The train started.

"I'm really very sorry, gentlemen," said the conductor.
"Under any other circumstances I should have been happy to oblige you.
But, after all, as you have not had time to fight here,
why not fight as we go along?

"That wouldn't be convenient, perhaps, for this gentleman,"
said the colonel, in a jeering tone.

"It would be perfectly so," replied Phileas Fogg.

"Well, we are really in America," thought Passepartout,
"and the conductor is a gentleman of the first order!"

So muttering, he followed his master.

The two combatants, their seconds, and the conductor passed through
the cars to the rear of the train. The last car was only occupied
by a dozen passengers, whom the conductor politely asked if they would
not be so kind as to leave it vacant for a few moments, as two gentlemen
had an affair of honour to settle. The passengers granted the request
with alacrity, and straightway disappeared on the platform.

The car, which was some fifty feet long, was very convenient
for their purpose. The adversaries might march on each other
in the aisle, and fire at their ease. Never was duel more easily
arranged. Mr. Fogg and Colonel Proctor, each provided with two
six-barrelled revolvers, entered the car. The seconds, remaining
outside, shut them in. They were to begin firing at the first
whistle of the locomotive. After an interval of two minutes,
what remained of the two gentlemen would be taken from the car.

Nothing could be more simple. Indeed, it was all so simple
that Fix and Passepartout felt their hearts beating as if they
would crack. They were listening for the whistle agreed upon,
when suddenly savage cries resounded in the air, accompanied
by reports which certainly did not issue from the car where
the duellists were. The reports continued in front and the whole
length of the train. Cries of terror proceeded from the interior
of the cars.

Colonel Proctor and Mr. Fogg, revolvers in hand, hastily quitted
their prison, and rushed forward where the noise was most clamorous.
They then perceived that the train was attacked by a band of Sioux.

This was not the first attempt of these daring Indians, for more than
once they had waylaid trains on the road. A hundred of them had,
according to their habit, jumped upon the steps without stopping
the train, with the ease of a clown mounting a horse at full gallop.

The Sioux were armed with guns, from which came the reports,
to which the passengers, who were almost all armed, responded
by revolver-shots.

The Indians had first mounted the engine, and half stunned
the engineer and stoker with blows from their muskets.
A Sioux chief, wishing to stop the train, but not knowing
how to work the regulator, had opened wide instead of closing
the steam-valve, and the locomotive was plunging forward
with terrific velocity.

The Sioux had at the same time invaded the cars, skipping like
enraged monkeys over the roofs, thrusting open the doors,
and fighting hand to hand with the passengers. Penetrating the
baggage-car, they pillaged it, throwing the trunks out of the train.
The cries and shots were constant. The travellers defended
themselves bravely; some of the cars were barricaded,
and sustained a siege, like moving forts, carried along
at a speed of a hundred miles an hour.

Aouda behaved courageously from the first. She defended herself
like a true heroine with a revolver, which she shot through the broken
windows whenever a savage made his appearance. Twenty Sioux had fallen
mortally wounded to the ground, and the wheels crushed those who fell
upon the rails as if they had been worms. Several passengers,
shot or stunned, lay on the seats.

It was necessary to put an end to the struggle, which had lasted
for ten minutes, and which would result in the triumph of the Sioux
if the train was not stopped. Fort Kearney station, where there was
a garrison, was only two miles distant; but, that once passed,
the Sioux would be masters of the train between Fort Kearney
and the station beyond.

The conductor was fighting beside Mr. Fogg, when he was shot and fell.
At the same moment he cried, "Unless the train is stopped in five minutes,
we are lost!"

"It shall be stopped," said Phileas Fogg, preparing to rush from the car.

"Stay, monsieur," cried Passepartout; "I will go."

Mr. Fogg had not time to stop the brave fellow, who, opening a door
unperceived by the Indians, succeeded in slipping under the car;
and while the struggle continued and the balls whizzed across each
other over his head, he made use of his old acrobatic experience,
and with amazing agility worked his way under the cars, holding on
to the chains, aiding himself by the brakes and edges of the sashes,
creeping from one car to another with marvellous skill,


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