo, Captain Grant had become a teacher as well.
Inside his spacious, specimen-crowded quarters, the captain hauled out his favorite volumes—the notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci, filled with drawings and musings and ideas. “Leonardo lived three and a half centuries ago, yet verily his inventions remain marvelous today.” Captain Grant stared at the pages with wistful eyes. “I purchased these copies in Milan—crude reproductions of the originals, but the magic remains.”
With a long finger, he pointed to sketches of contraptions that looked impossible, yet intriguing. “Leonardo lived in troubled times, lad, when Italian city-states waged war against each other. Because he believed knowledge must be based on observation, he drew studies of anatomy, plants, architecture. He developed theories of mechanics and mathematics, and applied them to engineering.”
Nemo could not decipher the writing on the pages in front of him. “I don’t speak Italian, sir.” He had been learning passable English aboard the ship, but had not yet managed any other languages.
Captain Grant chuckled. “’Twould be of no help to you, lad. Leonardo was left handed, so he taught himself to write backward. One must hold the letters in a reflecting glass to understand.” He turned a ragged page. “Feast your eyes on the drawings alone and allow your imagination to translate.”
An architectural plan of a cathedral, the cross-section of a human skull, designs for strange weapons … Nemo pored over plans showing a gigantic crossbow, a chariot with revolving scythe blades to mow down infantrymen like weeds, and a four-wheeled car armored with wooden planking. The brilliant inventor had also drawn designs for flying craft, huge mechanical flapping wings, a flying screw, and a broad kite large enough to let a man soar on the winds like a falcon.
Most intriguing to Nemo, though, was a small boat designed to travel underwater, keeping a man safe and protected. “Are these ideas possible, sir? Or just fanciful visions from an impractical man?”
Captain Grant looked at the cabin boy, bemused, then closed the book. He replaced it in a revered place on his shelf. “Anything is possible, lad—given enough imagination, some engineering knowledge, and a lot of persistence.”