Chapter 16

A SNUG REFUGE

The weather had suddenly become intensely cold, and Bobby's wet clothing was already stiff with ice. The northeast wind, laden with Arctic frost, swept the island with withering blasts, and cut to the bone.

The wind was rising, too, and there was no doubt that with darkness it would attain the velocity of a gale, and the storm the proportions of a sub-Arctic blizzard. Snow was already falling heavily, and presently it would be driving and swirling in dense, suffocating clouds. Winter had fallen like a thunderbolt from heaven.

But Bobby never permitted himself to worry needlessly. He was not one of those who with the least difficulty plunge into unnecessary discouragement and lose their capacity for action. It was not in his nature to waste his time and opportunities and energies worrying about what might happen, but what in the end rarely did happen. He conserved his mental and physical powers, and turned his mind and muscles into vigorous and practical action. And like every fortunate possessor of this valuable faculty, Bobby more often than not raised success out of failure.

And so it came to pass that when Bobby found himself cast away upon the naked rocks of a small and treeless sub-Arctic island, with no shelter from the awful cold of a driving blizzard, and with no other tools than his hands, he did not give up and say, "This is the end," and then sit down to wait for the pitiless cold to end his sufferings. What he did say was:

"Well, here I am in another mess, and I've got to find some way out of it."

He examined the skiff carefully and the examination satisfied him that it was too badly injured to be repaired with the means at his command, and so with all his energy he set himself at once to making himself as comfortable as the conditions and the surroundings would permit.

First he scoured the island for wood, for he knew that presently the storm and blizzard would rise to such proportions as to render any efforts to find wood impossible, and any attempt to move about perilous, and therefore no time must be lost.

In a little while he succeeded in collecting a considerable amount of driftwood, and when he turned his attention to other things he had the consolation of knowing that the gale would sweep the snow from the rocks and into the sea, and that any wood that he had overlooked in his search, or had no time now to gather, would be left uncovered, where he could find it when the blizzard was past and he could go abroad again.

He piled his fuel by the side of a big, high, smooth-faced bowlder which he had purposely chosen because of its location, not far from the place where he had been driven ashore, and on the lee side of the island. The smooth face of this bowlder looked toward the water, and with its back toward the wind it offered a fairly good wind-break, and a considerable drift had already formed against its face, or sheltered, side, where the snow lodged as it was driven in swirling gusts around its ends or swept over its top.

When his wood was gathered, Bobby with much effort dragged the boat to the rock, and then working hard and fast cleared away the snow as best he could with the aid of sticks and feet from the smooth rock bed in front of the bowlder, and on which the bowlder rested. He now carried from the innumerable stones lying about upon the wind-swept rocks, sufficient to build at right angles to the bowlder two rough walls about two feet high and as long as the width of the boat. These walls were perhaps eight feet apart, and when they were finished he raised the boat, bottom up, upon them, the after part of the boat resting upon one, the prow extending over the other, and the side of the boat shoved back flush against the bowlder face.

Thus he made for himself a covered shelter, and the front of this he enclosed with other stones, save for a space three feet wide in the center, which he reserved for a door. From low spruce bushes--for there were no trees on the island--he now gathered a quantity of brush and arranged it under the boat for a bed.

Dusk was settling before these arrangements had been completed. When all was at length as snug as his ingenuity could make it in the short time at his disposal, he stored as much of the wood, under the boat as the limited space would allow and still permit him room to stretch with some comfort; and as quickly as possible he built a small fire just outside the door. Already snow had drifted around the ends and on top of the boat and his little fire reflecting heat within soon made his covered nook comfortable enough.

Fourteen sea pigeons would make fourteen meals, though scant ones for a husky fellow like Bobby. Now he was hungry enough, as indeed he always was at meal hour and it did not take him long to pluck and dress one of the birds, and in short order it was grilling merrily on the end of a stick. There was no bread to keep the grilled sea pigeon company, but Bobby did not mind in the least. Indeed, this lack of variety was no hardship. He often dined upon meat alone, and now he was thankful enough to have the sea pigeons, or indeed anything.

But almost before his supper was cooked the little fire, deluged with clouds of snow, dried out and refused to burn, and it became evident to Bobby that he must face the night without fire, and resort to other means to protect himself in his narrow quarters from freezing. He was already ashiver and his hands and feet were numb.

He had no blanket, and no other covering than the wet clothes he wore, and he closed the door of his shelter as best he could with the sticks of driftwood which were stored under the boat. There was nothing else to be done.

The cold had become intense. The storm demon had broken loose in all its fury and was lashing sea and land in wild frenzy. The shrieking wind, the dull, thunderous pounding of the waves upon the rocks and the hiss of driving snow, filled the air with a tumult that was little less than terrifying.

No man unsheltered could have survived an hour upon the exposed rocks of the blizzard-swept island, and cold and shivering as he was, Bobby gave thanks for his narrow little cover under the boat, which in contrast to the world outside appealed to him now as an exceedingly snug retreat. It was safe for a little while, at least, and here he hoped he might have the strength to weather the storm in safety.

And while he lay and listened to the roar and tumult of the storm, presently he became aware that he was growing warmer. His shivering ceased. The bitter chill of the first half hour after his fire went out passed away, and in a little while to his astonishment he discovered that he was not after all so uncomfortable.

"The snow must have covered me all up," he exclaimed with sudden enlightenment, "and I'll be at the bottom of a big drift pretty soon, and that's what's making me warm."

It was dark, and he struck a match to investigate, and sure enough, every chink and crevice, even his door, was packed with snow, and not a breath of air stirred within. Gradually the sound of the shrieking wind and pounding sea seemed farther and farther away, and he heard it as one hears something in the distance.

"Mother's going to be scared for me," he mused, as he rearranged his bed of boughs. "She'll think I'm lost, and I'm sorry. She'll be all right when I get home, though. It is a fine mess to get into."

Then his thoughts turned to Abel Zachariah and Skipper Ed and Jimmy, somewhere out on the coast and weathering the same storm. But they had a tent and a stove, and they would be comfortable enough, he had no doubt.

But there was the seal hunt. Winter had come to cut off the seal hunt two weeks too soon, and they could scarcely have made a beginning. That was a serious matter. The failure of the fishing season, now coupled with an undoubted failure of the autumn seal hunt, would pinch them harder than they had ever been pinched before. Without the seals they would not be able to keep all of their dogs, and the dogs were a necessity of their life.

All of these thoughts passed through Bobby's mind as he lay in the dense darkness of his den. But he was young and he was optimistic, and disturbing thoughts presently gave way to a picture of the snug little cabin at the head of Abel's Bay and of its roaring fire in the big box stove, and with the picture the sound of the storm drew farther and farther away until it became at last one of Mrs. Abel's quaint Eskimo lullabies, that she crooned to him when he was little, and Bobby slept.

And there under the snow drift he slept as peacefully as he could have slept in his bed at home in the cabin at Abel's Bay, and just as peacefully as he could ever have slept in a much finer bed in that misty and forgotten past before he drifted down from the sea to be a part of the life of the stern and desolate Labrador.

And so God prepares and tempers us, to our lot, and shows us how to be happy and content, if we are willing, in whatever land He places us, and with whatever He provides for us. And thus He was tempering Bobby and directing him to his destiny.