Around the World in Eighty Days Part 3

"You have forgotten nothing?" he asked.

"Nothing, monsieur."

"My mackintosh and cloak?"

"Here they are.

"Good! Take this carpetbag," handing it to Pa.s.separtout. "Take good care of it, for there are twenty thousand pounds in it."

Pa.s.separtout nearly dropped the bag, as if the twenty thousand pounds were in gold, and weighed him down.

Master and man then descended, the street door was double-locked, and at the end of Saville Row they took a cab and drove rapidly to Charing Cross. The cab stopped before the railway station at twenty minutes past eight. Pa.s.separtout jumped off the box and followed his master, who, after paying the cabman, was about to enter the station, when a poor beggar woman, with a child in her arms, approached him. Her naked feet were smeared with mud, her head covered with a wretched bonnet, from which hung a tattered feather, and her shoulders shrouded in a ragged shawl. She mournfully asked for alms.

Mr. Fogg took out the twenty guineas he had just won at whist, and handed them to the beggar, saying, "Here, my good woman. I'm glad that I met you"; and pa.s.sed on.

Pa.s.separtout had a moist sensation about the eyes. His master's action touched his susceptible heart.

Two first-cla.s.s tickets for Paris having been speedily purchased, Mr. Fogg was Crossing the station to the train, when he perceived his five friends of the Reform Club.

"Well, gentlemen," he said, "I'm off, you see; and, if you will examine my pa.s.sport when I get back, you will be able to judge whether I have accomplished the journey agreed upon."

"Oh, that would be quite unnecessary, Mr. Fogg," said Ralph politely. "We will trust your word, as a gentleman of honor."

"You do not forget when you are due in London again?" asked Stuart. "In eighty days. On Sat.u.r.day, the 21st of December, 1872, at a quarter before nine P.M. Good-by, gentlemen."

Phileas Fogg and his servant seated themselves in a first-cla.s.s carriage at twenty minutes before nine. Five minutes later the whistle screamed, and the train slowly glided out of the station.

The night was dark, and a fine, steady rain was falling. Phileas Fogg, leaning back in his corner, did not open his lips.

Pa.s.separtout, not yet recovered from his stupefaction, clung mechanically to the carpetbag, with its enormous treasure.

Just as the train was whirling through Sydenham, Pa.s.separtout suddenly uttered a cry of despair.

"What's the matter?" asked Mr. Fogg.

"Alas! In my hurry--I--I forgot-"

"What?"

"To turn off the gas in my room!"

"Very well, young man," returned Mr. Fogg, coolly, "it will burn--at your expense."

Chapter 5

In Which a New Security Appears on the London Exchange

Phileas Fogg rightly suspected that his departure from London would create a lively sensation at the West End. The news of the bet spread through the Reform Club, and afforded an exciting topic of conversation to its members. From the club it soon got into the papers throughout England. The boasted "tour of the world" was talked about, disputed, argued with as much warmth as if the subject were another Alabama claim. Some took sides with Phileas Fogg, but the large majority shook their heads and declared against him. It was absurd, impossible, they declared, that the tour of the world could be made, except theoretically and on paper, in this minimum of time, and with the existing means of traveling. The Times, Standard, Morning Post and Daily News, and twenty other highly respectable newspapers scouted Mr.

Fogg's project as madness. The Daily Telegraph alone hesitatingly supported him. People in general thought him a lunatic, and blamed his Reform Club friends for having accepted a wager which betrayed the mental aberration of its proposer.

Articles no less pa.s.sionate than logical appeared on the question, for geography is one of the pet subjects of the English; and the columns devoted to Phileas Fogg's venture were eagerly devoured by all cla.s.ses of readers. At first some rash individuals, princ.i.p.ally of the gentler s.e.x, espoused his cause, which became still more popular when the Ill.u.s.trated London News came out with his portrait, copied from a photograph in the Reform Club. A few readers of the Daily Telegraph even dared to say, "Why not, after all? Stranger things have come to pa.s.s."

At last a long article appeared, on the 7th of October, in the bulletin of the Royal Geographical Society, which treated the question from every point of view, and demonstrated the utter folly of the enterprise.

Everything, it said, was against the travelers, every obstacle imposed alike by man and by nature. A miraculous agreement of the times of departure and arrival, which was impossible, was absolutely necessary to his success. He might, perhaps, reckon on the arrival of trains at the designated hours, in Europe, where the distances were relatively moderate; but when he calculated upon crossing India in three days, and the United States in seven, could he rely beyond misgiving upon accomplishing his task? There were accidents to machinery, the liability of trains to run off the line, collisions, bad weather, the blocking up by snow--were not all these against Phileas Fogg? Would he not find himself, when traveling by steamer in winter, at the mercy of the winds and fogs? Is it uncommon for the best ocean steamers to be two or three days behind time? But a single delay would suffice to fatally break the chain of communication. Should Phileas Fogg once miss, even by an hour, a steamer, he would have to wait for the next, and that would irrevocably render his attempt vain.

This article made a great deal of noise, and, being copied into all the papers, seriously depressed the advocates of the rash tourist.

Everybody knows that England is the world of betting men, who are of a higher cla.s.s than mere gamblers. To bet is in the English temperament. Not only the members of the Reform, but the general public, made heavy wagers for or against Phileas Fogg, who was set down in the betting books as if he were a race horse. Bonds were issued, and made their appearance on the Exchange. "Phileas Fogg bonds" were offered at par or at a premium, and a great business was done in them. But five days after the article in the bulletin of the Geographical Society appeared, the demand began to subside. "Phileas Fogg" declined. They were offered by packages, at first of five, then of ten, until at last n.o.body would take less than twenty, fifty, a hundred!

Lord Albemarle, an elderly paralytic gentleman, was now the only advocate of Phileas Fogg left. This n.o.ble lord, who was confined to his chair, would have given his fortune to be able to make the tour of the world, if it took ten years; and he bet five thousand pounds on Phileas Fogg. When the folly as well as the uselessness of the adventure was pointed out to him, he contented himself with replying, "If the thing is feasible, the first to do it ought to be an Englishman."

The Fogg party dwindled more and more. Everybody was going against him, and the bets stood a hundred and fifty and two hundred to one; and a week after his departure an incident occurred which deprived him of backers at any price.

The commissioner of police was sitting in his office at nine o'clock one evening, when the following telegraphic despatch was put into his hands:

Suez to London

ROWAN, COMMISSIONER OF POLICE, SCOTLAND YARD:

I've found the bank robber, Phileas Fogg. Send without delay warrant of arrest to Bombay. FIX, Detective

The effect of this despatch was instantaneous. The polished gentleman disappeared to give place to the bank robber. His photograph, which was hung with those of the rest of the members of the Reform Club, was minutely examined, and it betrayed, feature by feature, the description of the robber which had been provided to the police. The mysterious habits of Phileas Fogg were recalled; his solitary ways, his sudden departure; and it seemed clear that, in undertaking a tour round the world on the pretext of a wager, he had had no other end in view than to elude the detectives, and throw them off his track.

Chapter 6

In Which Fix, the Detective, Betrays a Very Natural Impatience

The circ.u.mstances under which this telegraphic despatch about Phileas Fogg was sent were as follows:

The steamer Mongolia, belonging to the Peninsular and Oriental Company, built of iron, of two thousand eight hundred tons burden, and five hundred horsepower, was due at eleven o'clock A.M. on Wednesday, the 9th of October, at Suez. The Mongolia plied regularly between Brindisi and Bombay via the Suez Ca.n.a.l, and was one of the fastest steamers belonging to the company, always making more than ten knots an hour between Brindisi and Suez, and nine and a half between Suez and Bombay.

Two men were promenading up and down the wharves, among the crowd of natives and strangers who were sojourning at this once straggling village--now, thanks to the enterprise of M.

Lesseps, a fast-growing town. One was the British consul at Suez, who, despite the prophecies of the English Government, and the unfavorable predictions of Stephenson, was in the habit of seeing, from his office window, English ships daily pa.s.sing to and fro on the great ca.n.a.l, by which the old roundabout route from England to India by the Cape of Good Hope was cut by at least a half. The other was a small, slight-built person, with a nervous, intelligent face, and bright eyes peering out from under eyebrows which he was incessantly twitching. He was just now manifesting unmistakable signs of impatience, nervously pacing up and down, and unable to stand still for a moment. This was Fix, one of the detectives who had been despatched from England in search of the bank robber. It was his task to narrowly watch every pa.s.senger who arrived at Suez, and to follow up all who seemed to be suspicious characters, or bore a resemblance to the description of the criminal, which he had received two days before from the police headquarters at London. The detective was evidently inspired by the hope of obtaining the splendid reward which would be the prize of success, and awaited with a feverish impatience, easy to understand, the arrival of the steamer Mongolia.

"So you say, consul," he asked for the twentieth time, "that this steamer is never behind time?"

"No, Mr. Fix," replied the consul. "She was signaled yesterday at Port Said, and the rest of the way is of no account to such a craft. I repeat that the Mongolia has been in advance of the time required by the company's regulations, and gained the prize awarded for excess of speed."

"Does she come directly from Brindisi?"

"Directly from Brindisi. She takes on the Indian mails there, and she left there Sat.u.r.day at five P.M. Have patience, Mr. Fix. She will not be late. But really, I don't see how, from the description you have, you will be able to recognize your man, even if he is on board the Mongolia."