From Cape Serdze eastward the water is deep near the shore and the travelling in places along the sea-ice was rough, because the drift ice came close to shore. We had a good many steep inclines to go down and had exciting experiences, especially as we went along at top speed. Corrigan, however, was a daring and capable dog-driver, and knew how to steer the sledge as well as a man can steer a ship. He had sixteen dogs, all of the very best quality, and where the going was good we travelled very fast. Corrigan had a chum who went along with us with some of Corrigan’s dogs and ours. Kataktovick travelled with this other man.
At several points along the way we passed groups of arangas perched on shelves projecting out from the face of the cliffs, a hundred feet above the shore. In some cases it was hard to see how the natives could climb up into them; they reminded me of pictures I had seen of the homes of the cliff-dwellers. The natives live on these heights because they want to be on the coast near the walrus and seal and can find no other location for their arangas.
We made fifty miles during the day. It was light nearly all of the twenty-four hours now and we were able to keep going until seven o’clock in the evening, before stopping at a very comfortable aranga for the night.
Sitting on the sledge so long, when I had not been used to it, made my back ache and the pain was so great that I did not sleep at all; in fact, I had a miserable night. The air in the aranga, too, was very hot.
The next day we got away shortly after daybreak. The going was rough in many places and we had to travel close under the cliffs. It was a warm day, with a temperature about freezing; where the sun’s rays struck the angles of the cliffs water was dropping. There was, in fact, a good deal of danger in passing along under the cliffs, for the heat of the sun was releasing the boulders that the frost had dislodged during the winter and now they came tearing down the face of the cliff without warning straight across our path.
As we journeyed on the pleasant warmth of the sun’s rays made the ride a rather more enjoyable excursion than we had been experiencing before on our travels. At times Corrigan and I attempted conversation. He could speak very little English and though I had picked up a few phrases along the coast I could speak no native language that he could understand. He was considered the dare-devil of northern Siberia and had such a reputation for taking chances that it was said that when Corrigan could not get a bear it was because bear were scarce and it would not be worth while for any one else to try. Mr. Wall had told Corrigan what I had said about our voyage and shipwreck and our experiences since. Now, while we were riding along, Corrigan would start in to tell me of his exploits. I knew just enough of the language to recognize an occasional word when he described hunting the walrus and polar bear and the narrow escapes he had had on the drift ice and hunting whale in skin-boats with the harpoon. He would get more and more excited, and finally I would cease to understand anything and could do nothing but nod at frequent intervals, until he would become aware of my total ignorance of what he was saying; then he would put his hands to his head, with a gesture of despair. He became greatly excited and irritated when he found that neither of us could relate his adventures to the other. It was all very amusing to me, especially as when I had first heard his name mentioned I had thought of him as an Irishman.
Stopping at intervals along the way to have tea in the various arangas that we passed, we finally reached Emma Town, a few miles to the southwest of East Cape, at about six P.M. The second stage of our journey from Wrangell Island was over. We had been thirty-seven days on the march and probably had actually travelled about seven hundred miles, all but the last part of the way on foot. There now remained the question of transportation to Alaska, and the sooner I was able to arrange for that the better.
CHAPTER XXVII
WITH BARON KLEIST TO EMMA HARBOR
At Emma Town I found the brother of the Mr. Caraieff whom I had met at Cape North. I presented my letter of introduction and was hospitably received. Mr. Caraieff, I found, was a graduate of a college at Vladivostock. He was able to carry on a conversation with me in quite intelligible English and had no difficulty in understanding me. He invited me to stay at his home as long as I liked. I thanked him but said that I must get over to the American shore as soon as possible.