THE MOUNTAIN WAKES
As I shot beamingly out into the wholesome light of day a cheer rang
out, waking the cold echoes delightfully. More than half the ship’s
company was ringing the crevasse mouth, Mr. Rafferty and half-a-dozen
sailors hauling at the rope with a vigor that bespoke their entire
satisfaction in the job. It was with a mighty tug that they finally
yanked me on to the glacier, and I unwound myself and crawled on to the
flat ice most thankfully.
Gwen was there with Denvarre, and Vi was standing talking to Gerry, who
leaned back luxuriously on a rug, enjoying the sunlight and the smiles
of the ladies. Waller, his usual apathetic calm broken by an obvious air
of relief, was the first to take my hand, and Lessaution, bandages and
all, was ready to weep with a joy that I really believe was unaffected.
He had already gleaned from Gerry a slight inkling of the wonders that
lay beneath his feet, and was demanding to be immediately lowered into
their presence. His gratitude at our marvellous escape had a strong
rival for the possession of his soul in the jealousy he felt that this
notable discovery should have fallen to any one but himself.
I think Gwen, happy as she may have been in her new-found love for
Denvarre, could not altogether have forgotten that she and I, though we
had never acknowledged it definitely, had once been more than friends.
Her face—I could but note it as I sped up from the mouth of the pit—had
been white and anxious, and as I rolled unharmed from the edge to her
feet, had flushed rosy red with what I could but hope was joy. She
smiled at me as I rose to my feet, and shyly put her hand in mine, her
eyes humid and wistful as she felt my answering grasp. But her words
were few. “Thank God” was all she whispered, as she drew back to let
Lessaution fling himself upon me with a flood of gratulation and
inquiry.
We reasoned fluently with the Professor as he escorted us back to the
ship, disclaiming any desire to compete with him in the realms of
research, and explaining to what simple and unsought chance our
discovery was due. No argument, however, would move him from his set
purpose. He demanded that he should be lowered without delay into the
Mayan hamlet, vociferating his determination with a volubility that
drowned all reason in mere noise. Finally we compromised. We put it
before him that the launching of the boat was the supreme need of the
whole party, and would take all the power and ropes at our disposal. No
one could be spared to attend to his gropings in the glacier. If he
agreed to postpone his desires till the launch was accomplished, we on
our parts solemnly promised that he, first of any, should descend into
the mystic solitudes below, solitudes, which we represented, were still
practically unexplored. He gave a grudging assent, and thereafter quiet
reigned.
Gwen walked between Denvarre and me, and somehow a sense of discomfort
seemed to hang about my companions. Despite my thumped understanding I
thought that I was bearing myself not ingloriously in the conversational
_mêlée_, but the interest they manifested in my recital seemed to lag.
Denvarre was distinctly gloomy, and Gwen was so desperately vivacious
that I easily understood that she was not listening, but was occupied
with other and unpleasant thoughts. I caught my breath as I wondered if
by any possible chance they could have quarrelled, trying with all my
might not to dwell on the possibilities that such a matter might have
for myself.
They seemed all right again at dinner, both of them, and Baines served a
special effort to signalize our great deliverance. A bottle or two of
Heidsieck made every one of a cheerful countenance, whatever feelings
their hearts may have held, and we speedily forgot the gray shadow of
borderland that had hung so heavily over two of us.
After dinner we sat upon the deck in the starlight, and discussed
coffee, cigarettes, and the chances of getting away. That these depended
utterly on ourselves seemed entirely conclusive. A passing whaler was
the tiniest of probabilities, nor would she be likely to sight any
signal of ours on these desolate shores. True enough old Crum had a fair
idea of our destination, but it would be many months before he would
think it his duty to send to look for us. Nothing obviously remained but
to attempt the launch of the boat, and decide who should go in it.
It was quite certain that the ladies could not face fifteen or twenty
days in an open boat. If they could not go, Garlicke and Denvarre
wouldn’t. Gerry was in no fit condition to face hardships after his
knocking about, no more was I. The man to take charge then was Waller or
Janson.
Waller we felt was the man for the job, but on the other hand we had
also a strong feeling that bereft of his society and counsel we should
be like children without their nurse. We decided to put the case before
him, leaving the decision to his own good sense and knowledge.
I did not think the men would refuse a chance to go if it was offered
them. I felt confident that a sufficiency of them would prefer a cruise
on open water, even in an open boat, to sitting longshore and hauling at
hawsers for the entirely unprofessional object (from a seaman’s point of
view) of bracing up what had become a land domicile. This especially
would be so if the former procedure brought about a hope of eventually
coming to a land of civilization, hard food, and good liquor—we had put
them on an allowance of both—and away from horrifying fears of unknown
and uncouth dragons. For Mr. Parsons had not been idle in his
conversational moments, and the details of our adventure in the cañon
had been painted by him with an unsparing wealth of imaginative
incident.
Waller picked his men, reporting to me that any one of the ship’s
company would have jumped at the chance to go. This matter being
settled, it remained to arrange the practicalities of the launch. Not
only had we to drop our boat handsomely down a hundred feet of sheer
cliff, but we had first to transport her bodily up the steep slopes of
the basin before us. Looking at the job made it seem no more likeable;
but the next morning we rose betimes and flung ourselves upon the
business.
First of all we cut down the yacht’s topmasts and sawed them into
rollers. We did this with a light heart, well knowing that we could
never want to test our ship’s sailing qualities again. Then with levers
we inserted them under the cutter’s keel. This done we began to roll her
proudly across the smooth rock floor—a transit we performed with
consummate ease—and pointed her bows up the steep slope cliffward.
Over the unavailing wretchedness of the next two days I must draw a
veil. Shortly, we gave the business a very ample trial, and were
thoroughly beaten at the start. Tug as we would the task was entirely
beyond us—vanquished us hip and thigh. The angle, which at first was
moderate enough, increased to about forty-five degrees. The weight was
about ten tons. If you would like to try the experiment we did, and test
our physical inferiority, take to yourself a dozen other fools and try
to drag a wheelless railway truck up Arthur’s Seat, for instance, on
rollers. Then let me have a written statement of your experiences. If it
doesn’t give points to many of the foremost writers of the impressionist
school I shall be strenuously surprised.
By the evening of the second day we had progressed about two hundred and
fifty yards, and the worst was still to come. We had expended enough
perspiration to float the boat, and had just paused to shove in the
wedges behind the rollers while we rested. We did this carelessly. They
slithered on the smooth stone, the rollers revolved smartly, and before
we could arrest her progress with levers, the wretched cutter was
half-way back to the bottom again, bumping and straining her timbers
viciously.
Gerry sat down and voiced the sentiments of the whole company at this
point. He explained that to him it was obvious that no less period of
time than a century would suffice to see our labor approach completion.
As the span of human life was now ordered, we were unlikely, any of us,
to attain to this age. Why then waste time that might just as profitably
be spent in twiddling our thumbs? He added comprehensive anathemas on
any who should attempt to combat this opinion, and then relapsed into
surly silence, while the panting crew waited apathetically for further
developments.
Then Waller suggested that our present attempt being a failure, the plan
for reducing the launch to sections should be tried. This we had
resolved to leave as a last resource, from haunting fears that once
dismembered, we might well fail to put her together again, the book of
explanations supplied by her makers having been lost. I lifted my head
wearily to meet his proposal, when my words were checked in the very
utterance.
A dull boom, sullen and muffled at first, but swelling with grating
intensity to a thunderous crash, rolled and re-echoed down and around
the gray rock basin that surrounded us. The cutter swayed and danced,
hammering and splintering the rollers under her. We ourselves fell in
unstudied helplessness on the hard stone slabs. The earth quivered in
our sight as the heat haze quivers in the June sunlight. A current of
hot air swept over us, seeming to swamp us in murkiness. The little
loose pebbles sang and clattered as they rolled down the slope, running
together and leaping upon one another in little swirls and piles. A
giant crag fell from the glacier foot. The roar of it slammed across the
hollow ponderously, the splinters scattering on the hard flooring of the
lake bed, shooting out and across the smooth granite in a thousand chips
of glancing, flashing crystal. The sun glistened upon them gloriously in
many-hued, rainbow rays. Behind us a great pinnacle of basalt was flung
from the peak, falling on the glacier with the crash of an artillery
salute. A moan trembled out from the vitals of the riven glacier, as if
from a prisoned soul within. The impulse of the crushed ice billowed out
a dark spate of water at its foot.
Awe-inspiring as were these manifestations, they did not affect us as
did one slighter, but close at hand. A grate and crack from below made
us turn swiftly. The fissure across which our ship was buttressed with
walls of boulder gaped widely. Into this sudden cleft the _Racoon_
slipped to the level of her bulwarks; the hawsers strained, tightened,
thrummed tensely, and then snapped apart like the flick of returning
thongs. The masts whipped to and fro quivering, and the stays shook
uneasily. Then with a grinding of copper the ship sagged over and lay
still, propped by the ragged edge of the rock.
As we raced back across the lake bed towards her, a round, middle-aged
shriek broke the stillness of the after-quiet. Lady Delahay was vomited
up from the saloon as Baines and the cook erupted from the galley. She
stumbled across the deck, and, with the aid of the valet’s deferential
hand, mounted upon the bulwarks. The rocks were now level with the
stanchions, and she stepped upon them to sink down thereon in desolate
helplessness, Baines hanging over her with well-bred but astonished
sympathy.
Gwen and Vi had been upon the heights above us, trying to sketch the
line of needle-like pinnacles that crowned the ridge. Gwen, it appeared,
had been engaged upon the very one that had fallen upon the glacier, and
had been utterly stupefied, as it bowed toward her and then precipitated
itself into the depths below. Both of them were dismayed beyond measure
by the upheaval and the partial disappearance of the ship, and came
flying down the slope, frightened to death by the roar and thrilling of
the solid earth, confidently expecting further shocks and total
engulfment. We met around Lady Delahay’s prostrate form amid much
excitement.
Nothing further occurred, but an oppressive silence seemed to have
fallen over the land. The cries of the sea-birds melted out seaward, and
not one of them showed far or near. The glacier stream had swept all its
volume into that one great spout of a few minutes back, and not a single
splash came from the empty opening in the ice. No sound was to be heard
from the cliffs, though a minute or two before the fall and return of
the surges had risen to us mellow and distinct.
We climbed the slope to look abroad upon the sea. It was oily and glass
smooth as quicksilver, and far west the glow of the sunset was beginning
to show upon its bosom, but not clear and gleaming. It was lurid and
suffused as with vapor mist. The floe was clustered in strange herdings,
and ringed beside the larger bergs were floating splinters from their
summits. The dark lanes of water between the walls of ice were strangely
regular—almost like the parallel lines of irrigation works. The usual
motion of the unending swell had ceased utterly.
Suddenly Rafferty gave a shout.
“Saints in glory!” he exclaimed excitedly, “’tis the mountain that’s
afire.”
We wheeled round to face the peak behind us. The torn scar left by the
unseated pinnacle showed hard and raw in the evening light. From the dip
between the snow caps a thin column of smoke was rising into the still
windless air, commencing straight as a lance, but mushrooming out over
our heads a few hundred feet up as if in weariness of its own weight.
It poured out of some new-hewn chimney in the rock relentlessly slow
indeed, and lazily, but with a very business-like steadfastness. A few
smuts were wafted to us, falling upon our clothes and faces.
From that moment a very large lump of despair began to settle upon my
heart and stayed there. I began to fully realize the nature of the trap
we were in. It must take days, work as we would, to get the boat up the
slopes, put it together again on the top—even provided we didn’t break
it in the process—and drop it in safety down the cliffs. Waller might
with very great luck get to the Falklands in three weeks. There might
possibly be a ship there which would come to our rescue; very probably
there might not. Giving everything the very best possible chance of
succeeding, we couldn’t get away from this horrible place under six or
eight weeks. On the other hand, Waller might never reach the Falklands
at all. Every hazard of sea and ice would be against him. If he got
there he might never get back, for the berg might close. Our provisions
might fail; the birds and the sea-lions would depart. The ship might
sink further into the cleft and take our home and stores with her, for
it was of course no more than likely that another earthquake shock would
ensue. And above all this, there was the Horror of the cañon prowling
around, ready to interrupt our proceedings at any moment. So beneath my
breath I cursed the race of Maya, my besotted old ancestor, Crum, Gerry,
Lessaution, and many other animate and inanimate influences that had
brought about this disastrous expedition, and had landed us in this
unspeakable plight. When I had thus softly vented my feelings upon the
smut-filled air, forbearing open complaint as a bad ensample for the
men, I turned to see what the others were thinking in the matter.
There was a grim look on Gerry’s face. He too, I gathered, was beginning
to understand what was meant by that black cloud which now rolled
between us and the sun like some monstrous umbrella. Denvarre was
looking at Gwen, and she, I gathered from the sudden motion of her face
as I turned toward her, had but lately been staring at me, trying, I
suppose, to understand what I thought of it. Garlicke eyed the
phenomenon through his eye-glass, viewing it as if it was some
second-rate performance which had to be endured, but equally to be
depreciated. Lessaution gaped up at it open-mouthed; he nodded like a
mandarin, showing by his expression his complete satisfaction with these
arrangements for further volcanic demonstrations. Vi looked on with
placid astonishment, being by now used to vagaries in this strange land
of topsy-turvydom, and not wishing to appear unnecessarily surprised.
The members of the crew made unanimous use of the common adjective to
opine that the smoke was sanguinarily droll, and at that they left it.
Waller’s lips were compressed, though moving now and again in what I
took to be _sotto voce_ swearings. He shared no doubt with me a silent
uneasiness that he preferred not to express.
An earthquake is no joke. One has absolute belief in the stability of
the ground beneath one’s feet—a belief which it takes much to destroy.
When therefore you see the land shake like an ill-made jelly, when it
grins and grimaces at you like a third-rate comedian, the traditions of
a lifetime are undermined. That upon which you have planked the whole of
your confidence deceives you. Faith is no longer a rock. Belief of every
kind is vain. Stability in leaving the earth leaves all else unstable,
and your spirit dies within you. Nothing is impregnable or unassailable
thereafter. You are, to put it tersely, most horribly afraid.
At any rate I was. For at least six weeks and possibly for a year we
were to live under this shadow of death. The cave, that we had chosen as
a refuge should the Beast crawl down upon us, had now become a possible
death-trap more horrible than his maw itself. The mountain was obviously
volcanic, and as obviously was the cleft the result of volcanic action.
Suppose it to close when we were in it. Like worms beneath a cart-wheel
we should be crushed. Suppose it to suddenly widen. Like worms again
should we be dropped into the very bowels of earth to be hopelessly cast
away.
So again I cursed my fate and those who had been its arbiters, and
assumed a cheerful countenance.
“I think that’s all for the present,” I remarked courteously to the
company at large, “so if you have seen all you require perhaps you’ll
return to business.”
They turned from their starings at the mountain, and Gerry chucked down
the lever he still held with a surly air.
“So we’re to start all over again?” said he.
“Have you anything else to suggest?”
He found no answer but a grunt, and I explained that Captain Waller’s
proposition seemed the only feasible one. We must reduce the launch to
sections, and carry them one by one to the cliff-top. I invited
amendments, but none were forthcoming, and collecting spanners, we
turned wearily to work again.
By good luck the lost plan of construction turned up. It was ingenious,
but fiendishly intricate, and it was hours before we properly mastered
it. Then with wrenches and screwdrivers we flung ourselves upon the
boat, covering ourselves with dirt and wretchedness. This, however, only
after stupendous wranglings over the writing and the interpretation
thereof; in which wordy _mêlée_ Gerry and Lessaution nearly came to
blows, sneering over every mortice, and displaying directly opposite
views concerning every nut and screw.
Yet within the course of the next day, by superhuman exertions, we
managed to dismember the boat, and transport it in sections to the
cliff-top. Here we found that the undoing of her was but child’s-play to
the putting of her together again. During the next three days language,
temper, and filthiness of person bore hideous rule, and discomfort
enveloped us like a fog.
Across these things I draw a discreet veil. Suffice it to say that on
the evening of the third day, somehow or other, we had got the boat
patched together and ready for lowering. Then we transported one of the
ship’s windlasses up the rocks, and fixed it firmly with stanchions at
the edge of the crags. We made a sort of cradle of hawsers. With immense
care, with ropes thickly parcelled to avoid the frayings of the ledges,
and with fenders firmly fastened to her sides, we were enabled to lower
the cutter by slow degrees to the water, and to see her sit thereon
unharmed.
Rafferty slid down to her, and there were lowered to him tow, chisels,
and a pot of pitch. With these he contrived to give her an inside calk
where her seams leaked worst from her unhandy rebuilding. We left her
floating for the night, with two men aboard to keep watch and watch lest
the sea rising should dash her against the cliffs, or the floe bear down
to nip her against the rocks. Upon the cliff-top two more camped to be
within rope’s reach of the boatmen if need arose.
No misfortune happily occurred, and the next day found us toiling up the
cliff with stores for her provisioning, and water to fill her breakers.
All these we passed down the swinging rope to Rafferty, who bestowed
them in her lockers with nautical precision and neatness. Finally by
eventide Waller and his six chosen associates descended, and amid the
cheers of the assembled company took their places at the oars.
Then with one last encouraging shout, and amid great wavings of
handkerchiefs and caps, they pulled away steadily up the channels
between the pack-ice.
We watched them as they gradually faded to a black speck among the lanes
in the floe and berg, and then disappeared to come into view again on
the open water. There we saw their sail rise against the rays of the
setting sun, and slant away slowly toward the horizon. At last even this
vague dot upon the emptiness of ocean was not, and we turned away to
seek the ship in the growing darkness.
There was sadness and an irresistible presentiment of coming evil in my
heart; undefined it was; but none the easier borne. It was a silent and
joyless meal we took before turning in, and I think every man of us sent
up a prayer that night for our comrades on the open main; whose lives
bore double burden, in that, if evil befell them, we should all likewise
perish.