he would have too much time to aim while Passepartout tried to scramble up over the eight-foot-high wall. No, that was out.
He swore a few Gallic oaths. He had hoped to go through the door from which he had rebounded and so have access to a street window. There he could have shouted to the people in the street or even have dived through a window. But now he was in the same situation as Fogg and Aouda.
Nemo, on coming to his senses, may or may not have had another seizure. It is safe to assume that his jaw, head, and side hurt and that he raved at his aides and threatened horrible punishments. Then he turned his attention to the banging on the door. He opened it a crack. By the illumination of the nearby gaslight, he saw Fix. Fix was dressed in a messenger’s uniform.
Beyond, two men were carrying off the still form of the colonel on a stretcher. Leading them was a man carrying a leather bag. Doubtless, this was the Doctor Caber who lived near Fogg. He was bringing the colonel to his house to wait for the ambulance.
“Go away!” Nemo said through the crack. “Go away, you fool! The situation has changed!”
“What?” Fix said, and then, hesitatingly, “But you must read this telegram!”
Nemo could see that everybody in the crowd was turned to watch the colonel being carried off. He opened the door, reached out, grabbed Fix by his coatfront, and yanked him inside. He shut the door and said, “I must, must I?”
“Yes,” Fix said. He looked curiously around in the light afforded by the single gas jet. “What’s happened?”
“Never mind that,” Nemo said. He tore the envelope from Fix’s grasp. It had been opened, so obviously Fix had read it.
“Just as you told me, sir,” Fix said. “I stopped the real messenger, and I showed him that I was a detective. I told him that I had to have the telegram because it was evidence in a criminal case. I gave him two shillings to assure his cooperation, then read the message and hurried here as swiftly as I could.”
“Shut up!” Nemo said. He walked over to the gas jet and read the telegram silently the first time and loudly the second time. It was evident that he did not like what he read either time.
RELEASE THE THREE UNDAMAGED BY 8:30, AND YOU MAY GO UNTOUCHED. WE HAVE NESSE I. THE OLD ONE IS NO MORE. CONGRATULATIONS. YOU ARE NOW THE CHIEF. CONSIDER THE CONSEQUENCES. CHIEF OF ERID
Fix put his hands in his pockets to conceal their trembling. He said, “What does all that mean?”
“It’s obvious,” Nemo said scornfully. “They managed to located Nesse I when I arrived because of the noise made by the distorter. It took them some time, which is why I got away before they found it. They’ve killed our chief, the last…”
He paused, thinking of the effect on their morale if they knew that the last of the Old Capelleans was dead. He was too late. The others understood what he meant.
“The Old One is dead!” Fix said, almost wailing.
“Perhaps,” Nemo said. “The Eridanean may be lying, you know, and probably is. But he’s not lying about his knowledge of the situation here. So he’s giving us until eight-thirty to produce Fogg, the Frenchman, and Jejeebhoy unharmed. If we don’t, we’ll probably be invaded, no matter how many Earthlings are attracted by the battle.”
Fix started to the curtain as if he meant to look outside.
Nemo said, “Belay that! They’re out there somewhere.”
He stood for a moment in thought, softly rubbing his jaw, on which a swelling had appeared.
“Get Osbaldistone and Vandeleur back down here.”
“And what about…?”
“The others? They won’t know they’ve been left unguarded. They won’t open the door for fear they’ll get a ball in the head. I want everybody to be acquainted with this new situation. Moran can be told later; if they saw him coming back into the house, they might try to leave by the windows. Hurry!”
Fix went upstairs and quietly got Vandeleur and Osbaldistone away from their posts. On the way down from the second floor, he whispered the news to them. Vandeleur said nothing. The baronet went gray. “The last of the Old Ones is dead,” he murmured. “What do we do now?”
“Nemo says that the Eridaneans may be lying about that,” Fix said. “But I doubt it. They must have taken Nesse I; otherwise, how would they have even known that that is what we call the prime headquarters? But Nemo is the first chief now.”
Nemo affirmed everything that Fix had said. “But don’t feel that the Eridaneans have any advantage over us because they might still have an Old One to lead them. For all we know, they don’t have any either. Even if they do, what about it? The Old Ones were no more intelligent than we. In fact, their very alienness has handicapped us, in my opinion. It takes a genuine human being to know how to fight human beings, and now we Capelleans have one-myself-to lead them! Now we can conduct our war as we please and with a more realistic goal.”
Fix wondered what Nemo meant by
Osbaldistone said, “But what about the sharing of the Blood? There is no more Blood from the Stars to mingle in our veins at the puberty ceremonies.”
“So what?” Nemo said, glaring. “The Blood itself has no intrinsic value. Its only value is symbolic. From now on the blood of the human chief will be used in the ceremonies. Capelleanism is an ideal; its goal is the conquest of Earth for the good of the Earthlings. The Earthlings must be saved from themselves.”
“But the way things are going, the Eridaneans might win!”
“That’s close to treason,” Nemo said. “It is true that the end is near, since neither we nor the enemy probably number more than a hundred each, if that. But I have a plan. We’ll conduct a campaign such as the Old Ones were too inflexible, too unintelligent to conceive. We’ll concentrate, bring in our people, who are scattered all over the globe, reorganize, and launch a hunt which will not stop until we have run every Eridanean to the ground and killed him. And…”
“Only a hundred each!” Fix said.
Nemo looked as if he wished he had not said so much. Then he said, “Enough of the future. The present is what counts, and, for the present, we must retreat. The enemy has won this round, but it’ll be the last he’ll win.”
He took Passepartout’s watch from his coat pocket and snapped the lid on its back open.
“We’ll retreat, but only after Fogg and company have been eliminated,” he said. “Then we use the distorter to get to Nesse II. Vandeleur, you’re carrying the tape for…”
He stopped, his mouth hanging open. First, he paled. Then he became red.
“This isn’t the Frenchman’s watch!” he cried. “This doesn’t have any controls! It’s just a watch, that’s all, just a watch!”
Fix became numb.
Vandeleur said, “What do you mean?”
“I mean those swine have tricked us!” Nemo said. “That Fogg! He must have taken the distorter and given the Frenchman a watch to carry so we’d think… he… he… Fogg… has the watch with the distorter!”
Fix said, “Then we’re trapped! We can’t get out!”
“No, by all the furies!” Nemo said. “We’ll get it from Fogg!”
“Sir,” Fix said, “why don’t we just accept their terms and leave quietly?”
Fix, half-stunned, lay on the floor. He tried to rise, but, seeing that Nemo was about to hit him again, decided to stay where he was.
“Do you think for a moment they’d keep their word any more than we would ours?”
He turned away, and Fix thought it safe to get up. He was scared to speak up, but he felt that he must. Their salvation depended upon it.
“Sir,” he said, “if Fogg gave his word, we’d be safe. He wouldn’t go back on his word.”
Nemo swung back to face him. “What, an Eridanean’s word is good?”
“Eridanean or not, Fogg would not betray us because then he’d be betraying himself,” Fix said. “I know the man well.”
“Perhaps you know him too well!” Nemo said. “Perhaps he has seduced you into turning traitor?”
“Exactly my thinking,” Vandeleur said.
Fix trembled, but he said, “Not at all. But I do know that Fogg, whatever else he may be, is a true man. He
