CHAPTER XIV
A LONESOME ISLAND
After fleeing from the great white bear, the two girls crouched behindthe ice pile with bated breath. Expecting at any moment to see thelong neck of the gigantic beast thrust around the corner of the icepile, they longed to flee, yet, not daring, remained crouching there.
"Do you think he saw us?" Marian whispered.
"No. He was snuffing around looking for something to eat."
Marian shivered.
Lucile worked her way about the ice-pile to a point where she could seethrough a crack between cakes, then she motioned Marian to join her.Together they watched the antics of the clumsy white bear.
"My! Isn't it huge!" whispered Marian.
For a time the bear amused himself by knocking rusty ten-gallongasoline cans about. At last, seeming to scent something, he begantearing up a particular garbage pile. Presently a huge rat ran out andwent scurrying away. There followed a lively chase which ended in aprolonged squeal.
"He got him!" Marian shivered.
The bear had moved out of their view. Cautiously, they turned and madetheir way from ice-pile to ice-pile, from the rubbish heap toward camp.
"I hope he doesn't get our scent and follow us," said Lucile. "Theydon't usually bother people much, though."
In spite of her belief that the bear would not harm them, Lucile didnot sleep well that night. "You can never tell what a hungry bearmight do," she kept saying over and over to herself.
At last, late in the night, she fell asleep and slept soundly untilmorning. When finally she did awake, it was with the feeling thatsomehow something had changed.
"Land! Land!" something seemed to be whispering to her. It could havebeen nothing short of intuition which gave her this suggestion. Theyhad been riding on the surface of a gigantic ice-floe. It was,perhaps, twenty miles wide by a hundred long. There was no sense ofmotion. So silent was its sweep, one might imagine oneself to be uponland; yet, as she crept quickly out of her sleeping-bag, she saw atonce that the motion of the floe was arrested and off to the right sheread the reason. A narrow stretch of rocky shore there cast back thefirst rays of the morning sun.
"Marian! Marian!" she called excitedly. "Land! Land! An island!"
There could be no questioning this great good fortune. The oneremaining problem was to reach the shore of that island. They did notdare to abandon their kiak, sleeping-bag, and scanty supplies, for whocould tell them that this was not a small uninhabited island? They hadtraveled many miles with the ice-floe in some direction, perhaps manydirections. Who could say where they were now?
"The ice must be piling close to shore," said Lucile, "but we must tryit. It's our only chance."
After a hasty breakfast of tea and a last remaining bit of cold duck,they piled all their supplies and equipment into the kiak, then,bidding farewell to the humble ice-pan which had given them such a longride, they began dragging the kiak toward the island.
This proved a long and tedious task, requiring all the skill andstrength they possessed, for the island, though scarcely four miles inlength, had appeared to be much closer than it really was. Theice-piles, too, grew rougher and more uneven as they advanced. Whenthey neared the shore, they found themselves in infinite peril, for theice was piling. Here a huge cake a hundred feet across and eight feetthick glided without a sound, up--up, into mid-air, at last to crumbleand fall; and here a mass of small cakes were thrown into convulsions.
Pick their way as they might with greatest care, they were more thanonce in danger of being crushed by overhanging ice-pans, or of beingplunged into a dark pool of water.
When, at length, in triumph, they dragged their kiak to a rocky shelfwell above the trembling ice, Marian, from sheer exhaustion, threwherself flat upon the rock and lay there motionless for some time.Lucile sat beside her absorbed in thought.
At last Marian sat up. "Well, we're here," she smiled, giving herblistered hands a woeful look.
"Yes," smiled Lucile, "we're here. Now where is 'here' and what's itlike?"
The two girls looked at one another solemnly for a full minute. Intheir larder was still a little tea, a pint bottle of weak duck soup, ahalf-can of much frozen condensed milk--and that was all. They were onan island of which as yet they knew nothing. Above them towered great,overhanging cliffs. Before them the giant ice-pans rose, crumbling andcreaking in mad turmoil.
"Life is so strange," said Lucile, at length; then energetically:"Let's make some soup of the things we have left. Then, if we can getup there, we'll explore our island. We'll have three or four hours ofdaylight left, and if there's anything for us to eat anywhere, thesooner we find it out the better."
The climb to the top of the island, which they undertook an hour later,was scarcely less dangerous than had been the struggle to cross thetumbling ice-floe, for this island was little more than a giganticgranite bowlder rising for a distance of some five hundred feet out ofthe sea.
They crept along a narrow shelf where a slip on some pebble might sendthem crashing to death in the tumbled mass of ice below. They scaledan all but perpendicular wall, to drag their sleeping-bag and the fewother belongings, which they had dared attempt to carry, after them bythe aid of a skin-rope. Then, after a few minutes' rest, they wouldrise to climb again.
But at last, their efforts rewarded, they found themselves standing onthe edge of a snow-capped plateau. "Now," said Lucile, "if there areany people living on the island, it won't be on top of it, but in somesheltered cranny down by the shore where they are away from thesweeping winds and where they can hunt and fish."
"But think what they may be like!" said Marian. "They may be savageswho have never seen a white man. We don't even know whether we are ahundred miles from Bering Straits or five hundred. And neither of ushas ever been on an island in the Arctic Ocean!"
"That," said Lucile, "has nothing to do with it. We're on one now. Wecan't very well go back to the ocean ice. We haven't any food. Wecouldn't hide on this little island if we wished to. So the best thingto do is to try to find the people, if there are any, and cast our lotwith them. I once heard a great bishop say that 'humanity iseverywhere very much the same.' We've just got to believe that and goahead."
Shouldering the sleeping-bag, and leaving to Marian the remainingseal-oil in the skin-sack, the butcher knife, and the fishing outfit,she marched steadily forward on a course which in time would enablethem to make the outer circle of the island.
"See those piles of stones?" Lucile said fifteen minutes later. "Thosedid not just happen to be there. They were put there by men. See howcarefully they are piled. The piles look tall and slim. I have hearda sea captain say that the natives of this coast, in very early days,when there was warring among tribes, piled stones on high points likethis to make those who desired to attack them think they were men, andthat there were many warriors in the place."
"Then," said Marian, catching her breath at the thought, "there must bepeople on this island."
"Not for sure," said Lucile. "The people who piled up those rocksmight merely have been living here temporarily, using this island as ahunting station; and then, even if they were living here permanently,famine and contagious diseases may have killed all of them off."
They trudged on again in silence. Everywhere the rocky rim of theisland frowned up at them, offering no suggestion of a path down to thefoot, or of a rocky shelf below where a group of hunters might build avillage.
"There's a place somewhere," said Lucile stoutly, as she lowered herburden to the snow and paused for a brief rest. "There's a path downand we must find it, if it's nothing more than to find a safe spot bythe sea where we can fish for smelt, tomcod and flounders."
Dusk was falling when, at length, with a little cry of joy, Lucilesprang forward, then began a cautious descent over a winding andapparently well-worn trail which even the snow did not completelyconceal.
With hearts beating wildly, in utter silence they mad
e their way down,down the winding way--to what? That, they could not tell.
Finally Lucile paused. She caught her breath quickly and clutched ather throat.
At length, in a calmer moment, she pointed down and to the right of thetrail.
"See that square of white?"
Marian strained her eyes to peer through the gathering darkness.
"Yes," she said at last, "I see it."
"That," said Lucile in a tone that was tense with emotion, "is the roofof a house--a white man's house!"
"Wha--what makes you think so?" gasped Marian.
"There's nothing as square as that in nature's panorama. And a nativedoes not build a house like that."
"And if it is?"
"If it is, we must trust ourselves to their care, though I'd almostrather they were natives." She closed her eyes and saw again therough, unkempt white men, beach combers, who lived by trading, huntingand whaling with the natives. They were a hard, bad lot, and she knewit.
"Well," she sighed, "come on. Let's go down."
Down they went, each turn of the path bringing them closer to themysterious house.
"There's no light," said Lucile at last.
"There are no tracks in the snow," added Marian, a moment later.
"It's boarded up," said Lucile, as they came closer. It would havebeen hard to judge whether there was more of relief or ofdisappointment in the tone in which she said this.
They stood there staring at the house. It was a nice house, a bungalowsuch as one might desire for a summer home in the mountains or at theseashore.
"Who do you suppose brought all that fine lumber up here and built thathouse?" said Lucile.
"I wonder who," echoed Marian.
They took a turn about it. All the windows had been boarded up withrough lumber. There were two doors. These were fastened with padlockand chain. An examination of the locks showed that keys had not beenused in them for months.
Lucile's eyes were caught by poles and some platforms to the right,along the rocky shore. She walked in that direction.
"Marian, come here!" she cried presently. Marian came running. "Look!Here's a whole native village! They've built their homes out of rocks.See! It's like tunneling into the side of the mountain. Must be homesfor a hundred people!"
"And not a soul here! How strange!"
"Not even a dog!" Lucile's own voice sounded strangely hollow to her,as if echoed by the walls of a tomb.