Around the World in 80 Days

Chapter XXVIII

IN WHICH PASSEP­ARTOUT DOES NOT SUC­CEED IN MAK­ING ANY­BODY LIS­TEN TO REA­SON

The train, on leav­ing Great Salt Lake at Og­den, passed north­ward for an hour as far as We­ber Riv­er, hav­ing com­plet­ed near­ly nine hun­dred miles from San Fran­cis­co. From this point it took an east­er­ly di­rec­tion to­wards the jagged Wah­satch Moun­tains. It was in the sec­tion in­clud­ed be­tween this range and the Rocky Moun­tains that the Amer­ican en­gi­neers found the most formidable dif­fi­cul­ties in lay­ing the road, and that the gov­ern­ment grant­ed a sub­sidy of forty-​eight thou­sand dol­lars per mile, in­stead of six­teen thou­sand al­lowed for the work done on the plains. But the en­gi­neers, in­stead of vi­olat­ing na­ture, avoid­ed its dif­fi­cul­ties by wind­ing around, in­stead of pen­etrat­ing the rocks. One tun­nel on­ly, four­teen thou­sand feet in length, was pierced in or­der to ar­rive at the great basin.

The track up to this time had reached its high­est el­eva­tion at the Great Salt Lake. From this point it de­scribed a long curve, de­scend­ing to­wards Bit­ter Creek Val­ley, to rise again to the di­vid­ing ridge of the wa­ters be­tween the At­lantic and the Pa­cif­ic. There were many creeks in this moun­tain­ous re­gion, and it was nec­es­sary to cross Mud­dy Creek, Green Creek, and oth­ers, up­on cul­verts.

Passep­artout grew more and more im­pa­tient as they went on, while Fix longed to get out of this dif­fi­cult re­gion, and was more anx­ious than Phileas Fogg him­self to be be­yond the dan­ger of de­lays and ac­ci­dents, and set foot on En­glish soil.

At ten o'clock at night the train stopped at Fort Bridger sta­tion, and twen­ty min­utes lat­er en­tered Wyoming Ter­ri­to­ry, fol­low­ing the val­ley of Bit­ter Creek through­out. The next day, 7th De­cem­ber, they stopped for a quar­ter of an hour at Green Riv­er sta­tion. Snow had fall­en abun­dant­ly dur­ing the night, but, be­ing mixed with rain, it had half melt­ed, and did not in­ter­rupt their progress. The bad weath­er, how­ev­er, an­noyed Passep­artout; for the ac­cu­mu­la­tion of snow, by block­ing the wheels of the cars, would cer­tain­ly have been fa­tal to Mr. Fogg's tour.

“What an idea!” he said to him­self. “Why did my mas­ter make this jour­ney in win­ter? Couldn't he have wait­ed for the good sea­son to in­crease his chances?”

While the wor­thy French­man was ab­sorbed in the state of the sky and the de­pres­sion of the tem­per­ature, Aou­da was ex­pe­ri­enc­ing fears from a to­tal­ly dif­fer­ent cause.

Sev­er­al pas­sen­gers had got off at Green Riv­er, and were walk­ing up and down the plat­forms; and among these Aou­da recog­nised Colonel Stamp Proc­tor, the same who had so gross­ly in­sult­ed Phileas Fogg at the San Fran­cis­co meet­ing. Not wish­ing to be recog­nised, the young wom­an drew back from the win­dow, feel­ing much alarm at her dis­cov­ery. She was at­tached to the man who, how­ev­er cold­ly, gave her dai­ly ev­idences of the most ab­so­lute de­vo­tion. She did not com­pre­hend, per­haps, the depth of the sen­ti­ment with which her pro­tec­tor in­spired her, which she called grat­itude, but which, though she was un­con­scious of it, was re­al­ly more than that. Her heart sank with­in her when she recog­nised the man whom Mr. Fogg de­sired, soon­er or lat­er, to call to ac­count for his con­duct. Chance alone, it was clear, had brought Colonel Proc­tor on this train; but there he was, and it was nec­es­sary, at all haz­ards, that Phileas Fogg should not per­ceive his ad­ver­sary.

Aou­da seized a mo­ment when Mr. Fogg was asleep to tell Fix and Passep­artout whom she had seen.

“That Proc­tor on this train!” cried Fix. “Well, re­as­sure your­self, madam; be­fore he set­tles with Mr. Fogg; he has got to deal with me! It seems to me that I was the more in­sult­ed of the two.”

“And, be­sides,” added Passep­artout, “I'll take charge of him, colonel as he is.”

“Mr. Fix,” re­sumed Aou­da, “Mr. Fogg will al­low no one to avenge him. He said that he would come back to Amer­ica to find this man. Should he per­ceive Colonel Proc­tor, we could not pre­vent a col­li­sion which might have ter­ri­ble re­sults. He must not see him.”

“You are right, madam,” replied Fix; “a meet­ing be­tween them might ru­in all. Whether he were vic­to­ri­ous or beat­en, Mr. Fogg would be de­layed, and--”

“And,” added Passep­artout, “that would play the game of the gen­tle­men of the Re­form Club. In four days we shall be in New York. Well, if my mas­ter does not leave this car dur­ing those four days, we may hope that chance will not bring him face to face with this con­found­ed Amer­ican. We must, if pos­si­ble, pre­vent his stir­ring out of it.”

The con­ver­sa­tion dropped. Mr. Fogg had just woke up, and was look­ing out of the win­dow. Soon af­ter Passep­artout, with­out be­ing heard by his mas­ter or Aou­da, whis­pered to the de­tec­tive, “Would you re­al­ly fight for him?”

“I would do any­thing,” replied Fix, in a tone which be­trayed de­ter­mined will, “to get him back liv­ing to Eu­rope!”

Passep­artout felt some­thing like a shud­der shoot through his frame, but his con­fi­dence in his mas­ter re­mained un­bro­ken.

Was there any means of de­tain­ing Mr. Fogg in the car, to avoid a meet­ing be­tween him and the colonel? It ought not to be a dif­fi­cult task, since that gen­tle­man was nat­ural­ly seden­tary and lit­tle cu­ri­ous. The de­tec­tive, at least, seemed to have found a way; for, af­ter a few mo­ments, he said to Mr. Fogg, “These are long and slow hours, sir, that we are pass­ing on the rail­way.”

“Yes,” replied Mr. Fogg; “but they pass.”

“You were in the habit of play­ing whist,” re­sumed Fix, “on the steam­ers.”

“Yes; but it would be dif­fi­cult to do so here. I have nei­ther cards nor part­ners.”

“Oh, but we can eas­ily buy some cards, for they are sold on all the Amer­ican trains. And as for part­ners, if madam plays--”

“Cer­tain­ly, sir,” Aou­da quick­ly replied; “I un­der­stand whist. It is part of an En­glish ed­uca­tion.”

“I my­self have some pre­ten­sions to play­ing a good game. Well, here are three of us, and a dum­my--”

“As you please, sir,” replied Phileas Fogg, hearti­ly glad to re­sume his favourite pas­time even on the rail­way.

Passep­artout was dis­patched in search of the stew­ard, and soon re­turned with two packs of cards, some pins, coun­ters, and a shelf cov­ered with cloth.

The game com­menced. Aou­da un­der­stood whist suf­fi­cient­ly well, and even re­ceived some com­pli­ments on her play­ing from Mr. Fogg. As for the de­tec­tive, he was sim­ply an adept, and wor­thy of be­ing matched against his present op­po­nent.

“Now,” thought Passep­artout, “we've got him. He won't budge.”

At eleven in the morn­ing the train had reached the di­vid­ing ridge of the wa­ters at Bridger Pass, sev­en thou­sand five hun­dred and twen­ty-​four feet above the lev­el of the sea, one of the high­est points at­tained by the track in cross­ing the Rocky Moun­tains. Af­ter go­ing about two hun­dred miles, the trav­ellers at last found them­selves on one of those vast plains which ex­tend to the At­lantic, and which na­ture has made so pro­pi­tious for lay­ing the iron road.

On the de­cliv­ity of the At­lantic basin the first streams, branch­es of the North Plat­te Riv­er, al­ready ap­peared. The whole north­ern and east­ern hori­zon was bound­ed by the im­mense se­mi-​cir­cu­lar cur­tain which is formed by the south­ern por­tion of the Rocky Moun­tains, the high­est be­ing Laramie Peak. Be­tween this and the rail­way ex­tend­ed vast plains, plen­ti­ful­ly ir­ri­gat­ed. On the right rose the low­er spurs of the moun­tain­ous mass which ex­tends south­ward to the sources of the Arkansas Riv­er, one of the great trib­utaries of the Mis­souri.

At half-​past twelve the trav­ellers caught sight for an in­stant of Fort Hal­leck, which com­mands that sec­tion; and in a few more hours the Rocky Moun­tains were crossed. There was rea­son to hope, then, that no ac­ci­dent would mark the jour­ney through this dif­fi­cult coun­try. The snow had ceased falling, and the air be­came crisp and cold. Large birds, fright­ened by the lo­co­mo­tive, rose and flew off in the dis­tance. No wild beast ap­peared on the plain. It was a desert in its vast naked­ness.

Af­ter a com­fort­able break­fast, served in the car, Mr. Fogg and his part­ners had just re­sumed whist, when a vi­olent whistling was heard, and the train stopped. Passep­artout put his head out of the door, but saw noth­ing to cause the de­lay; no sta­tion was in view.

Aou­da and Fix feared that Mr. Fogg might take it in­to his head to get out; but that gen­tle­man con­tent­ed him­self with say­ing to his ser­vant, “See what is the mat­ter.”

Passep­artout rushed out of the car. Thir­ty or forty pas­sen­gers had al­ready de­scend­ed, amongst them Colonel Stamp Proc­tor.

The train had stopped be­fore a red sig­nal which blocked the way. The en­gi­neer and con­duc­tor were talk­ing ex­cit­ed­ly with a sig­nal-​man, whom the sta­tion-​mas­ter at Medicine Bow, the next stop­ping place, had sent on be­fore. The pas­sen­gers drew around and took part in the dis­cus­sion, in which Colonel Proc­tor, with his in­so­lent man­ner, was con­spic­uous.

Passep­artout, join­ing the group, heard the sig­nal-​man say, “No! you can't pass. The bridge at Medicine Bow is shaky, and would not bear the weight of the train.”

This was a sus­pen­sion-​bridge thrown over some rapids, about a mile from the place where they now were. Ac­cord­ing to the sig­nal-​man, it was in a ru­inous con­di­tion, sev­er­al of the iron wires be­ing bro­ken; and it was im­pos­si­ble to risk the pas­sage. He did not in any way ex­ag­ger­ate the con­di­tion of the bridge. It may be tak­en for grant­ed that, rash as the Amer­icans usu­al­ly are, when they are pru­dent there is good rea­son for it.

Passep­artout, not dar­ing to ap­prise his mas­ter of what he heard, lis­tened with set teeth, im­mov­able as a stat­ue.

“Hum!” cried Colonel Proc­tor; “but we are not go­ing to stay here, I imag­ine, and take root in the snow?”

“Colonel,” replied the con­duc­tor, “we have tele­graphed to Om­aha for a train, but it is not like­ly that it will reach Medicine Bow is less than six hours.”

“Six hours!” cried Passep­artout.

“Cer­tain­ly,” re­turned the con­duc­tor, “be­sides, it will take us as long as that to reach Medicine Bow on foot.”

“But it is on­ly a mile from here,” said one of the pas­sen­gers.

“Yes, but it's on the oth­er side of the riv­er.”

“And can't we cross that in a boat?” asked the colonel.

“That's im­pos­si­ble. The creek is swelled by the rains. It is a rapid, and we shall have to make a cir­cuit of ten miles to the north to find a ford.”

The colonel launched a vol­ley of oaths, de­nounc­ing the rail­way com­pa­ny and the con­duc­tor; and Passep­artout, who was fu­ri­ous, was not dis­in­clined to make com­mon cause with him. Here was an ob­sta­cle, in­deed, which all his mas­ter's ban­knotes could not re­move.

There was a gen­er­al dis­ap­point­ment among the pas­sen­gers, who, with­out reck­on­ing the de­lay, saw them­selves com­pelled to trudge fif­teen miles over a plain cov­ered with snow. They grum­bled and protest­ed, and would cer­tain­ly have thus at­tract­ed Phileas Fogg's at­ten­tion if he had not been com­plete­ly ab­sorbed in his game.

Passep­artout found that he could not avoid telling his mas­ter what had oc­curred, and, with hang­ing head, he was turn­ing to­wards the car, when the en­gi­neer, a true Yan­kee, named Forster called out, “Gen­tle­men, per­haps there is a way, af­ter all, to get over.”

“On the bridge?” asked a pas­sen­ger.

“On the bridge.”

“With our train?”

“With our train.”

Passep­artout stopped short, and ea­ger­ly lis­tened to the en­gi­neer.

“But the bridge is un­safe,” urged the con­duc­tor.

“No mat­ter,” replied Forster; “I think that by putting on the very high­est speed we might have a chance of get­ting over.”

“The dev­il!” mut­tered Passep­artout.

But a num­ber of the pas­sen­gers were at once at­tract­ed by the en­gi­neer's pro­pos­al, and Colonel Proc­tor was es­pe­cial­ly de­light­ed, and found the plan a very fea­si­ble one. He told sto­ries about en­gi­neers leap­ing their trains over rivers with­out bridges, by putting on full steam; and many of those present avowed them­selves of the en­gi­neer's mind.

“We have fifty chances out of a hun­dred of get­ting over,” said one.

“Eighty! nine­ty!”

Passep­artout was as­tound­ed, and, though ready to at­tempt any­thing to get over Medicine Creek, thought the ex­per­iment pro­posed a lit­tle too Amer­ican. “Be­sides,” thought he, “there's a still more sim­ple way, and it does not even oc­cur to any of these peo­ple! Sir,” said he aloud to one of the pas­sen­gers, “the en­gi­neer's plan seems to me a lit­tle dan­ger­ous, but--”

“Eighty chances!” replied the pas­sen­ger, turn­ing his back on him.

“I know it,” said Passep­artout, turn­ing to an­oth­er pas­sen­ger, “but a sim­ple idea--”

“Ideas are no use,” re­turned the Amer­ican, shrug­ging his shoul­ders, “as the en­gi­neer as­sures us that we can pass.”

“Doubt­less,” urged Passep­artout, “we can pass, but per­haps it would be more pru­dent--”

“What! Pru­dent!” cried Colonel Proc­tor, whom this word seemed to ex­cite prodi­gious­ly. “At full speed, don't you see, at full speed!”

“I know--I see,” re­peat­ed Passep­artout; “but it would be, if not more pru­dent, since that word dis­pleas­es you, at least more nat­ural--”

“Who! What! What's the mat­ter with this fel­low?” cried sev­er­al.

The poor fel­low did not know to whom to ad­dress him­self.

“Are you afraid?” asked Colonel Proc­tor.

“I afraid? Very well; I will show these peo­ple that a French­man can be as Amer­ican as they!”

“All aboard!” cried the con­duc­tor.

“Yes, all aboard!” re­peat­ed Passep­artout, and im­me­di­ate­ly. “But they can't pre­vent me from think­ing that it would be more nat­ural for us to cross the bridge on foot, and let the train come af­ter!”

But no one heard this sage re­flec­tion, nor would any­one have ac­knowl­edged its jus­tice. The pas­sen­gers re­sumed their places in the cars. Passep­artout took his seat with­out telling what had passed. The whist-​play­ers were quite ab­sorbed in their game.

The lo­co­mo­tive whis­tled vig­or­ous­ly; the en­gi­neer, re­vers­ing the steam, backed the train for near­ly a mile--re­tir­ing, like a jumper, in or­der to take a longer leap. Then, with an­oth­er whis­tle, he be­gan to move for­ward; the train in­creased its speed, and soon its ra­pid­ity be­came fright­ful; a pro­longed screech is­sued from the lo­co­mo­tive; the pis­ton worked up and down twen­ty strokes to the sec­ond. They per­ceived that the whole train, rush­ing on at the rate of a hun­dred miles an hour, hard­ly bore up­on the rails at all.

And they passed over! It was like a flash. No one saw the bridge. The train leaped, so to speak, from one bank to the oth­er, and the en­gi­neer could not stop it un­til it had gone five miles be­yond the sta­tion. But scarce­ly had the train passed the riv­er, when the bridge, com­plete­ly ru­ined, fell with a crash in­to the rapids of Medicine Bow.