Part 7

For ten minutes or more the heaving and grinding continued. Huge pressure ridges formed on every side, and the ice world about us was a living, groaning agony. Then it seemed that there came relief. The pack split and thundered apart in every direction. The Billowcrest settled back into place, and before us lay a long way of open water, stretching northward as far as the eye could reach. Our steam was ready, and in a very brief time we were on our way back to the sea.

“That was about the tightest squeeze I ever got caught in,” observed Gale, “and, say, I didn’t build her for a nip like that, but didn’t the old Billowcrest do noble?”

“Chauncey Gale,” I said, “you’re the best ship builder, and the bravest man God ever made!”

“How much do you want to borrow?” asked Gale, but he said it without bitterness.

XV. AS REPORTED BY MY NOTE-BOOK.

If we were more fearless now, we were also more careful. Our faith in the Billowcrest was complete, but we profited by experience. At the next indication of bad weather, we headed northward in time, and rode out the storm at sea.

I think Captain Biffer had hoped that we would abandon our project after the ice squeeze, but Christmas Day found us far to the westward, and still creeping slowly along the edge of the ice-fields. Our days were a never-ending glory now, for it was midsummer, and of good weather we were having far more than we had been led to expect. We did not need to go to the crow’s-nest to see the midnight sun on Christmas Eve, and Christmas Day we celebrated by crossing the one hundred and fortieth meridian, and by telling, after dinner, where we had been and what had happened to us the year before.

The Gales, with the yacht and its present officers, had been in Naples, where they had met Ferratoni, who was then perfecting his experiments. I had been in the interior of the “States,” making ready to drift, I knew not where. Now all were here together, in the luminous, and fantastic midsummer of the farther South, seeking at my direction a half mythical highway to what might be a wholly mythical destination. Edith Gale had referred to me once, in jest, as a new Lochinvar. I said that I would strive to be that, but there were nights when I woke and remembered what all those men of science had said, and just how they had said it; and on those nights I trembled and weakened a little at the thought of the responsibility of life and expenditure I had assumed, and might have faltered still more, perhaps, had I not been strong in my determination to prove those sages of the test-tube and microscope at fault.

Thus far we had found no indication of a warm current, nor, in fact, anything else suggestive of warmth in the latitudes below the Antarctic Circle, but, as the books say, there had been plenty to amuse and instruct. Our days were a good deal alike, but they were never monotonous. As we approached the point where Borchgrevink had penetrated the ice-pack, our expectations increased and our painstaking scrutiny of each step of the way was redoubled. Perhaps the brief daily record of my notebook will best continue the narrative at this point.

Jan. 1. Still pushing westward, slightly south. The New Year finds us at latitude 68° 12´, longitude 163° 44´. We are going very slowly now, barely thirty miles a day. The weather is excellent, and seems very warm. I spend fifteen hours out of the twenty-four in the fighting-top. When I am not there we lie to, or drift. There appears to be a slight westward movement in the ice, and we go with it during the night, or rather while I am asleep, for, of course, there is no night yet. Plenty of life here. Several sorts of whales appear in the open water, and penguins visit the ship daily. Edith Gale declares that some of them are the same ones that we first saw, and that they have taken a fancy to us.

Jan. 2. We cannot be far now from Victoria Land, but still no sign of the warm current. True, Borchgrevink pushed thirty-eight days through the pack-ice before he came to this current, but these things vary in different years, and it is more than likely that we are already nearing the point where he emerged from the pack. The slight drift we have noticed continues and appears to bend to the south as we approach the coast.

Jan. 3. Edith and Chauncey Gale were with me almost constantly to-day in the crow’s-nest. The sailors to-night claim they can “smell” land. As we approach it, life becomes much more frequent, though not more cheerful. It is either white or black, and unmusical. The chant of the seals is depressing, and the chorus of the penguins a thing to be avoided. However, they always amuse us, and we appear to furnish entertainment for them. Also, they are fond of good music, perhaps because they cannot make it themselves. Edith Gale played the piano last night, and a whole flock of “Billy Watsons” in dress suits crowded on deck to listen to it. Probably they thought it a musicale given for their benefit. The sea-leopards and crab-eaters gathered about the ship, too, and would have come on board if they had been able. Mr. Sturritt is experimenting with all of these from a food standpoint, and the sailors are collecting many skins and feathers.

Jan. 5. Borchgrevink must have found very different conditions, indeed, from the westward, for we are at latitude 70°, or very near it, and we have not yet found it necessary to penetrate the ice. This current that now appears to drift us to the southwest may have something to do with it, or it may be that this is a warmer summer, hence the different conditions.

Jan. 6. This current, if it is a current, puzzles us all. It is not noticeable on the surface, where the ice moves with the wind (I have even fancied to-day when there was no wind that the floes drifted northward), but seems to grip us from beneath and push us slowly, very slowly, but surely, to the southwest. Gale said to-day it was like the illness, “grip.” We were sure we had it, but we didn’t know just where.

Jan. 8. Whatever this current is, it is carrying us in the right direction. It has brought us safely through the waters explored by Sir James Ross fifty years ago, and where pack-ice delayed Borchgrevink thirty-eight days. The Captain thinks it a slight undercurrent that curves in around Possession Island, which we shall see to-morrow, if all goes well. We are all eager for the first sight of Antarctic land. Again to-day there was no wind, and both Edith Gale and I held that the surface ice was drifting to the north, but the others thought it only _seemed_ so because of our movement to the southward. We did not change our opinion, however. It is curious, but we almost invariably agree. It is as if we were two parts of one mind. How beautiful she was to-day in her new seal hood, with the funny little point at the top. I....

Jan. 9. We have seen the coast to-day, but did not think it wise to attempt a landing. From the deck we could view with our glasses Possession Island, with its millions of penguin inhabitants. Their lookouts screamed and yelled at us to keep off, and their bleak shore is well defended by jagged rocks and long glacier points that push out into the water. We observed the perfect system of order and highways maintained by these solemn creatures as they moved procession-like to and from the shore—the fat ones on one side all proceeding to their nests in the cliffs, and the thin ones coming to the sea for food. They did not quarrel, or get in each other’s way. It seemed that we could never get through laughing at them. Gale says the place should be named Procession Island, and that the first addition he lays out down here he’s going to get “Billy Watsons” to build the streets for him. There are many icebergs about, nearly all with the blue lines and the tabular top. They are from the great barrier to the south, whence they have doubtless been blown by the gales of last winter, and now seem to be drifting homeward to be there in time for next.

Jan. 12. Our current has not deserted us, but we are more mystified with it than ever. The surface ice is certainly drifting slowly northward, for we can now gauge its movement by the shore, while we and the bergs are drifting to the south. The Captain says that it is not uncommon for currents to flow in opposite directions, one above the other, for a short distance, and that they are called “witch tides,” for the reason that ships are sometimes unable to move in them, even with a fair wind, but that he has never seen anything just like this. Can it be that this upper drift from the south is our warm current, and that we have been in it for days without knowing it? Certainly it is but a feeble current as yet, and there is no warmth in it that we can discover. There is no pack here, and we shall keep on going. Borchgrevink found open water as low as 74°.

Jan. 13. It _is_ our warm current from the south! There is no doubt of this to-day, and there is more to be told! When I went on deck this morning, Officer Larkins, who was on watch, reported that the ice seemed to run north a bit stronger, and that our drift southward was proportionately less rapid. I immediately had a pail of water drawn up, and tested it. It was 32°. Yesterday it had tested 30°! There was something about the look of the water that made me taste it. Larkins said he thought it had thrown me into a fit, and I suppose I did make some sort of a demonstration, for it was fresh! At least it was only brackish, from the melting in it of the salt-water ice. I don’t remember just what I did at first, but I know that when I turned around and saw Edith Gale coming out of the cabin, I found it not easy to keep from behaving in a manner which I feel quite certain she would have disapproved. As it was, I rushed up to her with the glass. “Taste it!” I urged. “Taste it! It’s fresh water from a warm river flowing straight from the South Pole!” She tasted and rejoiced with me. That it came from inland warmth we could not doubt. And now the mystery of these currents becomes clearer. Above the heavily-moving ocean current below us there is the lighter, shallower current of fresh warm water, carried by its force in the opposite direction, and finally spreading and losing itself in the sea. It was doubtless this strange combination that helped to open our way through the pack, and that we believe now will show us the way to our destination. In celebration of the event we have just had a great feasting, at which I was the guest of honor. I cannot sleep, so I must go back to the deck to watch and rejoice.

Later—Edith Gale was there, and we walked up and down for an hour, constructing wild theories. We still drift southward against our new warm river. The drift of the great salt current a few feet below the surface is strong, and we let it carry us—whither?

Jan. 15. We are in the midst of a fierce, northeasterly storm that has brought a world of grinding pack-ice about us. All trace of our warm current is lost, of course, and we are fighting now with steam and sail to keep from being driven upon the ragged shores of Victoria Land. We cannot see the coast, for a thick mist has shut us in, but we know by the screaming flocks of birds whirling about us that it is not far distant. At any moment we may strike a hidden reef or rock, or be crushed by a toppling berg. No one slept last night, and one of the officers has been in the crow’s-nest constantly. Two days ago all seemed joy. To-night I am heartsick, and only for the abiding courage and faith of Chauncey and Edith Gale would be despairing. Gale is a king among men, and Edith——

Jan. 20. Five days in the clutch of this fearful storm. I seem to have lived as many years since we found the warm current. If I have slept I do not know it. I am thin and haggard with watching and anxiety. But now the wind has gone down, and there is hope, though we are still beset with this pounding, maddening ice, and the Captain has taken no observation since the 14th. I shall try to sleep.

Jan. 21. The sun came out this morning, and Biffer got our position. There has been little change in the past week. We have just about held our own in keeping off shore. Now we are hemmed in by ice and our currents are lost beneath it. We shall try to push southward, however, in the hope of reaching clear water. The wind is behind us, but the drift ice ahead packs fearfully, perhaps because of the opposite flowing current.

Jan. 26. This morning I was called before I was awake, and hurried on deck to find Captain Biffer looking through a glass at a grim outline ahead.

“There’s your ice-wall,” he said, as I approached.

“What’s our latitude?” I asked.

“72° 33´.”

“Then it can’t be the wall,” I said. “It lies somewhere below 74°.”

The Captain looked again through his glass. Then we ascended to the crow’s-nest for a better view.

“Well,” he declared, at last, “if that ain’t the ice-wall, it’s the father of all the icebergs we’ve seen yet.”

And an iceberg it proved to be. We pushed and worked our way toward it all the forenoon, and about two o’clock came near enough to make out an area of open water adjacent to it, by which we knew it was being carried southward against the surface current thus leaving a clear space behind. Into this we pushed a little later, and steaming in close, found that in the back of our ice giant there was a hollow of considerable size. It was, in fact, a sort of harbor for us, though not without its drawbacks. For to the right and left and behind lay pack-ice, so solid that escape in any direction seemed impossible, and ready to close in upon us should the great berg halt or hesitate in its progress poleward.

“We are going now, whether we want to or not,” said Chauncey Gale.

“Yes,” laughed Captain Biffer, “we’ve got a pacemaker.”

And this is so. Borne on by the vast salt current far beneath, our giant berg, regardless of drift ice and feeble fresh-water resistance, is pushing slowly steadily to the southward, whence it came. I believe now that this salt undercurrent describes a huge circle in the Antarctic Ocean; that it bends to the eastward when it reaches the great southern barrier, thence northward, detaching and carrying with it into the upper seas these giant sections of the wall, drifting them across westward and bringing them back southward, at last, as this one is being brought, to the point of its titanic birth. The bergs we met over by the Shetlands were drifting northward. Those along the way came as we came. Some of them looked worn and travel-stained, as if they had been swinging around the circle for a long time; bruised and battered for perhaps centuries. The one we are following must be on its first trip, for it is a giant of giants, going home mighty and magnificent after its first trip abroad.

And we are going with it. We shall not attempt to force our way out, and why should we? We set out for the South. We believe now—all of us, I think—that there is a land there from whence can flow a warm river. We are going to find it!

XVI. FOLLOWING THE PACEMAKER.

For a full month we drifted slowly with our monster berg. So slowly that at times, when the wind shifted, we were almost at a standstill, and the drift-ice was ready to shut us in. But within our big giant’s lap we were well protected, and lying idly were borne steadily to the south. We grew presently to love our big protector, and had the Captain’s name of Pacemaker not clung to him we should have christened him something very grand, indeed. For as a pacemaker he was not a success. An average of twenty miles a day was about the best we could do, and at times we did even worse. Still, we gave him great credit, for without him we might, as Gale said, “have gone to the wall” before we were ready to.

As the days passed I found that I must change my calculations somewhat concerning the position of the barrier. I had located it not lower than 75°, but by the 25th we were below 76°, and no barrier as yet. Could it be that this undercurrent flowed _through_ the Antarctic Continent? But this, I decided, would be impossible.

We were not idle during this period of drifting, and the month as a whole was one of enjoyment. When we no longer had the sun at midnight, we began preparing for winter. From the skins obtained by the sailors we rigged ourselves out in new suits, according to the best polar authorities. It was not seriously cold as yet, but with the advent of the Antarctic night who could say what cold might come? Gale was fondly referred to as Jumbo when he got properly put together. One day, however, he got down on his back and could not get up again. Then he was christened the “Turtle.”

“I’ve heard of people being as big as a barrel,” he said, “but in this outfit I’m as big as a whole cooper-shop.”

We were frequently tempted to try scaling our big Pacemaker to make observations ahead. Edith Gale would have gone promptly had her father consented. Ferratoni, too, was eager to make some further experiments, testing his apparatus with the berg as an elevation. With our little steam launch we believed we might be able to find a place where the ascent would not be difficult, and as days passed and brought still deeper latitudes, the temptation grew even stronger.

We yielded to it, at last, on the second of March, a momentous day in our calendar. Immediately after breakfast that morning we discovered that our pacemaker was moving considerably faster than at any previous time, and that its great right wing was swinging ahead of the left. I argued at once that we had reached a bend in the current, where the outer edge would have the greater speed. It seemed to me that we must be near the barrier by these indications, and that it was now more important than ever that we should know how the land, or rather the water, lay ahead, that we might decide whether to continue with the berg, or to strike out now on our own account and endeavor to find a way around to the south. Gale was for sending up the balloon, but this would have required two days’ preparation, and seemed unnecessary. I was greatly in favor of trying to scale the berg ahead, which plan was finally adopted.

I had thought of going with two sailors only, one to remain with the launch, and one to assist me in the ascent, but when the launch was ready Edith Gale suddenly appeared, panoplied for the undertaking, and finally coaxed and intimidated her father into yielding. It was against his judgment and mine, but she had been confined to the ship so long, and our old friend ahead had been so steady and faithful, that it seemed there could be no more danger than in scaling a mountain, provided we found an accessible and easy path. This we did without much difficulty, and just outside of the little hollow where the Billowcrest lay. Here the berg appeared to have been washed or gullied out by snow melting from above, which had formed a sort of natural snow-carpeted stairway, similar to that made by a mountain brook in winter. There was also a good landing below, and here we left the sailors with the launch, which we thought was more likely to need them than we. Then we ran and stumbled up the snowy stair like two children.

It was not quite so easy and safe as it looked. At one place I slipped into a narrow crevice and came near breaking my ankle, as well as Ferratoni’s telephone apparatus, which I carried. After this we went more carefully. The berg was even higher than it appeared, but we soon reached the top, which we were glad to find comparatively level and firmly crusted over. Here we tried the telephone with great success. Chauncey Gale asked if we could see the South Pole from where we were, and cautioned “Johnnie” to be careful. By going near the brink we could have looked down on the vessel, but this we would not risk.

We now hastened across to the opposite side of the berg, not more than a third of a mile distant, for the Pacemaker was a long, narrow section of the barrier, and the hollow in which the Billowcrest was lying made it still narrower at this point. There was a light mist rising from the ice that obstructed our vision somewhat, and there was a dazzle, too, that we thought must be the sun shining on the ice-pack ahead. It was not until we were quite near the edge that we realized our mistake.

Then, suddenly we stopped dead still. Out of the mist, the dazzle had crystallized into definite form. It was ice, truly, but not the far-lying level of the pack. Steadily, surely, inevitably, we were being borne forward to a towering, gleaming wall! It loomed far above us, and extended to the east and west as far as our eyes could follow. No need to guess what it was—we knew! We were face to face with the great barrier—the huge, impregnable fortress of the Antarctic world.

For a moment we stood stupefied, spellbound. Then came a realization of doom. The Pacemaker would strike presently, with its irresistible, crushing momentum. The right wing seemed to us even now touching. Rending destruction, perhaps annihilation, must follow.

There was no necessity of discussion. As usual we were of one mind, and were on our way back to the ship quicker than anything Ferratoni could produce. We even forgot we had the telephone and could warn the others. What we desired most was to get off from that berg before the earthquake.

“This is the way,” panted Edith Gale, presently.

“No, this!” I panted back, bending a little to the east.

In our haste and excitement we had grown a bit confused.

“Try both,” I breathed.

But at that instant there came a vast trembling under our feet, and the next I was lying upon the snow, while the air about me was being rent by a sound so awful as to batter into my brain the thought that we had struck the Antarctic Continent and split it in two! I was nearly right, only that, when a second later I opened my eyes, I saw that the split was the Pacemaker’s, and that I was lying within six inches of its edge. Just across, perhaps ten yards away, lay Edith Gale. More than two hundred feet below was the sea, and at that instant I saw the Billowcrest being lifted up and up by the mightiest, slowest wave that ever sea was heir to. It seemed to me that she would never stop, and I remember thinking dimly that if she kept on coming I could get aboard. Then at last she fell back and the sea swallowed her. Again I could count time, and I was sure she was on her way to the bottom when she reappeared, swinging and rolling, but apparently undamaged. I saw black figures on her begin to move; then I looked across once more to Edith Gale, who was slowly drifting farther from me. She was sitting upright, half dazed as it seemed. I called across to her. She assured me that she was not in the least injured—only a bit shaken up and confused. Then I saw she had been correct in the position of the launch.

“Go to the boat,” I said. “If they are not lost, they can take you to the ship, and then try to get me. I can see the ship from here. It seems safe.”

“Keep away from that edge!” she called back. “And why don’t you use the telephone?”

I had forgotten it entirely. Even as she spoke it began ringing, and holding it to my ear I distinguished the eager “hello” of Chauncey Gale.

“Hello!” I called, “all right up here! How’s the ship?”

“Wet, but safe. How’s Johnnie?”

“Safe. We were separated when the shake-up came and the berg broke between us. She’s on the side where the launch is.”

Gale would always be Gale.

“No danger of your fighting then about whose fault it was.”