At half-past six, the appointed hour for the sailing of the vessel, Mr. Fogg, Mrs. Aouda, and Passe-partout, who still wore his wings and long nose, stepped upon the deck of the American mail-steamer.
CHAPTER XXIV.
In which the Pacific Ocean is crossed.
The reader will easily guess what happened at Shanghai. The signals made by the Tankadere were perceived by the mail-steamer, and soon afterwards, Phileas Fogg having paid the price agreed upon, as well as a bonus of five hundred and fifty pounds, he and his party were soon on board the steamer.
They reached Yokohama on the 14th, and Phileas Fogg, leaving Fix to his own devices, went on board the Carnatic, where he heard, to Aouda's great delight, and probably to his own though he did not betray it, that a Frenchman named Passe-partout had arrived in her the day before.
Mr. Fogg, who was obliged to leave for San Francisco that very evening, immediately set about searching for his servant. To no purpose was it that he inquired at the Consulate or walked about the streets, and he gave up the search. Was it by chance or presentiment that he visited Mr. Batulcar's entertainment? He would not certainly have recognised his servant in his eccentric dress, but Passe-partout had spied his master out. He could not restrain a movement of the nose, and so the collapse had occurred.
All this Passe-partout learnt from Mrs. Aouda, who also told him how they had come from Hong Kong with a certain Mr. Fix.
Passe-partout did not even wink at the name of Fix, for he thought the moment had not yet come to tell his master what had passed; so in his recital of his own adventures, he merely said that he had been overtaken by opium.
Mr. Fogg listened coldly to his excuses, and then lent him money sufficient to obtain proper clothes. In about an hour he had got rid of his nose and wings, and was once more himself again.
The steamer in which they were crossing was called the General Grant, and belonged to the Pacific Mail Company. She was a paddle-steamer of two thousand five hundred tons, had three masts, and at twelve knots an hour would not take more than twenty-one days to cross the ocean; so Phileas Fogg was justified in thinking that he would reach San Francisco on the 2nd of December, New York on the 11th, and London on the 20th, so gaining several hours on the fatal 21st.