Adrift in the Ice-Fields

  CHAPTER IX.

  ADRIFT.

  About midday, Captain Lund drove down on the ice to draw up the boatowned by his sons; after which he was to return a second time for thedecoys and shooting-box of the homeward-bound sportsmen. The floe wasfast wasting under the April sun, and his horses' iron-shod hoofs sankdeep into the snow-ice, which the night-frosts had left at morn as hardas flint.

  He drove with his habitual caution, sounding more than one suspiciousplace with the axe, and at last came to a long tide-crack, through whichthe open water showed clear, and which seemed to divide the floe as faras the eye could reach.

  "I come none too soon," said the deliberate pilot; "and I must warn LaSalle not to trust his boat here another night."

  "Well, captain, what think you of the weather?" asked La Salle, as theshaggy pony and rough sled halted near the boat.

  "It looks a little cloudy, but I guess nothing more than a fog may beexpected to-night. You had better have your boat ready to get ashoreright away; for the ice, though heavy enough, is full of cracks, andwill go off with the first northerly gale which comes with the ebb."

  "Well, I'll be getting the boat clear of the ice, and you may come forus the last of all."

  And Lund, driving down the bar to his own boat, left La Salle busily atwork, with axe and shovel, clearing away the well-packed ice which hadfor the last three weeks concealed the sides of the goose-boat.

  By the time that Lund had hooked on to his own boat and driven up again,a large heap of ice and snow had been thrown out; but the runners wereevidently frozen down, and the boat was immovable.

  "I shan't have her clear until you get through with Davies's outfit; butI guess we shall be ready for you then."

  Lund drove on, dragging the heavy boat up to the beach, and thenconcluded to haul it up the bank, above the reach of the increasingtides, and the danger of being crushed by the ice. As he cast off herrope, he felt a snow-flake on the back of his hand. Before he reachedthe ice, they were falling thick and noiselessly.

  "I must hurry; for there's no time to lose. The tide is just at itsturn; and if the wind comes from the north, the boys will be adrift.Come; get up, Lightfoot. G'lang! Whoop! Go it!"

  Already the rising wind began to whirl the thick-falling flakes insmothering wreaths, and Lund groaned in spirit as, following the tracksof his last trip, the stanch little horse galloped down the ice.

  "I am afraid this is the end of my vision; for the ice won't be long inbreaking up now, and those boys are out in that d--n little craft."

  And Lund in his perturbation swore and cursed after the manner of"sailor-men" generally; that is, when they most need to pray.

  Suddenly the little horse hesitated, relaxed into a trot, snorted,reared, and stopped, wheeling half around, with the sleigh-runnersdiagonally across the half-effaced track, which came to an unexpectedstop. Lund saw at once that another rod would have plunged horse and maninto the Gulf; the ice-fields had parted, and the boats and theiroccupants were floating away at the mercy of the winds and waves.

  "Let's see," said Lund; "the wind is nor'-east, and the tide will setthem in some, too. So, if the gale does not shift, that'll carry thempast McQuarrie's Point, and I'll hail them then, and let them know wherethey are. God grant that they've got the boat clear; for once away fromthe lee of the island, their craft would never find land in such asquall as this. Come, Lightfoot," he added, as he sprang upon the sled,and brought his leathern reins smartly across the animal's back,"there's four lives on our speed; so go your fastest, poor fellow! andGod help that we may not be too late."

  Meanwhile La Salle and Peter had viewed with no little anxiety thesudden overclouding of the sky, or rather the heavy curtain of vaporwhich seemed to descend mysteriously from the zenith, rather than togather from beyond the horizon.

  "I no like snow; wind no good this time; tide too high. Spose Lund come,must get boat across crack yonder any way."

  And the one-armed hunter plied the light axe with a haste which showedno small amount of anxiety.

  The boat was soon clear, but the snow was falling so fast that theycould scarcely see to windward at all, and no part of the land wasvisible. Again the Indian spoke, and a new cause of anxiety was stated.

  "Where sposum boys this time? See boat little hile ago. No see any now.They no see hice. Spose shootum big gun call them hin?"

  La Salle took the heavy piece, and was about to discharge it to leeward,when, from the very air above their heads, a voice seemed to call onthem by name, "La Salle, Charley, Peter, ahoy!"

  La Salle dropped the butt of his gun, and listened. Again the voicesounded apparently nearer than before. "Charley, Peter, ahoy!"

  "That voice ole man Lund. I know it; but what for sposum voice there?Then track go that way. Ole man lose way, spose."

  "Perhaps he has fallen in, Peter. Come, let's go."

  And catching a rope near him, and forgetting to lay down the cumbrousgun, Charley ran towards the incessant and evidently-agonized cries,Peter following with an axe and a light fish-spear.

  Scarcely had the runners gone a hundred yards before they stopped indismay. At their feet the ice-field ended abruptly, and scarce a hundredyards away rose a wall of red sandstone, on whose summit stood Lund,peering down into the whirl of snow-flakes. His quick eye espied them,and he shouted his last advice.

  "Launch your boat at once; don't wait. Keep under the lee. Don't try tosave anything but your lives. Keep the wind at your backs in rowing, andmind the set of the tide eastward."

  "Ay, ay! I understand. We're waiting for the boys!" shouted La Salle.

  "I can't hear a word," called out Lund across the rapidly-increasingspace.

  "Give me that spear, Peter," said La Salle.

  And snapping off the tiny barbs, he drew from his pocket a pencil, andwrote as follows on the slender rod of white maple:--

  "We know our danger, but have no oars; for the boys have not returned. Unless they do so soon, shall stick to the ice until the weather clears. Look for us along the coast if the storm lasts.

  "Love to all. LA SALLE."

  Holding up the rod to be seen by Lund, he placed it in the muzzle of hispiece, and motioned to the captain to watch its flight. The pilotstepped behind a tree, and La Salle aimed at the face of a largesnow-drift near him. The report echoed amid the broken ledges, the longwhite arrow sped through the air, and stuck in the snow close to thetree. Lund picked it up, and bent over it a moment; then bowed his head,as if assuring them of his approval of its contents.

  Already the floe had moved into rough water, and the short waves raisedby the increasing gale began to throw their spray far up on the ice. Thesnow-squall gathered fury, and La Salle, waving his hand, pointedheavenward, while Peter, knowing but too well the danger of theirposition, sank on his knees, and began the simple prayers of his faith.Lund saw them fade from view into the sleety veil that hid the waste ofwaters, and groaning in spirit, turned homeward.

  "In half an hour no boat on the island can reach them, even if men couldbe found to face certain death in a snow-storm out on the open Gulf."

  Peter rose to his feet, apparently almost hopeless.

  "Good by, Saint Peter's! Good by, Trois Lieues' Creek! Good by, Lund!Poor Peter no more shootum wild goose here."

  "Come, Peter, don't give it up so," said La Salle. "We must find theboys and get their oars and boat, and then well try and see what we cando to get ashore."

  Peter's eyes brightened a little, and walking around the edge of thefloe, they came, in the course of twenty minutes, to the boys, snuglyseated under their inverted boat, in a hollow of a large berg, which,until that day, had never floated with the tide.

  "Come, boys, this won't do. We're adrift, and getting well out into theGulf. Turn over your boat, put everything into her, and let's try whatwe can do with the big boat."

  In desperate haste the four took down the light craft, threw in the oarsand guns, and dashed across the quarter of a mile which lay b
etween themand the windward side of the ice. In about five minutes they reached thelarge boat; but all saw at a glance that little less than a miracle wasneeded to carry them safe ashore.

  The snow was falling thick and fast, the wind driving it in eddyingclouds, and amid it could be seen at times the white caps of theincreasing surges as they broke on the edge of the floe. It was evidentthat it would be madness to attempt to leave their present position; yetall stood silent a moment, as if unwilling to be the first to confessthe painful truth.

  At last La Salle broke the silence. "It's no use, boys; we must stayhere all night. And first, let's get both boats down to the berg, forthis floe may go to pieces any time; but that is all of twenty feetthick, and will stand a good deal yet. Come, pile in the decoys andtools, and let's get under cover as soon as we can."

  The decoys of iron and wood, and even those of fir-twigs, of which theyhad added some three dozen, were piled into the boats, and taking holdat the painter of the largest, they soon trundled the heavy load to thethickest part of the field.

  "Sposum we get Davies's box and 'coys too. Then we makum camp, haveplenty wood too. Spose field break up, loosem sartin," said Peter.

  "You're right. Come, boys. We don't know how long we may be on thisice-field, and we shall need all the shelter we can get, and fuel too."

  It was nearly an hour before they found the box and its pile of decoys,but the box had been furnished with rude runners, and being alreadyclear of the ice, there was no delay in what was evidently becoming adangerous proximity to the sea; for that edge of the ice was alreadybreaking up, as the rollers broke over it, bearing it down with theweight of water. Sunset must have been close at hand when the partyarrived, wet, weary, and almost despairing, at the berg.

  "Now, boys," said La Salle, "we must build our house at once, for no onecan tell how long this storm may last. Luckily we have two shovels andtwo axes. Peter and I will cut away the ice, and you two will pile upfragments, and clear away the snow and rubbish."

  Choosing a crater-like depression on the summit of the berg, La Sallelaid out a parallelogram about eight feet square, and motioning toPeter, proceeded to sink a square shaft into the solid ice, which, atfirst a little spongy, rapidly became hard and flinty. Aided by thenatural shape of the berg, in the course of an hour a cavity had beencleared out to the depth of about six feet. Over this was inverted thebox belonging to Davies, and this was kept in place by fragments of icepiled around and over it, after which the interstices were filled withwet snow, and the whole patted into a firm, impermeable mound.

  On the leeward side the wall had been purposely left thin, and throughthis a narrow door, about three feet high, was cut into the excavation.Lighting his lantern, La Salle stepped inside, finding himself in agloomy but warm room, about nine feet high in the walls, and eight feetsquare. Taking the dryest of the fir decoys, he cut the cords whichbound them together, and laying the icy branches of their outer coveringon the bare ice, soon formed a non-conducting carpet of fir-twigs, ofwhich the upper layers were nearly dry.

  The whole party then entered, carefully brushing from their clothes andboots as much of the snow as possible, and, seating themselves, for thefirst time rested from incessant exertion amid the furious peltings of adriving north-east snow-storm.

  La Salle motioned to the rest to place their guns in a nook near thedoor, and taking the boiler of the lantern, filled it with snow, andplaced it above the flame. Regnar, noticing this, went out and broughtin the rude chest containing the remnants of their little stock ofcoffee, and the basket with what was left of the day's lunch.

  In the former were found a few matches, about a half pound of coffee,perhaps a pound of sugar, a box and a half of sardines, and two or threedozen ship's hard-bread. In the basket were left several slices ofbread, a junk of corned beef weighing about two pounds, and some applesand doughnuts.

  In a short time the tiny boiler, which held about a pint, was full ofboiling water, to which La Salle added some coffee, and soon each had asmall but refreshing draught, which helped wonderfully to restore theirusual warmth and vigor of circulation. From the lunch-basket, whosecontents had remained untouched all day, a slight meal was taken, andthen the remainder of the provisions put carefully away, although asecond cup of coffee was left preparing in the lantern for possiblecontingencies.

  La Salle looked at his watch--it was nearly eight o'clock.

  "We are now well down off Point Prime, and are probably under the lee ofother ice, as we no longer feel the tossing of the sea. The boats areall ready for use, but it is not likely we shall need them to-night,unless, indeed--Let us hold a council of war, and decide at once on ourcourse of action."

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