"No, Charley; I am safe, thanks to you."
And the lad, still weak with his previous illness, fear, and excitement, rose, threw his arms around his preserver's neck, and burst into a passion of tears.
"Better look, Regnar. Guess blow him head off too," grumbled Peter, with a strange mixture of vexation, pleasure, and humor in his tone, for he loved Regnar, disliked to see men or boys cry, and knew that Regnar's misadventure was more unpleasant than dangerous.
In a moment or so Regnar arose, holding his head with both hands, and an evident feeling of uncertainty as to his whereabouts.
"Well, you call that gun Baby! I don't want her crying anywhere near me, after this. I say, La Salle, you sure my head all right on shoulders?"
La Salle hastened to assure him that all was correct, but Regnar gave a grim smile, and continued:—
"It no use; I can't hear, not if it thunder. I've no doubt you say you're sorry, but I no hear your 'pology, and I don't think I ever shall again. Well, never mind. No time then to say, 'By your leave, sir,' and I glad George got clear all right."
Drawing their knives the party commenced the less pleasant and exciting task of flaying and butchering their victims. The ten "hoods" were enormous fellows, averaging eight feet in length, and nearly six in circumference, and weighing from five to six hundred weight each. Only two were eviscerated for the sake of the heart and membranous vessels; but the heads of all were struck off for the sake of the brains, and the large sinews were extracted for "sewing thread." It was noon when the first load was sent off, under the care of Regnar and La Salle, to the home berg, and, two hours later, when they returned to the floe, they found, with pleasure, that the distance between the two points had materially lessened.
Climbing the highest point of the floe, La Salle looked down upon a strange spectacle. Reaching away a mile or two to windward was a succession of floes, similar to the one on which he stood. Upon them all the seals were gathered in hundreds, and beyond the last of the chain a huge iceberg—a perfect mountain of congealed water—rose nearly a hundred feet into the air. From its sides, resplendent with prismatic colors and reflected light, flashed more than one cascade of pure fresh water, and the light breeze, as it blew against its vertical walls, or perhaps some currents deep down below the surface, was impelling the huge mass, and the line of floes pushed before it, down the lane of open water, which led to the floating home of the wanderers.