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Chapters 33–37

Summary: Chapter 33: Detective Fix Springs His Trap

While onboard the Henrietta, Fogg makes a daring move to lock Captain Speedy in a cabin and force the crew members to change course from Bordeaux, France, to Liverpool, England. The crew warns Fogg that they don’t have enough coal to make the trip. Fogg orders them to burn all the coal anyway, and it soon becomes obvious that the crew was right and the coal will burn out before they make landfall. Fogg releases Captain Speedy, demanding he sell him his ship so he can burn some of its wood for fuel. Captain Speedy angrily accuses Fogg of being a pirate and says he’ll never sell his ship, that it’s worth over $50,000. Fogg offers him $60,000, $10,000 more than Speedy’s quoted price. Speedy joyfully accepts, exclaiming what a wise decision it was to let Fogg onboard. With no more wood or fuel to spare, the ship lands in Queenstown, an Irish port. Fogg and the group make a mad dash for Liverpool by way of Dublin. Now on English soil and with his arrest warrant valid, Fix arrests Fogg for robbery and carries him off to jail.

Summary: Chapter 34: Back to London at Last!

Fogg has less than a day to meet his deadline or he loses the bet. Passepartout blames himself for not telling Fogg about Fix sooner. Aouda feels distraught but still doesn’t believe Fogg is a criminal. Fogg sits in his jail cell, calmly looking at his watch. At 2:33 p.m., Fix comes to free Fogg after it is reported that the real criminal had been found and arrested three days earlier. Fogg punches Fix brutally and finds the fastest train to London. He arrives at 8:50 p.m., five minutes past his deadline.

Summary: Chapter 35: A Sad Homecoming

Back at home, Fogg sits, feeling depressed at his loss. He has only a few banknotes left, and the rest of his money is getting ready to be transferred to pay off the bet. He doesn’t go to the Reform Club at 11:30 a.m. the next day as usual but stays in his room instead. Fogg apologizes to Aouda for bringing her to England now that he has no money to care for her. Aouda apologizes to Fogg, saying that if he didn’t save her, he may have made it back in time. Aouda asks him if he has any friends or relatives to help. Fogg replies that he has no one. Aouda boldly asks if he’d like to have both—by making her his wife. Fogg, with a tear in his eye, says yes and that he loves her. He arranges to have the Reverend Wilson marry them the next day.

Summary: Chapter 36: A Good Name Restored

Chapter 36 takes place in the parlor room at the Reform Club, where the men are looking at the clock, discussing whether Fogg will arrive in time to win the bet. The men wait for Fogg to arrive at 8:45 p.m. on December 21. At exactly 8:45 pm, Fogg appears.

Summary: Chapter 37: A Happy Ending

Readers learn that Passepartout, who was sent to Reverend Wilson’s house to get him for Fogg and Aouda’s marriage, has learned from the reverend that it is actually a day earlier than Passepartout and Fogg thought. Fogg, for all his attention to time, had forgotten that he would gain a day traveling east across the world. Passepartout rushes home with the news and arrives at 8:40 p.m., telling Fogg he has five minutes to get to the Reform Club. Fogg rushes to the club with seconds to spare. Fogg has won the bet. The trip, however, has cost him 19,000 pounds. Fogg splits his remaining 1,000 pounds between Passepartout and Fix, the latter of whom he has forgiven.

Fogg makes Passepartout use some of the money to pay for his gas bill to teach him a lesson about paying attention. Aouda asks Fogg if he’s still willing to marry her now that he’s rich again. He says of course, especially since if she didn’t raise the idea to get married, they would have never found out from Reverend Wilson that they actually were a day ahead. Back home, Passepartout mentions that Fogg could have made the trip in seventy-eight days. Fogg replies that he would have never met Aouda if that were the case.

Analysis: Chapters 33–37 

As the story closes, the stakes get higher for Fogg. It is the last leg of his trip, and he needs to make it across the Atlantic Ocean. He has just missed the last fast boat, and he is at the docks, bartering for a trip across. As he boards Captain Speedy’s ship, an even more daring and complicated picture of Fogg emerges. Fogg locks Speedy up on his own ship and later forces Speedy to sell him the ship so he can use timbers for fuel since they’ve run out of coal. This behavior is not gentlemanly or even legal. Fogg’s relationship to risk and challenge was always robust, but these events show that he’s willing to commit a crime and act outside the dictates of respectability to achieve his goal.

Speedy angrily accuses Fogg of being a pirate but is quelled when he learns he’ll make a profit off the sale of the ship. Such an event suggests that even in his criminal act, Fogg is still acting with respectability. Again, challenges to Victorian morality and sense of right and wrong are a theme throughout the work. These themes run through Fix’s mixed agenda of chasing after a robber as a call to duty but also for personal gain, and Passepartout’s brushes with alcohol and opium after vowing to have a quieter, more sober life.

Fogg has proven that he’ll rise to the challenge and that money truly is no object to reach his goal. He’ll likely be in the red by the time he reaches London, even if he wins the bet. By the end of the story, readers can see that money doesn’t motivate Fogg. His foolhardy spending, offering large sums and rewards to almost every person who can and does help him, makes him almost wasteful. More importantly, such behavior suggests that Fogg isn’t actually as precise as he first appeared to be. Money, unlike time, can and does slip through his fingers.

In the end, Fogg cares most for having an emotional connection with another person, something he lacked for so long. This revelation is a surprise even to himself. It’s ironic that Fogg has to travel eighty days across the world to find love and true friendship, but he does, with his servant, Passepartout, and his new wife, Aouda. True to the archetypal “hero’s journey,” both Fogg and Passepartout have changed over the course of the journey. Passepartout discovers the depths of his inner reserves to act as a loyal servant and can rest easy knowing that he is, in fact, a virtuous person. For his actions and efforts, Passepartout earns himself a rewarding and stable friendship. Fogg learns that he will put friendship over money and duty. Through a master-servant dynamic with Passepartout that is actually productive outside the home, Fogg has facilitated a truly life-changing journey across the world.

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