Philip Farmer - The Other Log of Phileas Fogg

Passepartout shivered. With such men holding them prisoner, what chance had they?

Vandeleur said, “Your brother wants you, Colonel.”

The tall dark man set the pail down and called up the stairs, “Shall I come up?”

“No,” Nemo said. “Don’t forget to stay out of the way of the horse when he first revives. The drug sometimes causes the beast to go into a frenzy. Hang onto his head for a minute, keeping out of the way of his hooves, and he’ll soon be quiet.”

“I haven’t forgotten,” the colonel said. “I’m no green recruit.”

“Also,” Nemo said, “I want you to take a message to Nesse I. Tell him to listen for our signals. We may use the distorter after all. There’s too much chance of the police or the neighbors getting curious. Those Reform Club swine may send somebody over to ascertain if Fogg has at least gotten home even if he hasn’t shown up there. And Fogg’s colleagues may try a rescue attempt. He surely must have notified them that he was back.”

“Why didn’t you think of that before we came here?” the colonel said somewhat sulkily.

“Because, my dear brother, I had expected to overpower these Eridaneans at once. I didn’t know how inept my help was.”

“You were with us,” the colonel said.

“Yes, and I should have handled the Frenchman myself. He would never have been able to get that shout out, and we would not now have Fogg and the woman giving us a problem. And pray shut up, brother, while I tell you what else you must do.”

“All right,” the colonel muttered.

“After you’ve delivered my message, stay at Nesse I. We don’t want too many coming and going here. Remember, Fogg’s a celebrated man, and if we hadn’t lured his neighbors away, they’d be down around our ears by now.”

“I’ll miss all the fun. Can’t Vandeleur go instead?”

“Do I have to repeat everything” Nemo said in an exasperated tone. “You are dressed like a cabbie. What if someone should see a gentleman drive off a hansom?”

“Very well,” the colonel said reluctantly. He turned and went to the pail.

Nemo’s voice came sharply. “Can’t you wait until I’m through? You will take one of the distorters with you. Nesse doesn’t have any, and I think it’d be better that we be transmitted there than to the other place, which is too close to the heart of London.”

“Which one?” the colonel said. “Passepartout’s or the one you made?”

The one you made! Passepartout thought. Then that was why Nemo stayed behind in San Francisco! And it was his arrival via the distorter that caused the clangings. That was sorry news indeed! Nemo could manufacture distorters! But how had he been able to accomplish something that both Eridaneans and Capelleans had been trying to do without success for two hundred years? The original Old Ones had brought some distorters with them, those still in use, but they had lacked the knowledge to make new ones. And their desire to take some apart for analysis had been unfulfilled because opening them would cause them to blow up.

The distorter which Head had carried! Was that one which had been recently manufactured? Had he taken passage as a mere cook-steward on a small merchant sailing vessel to avoid the Eridaneans covering the liners? Had he done this because the chief of the Eridaneans knew that he was coming to Europe with the distorter?

Where then had Nemo gotten the knowledge to make a new distorter? Surely, from schematics. Where had he gotten them? From Head? But Fogg had examined Head’s clothing and body, and Nemo had been examined by both Passepartout and Fogg. Still, Nemo had not been frisked again after returning to the General Grant.

Could Nemo have removed the schematics from Head’s body during the disarming and the cleaning up of the Mary Celeste? The only time he had been close to Head after he had been searched was when he had helped Fogg throw the corpse overboard.

Somehow, he had gotten hold of the schematics. And he had made two new ones in San Francisco while Fogg’s party was traveling east. One of the new distorters would have to be left behind. He had brought with him the other distorter when he was transmitted, undoubtedly by the device brought to London by the man from China.

And he had carried the new distorter with him to Fogg’s house just in case he would not be able to get hold of Passepartout’s.

The colonel went up the steps and returned a minute later. He left the house with a hard slam of the door. Nemo called out, “The fool! Will he never go quietly?”

Valdeleur got up to look through the window. He gave a cry and clutched the curtains. Then he said, “The idiot!”

He whirled and ran to the foot of the staircase and called up, “Your brother’s in trouble!”

Passepartout could hear the heavy footsteps of Nemo as he ran to the room overlooking the street. A moment later, his boots sounded on the floor as he returned and on the steps as he descended. He strode to the curtains, pulled Vandeleur roughly aside, and looked out.

He swore and said, “I told him! He was to keep his body away!”

He swore again, ran to the door, opened it, and then closed it again.

Passepartout heard a shrill whinnying, the clatter of hooves, and a scream. Shouts from down the street came faintly.

Vandeleur swore also.

“The beast knocked him down and the hansom rode over him!”

He turned to Nemo.

“What do we do now?”

Nemo said, “Oh, the fool! He’ll pay for this!”

“In more ways than one,” Vandeleur said. “He’s unconscious, the bloody blighter!”

“How he ever got to be a colonel is understandable only if you know the general level of intelligence of Her Majesty’s officers,” Nemo said. “But how I could be brother to him and that other idiot is explainable only by the fact that we had different mothers!”

“I didn’t know that,” Vandeleur muttered. “That explains why your brother’s named James, too.”

“And a fine lot of confusion that resulted in, too!” Nemo said. “She would insist on naming him after her father, even if my father objected!”

His expression became even harder. He said, “That’s neither here nor there.”

He went back up the stairs. Presumably, he was notifying whoever was stationed at the door of Fogg’s bedroom of the situation.

Passepartout groaned behind the gag. If only Mr. Fogg and Aouda had known about this, they could have made a break. With only one man at their door, they might have gotten loose.

Aouda was in her room and wondering if Phileas Fogg would ever ask her to marry him.

If she were called away on another mission, she might never see him again. If he did not ask her soon, he might not get a chance even if he wished to do so. Perhaps he was hesitating now only because she was a Parsi. Still, she could pass for a European, and their children would be even more European-looking than she.

But she doubted that her Oriental origin had anything to do with his failure to speak up. What did Fogg care about the opinions of others? No, his difficulty was his inability to express his deepest feelings. He had too much self-control, which meant, in effect, that in many things he could not control his true self.

Fogg, in his room, was thinking about asking Aouda to marry him. But what kind of life could he offer her? It was true that, once she started having children, she would be exempt from missions. Yet, she would know no ease of mind. He would be gone for long periods, in peril most of the time, and could be expected to be killed at any time. Moreover, if the Capelleans found out where she lived, they would kill her and perhaps the children, too.