Works of Jules Verne/Round the World in Eighty Days/Chapter 22
CHAPTER XXII
IN WHICH PASSEPARTOUT SEES VERY WELL THAT, EVEN AT THE ANTIPODES, IT IS PRUDENT TO HAVE SOME MONEY IN ONE'S POCKET
The Carnatic, having left Hong Kong on the 6th of November, at half past six Pp. M., turned under full head of steam towards the Japanese shores. She carried a full load of freight and passengers. Two cabins aft were unoccupied. They were the ones retained for Mr. Phileas Fogg.
The next morning the men in the forward part of the vessel saw, not without some surprise, a passenger, with half-stupefied eyes and disordered head, coming out of the second cabin, and with tottering steps taking a seat on deck.
This passenger was Passepartout himself. This is what had happened: Some minutes after Fix left the smoking-house two waiters raised Passepartout, who was in a deep sleep, and laid him on the bed reserved for the smokers. But, three hours later, Passepartout, pursued even in his bad dreams by a fixed idea, woke again and struggled against the stupefying action of the narcotic. The thought of unaccomplished duty shook off his torpor. He left this drunkard's bed, reeling, supporting himself by the wall, falling and rising, but always and irresistibly urged on by a sort of instinct. He finally went out of the smoking-house, crying in a dream, "The Carnatic! the Carnatic!"
The steamer was there, steam up, ready to leave. Passepartout had only a few steps to go. He rushed upon the plank, crossed it, and fell unconscious on the forward deck at the very moment that the Carnatic was slipping her moorings.
Some of the sailors, as men accustomed to this kind of scenes, took the poor fellow down into a second cabin, and Passepartout only waked the next morning, one hundred and fifty miles from the Chinese coast.
This is then why Passepartout found himself this morning on the Carnatic's deck, taking full draughts of the fresh sea breezes. The pure air sobered him. He commenced to collect his ideas, but he did not succeed without difficulty. But, finally, he recalled the scenes of the day before, the confidences of Fix, the smoking-house, etc.
"It is evident," he said to himself, "that I have been abominably drunk! What will Mr. Fogg say? In any event I have not missed the steamer, and this is the principal thing."
Then, thinking of Fix, he said to himself: "As for him, I hope we are now rid of him, and that he has not dared, after what he proposed to me, to follow us on the Carnatic. A police detective on my master's heels, accused of the robbery committed upon the Bank of England! Pshaw! Mr. Fogg is as much a robber as I am a murderer!"
Ought Passepartout to tell these things to his master? Would it be proper to inform him of the part played by Fix in this affair? Would it not be better to wait until his return to London, to tell him that an agent of the Metropolitan Police had followed him, and then have a laugh with him? Yes, doubtless. In any event, it was a matter to be looked into. The most pressing thing was to rejoin Mr. Fogg and beg him to pardon him for his inexcusable conduct.
Passepartout then rose. The sea was rough, and the ship rolled heavily. The worthy fellow—his legs not very steady yet—reached as well as he could the after-deck of the ship. He saw no one on the deck that resembled either his master or Aouda.
"Good," said he. "Aouda is still abed at this hour. As for Mr. Fogg, he has probably found some whist player, and according to his habit———"
So saying, Passepartout descended to the saloon. Mr. Fogg was not there. Passepartout had but one thing to do: to ask the purser which cabin Mr. Fogg occupied. The purser replied that he did not know any passenger of that name.
"Pardon me," said Passepartout, persisting. "The gentleman in question is tall, cold, non-communicative, accompanied by a young lady———"
"We have no young lady on board," replied the purser.
"To convince you, here is the list of passengers. You can examine it."
Passepartout looked over the list. His master's name did not appear. He felt bewildered. Then an idea struck him. "Ah! but see! Am I on the Carnatic?" he cried.
"Yes," replied the purser.
"En route for Yokohama?"
"Exactly so."
Passepartout had for a moment feared that he had mistaken the vessel! But though he was on the Carnatic, he was certain that his master was not there for he had not seen him.
Passepartout dropped into an arm-chair. It was a thunder stroke for him. And suddenly, there was a gleam of light. He recollected that the hour of departure for the Carnatic had been anticipated, that he was to notify his master, and that he had not done it! It was his fault, then, if Mr. Fogg and Aouda had missed this steamer!
His fault, yes, but still more that of the traitor who, to separate him from his master, to keep the latter in Hong Kong, had made him drunk! For at last he understood the detective's maneuver. And now Mr. Fogg surely ruined, his bet lost, arrested, perhaps imprisoned! Passepartout at this thought tore his hair. Ah! if Fix ever fell into his hands, what a settlement of accounts there would be!
Finally, after the first moment of bewilderment, Passepartout recovered his coolness and studied the situation. It was not enviable. The Frenchman was on the road to Japan. Certain of arriving there, how was he to get away? His pocket was empty. Not a shilling, not a penny in it! However, his passage and meals on board were paid in advance. He had then five or six days to come to a decision. It could not be described how he ate and drank during the voyage. He ate for his master, for Aouda, and for himself. He ate as if Japan, where he was going to land, was a desert country, bare of every eatable substance.
At high tide on the morning of the 13th, the Carnatic entered the port of Yokohama. This place is an important stopping point in the Pacific, where all the mail and passenger steamers between North America, China, Japan, and the Malay Islands put in. Yokohama is situated on the Bay of Yeddo, at a short distance from that immense city, the second capital of the Japanese empire, formerly the residence of the Tycoon, at the time that civil emperor existed, and the rival of Miako, the largest city in which the Mikado, the ecclesiastical emperor, the descendant of the gods, lives.
The Carnatic came alongside the wharf at Yokohama near the jetties of the port and the custom house, in the midst of the numerous vessels belonging to all nations. Passepartout set foot, without any enthusiasm, on this so curious soil of the Sons of the Sun. He had nothing better to do than to take chance for his guide, and to go at a venture through the streets of the city.
He found himself at first in an absolutely European city, with its low front houses, ornamented with verandas, under which showed elegant peristyles. This city, covered with its streets, its squares, its docks, its warehouses, the entire space comprised between "Treaty Promontory" and the river. There, as at Hong Kong, and as at Calcutta, there was a confused swarm of people of all races, Americans, English, Chinese, Dutch, merchants ready to sell everything and to buy everything, in the midst of whom the Frenchman found himself as strange as if he had been cast into the Hottentot country.
Passepartout had, it is true, one resource; it was to make himself known at the French or English Consular Agent's established at Yokohama; but he hated to tell his story, so intimately connected with that of his master, and before coming to that, he wished to exhaust all other chances.
Then, having gone through the European quarter of the city, without chance having served him in anything, he entered the Japanese quarter, decided, if it was necessary, to push on to Yeddo.
This native portion of Yokohama is called Benten, from the name of a goddess of the sea, worshiped in the neighboring islands. There were to be seen splendid avenues of firs and cedars; the sacred gates of a strange architecture; bridges half hid in the midst of bamboos and reeds; temples sheltered under the immense and melancholy shade of aged cedars, retreats in the depths of which vegetated the priests of Buddhism and the sectaries of the religion of Confucius; interminable streets in which could have been gathered a whole crop of children, rose-tinted and red-cheeked, good little people who might have been cut out of some native screen, and who were playing in the midst of short-legged poodles, and yellowish, tailless cats, very indolent, and very affectionate.
In the streets there was a constant swarm, going and coming incessantly; priests passing in procession, beating their monotonous tambourines; patrolmen, custom house or police officers, with pointed hats incrusted with lace, and carrying two sabers in their belts; soldiers dressed in blue cotton, with white stripes, and armed with percussion muskets; guards of the Mikado, enveloped in their silken doublets, with hauberk and coat of mail, and a number of other military men of all ranks—for in Japan the profession of a soldier is as much esteemed as it is despised in China. Then, mendicant friars, pilgrims in long robes, simple civilians, with their glossy and jet-black hair, large heads, long bust, slender legs, short stature, and complexions from the dark shades of copper to dead white, but never yellow like that of the Chinese, from whom the Japanese differ essentially. Finally, between the carriages, the palanquins, the horses, the porters, the curtained wheelbarrows, and bamboo litters, were seen moving some homely women, with tightly-drawn eyes, sunken chests, and teeth blackened according to the fashion of the time, taking short steps with their little feet, upon which were canvas shoes, straw sandals, or clogs of worked wood. They also wore with elegance the national garment, the "kiri mon," a sort of dressing-gown, crossed with a silk scarf, whose broad girdle expanded behind into an extravagant knot, which the modern Parisian ladies seem to have borrowed from the Japanese.
Then Passepartout found himself in the fields, in the midst of immense rice fields. There were expanding, with flowers which threw out their last perfumes, dazzling camelias, not borne upon shrubs, but upon trees; and in the bamboo enclosures, cherry, plum, and apple trees, which the natives cultivate rather for their blossoms than for their fruit, and which grinning scarecrows protect from the beaks of the sparrows, the pigeons, the crows, and other voracious birds. There was not a majestic cedar which did not shelter some large eagle; not a weeping willow which did not cover with its foliage some heron, sadly perched on one foot; while, finally, in all directions there were rooks, ducks, hawks, wild geese, and a large number of those cranes which the Japanese treat as "lords," and which symbolize for them long life and good fortune.
Wandering thus, Passepartout saw some violets among the grass, and said: "Good! there is my supper."
But having smelt them, he found no odor in them.
"No chance there!" he thought.
The good fellow had certainly had the foresight to breakfast as heartily as possible before he left the Carnatic; but after walking around for a day he felt that his stomach was very empty. He had noticed that sheep, goats, or pigs were entirely wanting at the stalls of the native butchers; and as he knew that it is a sacrilege to kill beeves, kept only for the needs of agriculture, he concluded that meat was scarce in Japan. He was not mistaken; but in default of butcher's meat, his stomach would have accommodated itself very well to quarters of deer or wild boar, some partridges or quails, some poultry or fish, with which the Japanese feed themselves almost exclusively, with the product of the rice fields. But he had to put a brave heart against ill luck, and postponed to the next day the care of providing for his nourishment.
Night came on. Passepartout returned to the native quarter, and wandered in the streets in the midst of the many-colored lanterns, looking at the groups of dancers, executing their feats of agility, and the astrologers in the open air gathering the crowd around their telescopes. Then he saw again the harbor, relieved by the fires of many fishermen who were catching fish by the light of their torches.
Finally, the streets became empty. To the crowd succeeded the rounds of the patrolmen. These officers, in their magnificent costumes and in the midst of their suite, resembled ambassadors, and Passepartout repeated pleasantly, each time that he met some dazzling patrol, "Good, good! Another Japanese embassy starting for Europe!"