Adventure stories; Voyages around the world -- Fiction
“I beg your pardon,” said Passepartout persistently. “He is a tall
gentleman, quiet, and not very talkative, and has with him a young
lady—”
“There is no young lady on board,” interrupted the purser. “Here is a
list of the passengers; you may see for yourself.”
Passepartout scanned the list, but his master’s name was not upon it.
All at once an idea struck him.
“Ah! am I on the ‘Carnatic?’”
“Yes.”
“On the way to Yokohama?”
“Certainly.”
Passepartout had for an instant feared that he was on the wrong boat;
but, though he was really on the “Carnatic,” his master was not there.
He fell thunderstruck on a seat. He saw it all now. He remembered that
the time of sailing had been changed, that he should have informed his
master of that fact, and that he had not done so. It was his fault,
then, that Mr. Fogg and Aouda had missed the steamer. Yes, but it was
still more the fault of the traitor who, in order to separate him from
his master, and detain the latter at Hong Kong, had inveigled him into
getting drunk! He now saw the detective’s trick; and at this moment Mr.
Fogg was certainly ruined, his bet was lost, and he himself perhaps
arrested and imprisoned! At this thought Passepartout tore his hair.
Ah, if Fix ever came within his reach, what a settling of accounts
there would be!
After his first depression, Passepartout became calmer, and began to
study his situation. It was certainly not an enviable one. He found
himself on the way to Japan, and what should he do when he got there?
His pocket was empty; he had not a solitary shilling, not so much as a
penny. His passage had fortunately been paid for in advance; and he had
five or six days in which to decide upon his future course. He fell to
at meals with an appetite, and ate for Mr. Fogg, Aouda, and himself. He
helped himself as generously as if Japan were a desert, where nothing
to eat was to be looked for.
At dawn on the 13th the “Carnatic” entered the port of Yokohama. This
is an important port of call in the Pacific, where all the
mail-steamers, and those carrying travellers between North America,
China, Japan, and the Oriental islands put in. It is situated in the
bay of Yeddo, and at but a short distance from that second capital of
the Japanese Empire, and the residence of the Tycoon, the civil
Emperor, before the Mikado, the spiritual Emperor, absorbed his office
in his own. The “Carnatic” anchored at the quay near the custom-house,
in the midst of a crowd of ships bearing the flags of all nations.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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