It seemed hard to believe, so rapidly had the change taken place. Only
a few minutes before, and they were gliding along with the blue sky
above and the air perfectly clear; now everything was shut out, even
Johannes in the bows of the boat looking indistinct from where Steve and
the captain were seated in the stern.
Captain Marsham made no verbal reply to the warning of the Norseman, but
his right arm which held the steering oar grew rigid, and he did not
stir from his position.
Steve was no experienced sailor, but he had seen plenty of the last fog,
and as he sat there growing anxious the following problem presented
itself to him after the fashion of the mathematical studies at school,
and based on the difficulty of making a way through what was little
better than black darkness. Let A, B, and C represent the points of a
triangle. If three parties start together from those points to reach a
common centre, and travel at different rates of speed, when will they
meet?
"It looks as if the answer is--never," thought Steve. "Why, the
_Hvalross_ is steaming faster--we saw her; and she'll go right on and
leave us behind. This fog, too, may last for days."
"Keep cool, my lad," said the captain in a low voice; "we shall soon be
on board. Listen, and try if you can hear the beat of the propeller."
Those words sent a hopeful thrill through the boy, just as his spirits
were getting very low indeed, and he leaned over the boat's side
listening, but the regular dip, dip of the oars was all he could
distinguish. He did not speak; there was no need.
"Steady!" cried the captain suddenly, and his voice sounded as if it
were shut in. "Lie on your oars for a few moments. Listen for the beat
of the steamer."
There was dead silence then, and Steve began to realise for the first
time in his life the meaning of the word "lost."
But no sound came to their ears from out of the mist which now
surrounded them, and seemed to arch them in as if they were in a dark
grey cell just big enough to hold the boat.
"Had we better cast off the fish, sir," said Johannes at last, "and pull
hard?"
"No," said Captain Marsham; "matters are not so desperate as that.
Here, Steve boy, your voice is the youngest and most likely to pierce
the mist; give a good ahoy."
"Ahoy!" yelled the boy, and again, "Ahoy! ahoy!" but the hail sounded as
if he were shouting with his head closely shut in a box, and all felt
that it was useless to listen for a reply.
"You hail, Johannes, as you would do if alone."
The Norseman rose up, placed his hands to his mouth, and uttered a
bellowing roar. But though this was repeated again and again there was
no reply.
"Give way!" cried the captain, and the oars began to dip, the men rowing
steadily without a word, trusting themselves entirely to their captain
as the one who must know best under the circumstances; while Steve, who
felt that he ought to be perfectly calm and cool, knew that moment by
moment he was growing more nervous and uncomfortable, haunted as he was
by the idea that they might never reach the _Hvalross_, and be left
alone in that icy solitude, without weapons or provisions, to try and
reach Jan Mayen, and find the refuge they had thought possible for the
others.
"There is the wrecked ship," he said to himself, as thoughts came
swiftly; "it would do for a shelter, and we should have to live on
sea-birds, unless we could find that after all there are some stores
buried in the ship's hold under the sand."
"Steady!" cried the captain just then, interrupting the flow of his wild
thoughts; and the men rested on their oars again, while shout after
shout was sent up, but with no reply.
"We must have come far enough," muttered Captain Marsham; and he
hesitated as he vainly tried to pierce the dense medium which surrounded
them. "We'll lie on our oars and drift a little while," he said aloud;
"the fog will pass over soon. What do you say, Johannes?"
"One never knows, sir," replied the man gravely; "but it is of no use to
go on rowing; we must have passed the ship, for there is a strong
current here."
"Well, we shall see."
They sat listening till, growing fidgety, Steve turned to lean over the
stern and take hold of the rope which held the beluga. The great
fish-like creature yielded to the drag and came close up, but its head
was hardly discernible, and it looked so weird and strange that the boy
loosed his hold with a shudder, expecting that it would float away. But
it remained stationary for a few moments, and then, urged by the
current, rubbed heavily against the boat's side, imperceptibly altering
its position by dragging round the stern.
After listening patiently for some time, the captain drew a little
compass from his pocket and placed it beside him on the thwart, waiting
till it was steady, when he exclaimed in quite a startled tone:
"Which way were we pulling, my men?"
"About due west, sir."
"But the boat's head lies south, and we have been going right away from
the steamer. Here, pull hard starboard, backwater port!" he cried; and
as the oars dipped he bent down and watched the compass till he found
the boat's head pointing north-east, when he shouted, "All together:
give way!"
It was a relief to feel that something was being done to extricate them
from their awkward predicament, and the men pulled hard for the next ten
minutes or so, when, at a word from Captain Marsham, they easied, and a
fresh howl was sent forth to penetrate the fog. But this had no better
result than the last, and once more the order was given to pull and
obeyed with fresh vigour, when Steve suddenly leaped up.
"I heard it then," he said.
"Hold hard!" cried Captain Marsham, and the oars hung dripping over the
side. "Heard what, my lad?"
"The steamer's whistle, quite plainly."
There was a dead silence at this as all listened, but not a sound
reached them but the drip, drip, drip of the water from the blades of
the oars.
"Mistaken, I'm afraid, Steve, my lad," said the captain. "Any one of
you hear the whistle?"
There was no reply.
"Give way, my lads."
Splash went the oars, and at that moment Steve cried excitedly:
"There it is again, right astern!"
"Nonsense, boy!" said the captain;--"imagination. We should have heard
it too. Pull, my lads, pull."
The men dragged at their oars, and Steve sank down in his place feeling
abashed, but perfectly certain all the same that he had heard the
whistle. At the end of a few minutes the captain said kindly:
"It's very easy to be deceived, my lad, and to fancy we hear that which
we wish to hear. Johannes, come aft here, and cast off this little
fish. We shall have enough to do without towing it."
"Cast it off, sir?" said the man as soon as he had passed the rowers,
and he opened his great knife slowly.
"Yes; it is too heavy to drag. Well, why do you hesitate?"
"I was thinking, sir."
"Well, think afterwards. Don't cut the rope; you can untie it."
"Yes, sir," said the man slowly; and in a voice which did not reach the
others, "but had I not better tell you what I was thinking first?"
"Well, go on," said the captain shortly.
"We might want the whale--for food."
Captain Marsham gave quite a start, for there was so much meaning in
those few words, suggestive as they were of their being starving in the
open boat, and he sat there gazing full in the man's eyes.
"You think, then, that we may not find the ship?" he said in a whisper.
"The good God only knows," said the Norseman, taking off his cap. "We
are in His hands; but it is our duty to provide for the worst."
"Yes," said the captain slowly, "you are quite right, my man; let the
fish stay."
"There!" cried Steve, starting up again. "I'm sure I heard it then!"
"Steve!" cried the captain angrily, as he turned sharply on the boy.
"Yes, I heard it then," said Johannes slowly, as he held his hands
behind his ears and leaned toward the stern.
"You heard it?"
"Yes; there again. Listen, captain."
"I hear nothing."
"No, it has stopped now."
Captain Marsham made an impatient gesture.
"There!" cried Steve excitedly.
"Yes, there!" said Johannes. "You heard it then, sir?"
"No," said the captain after a few moments' listening. "You must both
be mistaken."
"No, sir," said the Norseman gravely, "I am not mistaken; that was a
steamer's whistle."
"Then it cannot be ours."
"Perhaps not, sir; but it was a steamer's whistle, a signal, and it is
dead astern. Shall we run back?"
"Yes; we must get on board something as soon as we can. This may be
some whaler caught in the fog. Pull, my lads, and I will steer you
round."
Captain Marsham looked down at the dimly seen compass on the thwart
beside him, and gradually got the boat's head south-west.
At the end of half an hour's pulling the captain suddenly exclaimed:
"Yes, I heard it then! Did you?"
"I have heard it several times since we changed our course," said
Johannes quietly.
"Indeed! and you, Steve?"
"Yes, sir, I've heard it, too."
"Then why didn't you speak?"
Steve was silent, and the captain listened again.
"Yes, that is a steamer's whistle undoubtedly, and perhaps not very
distant."
"She can't be very far away, sir. If she were, we could not have heard
her at all."
The men were cheery now, and pulled with a steady stroke, making but
little way on account of the heavy load they were towing; but the fact
of their hearing the vessel, of which there was no doubt now, inspirited
them.
"Stop!" said the captain suddenly. "Now, Steve, hail!"
As the boy sent forth as loud an ahoy as his lungs would allow there was
a dull, smothered wail off astern, very near at hand, evidently, one
moment, and the next sounding distant and far away.
"Hail again!" cried the captain; and this time Johannes gave forth one
of his hoarse, deep roars, the sound seeming to return upon them, but
there was no reply.
"Hail again, Steve," and the boy shouted; but still without result.
Then Johannes sent forth another of his sonorous roars, and all laid on
their oars and listened, when, so softly as to be almost imperceptible
as the men held their breath, there came a low hail, which grew fainter
and fainter and then died away.
"That was the _Hvalross_, I'm sure!" cried Steve excitedly, as the
boat's course was altered once more.
"Yes; and she's hanging about to find us," said the captain. "Cheer up,
my lads. She won't go far without trying back; she can't be far away."
The men tugged at their oars, but there was no answering cheer; even the
great Norseman was silent, while, as Steve settled down in his place
once more, he felt as if they were to be left to take their chance on
the outskirts of the region of ice, for, after signalling till they were
weary, the _Hvalross_ must be steaming right away.