But it was not sufficient to reach the foot of the walls, it was necessary to make an opening there. For this operation Phileas Fogg and his companions had nothing at all but their pocket-knives. Fortunately, the temple walls were composed of a mixture of bricks and wood, which could not be difficult to make a hole through. The first brick once taken out, the others would easily follow. They went at it, making as little noise as possible. The Parsee, from one side, and Passepartout, from the other, worked to unfasten the bricks, so as to get an opening two feet wide.
The work was progressing, but—unfortunate mischance—some guards showed themselves at the rear of the pagoda, and established themselves there so as to hinder an approach.
It would be difficult to describe the disappointment of these four men, stopped in their work. "What can we do but leave?" asked the general in a low voice.
"We can only leave," replied the guide.
"Wait," said Fogg. "It will do if I reach Allahabad to-morrow before noon."
"But what hope have you?" replied Sir Francis Cromarty. "It will soon be daylight, and———"
"The chances which escape us now may return at the last moment."
The general would have liked to read Phileas Fogg's eyes. What was this cold-blooded Englishman counting on? Would he, at the moment of the sacrifice, rush towards the young woman, and openly tear her from her murderers?
That would have been madness, and how could it be admitted that this man was mad to this degree? Nevertheless, Sir Francis Cromarty consented to wait until the denouement of this terrible scene. The guide did not leave his companions at the spot where they had hid, but took them back to the foreground of the clearing. There, sheltered by a clump of trees, they could watch the sleeping groups.
In the meantime Passepartout, perched upon the lower branches of a tree, was meditating an idea which had first crossed his mind like a flash, and which finally imbedded itself in his brain. He had commenced by saying to himself, "What madness!" and now he repeated, "Why not, after all? It is a chance, perhaps the only one, and with such brutes———"
