Around the World in Eighty Days
Phileas Fogg and his servant seated themselves in a first-class
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,
snugly ensconced in his corner, did not open his lips. Passepartout,
not yet recovered from his stupefaction, clung mechanically to the
carpet-bag, with its enormous treasure.
Just as the train was whirling through Sydenham, Passepartout 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 V.
IN WHICH A NEW SPECIES OF FUNDS, UNKNOWN TO THE MONEYED MEN, APPEARS ON
’CHANGE
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 travelling. 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 passionate 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 classes
of readers. At first some rash individuals, principally of the gentler
sex, espoused his cause, which became still more popular when the
_Illustrated 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
pass.”
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 travellers, 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 travelling 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 class 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 ’Change; “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 nobody would
take less than twenty, fifty, a hundred!
Lord Albemarle, an elderly paralytic gentleman, was now the only
advocate of Phileas Fogg left. This noble lord, who was fastened 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 dispatch 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 dispatch 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 at 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 VI.
IN WHICH FIX, THE DETECTIVE, BETRAYS A VERY NATURAL IMPATIENCE
The circumstances under which this telegraphic dispatch 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 horse-power, was due at eleven o’clock a.m. on Wednesday,
the 9th of October, at Suez. The “Mongolia” plied regularly between
Brindisi and Bombay _viâ_ the Suez Canal, 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 unfavourable predictions of
Stephenson, was in the habit of seeing, from his office window, English
ships daily passing to and fro on the great canal, by which the old
roundabout route from England to India by the Cape of Good Hope was
abridged by at least a half. The other was a small, slight-built
personage, 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 dispatched from England in search of the
bank robber; it was his task to narrowly watch every passenger 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,” asked he for the twentieth time, “that this
steamer is never behind time?”
“No, Mr. Fix,” replied the consul. “She was bespoken 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 Saturday 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 recognise your man, even if he is on board the
‘Mongolia.’”
“A man rather feels the presence of these fellows, consul, than
recognises them. You must have a scent for them, and a scent is like a
sixth sense which combines hearing, seeing, and smelling. I’ve arrested
more than one of these gentlemen in my time, and, if my thief is on
board, I’ll answer for it; he’ll not slip through my fingers.”
“I hope so, Mr. Fix, for it was a heavy robbery.”
“A magnificent robbery, consul; fifty-five thousand pounds! We don’t
often have such windfalls. Burglars are getting to be so contemptible
nowadays! A fellow gets hung for a handful of shillings!”
“Mr. Fix,” said the consul, “I like your way of talking, and hope
you’ll succeed; but I fear you will find it far from easy. Don’t you
see, the description which you have there has a singular resemblance to
an honest man?”
“Consul,” remarked the detective, dogmatically, “great robbers always
resemble honest folks. Fellows who have rascally faces have only one
course to take, and that is to remain honest; otherwise they would be
arrested off-hand. The artistic thing is, to unmask honest
countenances; it’s no light task, I admit, but a real art.”
Mr. Fix evidently was not wanting in a tinge of self-conceit.
Little by little the scene on the quay became more animated; sailors of
various nations, merchants, ship-brokers, porters, fellahs, bustled to
and fro as if the steamer were immediately expected. The weather was
clear, and slightly chilly. The minarets of the town loomed above the
houses in the pale rays of the sun. A jetty pier, some two thousand
yards along, extended into the roadstead. A number of fishing-smacks
and coasting boats, some retaining the fantastic fashion of ancient
galleys, were discernible on the Red Sea.
As he passed among the busy crowd, Fix, according to habit, scrutinised
the passers-by with a keen, rapid glance.
It was now half-past ten.
“The steamer doesn’t come!” he exclaimed, as the port clock struck.
“She can’t be far off now,” returned his companion.
“How long will she stop at Suez?”
“Four hours; long enough to get in her coal. It is thirteen hundred and
ten miles from Suez to Aden, at the other end of the Red Sea, and she
has to take in a fresh coal supply.”
“And does she go from Suez directly to Bombay?”
“Without putting in anywhere.”
“Good!” said Fix. “If the robber is on board he will no doubt get off
at Suez, so as to reach the Dutch or French colonies in Asia by some
other route. He ought to know that he would not be safe an hour in
India, which is English soil.”
“Unless,” objected the consul, “he is exceptionally shrewd. An English