Part 9

“But it wasn’t shwimmin’ that saved Doolan, ner food, ner reshponsibility, ner even the beauties of nature, though he had a chance durin’ the night he fell over to view thim at close range. It was the life-buoy that saved Doolan, an’ kep’ him floatin’ till he was picked up next mornin’ by a shmarter boat that beat the Mary Collins to Bombay by one tide. I’m not sayin’ but that the others air sushtainin’ too, but it was the life-buoy that saved Doolan.”

“There are many kinds of life-buoys, Mr. Larkins,” laughed Edith Gale, “and I confess that Mr. Doolan seems to have found the one best suited to his needs. What is your experience, Mr. Emory?”

The quiet Second Officer was silent for a moment, and his face saddened.

“I was shipwrecked once,” he said. “We lost our vessel and drifted for a long time in a leaky boat. A good many died. I was kept up by the memory of a girl, waiting for me at home. When I got there——”

Mr. Emory paused as if to gather himself. It had grown very still in the saloon.

“She was dead,” he concluded, “so you see my shipwreck and dark night are not over yet.”

Our narrow round had indeed brought us close together. I doubt if Emory had ever spoken of this before to any one. Edith Gale laid her hand on his arm.

“And she is still waiting,” she said, “you must not forget that.”

“Suppose we hear from you, Chase,” said Gale, after a pause.

Matters had taken rather an unexpected turn. I felt that I could not discuss what would best sustain me through the dark night ahead without putting myself and one other person in a trying position. I made an effort to gain time.

“I think we should hear from the Admiral, now,” I said.

“Oh, well,” said Gale, “I’m not bashful if I _have_ got new clothes on. Here’s a few observations that I’ve jotted down from time to time, not especially for a dark night, but for any old night, or day either, when you happen to think about ’em.” Gale straightened back and pulled down his vest comfortably. “Seventeen Observations,” he began, “by Chauncey Gale. Homes and Firesides a Specialty.”

I. “This is a good world if we just think so. The toothache is about the worst thing in it, and we can have the tooth pulled.

II. “There ain’t so many mistakes in this world as people think. A man’s pretty apt to get where he belongs by the time he’s forty.

III. “It’s easy to get rich if people only know it. Most folks want to make too hard work of it.

IV. “There may be men who could get rich playing poker, but I’ve only happened to meet the ones that had _tried_ it.

V. “It isn’t hard work to judge human nature if you let the other man do the talking.

VI. “A man’s word may be as good as his bond, but if it is he won’t mind giving his bond, too.

VII. “The commuter who keeps his lawn mowed is a gentleman. If he mows the vacant lot next to him, he’s fit for a better world.

VIII. “Many a man is a blamed fool with the best intentions in the world.

IX. “A free show may be a good show, but if it is, the crowd will pay for it.

X. “A mosquito has no fear of death, and a pound of them will ruin the best addition ever laid out.

XI. “Luck is a good thing, but it’s the men that don’t count on it that mostly have it.

XII. “It isn’t the biggest creature that can stand the most punishment. A lick that will only amuse a fly will kill a baby.

XIII. “Distance depends a good deal on how fast a man can walk. No addition should be more than five minutes from the station.

XIV. “A man can enjoy leisure just as well while he’s waiting for a train as any other time if he’ll only think so.

XV. “I never saw a failure yet that wasn’t worth more than it cost, if the fellow that failed made use of it.

XVI. “The best way to make yourself liked is to make yourself worth liking.

XVII. “Never laugh at a lunatic’s plans. The biggest fool scheme to-day may be a sound business proposition to-morrow.”

Gale sat down amid enthusiasm. Most of his observations were not new in substance, and some of them I did not altogether agree with, but in them all I recognized the characteristic philosophy that had made Chauncey Gale the man I had learned to admire, and even to love. His last “observation,” though uncomplimentary in form, explained to me our presence in Bottle Bay at this moment. I would endeavor to make it hold good.

“Come, Chase, it’s your turn, now!”

“This,” I said, rising, “is something I did while wandering about the docks of New York City. The editors that saw it didn’t care for it, and I don’t care very much for it now, myself. I have altered my opinion about some things since then—not about the sea, I mean, but about the—the most sustaining—that is, through a dark night—I mean, that is—now——”

“Never mind what you mean now,” said Gale. “Suppose you read it and let us see if we can tell what you meant then.”

I was glad enough for this interruption, and proceeded, forthwith:

SEA HERITAGE.

I was born with the sea in my blood— The sea with its surge and its flow— The voice of the tide at its flood Keeps calling and calling to me, And sooner or later I know I must go back to the sea.

I hear it pound in the dark: The salt mist creeps to my brain As I lean from my window and hark To the voice that keeps shouting for me In vain—and yet, not in vain, For I shall go back to the sea.

I long for the leap of the spray— I lust for the swirl of the brine— Though lingering day after day (Land fetters still cumbering me) Some morn I shall claim what is mine— I will rise—I will go to the sea.

It may be a year, or a day— It may be to-morrow—God knows! When, to answer, I’ll up and away, But when and wherever it be, This birthright is bound to foreclose— I must go back to the sea!

“Well, yes,” commented Gale, as I sat down. “I seem to gather what you were driving at then, but it didn’t seem to me you meant quite the same thing the day we sailed.”

Edith Gale came out of a reverie to join in the laugh. I wondered if she knew what I had meant by my floundering about before beginning the verses—if she realized that a word, or perhaps three words, from her would mean more to me now than all the seas and lands of earth.

But Ferratoni, at a signal from Gale, had arisen. For days he had been as one in a dream. We had thought him depressed by the oncoming night. It seems doubtful, now, that he even realized that there was a night.

“Force!” he began. “In that word lies the secret of all the worlds and skies.

“Force, and its visible symbol, vibration!

“Sound—it is vibration—all know it.

“Heat, light, color, Electricity—they are vibrations:—many recognize it.

“Life, thought, soul—these, too, are vibrations, yet more subtle:—I have proved it.

“And from vibrations—harmony.

“Music—the fitting together or chording of sounds—the union of vibrations—it is the form all know, it has soothed and charmed so many.”

He paused and looked toward Edith Gale.

“Beauty,” he continued, “that which _you_ so well offer to men as spirit sustenance, what is it but the combining of life and color vibrations into chords which bring joy to those whose souls awake to answer?

“Harmony—it is Nature’s law. Only the hand of man may work discord. Left undisturbed for even a brief period, the wood and the stream, the meadow and the hill, fall into rhyme and melody, while from the sun and moon falls a quivering glory of light, and voices of the air come whispering or shouting past to blend more perfectly the elemental chord.”

His eyes wandered about to the others in the room.

“Lives vibrating to lives—the chord is friendship.” His gaze came back to Edith Gale, then to me. “Soul vibrates to soul—the chord is love.”

During the brief silence which followed this there was no question as to vibrations on my part. They were distinct waves, in fact, and I did not dare to look otherwise than straight ahead.

“For myself,” he continued, and I breathed again, “I have found the way of mental unity which means the voiceless speaking.”

He motioned to Miss Gale, who struck a chord on the harp near her. From the strings of the piano across the room came a faint yet perfect answer.

“That,” he said—“it contains it all. Thus the electric chords answer to each other and we speak without wires across the spaces. So the vibrations of the thought awaken in the mind of another their echo, and men are made to know, and may answer, without words.”

Once more he paused, and we had somehow a feeling that he was drifting away from us. When he spoke again there was in his voice the quality of one who, listening to faint far-off words, tries to repeat them.

“Somewhere,” he said, “from out of the land we are about to enter—there is seeking us now such a message. It comes far through the spaces—the strings of my thought are not perfectly adjusted to its tuning. Here, in the close union of our daily round the difficulty is not. We have become in mental adjustment—our minds have formed in a chord to which it is not strange that I, who have given my life to such research, should have found the key—should have become able to know without words, as in another way I have been able to hear without wires.”

He roused, as it were, and once more came back to us—to me, in fact.

“You,” he continued, “are at this instant wondering if what I said of the answering soul be true. It is, and you shall presently know it. You,” turning to Gale, “are thinking of the hour. You wished to consult your watch and hesitated out of consideration for me. You have no need. The Captain who sits behind you has just done so, and it lacks still a half-hour of midday.” He turned to Zar, who thus far had been a silent observer of the ceremonies. “You,” he said, “are remembering a little sunny cabin in the North, where thirty years ago you lived with your little ones about you. One of them is grown, now; the others are dead.”

Zar had comprehended little or nothing of what had gone before of Ferratoni’s words. She had been in a reverie, but at this point she sprang to her feet excitedly.

“Good Lawd!” she cried, “what kin’ o’ man _is_ dat? Stan’ here an’ tell me jes’ puzzacly what I thinkin’ dat berry minute! I gwine out o’ here! I not gwine stay in no sech place!”

She set out hastily for the door. Her outbreak had brought the needed relaxation, and we all laughed.

“Come back,” called Gale. “You haven’t made your speech yet. We want to hear what you have to say.”

The old woman turned suddenly.

“All right, den I tell you what I got to say! I’s mighty good an’ tired dis heah country! Dat’s what I got to say! Heah we come off f’m a good civilianized lan’ wheah de sun git up an’ go to bed same as people do, an’ come off heah wheah de sun git up ha’f way, an’ cain’t git up no furdah, and cain’t git back nohow, but jes’ stay dar week in an’ week out, an’ keep hones’ folks awake, an’ den when it do git down cain’t git up ag’in, an’ de whole worl’ freeze up a-waitin’ foh hit. An’ what we come foh? Why, to fin’ a’ old pole what can be pick’ up in anybody’s wood-pile, free foh ca’yin’ off! Come down heah aftah a _pole_! What kin’ o’ pole you reck’n’ gwine grow in such place, anyhow? I sh’d _say_ pole! Why, you couldn’t grow a bean pole! You couldn’t grow a willer squich like I use to keep foh a little girl what need hit now—bringin’ her ole mammy off down heah to freeze up in dis ice-jug! Come aftah a pole an’ fine a hole, dat’s what we done! No won’er Mistah Macaroni know what I thinkin’ ’bout, when hit all freeze up an’ stay heah, ’stid o’ gwine wheah hit b’long!” The old woman paused an instant for breath, then in a deep voice of warning concluded her arraignment. “An’ what kin’ o’ great black beas’ gwine come an’ get dis ship befo’ we all see mo’nin’? What great black monstah comin’ outen dis long black night what you-all mention? I know—hit Deff! Dat what comin’—Deff! Gwine out to say good-by to de sun, is you? Well, you bettah, caise when dat sun git roun’ dis way ag’in, if hit evah do, hit’s my ’pinion dat hit wait a long time befo’ _we_-all come out to say ‘Howdy!’”

The old woman flung herself out of the saloon. We laughed, but her final words had not been entirely without effect. It was by no means impossible that during the long night the “black beast” would come, and that the returning sun would find fewer to bid it welcome.

“I think she speaks not with the spirit of prophecy,” said Ferratoni, but nevertheless we grew rather silent as we passed into the gloom without. Edith Gale and I ascended to the bridge. The others did not follow, but huddled forward to the bow. It lacked still ten minutes of midday.

We now saw that the sky overhead was thick, but clear-streaked in the north. Where the sun would appear there was a sorrowful semblance of dawn. Far across the black, frozen wastes, chill bands of red and orange glowed feebly amid heavier bands of dusk violet. Profound, overpowering, the infinite dark and cold were upon us. Before it, philosophies dwindled and the need of warm human touch and sympathy came powerfully upon us all. Edith Gale did not speak, and instinctively we drew closer together. Somewhere beneath the fur wrappings my hand found hers. She did not withdraw it. The caution of Chauncey Gale seemed as far off as the place where he had spoken it. I leaned nearer to her. The word formed itself on my lips—I could not be blamed.

“Sweetheart!” I whispered.

She did not answer—the sun was coming. Above the far rim it showed a thin rayless edge. Between, there seemed to lie a million miles of frozen sea. We watched it creep slowly westward. It was not a real sun, but a wraith—a vision such as Dante might have dreamed.

Again, leaning near, I whispered to her; and again, just at first, she did not answer. Then, very softly:

“But it was not until you found the new world that you were to claim your reward.”

My heart bounded. She had remembered, then.

“Yes—I wish only to _name_ it, now.”

The sun that had grown to a narrow distorted segment became once more a wavering line.

“Wait,” she said—“not now—to-morrow, perhaps—in the morning——”

“Morning? It is months till then. It is the long night I am thinking of——”

“Yes, I know. I didn’t mean—I meant——” and then somehow my arm had found its way about her, and she was close, close, and did not draw away.

The sun went out. The black wall—the black sea—the great black Antarctic Night and cold closed in, but within and about us lay the ineffable glory that has lighted the world and warmed it since man first looked on woman and found her fair.

XX. THE LONG DARK.

I cannot attempt to picture the vast Antarctic Night. The words I have learned were never intended to convey the supreme mightiness of the Polar Dark. Chauncey Gale has referred to it as “Creation’s Cold Storage.” I am willing to let it go at that.

In the electric blaze of the Billowcrest we made merry, and occupied ourselves usefully. When the cold without was not too severe we went snow-shoeing over Bottle Bay, where a crust of ice had eventually formed, and where snow grew ever deeper until we half expected to be overwhelmed. Sometimes we heard the roaring of the pack outside, but in our snug harbor we felt little of its grinding discontent. How much we were warmed by our current beneath the ice we could not know, but the thermometer at no time showed more than 30° below zero. I have seen it as cold in northern Nebraska.

Neither was it wholly dark in clear weather. We had the stars, and at regular intervals, through our harbor gateway, the moon looked in. Often it was a weird, distorted moon—flattened and wrinkled by radiations of cold from the far-lying ice—but always welcome. More than once it was doubly and even trebly welcome, for the atmosphere was responsible for some curious effects. Once Gale came down hastily to where Edith and I were deep in a game of cribbage.

“I want you and Johnnie to come on deck a minute,” he said with some urgency, “I want you to look at the moon.”

We arrayed ourselves and obeyed. Gale led the way and pointed to the harbor entrance.

“Nick,” he commanded, “I want you and Johnnie to tell me how many moons you see there.”

My hand lay on Edith’s arm and I gave it a significant pressure.

“Why,” I said, “I see one moon, of course. How many do you want me to see?”

“I hope, papa,” said his daughter gravely, “that you haven’t been taking too much wine. You know that it doesn’t agree with you. It makes you too stout, and now that it affects your eyes this way, I should think you would at least moderate your appetite for strong waters.”

“Johnnie,” said Gale severely, “you’re a goose, as usual. But on the dead, now, I want you and Nick to tell me how many moons you see there. I see three. If you only see one, then this cold storage, or something else, has got into my eyes, and it’s time I was doing something for it.”

We assured him, then, that we saw what he did, one real moon and two false ones, the result of some strange condition of the air. When we descended to the cabin, Gale followed singing,

“Three moons rose over the city where there shouldn’t have been but one.”

Besides these things we had the Aurora Australis, though from our position under the ice-wall we seldom got a direct view of this phenomenon, and we sometimes made excursions into the desolation of the pack to view it. On one of these we were separated from the ship by a wide waterway that opened just outside the harbor. It seemed a serious predicament for a time, but the little telephone, which we always carried, promptly “vibrated” a message to the ship, and our balloon-boat-and-sled combination was first put into actual service as a ferry to bring us safely over. From without, our harbor entrance had seemed a portal to the lower regions. Crossing to it in the boat was like being ferried over the river Styx.

To me the days did not drag, though to others of the party they may have passed less swiftly. Love did not speed the hours for them, unless in the sense that all the ship loved the lovers, and in making our lives interesting for us they found sufficient entertainment for themselves. Gale’s acceptance of the new understanding between Edith and myself had been characteristic and hearty.

“Well,” he said, “’tain’t my fault. Don’t come around now, you and Johnnie, tryin’ to blame it onto me. I told you how it would be. Oh Lord, what’s a circus without monkeys!” He took our hands then, and squeezed them together in one big, splendid palm. “Nicholas Chase,” he went on, “you’ve got the boat, and me, and now a mortgage on Johnnie. If there’s any other outlying and unattached property you’d like to have, just name it. And if you don’t see what you want ask for it. Johnnie’s the only undivided interest I had left that I cared anything about, and if you’re going to get that you might as well have all the rest.” But at this point Edith had thrown her arms about his neck, laughing and crying at once. Happy as I was, there was a moment or two just then in which I did not feel entirely comfortable.

One day, perhaps a week later, when we came in from an hour’s snow-shoeing, he suddenly greeted us with:

“Look here, Johnnie, how did it come you didn’t turn Nick down like the others?”

My sweetheart’s cheeks were already aglow, and her eyes sparkling. But I thought there came an added glow and sparkle at the unexpected question. Her eyes sent a quick look into mine that warmed my soul.

“Why, you see, Daddy, we—we were away off down here, and—and we couldn’t afford to have any unpleasantness on the ship, and——”

“Oh, yes, I see—I see! And you’re going to bounce him when we get back to New York. Great girl! Takes after her Daddy.”

From the hand that rested on my arm she had been withdrawing the little fur mitten. Now a small palm and some cold fingers came creeping up into mine for warmth, and to bestow a reassuring pressure.

“But—but don’t you see, Daddy,—I—I—we can’t afford to have any unpleasantness there, either,” she said.

We had a long series of whist rubbers in the cabin, and entertainments in which the forecastle was frequently invited to join. In turn, we sometimes looked in on the forecastle, or, for exercise, took a hand with the sailors in clearing snow and ice from the vessel. Altogether we were a well-fed, contented little world—a warm, bright spot in a wide waste of dark and cold—and even Zar grew stout and comfortable, and more considerate of my feelings.

“I can stay heah jes’ as long as de boat stays and de perwision hold out,” was her frequent assertion. “Mistah Sturritt certney is a mighty good perwider.” And Mr. Sturritt deserved this compliment, for whatever may have been his eccentricities in the matter of tablets, as our regular commissary, he appeared to be a complete and continuous success.

As spring approached and the return of the sun drew near, preparations for scaling the ice-wall and for the journey inland were perfected. Our balloon, the Cloudcrest, was carefully overhauled, and our boat-car furnished with all the requirements of an extended voyage, should we find, after making observations, such an undertaking to be advisable. The boat was very light and had air-tight aluminum compartments, as well as many water-tight compartments for our stores. Mr. Sturritt’s condensed food lozenges, which we had all tested and voted a success, were variously distributed.

“We don’t want to carry all our pills in one box,” explained Gale, “and say, Bill, don’t you think we’d better leave one place for a few old-fashioned sandwiches? Just to start on, you know; then we can kind o’ taper off onto tablets, as it were. You’ve fed us too well through the winter to jump right into pills at the drop of the hat.”

So a place for sandwiches was left; also places for field-glasses and other instruments, as well as for furs and sleeping-bags, which were likely to be needed, we thought, in the early stages of the journey. For ballast, instead of sand, we filled bags with zinc filings, these to be used later in making hydrogen for replenishing the balloon. It is true we thought it more than likely that we should return in some new fashion, to be provided by the Antarcticans, but we believed it well to be prepared for emergencies. Our propeller for both wind and water was now thoroughly tested, the retorts for making the gas were complete and ready, and all grew impatient at last for the day when we were to make our trial ascension.

Ferratoni, I think, was more eager than the others. He seemed convinced now that not only were there human beings beyond the barrier, but that they knew of us, and waited for our coming. In just what form this had “vibrated” to him he could not quite explain, and in fact rarely attempted to do so. He was quite willing, however, to experiment with us in telepathy, or, as he termed it, in the chording of mental vibrations, through which he could often follow a train of thought in another with a success that was certainly interesting, and even startling.

It appeared in no sense to be a gift with Ferratoni, but a scientific attainment, acquired by patient and gradual steps. He claimed that the principle of it was quite as simple as that of the answering musical or electric vibrations—in fact, the same. We grew to accept this theory in time, though we made little progress in its application. Perhaps our minds were too full of other things.

To Ferratoni all the problems of the ages resolved themselves into Chorded Vibrations.