faithful, wearing footgear in the temple. Lacking these, and also lacking the package of shoes and shirts he’d purchased, Passepartout fled. Fix overheard the valet explain to his master what had happened.
Fix had been about to follow them on the train, but this changed his mind. Though the warrant from London had not yet arrived, he could see to it that the two were arrested for an offense committed in India. He stayed behind to inform the authorities of the off enders’ identity.
The two got into a carriage with Sir Francis Cromarty, the brigadier-general who had played whist with Fogg on the
At eight o’clock the next evening, the train stopped some fifteen miles beyond Rothal. The conductor shouted that all passengers should get off, an announcement which amazed the three. Passepartout, sent out to inquire about it, returned alarmed. They had stopped here because the railway ended here. A further inquiry revealed a disturbing situation. No one had bothered to inform them that, contrary to what the London papers said, one could not ride the rails from Kholby to Allahabad.
Sir Francis was angry. Fogg was unperturbed. Very well. All was foreseen. Fogg knew that, sooner or later, some obstacle or other would present itself. Due to the speediness of the trip so far, Fogg had gained two days. At noon on the twenty-fifth, a ship would leave Calcutta for Hong Kong. That was the twenty-second. They had almost three days to get to Calcutta. That they might have to go on foot for seventy miles or more through jungle and over mountain was not something to worry about-for Fogg.
The restless, ever curious, Frenchman, having investigated possible means of conveyance on his own, returned with good news. They could continue on an elephant!
They proceeded to a nearby hut where they were introduced to a Hindu. Verne says that Fogg talked directly to the native. This means that the Hindu could speak some English or Fogg used the local dialect of these Khandesh people. Since Sir Francis might have wondered how he, supposedly a stranger to India, could have mastered this, Fogg must have refrained. Possibly the general did the interpreting and Verne did not bother to note this. In any event, there was no language difficulty.
Yes, the Hindu had an elephant. His name was Kiouni. But Kiouni was not for sale or hire. He was very valuable; he was being trained to be a war elephant.
Mr. Fogg offered ten pounds an hour for the use of the animal. No? Twenty? No? Forty?
Would Kiouni be for sale for a thousand pounds?
At this point, Sir Francis took Fogg to one side. He begged him not to ruin himself. Fogg coldly replied that he never acted rashly. He would pay twenty times what the beast was worth if need be.
Twelve hundred?
No?
Fifteen hundred?
No?
Eighteen hundred pounds?
No?
When Fogg offered two thousand pounds, Passepartout almost fainted. He could hear the money in the bag boiling away.
Two thousand?
Yes!
The Indian was afraid to ask for more because he might lose it all. The sum would enable him not only to live comfortably the rest of his life but would make him the biggest man in his community.
None of the three Europeans knew how to ride an elephant nor how to keep from getting lost if they could. A young and intelligent man of the Parsi faith then offered his services. Fogg quickly accepted this, promising a large sum in payment. An hour after they arrived, the three Europeans, with the Parsi, rode off. Sir Francis and Fogg sat on each side of the howdah; Passepartout straddled the saddlecloth between them; the mahout rode on the beast’s neck.
Their guide assured them that if they went directly through the jungle, they could lop twenty miles off the journey. Passepartout went pale, because this meant entering the territory of the rajah of Bundelcund. British law did not extend into it, and if the rajah were to discover that they were within, they would be in for it. He stroked the watch.
Fogg did not hesitate in ordering the shortcut taken.
At noon they had left the dense jungle for a country covered with copses of date trees and dwarf-palms. The pachyderm’s long legs soon left this behind, and they were on great arid plains on which were sickly-looking shrubs and huge blocks of syenite. This stone, Fogg informed Sir Francis, was an igneous rock largely composed of feldspar. It derived its scientific name from the ancient Egyptian city of Syene, where it was found in large quantities.
Sir Francis merely grunted in reply. He was hanging onto the side of the howdah, which moved up and down with a motion like a small boat’s in a choppy sea. Passepartout also found the motion upsetting and sickening. He had no inclination to meditate on what would happen if they encountered Bundelcundians. If he had, he might have wished that the meeting would be fatal, since he would rather die than continue this ride, and would soon do so anyway if it did not cease. Then they did see some natives, and these gestured threateningly. The Parsi, however, urged the beast to a faster speed, and the Hindus did not try to pursue them.
By eight that evening, they had crossed the principal chain of the Vindhya Mountains. They stopped at a ruined bungalow to rest in it for the night. The elephant had carried them for twenty-five miles, twice as fast as they could have gone on foot in this rough country. Allahabad now lay only another twenty-five miles away.
Verne says that the Parsi built a fire against the cold night and that they then ate the provisions they had brought from Kholby. This is confirmed by Fogg’s secret log. They resumed, as Verne says, at six o’clock next morning. But Verne’s account of the time intervening is not at all accurate. The guide, according to Verne, watched the sleeping elephant. Sir Francis slept heavily. Passepartout dreamed uneasily of the jolting journey. Fogg slept as peacefully as if he were in bed in No. 7, Savile Row.
This is not a likely picture. Anybody who has for the first time in a long time ridden all day on a horse would know how sore they would be and how hard sleep would come. Magnify the soreness and fatigue by a third and add to that the inevitable distress occasioned by eating the food of tropical jungle aborigines, and you have an excellent idea of their state. The truth, as revealed in the other log, is as follows.
9
Though their trip had been speedy, it had not been nonstop. All three Europeans had frequently required the Parsi to halt the elephant while they dashed into the bushes. Toward the end of the day even the imperturbable Fogg looked pale. Before they went to bed, master and servant stepped out into the thick jungle to perform certain bodily functions they felt almost too weak to perform. Fogg listened serenely, if sympathetically, to Passepartout’s groans, moans, and complaints until they were finished with their duties-or hoped they were.
He said, “Have you been checking your watch, as I impressed on you that you should?”
“But certainly…”
“And?”
“And nothing! No signals of any kind! Which is indeed fortunate! If there had been, then we would be certain that that pig of a rajah…”
“Speak more quietly,” Fogg said. “It would be easy for someone to approach unnoticed in this dense forest.”
“Pardon, sir, but it is possible that I did not hear the tiny gong which announces that another…”
“Do not use that word.”
