For an awful instant the wind dropped. Then came a mighty puff. The
topsails filled. The _Polly Ann_ heeled over till it seemed she must
capsize--and darted forward.
The next instant they were between the bergs.
“Lights!” roared Terror Carson. Immediately two flares showed they
were in the ice chasm. Luckily one of the bergs was bisected by a
sort of valley.
This allowed the breeze to blow through and saved the _Polly Ann_.
Gallantly she sped through the fearfully narrow passage and then,
while the crew broke into a cheer, she sped into the open sea
beyond.
It was a masterly stroke of seamanship. But Terror Carson, as he
relinquished the wheel, did not show in his manner that he deemed he
had accomplished anything extraordinary.
B-o-o-m!
Behind them the mountains of ice crashed together.
“Boys, but for Terror Carson we’d have been there,” bawled out a
deep-sea voice from the darkness forward. “Three cheers for Terror.”
They were given with hoarse, raucous enthusiasm. But Carson gave no
sign that he heard. He folded his arms and went below. Great swells,
generated by the impact of the two giant bergs, came racing after
the _Polly Ann_ as if angry she had escaped the fate that had
appeared certain.
Behind them they could hear crash after crash, like the noise of
heavy artillery, as ice pinnacles and towers were snapped off as the
ice mountains scraped together. These rugged summits, falling into
the sea, formed smaller bergs. The noise was appalling.
But the danger was over!
It was with a heart full of thankfulness that Raynor turned in that
night. He awakened at his usual hour and made his way forward to the
galley. Early as it was, Terror Carson was already on deck. He sat
on the companionway fussing with some bits of mechanical apparatus.
Raynor glanced at them carelessly as he passed and then thrilled
with a sudden shock.
Terror Carson was examining parts of a wireless apparatus!
A means of communicating his plight to the outside world flashed
into Raynor’s mind for, as we know, under Jack’s tutorship, he had
become a fairly expert operator. Terror Carson looked up quickly as
the boy half paused.
“Do you understand wireless, younker?” he demanded bruskly.
Raynor was about to reply in the affirmative when something checked
him. He shook his head, guided by some intuition.
“Too bad,” said Terror Carson, “I got this outfit, thinking it would
be a good way to keep clear of government craft. But I left in too
much ef a hurry to get an operator. I’ve been trying to master it
but I guess I haven’t got the brains, and if I haven’t--nobody else
on board has.”
Nothing more was heard or seen of the wireless apparatus just then,
and Raynor was glad he had denied knowledge of it, for otherwise he
would have been compelled to work it to keep clear of any ships that
might be cruising in the vicinity and offer a chance of escape. But
it gave a queer sidelight into the cleverness of Terror Carson. Not
many seal poachers would have thought of such a trick to dodge the
cruisers sent after them.
Still, he had nobody to work it, which certainly reduced its value
to nil. How Raynor longed to get a chance to set the wireless up and
operate the key! He felt sure that were he in a position to do so,
he could soon have summoned help.
But, as he was fain to admit to himself as he went about his kitchen
tasks, he might just as well have wished for the moon. He did not
even know where Carson had locked up the temporarily useless radio
set.
The next day a terrific Arctic storm descended on the _Polly Ann_.
The wind blew with a velocity that threatened to tear the sails from
the bolt ropes, and icy sleet and snow enveloped the craft as if in
a white blanket.
She scudded forward under almost bare poles. Raynor found cause
during those hours to admire Terror Carson’s schooner, which was the
staunchest, swiftest craft he had ever seen. It appeared marvelous
that anything built by man’s hands could endure the merciless
racking the _Polly Ann_ submitted to.
Work in the galley was only carried on with the greatest difficulty
during this period. The men forward lived on water and biscuit and
hot meals were cooked only for the officers.
And all this time Raynor was profoundly ignorant of the destination
of the storm-driven schooner, or if she was nearing it. By the
amount of northing that had been made, he knew that they were
getting into the region of seals, but Terror Carson gave no sign
that he intended to lie to.
In the midst of the white storm an incident happened which, looked
at afterward, was amusing, but at the time it occurred was actually
alarming. Not long after the dinner hour, while the storm was at its
height, the schooner struck some solid object with a dull thud that
made her shake from head to stern.
“Land ho! We’ve struck!” bawled some of the crew.
But the _Polly Ann_ flew onward, and in a few seconds the cause of
the bump was ascertained when, over the lee rail, was seen an
immense “right” whale. The creature spouted in indignation as the
schooner, her rail lined with men, shot by. The water fell in a
shower on the decks, drenching them.
“That’s the whale’s way of getting even fer dat uppercut we handed
him,” grinned Noddy comprehendingly.
The next day the gale had decreased in violence and the weather
cleared. Raynor, on his way from the galley with the mid-day meal,
looked up to windward and suddenly saw something that made his heart
bound.
It was another schooner, also flying north under a press of sail.
Like a flash an idea came to him. In a stern locker, already bent to
the hoisting halyards, was the schooner’s ensign,--one of many, for
at different times it suited Terror Carson to belong to different
nations. This flag was a United States ensign. Raynor’s daring plan
was to reverse the flag in the universal language of distress and
summon aid from the other schooner.
He looked at the man at the wheel. The fellow was dozing apparently.
Raynor set down the tin dishes he was carrying aft and cautiously
approached the flag locker.
It was the work of only a moment to reverse the ensign.
“Now I’ll hoist it and then hide some place till that other craft
sends a boat,” thought Raynor.
With infinite caution he began to hoist the reversed flag. It
fluttered out bravely in the brisk wind.
Raynor’s heart beat high.
“Jove, I believe it will be successful,” he exclaimed to himself.
The flag reached the peak and streamed out in the wind.
“Now if they only see it,” thought Raynor. He watched the schooner
in an agony of apprehension. Then, with a cry of triumph that he
could not suppress, he saw the canvas on the other craft flapping as
she put about.
So absorbed was he in the spectacle that he did not notice a quick,
sharp tread behind him, did not see the uplifted sledge-hammer fist
of Terror Carson.
But the next moment a terrific blow felled him to the deck.