Steve Young Part 35

"I am so ashamed, Marsham!" he cried warmly.

"For doing your duty as a non-combatant man?" replied the captain, smiling. "Nonsense! You did me the greatest service you could by keeping out of my way."

In a short time the sailor who acted the part of steward appeared, to show that the routine of the ship, interrupted by that fearful storm, had been resumed, and that the cook had his galley fire going; for a good breakfast was spread upon the table, after which Steve hurried out on deck, leaving the captain to have an hour or two's rest.

He gazed about him wonderingly, his eyes dazzled by the brilliant light; for the sun was shining brightly, and flashing and sparkling from the ice and snow floating in every direction and in motion in the water, which appeared by contrast absolutely black.

The _Hvalross_ was under steam, for the ropes and sails were thickly coated with ice and snow; but the aim of the man who was now on the bridge was not to attempt progress so much as to avoid coming in contact with the ma.s.ses and fields of ice which from time to time threatened to close in around and crush her like a sh.e.l.l. For there were ma.s.ses of ice from the size of one of the boats right up to detached fields that were hundreds of yards across; and feeling as if they had escaped a horrible danger, and in perfect ignorance of the fact that their position was as perilous as ever, Steve feasted his eyes on the glorious spread of fantastic beauty before him, and felt as if he had just awakened in a world where everything was silver, even to the vessel in which he sailed.

There were no towering icebergs such as are encountered floating in the Atlantic, for the ice here consisted of the broken-up surface of the frozen sea, the largest pieces not being twenty feet in height, and looking, from their irregularity, as if one field had been forced over another by the rushing waters, which ripped and tore and broke up the ice barrier at whose edge they had so often sailed. But these pieces exhibited every shade of lovely blue, side by side with the glittering as of crystallised silver, for their inequalities were in places covered with soft powdery snow such as three of the men were sc.r.a.ping up and brushing from the deck and tops of the deckhouses where it lay piled.

Forward the st.u.r.dy Nors.e.m.e.n were standing armed with hitchers and poles, which they held ready to try and ease off the floating ma.s.ses of ice, to keep them from driving hard on to the ship's bows, with the result that generally the _Hvalross_ was spared a heavy concussion, and the blocks went sc.r.a.ping along the sides. Every now and then there was a loud crushing up of the smaller pieces between the larger, some being shivered to atoms, while others were forced upward one above another, explaining the noises heard in the cabin; and soon after Steve had another startling experience in the splitting across of a great field of ice, which, consequent upon the undulating motion given by the sea, snapped with a noise like thunder; and this was followed by crashing and splitting of a nature that gave appalling evidence of the power of nature under circ.u.mstances like these.

"Well, Mr Steve," said the mate, as the lad mounted to the bridge beside him. "Mind; it's very slippery here."

"I've found that out," said the boy merrily; for he had hurt his shin in climbing the icy steps of the ladder.

"Yes, it is awkward. Well, what do you think of this?"

"Wonderful! Grand!" cried the boy. "Never saw anything so beautiful before."

"Oh yes, very beautiful," said the mate grimly; and Steve saw how haggard and weary he looked. "But I could do with a little less beauty and more open water, my lad."

"Yes; it is awkward to steer amongst all this."

"Very," said the mate drily, as there was a sharp concussion against a great floating piece of ice, which the strong prow of the _Hvalross_, cased with iron to meet such contingencies, cut in two as if it had been snow.

"You like it, then?" said the mate.

"Like it! Why, it's grander than anything I can imagine."

"Yes; grand enough to crush up the _Hvalross_ like an eggsh.e.l.l,"

muttered the mate.

"Yes; but you'll take care it does not!" cried Steve, smiling. "She would go to pieces on rocks, but you and the captain will mind that she does not."

The mate's grim, weary face brightened into a smile, and he clapped one of his fur-gloved hands on Steve's shoulder.

"Bravo, boy!" he said. "It's a fine thing to be your age, full of hope and confidence. Yes, we'll do our best not to get crushed; but it's a very awkward position to be in."

"Why?" said Steve. "The storm's over."

"Yes, the storm's over; but look where we are drifting north with all this. Suppose we come to the stationary ice, with all these great floes behind us?"

"Well, what then?"

"What then?" said the mate, with a laugh at this questioner's innocence.

"Why, the drifting ice behind us, pressed forward with a power of millions of tons, will force us against the fixed ice, and then we shall either be lifted right out of the water, or go, as I said, like an eggsh.e.l.l."

"Ah! but that's only what might happen," said Steve. "I say, though, Mr Lowe, whereabouts are we? Not up by the North Pole?"

"No," said the mate, smiling as he gave a look round, shading his eyes with his hand; "I don't see it sticking up out of the snow. We're not anywhere near the North Pole, but I can give a pretty shrewd guess as to where we are."

"Can you?"

"We've been driven right through the opened-up ice somewhere a long way east and north of Spitzbergen. I should say about where land was sighted in one of the expeditions up beyond Gillis Land, toward where the Austrians saw a coast which they called Franz Josef."

"Ah!"

"I don't say that's it; but we're somewhere thereabouts, and--"

He stopped short to use his gla.s.s for a few minutes, Steve watching him impatiently.

"Yes," he said at last, "there's land yonder."

"Where? amongst that ice?"

"Yes; look," said the mate, handing the gla.s.s; "right in the nor'-east yonder. There's land miles away. Quite mountainous. See it?"

"I can see a glittering pyramid of ice; yes, and a big, heavy ma.s.s beside it."

"That's right; that's it."

"But it's ice and snow, not land."

"The land's under it, my lad," said the mate. "The ice and snow don't pile up like that without something to stand on. The captain ought to know this; but he's so done up I wouldn't wake him. He could do no good if he came on deck."

"Then shall you make for that land?"

"Yes; there's nothing else to be done. We must go forward now, as there's open water. All astern is ice, where we should certainly be nipped. That's safety for us if we can steam there, for we should be sure to find some cove or fiord, and shelter from the pressure of the ice."

"But suppose we should get into a fiord, and the ice blocked us in, what then?" said Steve, more anxiously.

"Why, then we should have to wait till it opened again and let us out."

"But it might be a long time."

"Perhaps so; but that's better than getting our ship crushed, eh?"

"Of course," said Steve; and soon after he went down to talk to the Nors.e.m.e.n forward, the momentary depression at the idea of being shut in having pa.s.sed away.

There was a low, whimpering muttering as he neared the galley, the door of which was ajar, and he heard the cook say angrily:

"Look here, sir, if you don't stop that snivelling, I'll stand you outside to let the tears freeze. I'm not going to have you turning on the rain here. Do you want to put my fire out?"

"Aw canna help it," said Watty piteously. "Aw was thenking aboot my mither."

"Thinking about your 'mither,' you great calf! Well, other people think about their 'mithers,' but they don't go on blubbering when they've got some potatoes to wash. Hullo! Tut, tut, tut! They'll have to go overboard. Here, take these from close by the stove. Those others are frozen."