ould to keep him back. I sent the Bombay priests after
him, I got you intoxicated at Hong Kong, I separated you from him, and
I made him miss the Yokohama steamer."
Passepartout listened, with closed fists.
"Now," resumed Fix, "Mr. Fogg seems to be going back to England. Well,
I will follow him there. But hereafter I will do as much to keep
obstacles out of his way as I have done up to this time to put them in
his path. I've changed my game, you see, and simply because it was for
my interest to change it. Your interest is the same as mine; for it is
only in England that you will ascertain whether you are in the service
of a criminal or an honest man."
Passepartout listened very attentively to Fix, and was convinced that
he spoke with entire good faith.
"Are we friends?" asked the detective.
"Friends?--no," replied Passepartout; "but allies, perhaps. At the
least sign of treason, however, I'll twist your neck for you."
"Agreed," said the detective quietly.
Eleven days later, on the 3rd of December, the General Grant entered
the bay of the Golden Gate, and reached San Francisco.
Mr. Fogg had neither gained nor lost a single day.
Chapter XXV
IN WHICH A SLIGHT GLIMPSE IS HAD OF SAN FRANCISCO
It was seven in the morning when Mr. Fogg, Aouda, and Passepartout set
foot upon the American continent, if this name can be given to the
floating quay upon which they disembarked. These quays, rising and
falling with the tide, thus facilitate the loading and unloading of
vessels. Alongside them were clippers of all sizes, steamers of all
nationalities, and the steamboats, with several decks rising one above
the other, which ply on the Sacramento and its tributaries. There were
also heaped up the products of a commerce which extends to Mexico,
Chili, Peru, Brazil, Europe, Asia, and all the Pacific islands.
Passepartout, in his joy on reaching at last the American continent,
thought he would manifest it by executing a perilous vault in fine
style; but, tumbling upon some worm-eaten planks, he fell through them.
Put out of countenance by the manner in which he thus "set foot" upon
the New World, he uttered a loud cry, which so frightened the
innumerable cormorants and pelicans that are always perched upon these
movable quays, that they flew noisily away.
Mr. Fogg, on reaching shore, proceeded to find out at what hour the
first train left for New York, and learned that this was at six o'clock
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