The _Bear_ had one fact in its favour: the two ships were driving for
the Bering Strait. The Strait was less than forty miles from headland to
headland, and between the two capes lay the Diomede Islands. It was
possible that the _Bear_ would head off the _Pole Star_ before reaching
the Arctic Ocean.
Stirling studied the situation with scant hope. The Russians, urged to
desperation, had succeeded in getting every turn that was possible from
the screw. Steam plumed in the pipe aft of the funnel; the ship throbbed
and racked; the clang of doors and the lurid light which streamed from
the engine-room companion and the open hatches told of frantic work by
the leader who had a firm grip on the revolutionists.
The Diomede Islands rose out of the sea and stood with their rocky walls
black against the sun. Far-off Cape Prince of Wales seemed a cloud bank
of sombre aspect. Stirling climbed to the top of the crow's-nest and
studied the picture. The fast-flying _Bear_ had held her own. The
distance between the two ships was not more than eight miles; this,
however, was beyond range of the _Bear's_ guns.
"A stern chase," he said, with a glance at the horizon ahead. "We'll
make the Arctic."
The _Pole Star_ crashed through light floe ice and sheered abeam of the
Diomedes. She headed almost west by the compass, which course would
bring her in sight of Herald Island and Wrangel Land.
Heavier ice fields loomed ahead, and Stirling watched them with concern.
The Russian wheelsman peered over the barricade and took his orders from
the leader; the ship ported and starboarded, then steadied with clumsy
steering. The crash of ancient floes against her stem, and the grating
as the ice slipped alongside, caused the revolutionists to cry aloud.
They swarmed over the forepeak and pointed excitedly.
Stirling glanced aft. The _Bear_ had not been so fortunate in choosing a
passage through the ice, and had dropped back in the chase. He acted
with sudden inspiration.
Leaning over the edge of the crow's-nest he cried: "Make for the open
sea, you fools! Starboard three points! If you don't we'll all be
crushed!"
The leader blinked upward and widened his small eyes. He was a gross man
in a uniform of furs and sealskin boots stolen from the _Pole Star's_
slop-chest. He turned to the wheelman after a quick squint toward the
ice ahead.
The wheel was changed. The ship sheered, missed a heavy-floe formation,
and entered a lane of drift ice.
"Steady!" shouted Stirling, feeling the wine of the game. "Hold her
steady, there!"
He smiled despite the danger, for the act of giving commands and finding
them obeyed showed that the Russians were new to ice work. They would
most certainly wreck the ship and drown all on board. The century-old
floes through which they glided had been detached from the polar pack,
but once past these, a course held for the America shore would bring
safety.
The _Bear_ had not been as fortunate as the poacher. The ice between the
Diomedes and Cape Prince of Wales was almost impassable, and the
lieutenant in charge of the revenue cutter decided to take no chances.
He reduced speed and struck for the Alaskan coast, since it was evident
that this course would again intercept the poacher. Their place of
meeting would be off Kotzebue Sound.
Stirling forgot the massacre aboard the _Pole Star_. He never had sided
with the former crew; and the revolutionists, with their ignorance of
the ice, were less to be feared. They had seized a ship, were running
amuck, but at least had the virtue of motion. Their end might come in a
score of ways, and it was to Stirling's interest to see that the ship
remained afloat. There were the girl and Marr and the Frisco dock rat to
consider.
Stirling's blood tingled at the excitement of the game; he breathed the
refreshing air and raised his square shoulders. Open water and whale
slick showed ahead, and beyond this the eastern horizon and the gray
shadow of land. They were now plunging north by the compass, with a
slight inclination toward the east. The course, he figured, should read
northeast by north.
Lulled by the swaying and throbbing of the ship, he sensed a progression
of true adventure. He had come North to whale. The whaling voyage had
turned into an illicit sealing expedition. Now the revolutionists
closely followed by the _Bear_, held the deck.
The low Arctic sun swung closer to the horizon. Within the purple haze
astern came flashes of crimson light which died to lavender, and the
lavender into velvet dusk. Night was falling upon the wild sea. It was
well past ten o'clock. The revolutionists, busy at the fires and the
gin, gave scant attention to the ship's bells.
Stirling dozed with his head against the rim of the crow's-nest, woke at
odd times, and yawned. Sleep had overcome his stout frame. He peered
down at the deck, saw that it was almost deserted, then lowered himself
into the bottom of the nest and rested his chin on his drawn-up knees.
Here he slumbered through the night.
Awaking with a start of surprise, he found that the day had dawned. He
rose and stared out over the bow of the ship. Ice floes showed close to
the port rail, and beyond these the open sea and the cold glint of the
great North pack. He swung to starboard and studied the haze through
which the sun was rising on a long slant. Land was there, and he made a
swift calculation--the ship must be crossing the open Kotzebue Sound.
Out of the land mist as the sun veiled itself behind a cloud there
emerged a leaping thing of well-sheeted canvas and belching funnels. The
_Bear_ had stolen a march on the poacher during the hours of the night,
and a shot came skipping across the waves. It missed the _Pole Star's_
stern by a scant cable's length. Another followed from the revenue
cutter's bow gun, and this burst in the whaleboats that lined the
starboard rail.
A roar of fright and defiance rolled upward to Stirling. The leader
sprang from the galley house and dashed up the poop steps. A horde of
his followers swarmed from the forecastle hatch and the forehold, and
some leaped down the engine-room companion. The funnel belched big
clouds of smoke and the fire doors clanged. The _Pole Star_ swerved
toward the west and the open sea. This manoeuvre saved the
revolutionists from certain capture.
Stirling waited with held breath and rigid lips. It was nip and tuck for
the flying poacher, but gradually the distance between her and the
cutter increased. The next shots fell short.
Men danced on deck and shook their fists toward the cutter, while the
stokehold crew took turns in coming to the rail of their hatchway and
raving at the _Bear_. They glanced aloft at the lone figure in the
crow's-nest, but there was no malice in their expressions.
Stirling's blood tingled at the excitement of the game, and he lost his
enmity for the Russians. They acted like children freed from bondage.
They had fled from Vladivostok, been wrecked in the Gulf of Anadir, and
were now on the second leg of their adventure. It led to the icy North
and strange waters.
The ship plunged away from the coast and toward the North pack. Stirling
realized that the _Bear_ would follow to the bitter end, and he knew
there was also another revenue cutter in the Arctic Ocean--the chances
were slim for the Russians to escape, and the trap might be sprung at
Point Barrow which juts far out into the Arctic.
Hurtling west, and then edging toward the north as the day advanced, the
_Pole Star_ avoided the pack and settled down to steady progress toward
the American shore in the vicinity of Icy Cape.
The day unrolled with the cold sun swinging over the land and through
the mists. The night, which came with slow shadowing, found Stirling
weak and listless from lack of food and water, and he realized that an
effort would have to be made to escape from the crow's-nest. The crew
had drunk the entire store of gin and trade whisky, and they roamed the
deck in groups, their attention fastened upon the low coast along which
many Arctic whalers had been wrecked. The passageway between this coast
and the grounded ice was narrow in places. A north-easter would crush
the ship and drive it ashore.
The lane of ice-free waters widened as Cape Lisburne was passed. This
lane often had been blocked by light floes, and Stirling studied the
grounded pack to the west and north, coming to the conclusion that the
season would be an extremely open one. Never before in his experience
had he seen clearer steaming to the eastward.
Night came on with the _Pole Star_ logging thirteen knots. The ship was
surprisingly handled by the Russians, who worked more by intuition than
from experience, but they had the sense of drift and direction. The
_Bear_ was left hull down in the flecked field astern, but still coming
on grimly.
Walruses and seals were distributed by the wash of the ship; lone wolves
howled from the shore; a polar bear lumbered over the ice as the _Pole
Star_ crashed through, staggered, and resumed its eastward course. The
Russians on deck surged aft for fear of catastrophe. Surrounding the
wheelman and the leader, they peered anxiously toward the after
companion which was barricaded on the inside.
Streamers of yellow light shot athwart the eastern heavens, and this
light brightened into a nebula of crimson. The aurora played and
flickered and surged upward toward the zenith, while through it the pale
stars shone. A moon rose and rolled along the lowland which lay between
Lisburne and Icy Cape. The Barren Country stood revealed in cold
splendour, stretching to the ramparts of the Mackenzie River and the
mountains at Fort Yukon.
A sense of motion came to Stirling, for he knew the waters. Never
before, however, had he found the sea so open. The aged and grounded
floes were well to the northwest, and had not been driven above the
seven-fathom line. The lane they left for navigation was wide enough to
float all the navies of the world, and only a great storm would close it
behind the _Pole Star_.
Midnight found Stirling weary of the details of the voyage and weak from
lack of food and water. A languor stole over his rugged frame; he yawned
and attempted to sleep, but a clang of a fire door and a quarter-point
swing of the ship awakened him to dull consciousness. He peered over the
edge of the crow's-nest.
The deck below seemed a haven; there was food and water there. The way
down would be short. He searched about for some sign of the Russians.
Aside from the wheelman's head over the barricade and a towering leader
standing by the weather rail of the quarter-deck, there was no one in
sight.
The funnel, almost beneath shrouds, was crowned with a ring of fire, and
a shift of wind now and then drove smoke upward. Stirling choked in
this, tried to marshal the details of an escape, but felt his position
was far too desperate to await daylight. The Russians were sleeping off
the last of the gin. Their leader had given orders to drive for Point
Barrow and take the chances to be met there.
Stirling widened his eyes and pressed his hand to his hot brow, studying
the white lane of water which was bordered by ice on one quarter and the
dark land upon the other. A providence had the ship in its grip. Small
floes were avoided by no effort of the wheelman and thin ice, formed
overnight, was ripped as satin by a knife.
Point Barrow was less than five hours' steaming ahead, and beyond the
Point, with its whaling station and its native village, lay the open Sea
of Beaufort and the unknown land of Keenan. It was a desperate sea into
which to venture, and the horror of the short month came home to
Stirling. He was facing cold, starvation, and isolation--a trinity of
despair.
The stars paled as the slow dawn started creeping along the eastern
heavens. The onward surge of the ship through the dream scene of flecked
ice patches and mirrorlike water became a vision of unreality.
Stirling searched the way ahead, and recognized familiar landmarks from
other voyages. The ribs of a whale ship showed high driven upon the
tundra. This was the wreck of the _George M. Foster_, thrust ashore
three seasons before by the pressure of the North pack.
Other wrecks marked the beach, showing where a fleet of whalers had
attempted to gain the shelter of Point Barrow. A northwester had
scattered them and laid their bones out upon the pale Arctic wilds. Men
had died there from starvation and cold.
Native villages showed, with their summer huts gaunt and bare against
the snow, and behind them igloos, fast melting in the warm air. Kayaks
and umiaks dotted the beach; dogs came down to the shore and stared at
the ship. A head was thrust through a tent's bark door, and a hand
waved. Then afterward had come the rushing of dark forms along the
tundra and the cries of natives.
The wheelsman held the centre of the course between the North pack and
the sand spits. The leader, muffled to the eyes in sealskin, came out of
the galley and glanced aloft. The orders he gave were for more steam,
and the funnel belched forth smoke and driven cinders. The screw
thrashed as the ship hurtled on into the brightening dawn.
Stirling climbed out of the crow's-nest, lowered his legs over its
forward edge, and sat there with his hands gripping one of the
downhauls. The sea ahead was polished and rippleless, the way to Point
Barrow was open, and already the land had bent to the north and west.
They were now rounding Alaska.
A shout rose from the dark deck, forms swarmed from the forecastle, and
the ship took on churning life. The leader had sensed the danger to be
met with at Point Barrow. A premonition had seized him that the _Bear_
might have signalled by wireless to a waiting government boat.
Stirling divined that this would be the case, and pressed his palm
against his head. The throbbing of the ship, felt at the masthead, drove
a surge of nausea through his stout frame. The end was close at hand,
unless they struck out to open sea, through the ice floes, and avoided
the Point.
A misted sun rose in the north and east, directly before the taper jib
boom of the _Pole Star_. It drove the last of the aurora from the sky,
rose in a rolling eye of fire, and brought out all the details of the
stretching Arctic wild.
To the north and west showed great floes, which had grounded upon the
shallow land which marked the seven-fathom bank. Between these floes
lanes appeared, filled with whale slick and sporting seals. They led to
the true north and the solid pack below the cold horizon.
Swinging the helm with sudden intuition, the leader drove the ship down
a wide lane and away from the shore. Stirling sensed this manoeuvre was
to avoid being sighted at the Point. The leader had spread a chart out
upon the quarter-deck, and his thumb traced a course which would take
him away from any possible pursuit; it would also be a venture into an
unknown sea. Blond Eskimos and castaways from Franklin's expedition were
supposed to people the polar shores of Banks and Keenan Land.
Stirling studied the ship's deck with eyes brightened by hunger and
resolve. He sought for a place to descend--an opening which would allow
him to reach the forehold where stores and water could be found.
The revolutionists were scattered from the forepeak to the break of the
poop. Smoke showed from the galley stovepipe. The engine-room crew and
stokehold crowd had redoubled their efforts in order to sheer the ship
from the land. Word had been passed down that the _Bear_ might signal
the government people at Point Barrow, which was almost in sight.
Stirling glanced aft to where the Russian at the wheel was taking his
orders from the leader who had sprung upon the weather rail and was
holding to the mizzen shrouds.
The chance for escape from the crow's-nest had come. The mainsail hung
from the main yard, and its flapping canvas would afford some slight
shelter. Stirling weighed the opportunity and prepared to make the
effort. The open main hatch invited with its glimpse of boxes and
scattered trade stuff.
He lowered himself from the crow's-nest and stood on the jack above the
Jacob's ladder. Here he was sheltered from a chance glance aloft. He
poised himself, gathered together his remaining strength, then reached
downward and grasped the ladder's top, his eyes slowly swinging aft.
They rested on the barricade of canvas which had been erected forward of
the cabin companion. A form moved behind this canvas, and the eastern
light brought out the details. It was Slim, the Frisco dock rat, a
ragged tam-o'-shanter capping his uncut hair.
With his face pressed over the edge of the canvas, Slim took in the
details of the ship and the revolutionists and frowned. A second form
moved close to his side and the girl glanced over the canvas, her eyes
raised in tearful search of the crow's-nest. When they lighted upon
Stirling, she beckoned with a white finger, then gave a heart-rendering,
poignant call of distress.