Thus a week was consumed, and September was near at hand, when at length the clouds wearied of their task, and the sun again shone out of a clear sky through a glorious, transparent atmosphere.
But the northeast gale had reaped a harvest of ice from the Arctic waters, sweeping it down into Hudson Bay, where the packs broke into fragments, and vagrant pans were distributed far and wide, steadily working their way southward. This was not bay ice such as had been encountered off the eastern coast of Labrador, but the adamantine product of the Arctic. There was little difficulty, however, in avoiding the larger and widely distributed pans, and the smaller fragments bobbing here and there in the swell were quite harmless to the strongly built little steamship.
“Looks bad for the straits, sir, bad,” remarked Captain Bluntt, descending from the barrel in the foremast. “I’m thinkin’ th’ straits has plenty of ice now, plenty, sir. Bad place to meet ice, sir! Bad place! But if the weather holds calm for a week most of it’ll work out.”
“Are we likely to have trouble getting through the straits, Captain?”
“No! No! We’ll get through all right, sir, we’ll get through, with no more nor’easters or northers. A bit of a westerly breeze would clean the straits, sir, sweep the ice right out. Yes, sir, sweep it out!”
They turned northward, cruised close in along the Ottawa Islands, where Remington shot another bear, and then turned westward, where at length anchorage was made at 60° north latitude opposite Egg River and nearly a mile from its mouth.
“Not safe to run too close in,” explained Captain Bluntt. “Never like to anchor too close inshore when I’ve no cover, sir. Not safe, not safe. Always afraid of the rocks, sir, if a squall should strike me.”
“This is near enough,” said Remington. “It’s a short pull to the river mouth.”
“Now what’s the plan, sir? Going ashore to hunt caribou, you say? Well, you may find them in there around the lakes, sir. Must be lakes back there. Yes, sir, and caribou.”