by Verne, Jules, 1828-1905
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pirate!" ceied andeew speedy.
[Page 285.
" Pirate ! " cried Captain Speedy.
" I have sent for you, sir?"
'' Pickaroon ! "
'' ?Sir," continued Mr. Fogg, "to ask you to sell me your vessel."
" No ! By all the devils, no ! "
*' But I shall be obliged to burn her."
"Burn the ^Henrietta'!"
" Yes; at least the upper part of her. The coal has given out."
"Burn my vessel!" cried Captain Speedy, who could scarcely pronounce the words. " A vessel worth fifty thousand dollars ! "
" Here are sixty thousand," replied Phileas Fogg, handing the captain a roll of bank bills. This had a prodigious eftect on Andrew Speedy. An American can scarcely remain unmoved at the sight of sixty thousand dollars. The captain forgot in an instant his anger, his imprisonment, and all his grudges against his passenger. The " Henrietta " was twenty years old ; it was a great bargain. The bomb would not go off after all. Mr. Fogg had taken away the match.
''And I shall still have the iron hull," said the captain in a softer tone.
" The iron hull and the engine. Is it agreed V
" Agreed."
And Andrew Speedy, seizing the bank-notes, counted them, and consigned them to his pocket.
During this colloquy. Passepartout was as white as a sheet, and Fix seemed on the point of having an apoplectic fit. Nearly twenty thousand pounds had been expended, and Fogg left the hull and engine to the captain, that is, near the whole value of the craft! It was true, however, that fifty-five thousand pounds had been stolen from the bank. When Andrew Speedy had pocketed the money, Mr. Fogg said to him, " Don't let this astonish you, sir. You must know that I shall lose twenty thousand pounds, unless I arrive in London by a quarter before nine on the evening of the 2ist of December. I missed the steamer at New York, and as you refused to take me to Liverpool?"
" And I did well! " cried Andrew Speedy ; " for I have gained at least forty thousand dollars by it !" He added, more sedately, " Do you know one thing. Captain?" "Fogg."
'' Captain Fogg, you've got something of the Yankee about you."
And, having paid his passenger what he considered a high compliment, he was going away, when Mr. Fogg said, *' The vessel now belongs to me ? "
" Certainly, from the keel to the truck of the masts,?all the wood, that is."
" Very well. Have the interior seats, bunks, and frames pulled down, and burn them."
It was necessary to have dry wood to keep the steam up to the adequate pressure, and on that day the poop, cabins, bunks, and the spare deck were sacrificed. On the next day, the 19th of December, the masts, rafts, and spars were burned; the crew worked lustily, keeping up the fires. Passepartout hewed, cut, and sawed away with all his ^might. There was a perfect rage for demolition.
The railings, fittings, the greater part of the deck, and top sides disappeared on the 20th, and the *' Henrietta " was now only a flat hulk. But on this day they sighted the Irish coast and Fastnet Light. By ten in the evening they were passing Queenstown. Phileas Fogg had only twenty-four hours more in which to get to London ; that length of time was necessary to reach Liverpool, with all steam on. And the steam was about to give out altogether!
" Sir," said Captain Speedy, who was now deeply interested in Mr. Fogg's project, " I really commiserate you. Everything is against you. We are only opposite Queens-town."
**Ah," said Mr. Fogg, '^is that place where we see the lights Queenstown ?" " Yes." *' Can we enter the harbour ?"
"Not under three hours. Only at high tide."
" Stay," repHed Mr. Fogg cahiily, without betraying in his features that by a supreme inspiration he was about to attempt once more to conquer ill-fortune.
Oueenstown is the Irish port at which the transatlantic steamers stop to put off the mails. These mails are carried to Dublin by express trains always held in readiness to start; from Dublin they are sent on to Liverpool by the most rapid boats, and thus gain twelve hours on the Atlantic steamers.
Phileas Fogg counted on gaining twelve hours in the same way. Instead of arriving at Liverpool the next evening by the *' Henrietta," he would be there by noon, and would therefore have time to reach London before a quarter before nine in the evening.
