Part 22 (2/2)
”I couldn't find any, either,” said Ji We'll perish without shelter”
”I'loo_,” acknowledged Bobby, ”though we needn't perish if we can't ive up yet Let's try just a little longer, but we et separated”
”We can't live through the night without an _igloo_!” Jiloo_ isn't all right yet, after all? It sat a little back, you know, from the water”
”It wouldn't be safe,” Bobby protested ”If it hasn't gone already, it will soon in this blow, for the sea is eating away the ice floe on all sides Don't worry, Jis They don't have _igloos_ ever But I'ot to eat a biscuit before I do another thing”
Together they dug away the snow and found the food bag, and from it extracted some sea biscuits, and each cut for himself a thick piece of the boiled fat pork, frozen as hard as pork will freeze, but nevertheless very palatable to the faether under the lee of the _komatik_ theyhummocks we'd be blown clear off the ice,”
said Bobby, finally ”We've no idea how strong the wind is and how it sweeps over the level ice out there The dogs are wise to get under the drift so soon”
They again fell into silence for a little while, when Jiain, I suppose! There's no hope that I can see of getting off this floe I wonder what it will be like to die”
”I' to die till I have to It's the last thing I expect to do I'ets dark, and then keeping alive on here, and as coet ashore”
”I don't see hoe're ever going to get ashore,” Jih I'd rather live than die But it's an awful thing to feel that our bodies will be lost in the sea, and no one will knoe die”
”If we have to die the sea is as good a place as any to die in, and what difference does it make about our bodies? But,” added Bobby, ”on't die if I can help it, and I don't believe we're going to If we do, why that's the way the Alhty planned it for us, and we shouldn't ht He knohat is best for us”
”I can't believe just that,” said Jiht in this trap It was our fault I' you, Bobby I'ht further and told you to hurry, so I' about Partner and Abel and Mrs Zachariah, and how they'll feel and what they'll do”
”What's the use of worry? You always get worrying and stewing, Jis any and makes you miserable, and there's never been a time yet when it didn't turn out in the end that there never was anything to really worry about, after all If you keep on you'll get yourself scared Now quit it I wasus into the scrape than you were, and you know that too, and if you keep up this sort of talk I'll feel you're trying to rub it in”
”Well, perhaps you're right,” Jiested, as they rose to continue their efforts to make a shelter: ”Bobby--let's ask God to take care of us”
”Yes,” agreed Bobby enthusiastically, ”let's do; and then let's do our best to take care of ourselves, and help Him”
They sank on their knees in the snow, and each in silence offered his own fervent prayer, while the wind drove the thick snow about theh the hu of the seas, and thunderous se of the floe, fell upon their ears with soleain for hard snow,” said Bobby, when they rose presently ”You better keep close to the _koo far, and if I find snow that will cut I'll holler, and if I lose the direction I'll holler, and then you answer”
And taking his snow knife Bobby ed up by the swirling snow, and Jimmy waited and waited, in dreadful loneliness and suspense, while the an to steal upon his stor shout from Bobby came to him, and now he shouted and listened, and shouted and listened, but only the shrieking andseas and pounding ice gave answer
A sickening dread caathering darkness into ever thickening snow clouds, and called and shouted until he was hoarse
He could not see the dogs now--he could hardly see the length of the _kos lay quiet under their blanket of snow soh he had wrapped a caribou skin around his shoulders, was beco desperate at last, he set out to search for Bobby, but did not go far when he realized that it would be a hopeless search, and that it was after all his duty to ree and stu while before he fell upon it by sheer accident
With darkness the velocity of the stor force The bitter cold cut through Jih the caribou skin which he had again wrapped around him, and his flesh felt nu upon him which it was hard to resist He knew that to surrender to this in his exposed position would be fatal, and he rose to his feet and jumped up and down to restore circulation
Any further attempt to find Bobby, he realized, would be foolhardy if not suicidal His previous effort had proved this, and now he felt quite helpless He was also very certain that Bobby could not by any possibility, if he still survived, find his way back to the _komatik_ until the storm abated He would have lost the _komatik_ himself now had he wandered even a dozen feet froht that Bobby had learnedthe manner in which the Eskimos on the open barrens and ice fields protect themselves when suddenly overtaken by stored In these reat confidence in Bobby's ability to overcome conditions that to himself would seem unconquerable