The girl ran lightly across the deck and pressed the old prospector's arm.
"I knew you'd find it, Uncle Jim," she rejoiced, "I said so, all along!" Then, turning to the mine-owner, who had also come on deck, she added, "There it is, Mr. Owens!"
The Australian looked. That low flat bank, slowly sloping upwards, fringed with ice and deep in snow, was none too reassuring.
"You're sure?" he asked suspiciously. "It looks to me a whole lot more like an iceberg than it does like a gold-field!"
The "Wizard" interrupted, fearing lest Jim should make some rough rejoinder.
"It looks like an easy landing-place and that's one good thing," he said, cheerfully. "The Captain, here, has been making soundings and says there is good holding ground."
"That's all I will say, though," put in the yachtsman. "It's not a harbor. You're exposed here to every wind that blows!"
"You mean I'd have to build a breakwater?" Owens queried.
"Probably, if you want smooth water for handling cargoes. But I doubt if you could manage it. The winter ice would chew your breakwater all to bits. There's five months of open water, anyway, and the summer months are not so stormy."
"I wouldn't try to build a breakwater!" Owens burst out. "How would I get men and materials up here?"