Читать книгу Вокруг света за 80 дней / Around the World in Eighty Days - Жюль Верн, Жуль Верн - Страница 6

Phileas Fogg did not suspect that his departure from London created a lively sensation at the West End[44]. The news of the bet soon got into the papers throughout England. They talked, disputed, argued about his “tour of the world”. Many people shook their heads and declared against him. It was absurd, impossible – in this minimum of time! People in general thought him a lunatic, and blamed his Reform Club friends for this wager.

A few readers of the Daily Telegraph even dared to say, “Why not, after all? Stranger things happened.” Everybody knows that to bet is in the English temperament. Not only the members of the Reform, but the general public, made wagers for or against Phileas Fogg. He became a race-horse. But everybody was against Fogg, and the bets stood a hundred and fifty and two hundred to one.

A week after his departure an incident occurred. The commissioner of police was in his office at nine o’clock one evening, when the following telegraphic dispatch arrived:

“Suez to London.

Rowan, Commissioner of Police, Scotland Yard[45]:

I found the bank robber, Phileas Fogg. Send with out delay warrant of arrest[46] to Bombay.

Fix, Detective”.

The effect of this dispatch was instantaneous. The polished gentleman disappeared to give place to the bank robber. The mysterious habits of Phileas Fogg were recalled; his solitary ways, his sudden departure.