Passepartout attacks Fix aboard the General Grant

Passepartout attacks Fix aboard the General Grant after discovering the detective has again appeared in the party’s path. The blows settle a personal grievance only briefly: Fix’s admission that he had deliberately obstructed Fogg, followed by his offer to help, turns the encounter into a tense negotiation and exposes the self-interest behind both his pursuit and his sudden reversal.

Setting and Accumulated Grievance

The confrontation comes after Fix has repeatedly worked against Fogg’s progress. While Fogg was still on English ground, Fix wanted to detain him until an arrest warrant arrived. He later tells Passepartout that he sent the Bombay priests after Fogg, got Passepartout intoxicated in Hong Kong, separated him from his master, and caused Fogg to miss the Yokohama steamer. These are not suspicions or accusations supplied by Passepartout: Fix openly lists the obstacles he created, making the attack a response to a sustained campaign of interference.

That campaign had left Passepartout isolated. After missing the steamer, he found himself on the way to Japan without money, though his passage had already been paid. At Yokohama he went ashore and wandered without a plan, feeling alone among the crowds. Fix, meanwhile, was also aboard the ship on which Fogg and Aouda arrived. The two men’s meeting therefore reunites the detective and the servant after Fix’s actions have helped separate Passepartout from his employer.

The attack also stands against Fogg’s characteristic composure. During the voyage through the turbulent Red Sea, the ship rolled heavily, but Fogg showed no outward sign of anxiety and continued his regular meals and whist games. In Bombay, he had likewise ignored the city’s sights and kept to his timetable. Passepartout’s physical eruption gives the conflict a forceful counterpoint to his master’s measured progress: Fix’s obstruction, usually expressed through plans and delays, now meets an immediate bodily answer.

The Attack

On the forward deck, Passepartout rushes at Fix without first speaking. He grasps him by the throat and delivers a volley of blows. A group of Americans watches with amusement and begins betting on the fight; the narration presents the encounter as a comic spectacle, even remarking on the Frenchman’s superiority in pugilistic skill. That public audience contrasts with the private history behind the assault: the onlookers see a sudden brawl, while Passepartout is striking the man responsible for a chain of setbacks.

When Passepartout stops, he feels relieved and comforted. Fix gets up rumpled but answers with cool restraint: “Have you done?” Passepartout replies, “For this time—yes.” Their brief exchange marks the limit of the violence. Passepartout has discharged his anger, but Fix is not chased away or silenced; instead, he asks to speak. The scene shifts from physical force to an account of motives.

Fix’s Reversal

Fix tells Passepartout that he expected the beating and then announces, “I am now in his game.” His position has changed, but not his judgment of Fogg: he still thinks Fogg a criminal. What has changed is the calculation governing his actions. Fix explains that he wanted to hold Fogg in England until the warrant arrived, but that only in England can Passepartout learn whether he is serving an honest man or a criminal. For Fix, helping the journey proceed is now the useful course because it may bring the question to a resolution in England.

The distinction matters. Fix does not confess that his earlier suspicions were mistaken, nor does he offer an apology for the tactics he admits using. He promises instead to keep obstacles out of Fogg’s way, just as he previously put them there, because his interest has shifted. Passepartout listens closely and judges Fix sincere in what he is saying. The detective’s frankness changes the immediate situation without erasing the mistrust produced by his actions.

Conditional Alliance and Significance

Passepartout refuses to call them friends. He allows that they may be allies, while warning Fix that any sign of treachery will bring another attack. Fix accepts the terms quietly. Their compact is therefore practical and provisional: it aligns their immediate interests around Fogg’s progress, but leaves Passepartout’s suspicion explicit and Fix’s belief in Fogg’s guilt intact.

The encounter turns a sequence of concealed impediments into spoken knowledge. Fix names his own role in the delays, and Passepartout learns that the detective’s cooperation does not mean he has been persuaded of Fogg’s innocence. The comic deckside brawl thus produces a consequential change in the journey’s dynamics. Violence ends the immediate personal confrontation; an uneasy bargain determines what follows. Eleven days later, the General Grant reaches San Francisco, and Fogg has neither gained nor lost a day. The attack does not resolve the case, but it changes Fix from an active source of obstacles into a temporary helper whose assistance remains grounded in self-interest.