Around the World in 80 Days

Chapter XXXI

IN WHICH FIX, THE DE­TEC­TIVE, CON­SID­ER­ABLY FUR­THERS THE IN­TER­ESTS OF PHILEAS FOGG

Phileas Fogg found him­self twen­ty hours be­hind time. Passep­artout, the in­vol­un­tary cause of this de­lay, was des­per­ate. He had ru­ined his mas­ter!

At this mo­ment the de­tec­tive ap­proached Mr. Fogg, and, look­ing him in­tent­ly in the face, said:

“Se­ri­ous­ly, sir, are you in great haste?”

“Quite se­ri­ous­ly.”

“I have a pur­pose in ask­ing,” re­sumed Fix. “Is it ab­so­lute­ly nec­es­sary that you should be in New York on the 11th, be­fore nine o'clock in the evening, the time that the steam­er leaves for Liv­er­pool?”

“It is ab­so­lute­ly nec­es­sary.”

“And, if your jour­ney had not been in­ter­rupt­ed by these In­di­ans, you would have reached New York on the morn­ing of the 11th?”

“Yes; with eleven hours to spare be­fore the steam­er left.”

“Good! you are there­fore twen­ty hours be­hind. Twelve from twen­ty leaves eight. You must re­gain eight hours. Do you wish to try to do so?”

“On foot?” asked Mr. Fogg.

“No; on a sledge,” replied Fix. “On a sledge with sails. A man has pro­posed such a method to me.”

It was the man who had spo­ken to Fix dur­ing the night, and whose of­fer he had re­fused.

Phileas Fogg did not re­ply at once; but Fix, hav­ing point­ed out the man, who was walk­ing up and down in front of the sta­tion, Mr. Fogg went up to him. An in­stant af­ter, Mr. Fogg and the Amer­ican, whose name was Mudge, en­tered a hut built just be­low the fort.

There Mr. Fogg ex­am­ined a cu­ri­ous ve­hi­cle, a kind of frame on two long beams, a lit­tle raised in front like the run­ners of a sledge, and up­on which there was room for five or six per­sons. A high mast was fixed on the frame, held firm­ly by metal­lic lash­ings, to which was at­tached a large brig­an­tine sail. This mast held an iron stay up­on which to hoist a jib-​sail. Be­hind, a sort of rud­der served to guide the ve­hi­cle. It was, in short, a sledge rigged like a sloop. Dur­ing the win­ter, when the trains are blocked up by the snow, these sledges make ex­treme­ly rapid jour­neys across the frozen plains from one sta­tion to an­oth­er. Pro­vid­ed with more sails than a cut­ter, and with the wind be­hind them, they slip over the sur­face of the prairies with a speed equal if not su­pe­ri­or to that of the ex­press trains.

Mr. Fogg read­ily made a bar­gain with the own­er of this land-​craft. The wind was favourable, be­ing fresh, and blow­ing from the west. The snow had hard­ened, and Mudge was very con­fi­dent of be­ing able to trans­port Mr. Fogg in a few hours to Om­aha. Thence the trains east­ward run fre­quent­ly to Chica­go and New York. It was not im­pos­si­ble that the lost time might yet be re­cov­ered; and such an op­por­tu­ni­ty was not to be re­ject­ed.

Not wish­ing to ex­pose Aou­da to the dis­com­forts of trav­el­ling in the open air, Mr. Fogg pro­posed to leave her with Passep­artout at Fort Kear­ney, the ser­vant tak­ing up­on him­self to es­cort her to Eu­rope by a bet­ter route and un­der more favourable con­di­tions. But Aou­da re­fused to sep­arate from Mr. Fogg, and Passep­artout was de­light­ed with her de­ci­sion; for noth­ing could in­duce him to leave his mas­ter while Fix was with him.

It would be dif­fi­cult to guess the de­tec­tive's thoughts. Was this con­vic­tion shak­en by Phileas Fogg's re­turn, or did he still re­gard him as an ex­ceed­ing­ly shrewd ras­cal, who, his jour­ney round the world com­plet­ed, would think him­self ab­so­lute­ly safe in Eng­land? Per­haps Fix's opin­ion of Phileas Fogg was some­what mod­ified; but he was nev­er­the­less re­solved to do his du­ty, and to has­ten the re­turn of the whole par­ty to Eng­land as much as pos­si­ble.

At eight o'clock the sledge was ready to start. The pas­sen­gers took their places on it, and wrapped them­selves up close­ly in their trav­el­ling-​cloaks. The two great sails were hoist­ed, and un­der the pres­sure of the wind the sledge slid over the hard­ened snow with a ve­loc­ity of forty miles an hour.

The dis­tance be­tween Fort Kear­ney and Om­aha, as the birds fly, is at most two hun­dred miles. If the wind held good, the dis­tance might be tra­versed in five hours; if no ac­ci­dent hap­pened the sledge might reach Om­aha by one o'clock.

What a jour­ney! The trav­ellers, hud­dled close to­geth­er, could not speak for the cold, in­ten­si­fied by the ra­pid­ity at which they were go­ing. The sledge sped on as light­ly as a boat over the waves. When the breeze came skim­ming the earth the sledge seemed to be lift­ed off the ground by its sails. Mudge, who was at the rud­der, kept in a straight line, and by a turn of his hand checked the lurch­es which the ve­hi­cle had a ten­den­cy to make. All the sails were up, and the jib was so ar­ranged as not to screen the brig­an­tine. A top-​mast was hoist­ed, and an­oth­er jib, held out to the wind, added its force to the oth­er sails. Al­though the speed could not be ex­act­ly es­ti­mat­ed, the sledge could not be go­ing at less than forty miles an hour.

“If noth­ing breaks,” said Mudge, “we shall get there!”

Mr. Fogg had made it for Mudge's in­ter­est to reach Om­aha with­in the time agreed on, by the of­fer of a hand­some re­ward.

The prairie, across which the sledge was mov­ing in a straight line, was as flat as a sea. It seemed like a vast frozen lake. The rail­road which ran through this sec­tion as­cend­ed from the south-​west to the north-​west by Great Is­land, Colum­bus, an im­por­tant Ne­bras­ka town, Schuyler, and Fre­mont, to Om­aha. It fol­lowed through­out the right bank of the Plat­te Riv­er. The sledge, short­en­ing this route, took a chord of the arc de­scribed by the rail­way. Mudge was not afraid of be­ing stopped by the Plat­te Riv­er, be­cause it was frozen. The road, then, was quite clear of ob­sta­cles, and Phileas Fogg had but two things to fear--an ac­ci­dent to the sledge, and a change or calm in the wind.

But the breeze, far from less­en­ing its force, blew as if to bend the mast, which, how­ev­er, the metal­lic lash­ings held firm­ly. These lash­ings, like the chords of a stringed in­stru­ment, re­sound­ed as if vi­brat­ed by a vi­olin bow. The sledge slid along in the midst of a plain­tive­ly in­tense melody.

“Those chords give the fifth and the oc­tave,” said Mr. Fogg.

These were the on­ly words he ut­tered dur­ing the jour­ney. Aou­da, cosi­ly packed in furs and cloaks, was shel­tered as much as pos­si­ble from the at­tacks of the freez­ing wind. As for Passep­artout, his face was as red as the sun's disc when it sets in the mist, and he la­bo­ri­ous­ly in­haled the bit­ing air. With his nat­ural buoy­an­cy of spir­its, he be­gan to hope again. They would reach New York on the evening, if not on the morn­ing, of the 11th, and there was still some chances that it would be be­fore the steam­er sailed for Liv­er­pool.

Passep­artout even felt a strong de­sire to grasp his al­ly, Fix, by the hand. He re­mem­bered that it was the de­tec­tive who pro­cured the sledge, the on­ly means of reach­ing Om­aha in time; but, checked by some pre­sen­ti­ment, he kept his usu­al re­serve. One thing, how­ev­er, Passep­artout would nev­er for­get, and that was the sac­ri­fice which Mr. Fogg had made, with­out hes­ita­tion, to res­cue him from the Sioux. Mr. Fogg had risked his for­tune and his life. No! His ser­vant would nev­er for­get that!

While each of the par­ty was ab­sorbed in re­flec­tions so dif­fer­ent, the sledge flew past over the vast car­pet of snow. The creeks it passed over were not per­ceived. Fields and streams dis­ap­peared un­der the uni­form white­ness. The plain was ab­so­lute­ly de­sert­ed. Be­tween the Union Pa­cif­ic road and the branch which unites Kear­ney with Saint Joseph it formed a great un­in­hab­it­ed is­land. Nei­ther vil­lage, sta­tion, nor fort ap­peared. From time to time they sped by some phan­tom-​like tree, whose white skele­ton twist­ed and rat­tled in the wind. Some­times flocks of wild birds rose, or bands of gaunt, fam­ished, fe­ro­cious prairie-​wolves ran howl­ing af­ter the sledge. Passep­artout, re­volver in hand, held him­self ready to fire on those which came too near. Had an ac­ci­dent then hap­pened to the sledge, the trav­ellers, at­tacked by these beasts, would have been in the most ter­ri­ble dan­ger; but it held on its even course, soon gained on the wolves, and ere long left the howl­ing band at a safe dis­tance be­hind.

About noon Mudge per­ceived by cer­tain land­marks that he was cross­ing the Plat­te Riv­er. He said noth­ing, but he felt cer­tain that he was now with­in twen­ty miles of Om­aha. In less than an hour he left the rud­der and furled his sails, whilst the sledge, car­ried for­ward by the great im­pe­tus the wind had giv­en it, went on half a mile fur­ther with its sails un­spread.

It stopped at last, and Mudge, point­ing to a mass of roofs white with snow, said: “We have got there!”

Ar­rived! Ar­rived at the sta­tion which is in dai­ly com­mu­ni­ca­tion, by nu­mer­ous trains, with the At­lantic seaboard!

Passep­artout and Fix jumped off, stretched their stiff­ened limbs, and aid­ed Mr. Fogg and the young wom­an to de­scend from the sledge. Phileas Fogg gen­er­ous­ly re­ward­ed Mudge, whose hand Passep­artout warm­ly grasped, and the par­ty di­rect­ed their steps to the Om­aha rail­way sta­tion.

The Pa­cif­ic Rail­road prop­er finds its ter­mi­nus at this im­por­tant Ne­bras­ka town. Om­aha is con­nect­ed with Chica­go by the Chica­go and Rock Is­land Rail­road, which runs di­rect­ly east, and pass­es fifty sta­tions.

A train was ready to start when Mr. Fogg and his par­ty reached the sta­tion, and they on­ly had time to get in­to the cars. They had seen noth­ing of Om­aha; but Passep­artout con­fessed to him­self that this was not to be re­gret­ted, as they were not trav­el­ling to see the sights.

The train passed rapid­ly across the State of Iowa, by Coun­cil Bluffs, Des Moines, and Iowa City. Dur­ing the night it crossed the Mis­sis­sip­pi at Dav­en­port, and by Rock Is­land en­tered Illi­nois. The next day, which was the 10th, at four o'clock in the evening, it reached Chica­go, al­ready risen from its ru­ins, and more proud­ly seat­ed than ev­er on the bor­ders of its beau­ti­ful Lake Michi­gan.

Nine hun­dred miles sep­arat­ed Chica­go from New York; but trains are not want­ing at Chica­go. Mr. Fogg passed at once from one to the oth­er, and the lo­co­mo­tive of the Pitts­burgh, Fort Wayne, and Chica­go Rail­way left at full speed, as if it ful­ly com­pre­hend­ed that that gen­tle­man had no time to lose. It tra­versed In­di­ana, Ohio, Penn­syl­va­nia, and New Jer­sey like a flash, rush­ing through towns with an­tique names, some of which had streets and car-​tracks, but as yet no hous­es. At last the Hud­son came in­to view; and, at a quar­ter-​past eleven in the evening of the 11th, the train stopped in the sta­tion on the right bank of the riv­er, be­fore the very pier of the Cu­nard line.

The Chi­na, for Liv­er­pool, had start­ed three-​quar­ters of an hour be­fore!