Page:Works of Jules Verne - Parke - Vol 7.djvu/327

 a dozen passengers. The conductor asked them if they would be kind enough to vacate for a few moments for two gentlemen who had an affair of honor to settle.

Why not? The passengers were only too happy to be able to accommodate the two gentlemen, and they retired on the platforms. The car, fifty feet long, accommodated itself very conveniently to the purpose. The two adversaries might march on each other in the aisle, and fire at their ease. There never was a duel easier to arrange. Mr. Fogg and Colonel Proctor, each furnished with two six barreled revolvers, entered the car. Their seconds, remaining outside, shut them in. At the first whistle of the locomotive, they were to commence firing. Then after a lapse of two minutes what remained of the two gentlemen would be taken out of the car Truly, there could be nothing simpler. It was even so simple that Fix and Passepartout felt their hearts beating almost as if they would break.

They were waiting for the whistle agreed upon, when suddenly savage cries resounded. Reports accompanied them, but they did not come from the car reserved for the duelists. These reports continued, on the contrary, as far as the front, and along the whole line of the train. Cries of fright made themselves heard from the inside of the cars.

Colonel Proctor and Mr. Fogg, with their revolvers in hand, went out of the car immediately, and rushed forward where the reports and cries resounded more noisily. They understood that the train had been attacked by a band of Sioux.

It was not the first attempt of these daring Indians. More than once already they had stopped the trains. According to their habit, without waiting for the stopping of the train, rushing upon the steps to the number of a hundred, they had scaled the cars like a clown does a horse at full gallop.

These Sioux were provided with guns. Thence the reports, to which the passengers, nearly all armed, replied sharply by shots from their revolvers. At first the Indians rushed upon the engine. The engineer and fireman were half stunned with blows from their muskets. A Sioux chief, wishing to stop the train, but not knowing how to