The Blue Envelope Part 19

"May be a valuable find. Let's hurry," exclaimed Lucile.

Breaking into a run, they soon reached its side.

"Let's explore it!" whispered Marian. "You take the forecastle and I'll take the after-cabin," she laughed, as she thrust her arm into the open s.p.a.ce toward the stern of the kiak.

"Why, there is something there!" she exclaimed.

"Something here, too!" answered Lucile excitedly, as her slender white hand tugged away at a bundle which had been thrust into the prow of the boat.

"It's like going through your stocking Christmas morning!" laughed Marian, for the moment quite forgetting their dilemma in the excitement of discovery.

Marian drew forth a large sealskin sack. It was heavy and was tied tightly at the mouth. It gave forth a strange plop as she turned it over.

"Some sort of liquid," she announced. "Probably seal-oil."

With difficulty she untied the strings and opened the sack. Then quickly she pinched her nose. "Whew! What a smell!"

"Let's see," said Lucile, dropping the bundle she had just dragged forth. "Yes, it's seal-oil. That's a good find."

"Why? We can't use that stuff. It must be at least a year old and rotten. Talk about limburger cheese! Whew!"

She quickly tied the sack up again.

"Well," said Lucile, "we probably won't want to use it for food, but white people as fine-blooded as we have been compelled to. It's better than starving. But I was thinking about a fire. If we ever find any fuel where we're going--wherever that is--" she smiled a trifle uncertainly, "we'll need some oil to help start the fire if the fuel is damp, as most driftwood is."

"Driftwood? When do we go ash.o.r.e?" laughed Marian.

"It's well to be prepared for anything," smiled Lucile. "Let's see what's in my prize package."

Marian leaned forward eagerly while Lucile untied a leather thong.

"Deerskins!" she cried exultantly. "Four of them! Enough for a sleeping-bag! And wrapped in a sealskin square which will protect us from the damp. I believe," she said thoughtfully, "that this native must have been planning a little trip up the coast, and if he was there must be other useful things in our ark, for an Eskimo never ventures far without being prepared for every emergency."

Once more they bent over the kiak, each one to search her corner.

"Another sack!" cried Lucile; "a hunting sack, with matches wrapped in oiled sealskin, a butcher knife, some skin-rope, a pair of boola b.a.l.l.s with the strings, a fish line with hook and sinker; two big needles stuck in a bit of canvas. That's about all, but it's a lot."

"I've found a little circular wooden box," said Marian. "More food, I guess; probably the kind you can't eat without gagging. No," she cried, after a moment, "here's a big square of tea--the Russian kind, all pressed hard into a brick. There's enough for a dozen tea parties.

Oh, joy! here are three pilot biscuits!"

"Pilot biscuits!" Lucile danced about on the ice.

These large brown disks of hardtack, so often despised, would not have been half so welcome had they been solid gold.

"Well, I guess that's about all," but Marian smiled. "I'm hungry already, but we daren't eat anything yet. We'll save these and eat the deer meat first that we brought along."

"We'll be pretty awful hungry, I am afraid," said Lucile, "before we leave the ocean. But what worries me just now is a drink. Do you suppose we could find an ice-pool of fresh water?"

A short search found them the desired pool, and each drank to her heart's content. They then sat down upon the top of the kiak for a brief consultation. After talking matters over they decided that the best thing they could do was to remain by the kiak until the fog cleared. It was true that the kiak, carefully managed, would carry them across the break in the floe, but, once across, they would be no better off than before, since they had no way of determining directions. Furthermore, neither of them had ever handled a kiak and they knew all too well what a spill meant in that stinging water.

"Guess we'd better stick right here," said Marian, and Lucile agreed.

"Now," suggested Lucile, "we'll put your middy on a paddle and set it up as a sign of distress; then, since the ice isn't piling, I think we might both sleep a little while."

The flag was soon hoisted, and the girls, with the sealskin square beneath them, lay down under the deerskins and attempted to sleep. But the deerskins were not large enough to cover them, and kept sliding off. They were chilled through and sleep was impossible.

"Lucile," said Marian at last, "I believe we could set the kiak up and bank it solidly into place, then creep into it and sleep there."

"We might," said Lucile doubtfully.

The kiak was soon set, and, after many doublings and twistings, with much laughter they managed to slide down into it, and there, with two of the deerskins for a mattress and two for covers, they at last fell asleep in one another's arms, as peacefully as children in a trundle-bed.

"Oh, Marian, you're too--too chubby!" Lucile laughed, as she attempted to struggle from the bean-pod-like bed, after they had slept for some time.

Their first glance at the break in the floe told them it had widened rather than narrowed. A look skyward showed them that the fog too had thickened. Lucile's brow wrinkled; her eyes were downcast.

"Cheer up!" said Marian. "You can never tell what will happen. Things change rapidly in this Arctic world. We'd better explore our ice-floe, hadn't we? And don't you think we could eat a bit before we go?"

Cheered by the very thought of something to be done, Lucile munched her half of the pilot biscuit and bit of reindeer meat contentedly.

Then, after they had seen to it that their white middy flag was properly fastened, for this must act as a guide back to camp, they prepared to go exploring.

Armed with the butcher knife, Lucile led the way. Marian carried the fishing tackle, and about her waist were wound the strings of the boola ball.

"Quite some hunters," laughed Marian. "Regular Robinson Crusoettes!"

Several wide circles of the camp revealed nothing but ice, the whiteness of which was relieved here and there by spots of water, black as night.

"Might be fish in them," suggested Marian.

"Yes, but you couldn't catch them. You can only catch tomcod through a hole in the ice."

They were becoming tired, and had spoken of turning back, when Marian whispered:

"Down!"

She pulled her companion into the dark side of an ice-pile.

A shadow had pa.s.sed over the ice. Now it pa.s.sed again, and Lucile, looking up, saw a small flock of ducks circling for a pool of water not twenty yards away.

"Wha--what's the idea?" she whispered.

"Boola b.a.l.l.s. Maybe we can catch one. They come from the north; not easily scared."

"Can you--"

"Yes, my brother showed me how to handle the boola b.a.l.l.s. You whirl them about your head a few times, then you let them go. If the string strikes a duck's neck, it winds all about it; then the duck can't fly."