Philip Jose Farmer (2 page)

Fogg should have looked upset, since the metronome of his life had been checked. All was out of order, and while it is true that not many people would be disturbed by a mere two degree difference in their shaving water, Mr. Fogg regarded such as serious. But his serene expression changed only slightly. His eyebrows raised as if they were a pair of wings reluctantly flapped by a bird accustomed to gliding all its life. Then the eyebrows came down, and Fogg said, in a voice which was cold but not outraged, “You will leave as soon as I have acquired a new valet. You will inquire at some suitable agency for your successor, and I will interview the applicants. I will be here for that purpose until eleven-twenty-five.”

Forster said, “Yes, sir. Very good, sir. And may I ask about my recommendation?”

“You have been satisfactory up to this moment,” Mr. Fogg said. “I will state that in unmistakable terms for any would-be employers. But I must also state exactly why I was forced to dismiss you.”

Mr. Forster did not reply, but he surely must have been thinking that very few employers would regard two degrees of Fahrenheit as anything serious or even worth commenting on.

Neither man smiled at the end of this conversation, though it’s difficult to understand how they could refrain. Though there were no witnesses and no one could possibly have seen or overheard them, neither let down his guard. If there had been a hidden camera or electronic ears, nothing untoward would have been recorded. Of course, in 1872, neither of these devices existed.

Or did they?

What about the very slight whirring that could be heard in 
this house when neither man was speaking? To what could that be attributed? And what about the large mirror in Mr. Fogg’s bedroom? Could this possibly be a one-way piece of glass, and could there be equipment behind it, equipment which even 1972 A.D. might find very advanced indeed?

Whether or not the house was bugged, it was certain that Fogg and Forster never said a word or made a gesture which was not expected from people of their class and in this situation. There was nothing to indicate that 2°F. could be a signal for the dismissal of one servant and the hiring of another. Or that the famous bet made in the Reform Club was also the result of this signal.

This may be an excellent reason for Mr. Fogg’s eccentricity of undeviatingness. To fire a man because he offers water two degrees off the standard is to be eccentric. Such behavior in a “normal” man would at once attract attention. But such behavior was to be expected from Mr. Fogg. Indeed, if he had not reacted as he did, he would have been regarded suspiciously by any hypothetical hidden observer.

At twenty minutes before ten, Forster assisted Fogg to dress. Fifteen minutes later, Forster left the house and took a cab to the employment agency specializing in valets, footmen, maids, and cooks for the well-to-do.

Phileas Fogg sat down in his armchair and assumed his habitual posture. His spine was straight; his shoulder blades were firmly pressed against the back of the chair. His feet were close together. His hands were placed palm down on his knees. His eyes were fixed upon a large clock across the room. This instrument indicated not only the customary seconds, minutes, and hours, but the day, month, and year. He did not move except for the rise 
and fall of chest associated with every living mammal, even Mr. Fogg, when he is breathing normally, and for the blinking of the eyelids. Despite what is said about the unblinking gaze of villains in the penny dreadfuls of 1872 or 1972, no one with eyesight can do without blinking. The results are too painful. And so Mr. Fogg blinked, as he would have voluntarily done even if he had not been naturally required to do so.

He doubted that there were any concealed spies, human or mechanical, in the house, but it was possible. He lived as if he were an automaton—almost like Mr. Poe’s mechanical chess player—for two reasons. One, he had been taught to do so by his foster-father. Two, though he lived quietly, he did so conspicuously. There were few aware of his existence, but these few were very aware. His very standingoutness, however, was the quality to allay the suspicions of the enemy. They would believe that their enemies would be doing all they could to appear normal, to merge into the human herd. Therefore, Mr. Fogg, by his behavior, would convince them that he could not possibly be hiding from them.

Despite this theory, there was some evidence that Fogg was under surveillance. And so Fogg, whether in company or alone, always acted as Fogg should. He had done so for such a long time that he would have found it unnatural to do otherwise.

The image was he, and he was the image.

But this was to change very soon. It may be that the premonition of this, indeed, the certainty, made his heart beat faster.

Perhaps.

But was it not this man who said, “The unforeseen does not exist”? Was he, as he sat unmoving in the chair, using his 
brain as a computer to extrapolate the most likely of the futures? Did his usual training as a child enable him to switch certain neural circuits and stimulate certain patterns in his brain into computing unconsciously and with all the speed of modern electronic brains? Could he visualize the statistical chances of an occurrence 
in potentia
? Fogg never says so in his log, but there are some statements that sound as if he were referring indirectly to such a talent. If he could do this, then he must have known that he could not be sure that such and such a thing would be inevitable. And so, though in a sense the future contains no unforeseens, it holds no inevitabilities. If it did, and these could be anticipated, one side or the other in this secret war would long ago have acknowledged defeat. In fact, the war might have been over before it began, since computation would show both sides who eventually win.

There was a rap on the door—foreseen? James Forster opened the door and said, “The new servant.”

Why did Forster thus announce the applicant? The new man had not yet been interviewed, let alone hired. Why would Forster speak as if the matter were settled? Was it a slip on his part, and the matter had indeed been predetermined?

If so, Fogg’s expression did not change, and Verne says nothing of Forster’s. Why should he? Verne knew nothing of what was taking place behind the scenes.

A man entered and bowed. He was short and stockily built; had a pleasant face with red cheeks and bright blue eyes; his hair was brown and always looked windblown.

Mr. Fogg said, “You are a Frenchman, I believe, and your name is John?”

“Jean, if monsieur pleases. Jean Passepartout...”

Fogg had given the first code of inquiry when he had asked him if his name were John. And the Parisian had replied with the password when he said his name was Passepartout. Just as the name of Fogg indicated a certain role in the organization, by a happy coincidence, so Passepartout indicated his role. But the Frenchman’s name was not the one with which he had been born. He had been dubbed Passepartout—“Passes everywhere”—for a good reason. It indicated more than the Frenchman’s wanderlust and instability.

Passepartout, at Fogg’s request, gave his background. He had been a wandering minstrel, though not necessarily of rags and tatters. He had also ridden horses in circuses, and he had danced on the high wire, like the famous Blondin. If Passepartout could emulate the feats of this fellow Gaul, as he hinted he could, then he should have stuck to the tightrope. It was Blondin who first crossed above Niagara Falls on a wire 160 feet above the water and 1,100 feet long. This he did many times, blindfolded, on stilts, carrying a man on his back, sitting down on a chair and eating a meal, and so on. Only eleven years ago he had appeared at the Crystal Palace in London and there, wearing stilts, had somersaulted on a rope 170 feet above the ground.

It was not to be supposed that Passepartout was the equal of Blondin, but he may not have been far behind in skill. In any event, he had quit the high wire to teach gymnastics for a while. Then he became a fireman in Paris, but he had quit that five years before to take up valeting in England.

Surely this was a strange switch of professions, but he explained that he was tired of the dangerous and the unsettling. 
He desired the quiet life. He was now out of a position, but, hearing of Mr. Fogg, than whom no one led a more strictly scheduled and peaceful life, he had presented himself as a desirable valet. He did not even want to use the name of Passepartout anymore.

Mr. Fogg said, “Passepartout suits me. You are well recommended to me. I hear a good report of you.”

This was strange, because from whom and when would Mr. Fogg have heard about Passepartout? Until a few hours ago, he had not even thought about getting a new servant. Since he had fired Forster and sent him out to get another servant, he had communicated with no one. He had neither inserted an ad in the papers, written a letter and received a reply, nor used the telephone. The latter he did not have, since Mr. Alexander Graham Bell was only twenty-six years old and a little less than four years from filing his patent on the electric speaking telephone.

Mr. Fogg could have sent Forster out to the nearest telegraph office, but Verne says nothing of this. No, just as Forster’s introduction of Passepartout was a slip on his part, so Fogg’s comment on the recommendation was his slip. The question is, were these slips intentionally made to affect the hypothetical hidden observer in a certain fashion? If the unforeseen truly did not exist for Fogg, would he have slipped? And if Fogg made a mistake on purpose, then it’s safe to presume that Forster did so, too. This means that all three, Fogg, Passepartout, and Forster, were cognizant of a certain plan.

“You know my conditions?” Fogg said.

The Frenchman’s answer indicated that Forster had filled him in on the way from the agency.

Fogg then asked Passepartout what time it was. The Frenchman drew an enormous silver watch from his vest pocket, looked at it, and said, “Twenty-two minutes after eleven.”

“You are too slow,” Mr. Fogg said.

Passepartout replied that that was impossible.

Fogg said, coldly, “You are four minutes too slow. No matter. It’s enough to mention this error. Now from this moment, twenty-six minutes after eleven o’clock, this Wednesday, the second of October, you are in my service.”

Phileas Fogg rose, took his hat in his left hand, put it on his head, and walked out.

Mr. Fogg was thoroughly satisfied that Passepartout was the man sent to help him in his new venture, whatever that was to be. Forster had checked him with certain passphrases at the agency. The bit about Passepartout’s watch being slow had been another method of identification. In addition, the Frenchman’s name had indicated his function, and the “enormous” watch was so large because it contained more than a timepiece. Mr. Fogg’s taking his hat with his left hand had been the final signal, since he was right-handed. If he were left-handed, he would have used the right. Passepartout had observed his last confirmation and so was also pleased.

After Fogg left the room, he stood listening for a moment. The door to the street shut. That would be his ally and master leaving at exactly 11:30 a.m. A few seconds later, the door closed again. That would be James Forster going to wherever the plan dictated. There Forster would make another move in the secret and martial chess game that had been going on for two-hundred years between the Eridaneans and the Capelleans.

 2 

The Reform Club toward which Mr. Fogg proceeded at an exact velocity was only one-thousand-and-one-hundred-and-fifty-one paces from Mr. Fogg’s house on Savile Row. Verne does not say what transpired during Fogg’s walk. For him, the ordinary would not have been worth describing, and the extraordinary was not reported to him. However, the ordinary of our day and Fogg’s may be contrasted for the benefit of the reader. The Londoner of 1872 had his own brand of smog. Indeed, the word, formed from smoke and fog, is of London origin. The smoke of hundreds of thousands of industrial and domestic furnaces and stoves burning soft coal often darkened the skies and laid a sooty film over everything. It also gave the London air a rather acrid odor and doubtless contributed to the generation of tuberculosis and other diseases of the lung.