The Invention of Morel

The narrator comes face-to-face with two men and a woman. The woman, looking toward him, shudders, though she does not point him out to the men. Instead, she says, “This is not the proper time for ghost stories” (38), and they go inside the museum. Faustine and Morel walk near the narrator, who notes that they are now using the familiar form of address (“tu” rather than the formal “vous”). She mentions not going to see someone, so the narrator thinks she is talking about him. He decides not to let her see him again for four days.

On the fifth day of avoiding her, he comes upon Faustine and Morel at the rocks. They are speaking French but in a way that makes the narrator think they’re South Americans. Morel complains that Faustine no longer trusts him, and they don’t seem as warm toward each other as they were previously. The narrator realizes that they are repeating a conversation they had a week earlier, as Morel again speaks of only having three days left.

At first, the narrator thinks he has made a realization about repetitions in human behavior, but after consulting his diary, he sees that many of their movements are the same, too. He suspects they are putting on a show for him, teasing him. However, he still wants to make Faustine see that she should be with him, so he tries to insult Morel in front of her by jumping out and shouting in French. The two visitors continue on unaffected.

Later, the narrator plans to give himself up, but when he goes up the hill to the museum, no one is there. Not only does he not see the 15 people and their retinue of servants, he sees no signs that they were ever there. He posits two possibilities: One, he’s been eating different roots, and he had read that some roots can cause delirium lasting several days; two, they know he’s a fugitive and are playing a trick on him. He inspects the entire island to no avail.

Back at the museum, he discovers that he cannot turn on the lights. He speculates that the tides power the motors, and the people used up all the energy. The narrator feels depressed and contemplates suicide because Faustine is gone. First, though, he goes into the basement to try to make the machines run. After a few promising bursts, all is silent except for the storm outside. When he goes upstairs, the lights suddenly come on, and he sees two Iberian men talking about why Morel chose this island. They’re interrupted by a man announcing that dinner has been ready for an hour. Afraid, the narrator hides and wonders how the people got to the island in the storm and when they arrived, as the museum was empty just 15 minutes earlier.

He goes up to a balcony to look down on the dining room. Faustine is there, which raises the narrator’s spirits, though Morel is there, too. He eavesdrops on their conversations about random topics and learns the names of some other visitors: Alec, Dora, and Irene. After dinner, they go into an assembly hall and take up various pastimes like knitting and cards. Though the narrator worries that his enemies are all around him, he spies on Morel playing cards with Faustine, their feet close together. A servant sees the narrator, who then hurries into the room with the floor aquarium. All the same dead fish he removed after arriving on the island are now swimming around. He sees Alec, Dora, and Faustine come up the stairs and go into a room. The narrator enters a lit room across the hall, which seems to be deserted, but he can’t turn the light off. The visitors settle into their rooms and turn out the lights. Dora opens the door to the room the narrator is in, looks around, and leaves without turning out the light. The narrator decides to stay there so he can guard Faustine’s room. He has a dream that she comes to his room.

When he wakes up, the light is off. Frightened, he makes his way downstairs in the dark. He cannot open the door or the windows. Hearing footsteps, he slides into one of the giant alabaster urns to hide until morning. When he wakes, he is weak and hungry, unable even to move the curtains, and he goes to the pantry. He hears footsteps again, but he can’t open the door. There are people in the dining room, but there is also an open window, so he threads his way through them, jumps out the window, and runs down to the ravine. The day goes by and no one pursues him, and he reports in his diary that two suns and two moons are visible. The weather turned very hot when this happened, which he attributes to the second sun. He recalls that Cicero wrote about seeing two suns.

He contemplates his relationship with the intruders, putting forth five hypotheses. The first is that he has the mysterious island disease. The second is that his strange diet and the poor air quality have rendered him invisible; however, he discards this theory because he’s not invisible to insects and animals. The third is that the visitors are from another planet where ears and eyes are not used for hearing and seeing. However, they speak French, so he’s skeptical of that theory. The fourth theory comes from a dream he had in which his family took him to an asylum where Morel was the director, though sometimes the island was the asylum, and sometimes he was the director; thus, the theory is that the island is an asylum and the people its residents. The fifth hypothesis is that he has stumbled upon the ghosts of a group of friends.

Then, he thinks that he is the dead one. He reflects on his childhood in Caracas and his escape from the police. Twice he nearly died—once when in a boardinghouse and once on the boat trip to the island. He thinks he may have lost consciousness before he arrived. He figures that he could eliminate the intruders and live again, but then he decides to seduce Faustine instead.

One day, a freighter arrives and the captain gets off to talk to the people. Morel pulls him aside to ask whether he secured things from Rabaul. The narrator realizes that the people will probably be departing on the ship, which leaves him three choices: abduct Faustine, which would make the people send out a search party; go aboard the ship himself, though he would easily be found; or let her leave. Before he can decide, Morel and some men go into the museum, followed by the captain and the women. He’s confused about what they plan to do, expecting that they will prepare for departure. He is even more confused when he sees Faustine and some others go swimming. The men exercise as if trying to warm themselves, though it is hot outside. The water in the pool is disgusting, filled with algae, dead birds, and live snakes, but they swim anyway.