Around the World in 80 Days

Chapter IX

IN WHICH THE RED SEA AND THE IN­DI­AN OCEAN PROVE PRO­PI­TIOUS TO THE DE­SIGNS OF PHILEAS FOGG

The dis­tance be­tween Suez and Aden is pre­cise­ly thir­teen hun­dred and ten miles, and the reg­ula­tions of the com­pa­ny al­low the steam­ers one hun­dred and thir­ty-​eight hours in which to tra­verse it. The Mon­go­lia, thanks to the vig­or­ous ex­er­tions of the en­gi­neer, seemed like­ly, so rapid was her speed, to reach her des­ti­na­tion con­sid­er­ably with­in that time. The greater part of the pas­sen­gers from Brin­disi were bound for In­dia some for Bom­bay, oth­ers for Cal­cut­ta by way of Bom­bay, the near­est route thith­er, now that a rail­way cross­es the In­di­an penin­su­la. Among the pas­sen­gers was a num­ber of of­fi­cials and mil­itary of­fi­cers of var­ious grades, the lat­ter be­ing ei­ther at­tached to the reg­ular British forces or com­mand­ing the Se­poy troops, and re­ceiv­ing high salaries ev­er since the cen­tral gov­ern­ment has as­sumed the pow­ers of the East In­dia Com­pa­ny: for the sub-​lieu­tenants get 280 pounds, brigadiers, 2,400 pounds, and gen­er­als of di­vi­sions, 4,000 pounds. What with the mil­itary men, a num­ber of rich young En­glish­men on their trav­els, and the hos­pitable ef­forts of the purs­er, the time passed quick­ly on the Mon­go­lia. The best of fare was spread up­on the cab­in ta­bles at break­fast, lunch, din­ner, and the eight o'clock sup­per, and the ladies scrupu­lous­ly changed their toi­lets twice a day; and the hours were whirled away, when the sea was tran­quil, with mu­sic, danc­ing, and games.

But the Red Sea is full of caprice, and of­ten bois­ter­ous, like most long and nar­row gulfs. When the wind came from the African or Asian coast the Mon­go­lia, with her long hull, rolled fear­ful­ly. Then the ladies speed­ily dis­ap­peared be­low; the pi­anos were silent; singing and danc­ing sud­den­ly ceased. Yet the good ship ploughed straight on, un­re­tard­ed by wind or wave, to­wards the straits of Bab-​el-​Man­deb. What was Phileas Fogg do­ing all this time? It might be thought that, in his anx­iety, he would be con­stant­ly watch­ing the changes of the wind, the dis­or­der­ly rag­ing of the bil­lows--ev­ery chance, in short, which might force the Mon­go­lia to slack­en her speed, and thus in­ter­rupt his jour­ney. But, if he thought of these pos­si­bil­ities, he did not be­tray the fact by any out­ward sign.

Al­ways the same im­pas­si­ble mem­ber of the Re­form Club, whom no in­ci­dent could sur­prise, as un­vary­ing as the ship's chronome­ters, and sel­dom hav­ing the cu­rios­ity even to go up­on the deck, he passed through the mem­orable scenes of the Red Sea with cold in­dif­fer­ence; did not care to recog­nise the his­toric towns and vil­lages which, along its bor­ders, raised their pic­turesque out­lines against the sky; and be­trayed no fear of the dan­gers of the Ara­bic Gulf, which the old his­to­ri­ans al­ways spoke of with hor­ror, and up­on which the an­cient nav­iga­tors nev­er ven­tured with­out pro­pi­ti­at­ing the gods by am­ple sac­ri­fices. How did this ec­cen­tric per­son­age pass his time on the Mon­go­lia? He made his four hearty meals ev­ery day, re­gard­less of the most per­sis­tent rolling and pitch­ing on the part of the steam­er; and he played whist in­de­fati­ga­bly, for he had found part­ners as en­thu­si­as­tic in the game as him­self. A tax-​col­lec­tor, on the way to his post at Goa; the Rev. Dec­imus Smith, re­turn­ing to his parish at Bom­bay; and a brigadier-​gen­er­al of the En­glish army, who was about to re­join his brigade at Benares, made up the par­ty, and, with Mr. Fogg, played whist by the hour to­geth­er in ab­sorb­ing si­lence.

As for Passep­artout, he, too, had es­caped sea-​sick­ness, and took his meals con­sci­en­tious­ly in the for­ward cab­in. He rather en­joyed the voy­age, for he was well fed and well lodged, took a great in­ter­est in the scenes through which they were pass­ing, and con­soled him­self with the delu­sion that his mas­ter's whim would end at Bom­bay. He was pleased, on the day af­ter leav­ing Suez, to find on deck the oblig­ing per­son with whom he had walked and chat­ted on the quays.

“If I am not mis­tak­en,” said he, ap­proach­ing this per­son, with his most ami­able smile, “you are the gen­tle­man who so kind­ly vol­un­teered to guide me at Suez?”

“Ah! I quite recog­nise you. You are the ser­vant of the strange En­glish­man--”

“Just so, mon­sieur--”

“Fix.”

“Mon­sieur Fix,” re­sumed Passep­artout, “I'm charmed to find you on board. Where are you bound?”

“Like you, to Bom­bay.”

“That's cap­ital! Have you made this trip be­fore?”

“Sev­er­al times. I am one of the agents of the Penin­su­lar Com­pa­ny.”

“Then you know In­dia?”

“Why yes,” replied Fix, who spoke cau­tious­ly.

“A cu­ri­ous place, this In­dia?”

“Oh, very cu­ri­ous. Mosques, minarets, tem­ples, fakirs, pago­das, tigers, snakes, ele­phants! I hope you will have am­ple time to see the sights.”

“I hope so, Mon­sieur Fix. You see, a man of sound sense ought not to spend his life jump­ing from a steam­er up­on a rail­way train, and from a rail­way train up­on a steam­er again, pre­tend­ing to make the tour of the world in eighty days! No; all these gym­nas­tics, you may be sure, will cease at Bom­bay.”

“And Mr. Fogg is get­ting on well?” asked Fix, in the most nat­ural tone in the world.

“Quite well, and I too. I eat like a fam­ished ogre; it's the sea air.”

“But I nev­er see your mas­ter on deck.”

“Nev­er; he hasn't the least cu­rios­ity.”

“Do you know, Mr. Passep­artout, that this pre­tend­ed tour in eighty days may con­ceal some se­cret er­rand--per­haps a diplo­mat­ic mis­sion?”

“Faith, Mon­sieur Fix, I as­sure you I know noth­ing about it, nor would I give half a crown to find out.”

Af­ter this meet­ing, Passep­artout and Fix got in­to the habit of chat­ting to­geth­er, the lat­ter mak­ing it a point to gain the wor­thy man's con­fi­dence. He fre­quent­ly of­fered him a glass of whiskey or pale ale in the steam­er bar-​room, which Passep­artout nev­er failed to ac­cept with grace­ful alacrity, men­tal­ly pro­nounc­ing Fix the best of good fel­lows.

Mean­while the Mon­go­lia was push­ing for­ward rapid­ly; on the 13th, Mocha, sur­round­ed by its ru­ined walls where­on date-​trees were grow­ing, was sight­ed, and on the moun­tains be­yond were es­pied vast cof­fee-​fields. Passep­artout was rav­ished to be­hold this cel­ebrat­ed place, and thought that, with its cir­cu­lar walls and dis­man­tled fort, it looked like an im­mense cof­fee-​cup and saucer. The fol­low­ing night they passed through the Strait of Bab-​el-​Man­deb, which means in Ara­bic The Bridge of Tears, and the next day they put in at Steam­er Point, north-​west of Aden har­bour, to take in coal. This mat­ter of fu­elling steam­ers is a se­ri­ous one at such dis­tances from the coal-​mines; it costs the Penin­su­lar Com­pa­ny some eight hun­dred thou­sand pounds a year. In these dis­tant seas, coal is worth three or four pounds ster­ling a ton.

The Mon­go­lia had still six­teen hun­dred and fifty miles to tra­verse be­fore reach­ing Bom­bay, and was obliged to re­main four hours at Steam­er Point to coal up. But this de­lay, as it was fore­seen, did not af­fect Phileas Fogg's pro­gramme; be­sides, the Mon­go­lia, in­stead of reach­ing Aden on the morn­ing of the 15th, when she was due, ar­rived there on the evening of the 14th, a gain of fif­teen hours.

Mr. Fogg and his ser­vant went ashore at Aden to have the pass­port again visaed; Fix, un­ob­served, fol­lowed them. The visa pro­cured, Mr. Fogg re­turned on board to re­sume his for­mer habits; while Passep­artout, ac­cord­ing to cus­tom, saun­tered about among the mixed pop­ula­tion of So­ma­lis, Banyans, Parsees, Jews, Arabs, and Eu­ro­peans who com­prise the twen­ty-​five thou­sand in­hab­itants of Aden. He gazed with won­der up­on the for­ti­fi­ca­tions which make this place the Gibral­tar of the In­di­an Ocean, and the vast cis­terns where the En­glish en­gi­neers were still at work, two thou­sand years af­ter the en­gi­neers of Solomon.

“Very cu­ri­ous, very cu­ri­ous,” said Passep­artout to him­self, on re­turn­ing to the steam­er. “I see that it is by no means use­less to trav­el, if a man wants to see some­thing new.” At six p.m. the Mon­go­lia slow­ly moved out of the road­stead, and was soon once more on the In­di­an Ocean. She had a hun­dred and six­ty-​eight hours in which to reach Bom­bay, and the sea was favourable, the wind be­ing in the north-​west, and all sails aid­ing the en­gine. The steam­er rolled but lit­tle, the ladies, in fresh toi­lets, reap­peared on deck, and the singing and danc­ing were re­sumed. The trip was be­ing ac­com­plished most suc­cess­ful­ly, and Passep­artout was en­chant­ed with the con­ge­nial com­pan­ion which chance had se­cured him in the per­son of the de­light­ful Fix. On Sun­day, Oc­to­ber 20th, to­wards noon, they came in sight of the In­di­an coast: two hours lat­er the pi­lot came on board. A range of hills lay against the sky in the hori­zon, and soon the rows of palms which adorn Bom­bay came dis­tinct­ly in­to view. The steam­er en­tered the road formed by the is­lands in the bay, and at half-​past four she hauled up at the quays of Bom­bay.

Phileas Fogg was in the act of fin­ish­ing the thir­ty-​third rub­ber of the voy­age, and his part­ner and him­self hav­ing, by a bold stroke, cap­tured all thir­teen of the tricks, con­clud­ed this fine cam­paign with a bril­liant vic­to­ry.

The Mon­go­lia was due at Bom­bay on the 22nd; she ar­rived on the 20th. This was a gain to Phileas Fogg of two days since his de­par­ture from Lon­don, and he calm­ly en­tered the fact in the itinerary, in the col­umn of gains.