After leaving Passepartout alone with his new duties, Phileas Fogg arrived at the Reform Club, extremely punctual as usual, and spent a very pleasant day absorbed in reading various newspapers. No one disturbed him until teatime, when the club became crowded with other members, with whom Fogg usually played cards.
Among them was the director of the Bank of England, who was greeted by a question from one of the card players:
“So Andrew, what’s this robbery business all about?”
“A really serious problem it is, my friend,” the gentleman replied with a sigh. “The bank is going to lose a lot of money. They stole 55,000 pounds!”
All the others murmured when they heard how much had been taken from the bank safes. “Goodness gracious, what a sum of money! Do you at least know who the thief was? What will you do to catch him?”
“Some of the best police inspectors in England have been sent to the most important ports in America and Europe. We’ll get him. But he’s no common thief, that’s for sure.”
“What do you mean by that?” another club member asked with curiosity.
“The robbery was the work of a gentleman!”
This statement caused such a commotion that it annoyed Mr. Fogg, who lifted his eyes from the newspaper. “The newspaper says that the gentleman was spotted in the bank lobby,” he commented, folding the newspaper and going to sit at the card table.
“Whether he’s a gentleman or not, I’m certain he will be caught soon; where do you think he could hide after such a sensational robbery?” the bank director said.
“After all, the world is so big!”
“It was once, but not any more,” Phileas Fogg uttered in a low voice, while dealing the cards.
“What do you mean by that, sir? That the world has perhaps become smaller?”
“Absolutely not. But nowadays one can travel much more quickly,” the bank director stated with conviction.
“After all, now we can go around the world in three months…”
“In only eighty days,” Phileas Fogg interrupted him calmly.
“Eighty days! Well certainly, if you don’t take into account bad weather, train accidents and…”
“Everything included”, Fogg insisted, again quite calmly.
“You seem very sure of yourself, Mr. Fogg, but I think you would change your mind if you were to make that journey.
I would even bet on it!”
In the meantime, unaware of this alarming development, Phileas Fogg was seated at the desk in his cabin, writing the date and hour of departure from Egypt in his journal. His notes showed that up to then they had been traveling 158 hours and half, which amounts to 6 days and half, right on schedule. The Mongolia proceeded at full steam, which led Fogg to believe they would actually reach their destination ten hours ahead of time.
The train ride from Bombay to Calcutta was very long but also interesting, thanks to the tales told by General Cromarty, who had been living in India for decades.
The train departed right on schedule. Passepartout sat beside Mr. Fogg and fell asleep, his bare feet wrapped in a blanket, while his master was engaged in a conversation with General Francis Cromarty, who was seated opposite him. The general had listened with interest to Fogg’s description of the bet he had made and came to the conclusion that this was an absolutely impossible and absurd adventure.
“Mind you, a few years ago at this point you would have been way behind your planned schedule, because the railway was not finished.”
Passepartout woke up just in time to hear these last words and become alarmed:
“Not finished? Is that possible?”
“Don’t worry, my friend, the last stretch was completed a few weeks ago,” the general replied with a smile. But Passepartout was worried, no doubt about it. He had begun to think that they could win the bet and now the possibility of a delay distressed him. He kept on glancing at his large silver watch without paying attention to the advice of the general, who had explained to him that he should change the time at every change of meridian and should bear in mind that while moving eastward the days became four minutes shorter for every degree traveled. The young servant, who barely understood this complicated reasoning, decided to continue to stick to London time. After all, what harm could come from allowing himself a little bit of homesickness?
The amount of money the judge asked for Passepartout’s release was outrageous, but the bail allowed the English gentleman to board the steamship for Hong Kong that very day. He was followed by Passepartout, who was mortified and kept his head lowered, Aouda, who was filled with admiration and, once again, Fix. Indeed, it had been the police inspector’s idea to tell the authorities in Calcutta about Passepartout’s behavior. He then arrived at the capital before the others, who were caught up in freeing Aouda, so he had all the time he needed to obtain the warrant for the servant’s arrest. But his plan failed and he was forced to continue following the person he believed was the Bank of England thief.
“I’ll follow him to the end of the world if I have to,” he said while boarding the steamer.
The Rangoon (this was the name of the ship) was expected to arrive at Hong Kong in eleven days. During this long voyage young Aouda was able to become better acquainted with Phileas Fogg, as she spent most of the day talking and walking with him on the deck. Passepartout on the other hand often remained in the cabin to write his diary. He did not want to forget even one detail of that incredible journey and so he described every adventure very meticulously. When he finally decided to walk on the deck he was approached by Fix, who pretended he had met him by chance.
“Is that really you? You too on the Rangoon?”, he exclaimed, pretending surprise.
From that day on the detective, with one excuse or another, did not lose sight of the servant.
On it was written the following: A GREAT SPECTACLE!
BEFORE THEIR DEPARTURE TO THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, WE PRESENT THE LAST SHOWS OF THE FAMOUS ACROBATS, THE LONG NOSES
“The United States,” Passepartout thought, “that’s just what the doctor ordered!” So he decided in an instant: he would make use of the acrobatic exercises he had learned when young in order to become part of the Long Noses show and would go with them to America! The director of the acrobats’ troupe was only too happy to hire him when Passepartout assured him that he could sing while standing on his head, with a top spinning on his left foot and a saber balanced on his right one!
The next day at a quarter past eleven the train arrived at New York railway station and the party rushed to the harbor, only to find out that the steamer they were to take to Liverpool, the China, had left forty-five minutes earlier. Passepartout thought that Phileas Fogg’s last hope had boarded that ship. None of the ships in the harbor seemed to be suitable for the gentleman’s purposes except, perhaps, the Henrietta, a merchant vessel whose smokestack was already puffing out clouds of steam. Fogg went on board and asked to speak to the skipper, a cantankerous sea wolf who certainly did not appear to be very sociable. He said the Henrietta was about to depart but for no
reason in the world would he change the destination.
“Not even if I offered 2,000 dollars per passenger?”
Captain Speedy scratched his head in disbelief. That was really a lot of money! “Oh, all right, for that amount I’ll take you to Bordeaux, in France,” he finally said. “We’re setting off at nine. You’d better be on board because I won’t wait for you.”
An hour later, as the captain had said, the Henrietta headed into the open sea.
The following day a man went up to the bridge, took the helm and began to steer the ship. One would think it was Speedy, but it wasn’t. It was Phileas Fogg.
It was almost a quarter to nine.
In the club library the members had been waiting anxiously for hours to see how the bet would turn out. At 8:25 someone said:
“If Fogg had arrived here in London with the last train he would already be here. He has lost his bet.”
“Not at all,” replied the oldest member. “Let’s wait until 8:45.”
The grandfather clock struck the seconds with regularity and all the club members could hear the strokes echoing in the absolute silence that now dominated the hall. At the 40th second before 8:45 there was still no trace of Phileas Fogg, nor was there at the 50th! When the clock struck the 58th the door opened, Phileas Fogg entered the hall and with a calm voice said simply: “Here I am, gentlemen!” He had gone around the world in eighty days! He had won!
However, that evening it was not the satisfaction of having won his bet, or even the 20,000 pounds, that filled Fogg’s mind and heart, but rather the certainty that his future wife Aouda would make him the happiest man in the world.
