"I think I have; come and see."
CHAPTER IX
A STARTLING OCCURRENCE
As may be supposed, Jack Cosgrove was all excitement on the instant. He had not expected any such reply, and he was eager to learn the cause. As he started forward, he instinctively glanced down in quest of evidence that Fred had passed there. There was none so far as he could see, and, if there had been, it is not likely he would have been able to identify it, since all the party had been over the same spot, and some of them more than once.
"What is it?" he asked, as he reached his friend.
"It may mean nothing, but a little distance beyond where we camped the ice is broken and scratched as though some one has been that way."
"So there has, we were there yesterday afternoon."
"I haven't forgotten that, but these marks are at a place where we haven't been, that is unless it was Fred."
"How did you manage to find them in the dark?"
"I didn't; I groped over the ice as far as I could, and then sat down and waited for day. I must have slept awhile, but when it was growing light I happened to look around, and there, within a few feet of me, on my right hand, I noticed the ice scratched and broken, as though some one had found it hard work to get along. I was about to start right after him, when I thought it best to tarry for you. It is now so much lighter that we shall learn something worth knowing."
Even in their excitement they paused a few minutes to gaze out upon the ocean, as it was rapidly illumined by the rising sun. Before long their vision extended for miles, but the looked-for sight was not there. On every hand, as far as the eye could penetrate, was nothing but the heaving expanse of icy water.