The Eskimo wasted no time in sorrowful reflection, but started over the ice, hugging the sealskin bag to his breast, dragging the walrus-hide behind him. Dick followed. In the past few minutes he had experienced a change. He had seen raw men rise to great heights of courage, and die in silent bravery. The colorless Swede could have saved himself, throttled the Eskimo with his bare hands and taken the skin of oil, the walrus-hide and the spear, and with them food, warmth and protection. With the spear or without it, he could have beaten Walton to his knees, for he was a physical giant. Instead, he had given his life for another; and greater heights no man can attain. Before him Walton bowed in humble silence.
In the slow progress over the floe, Walton again reflected on the different codes of the two survivors. The code of Dick Walton protected and cared for the aged. The primal code of the Eskimo was self-preservation—the first law of Nature. Like the majority of civilized people, Walton did not know of the strange code more ancient than that of self-preservation.
Alone, Walton would have fought his way to the ice-armored shore. The Eskimo ignored it and crossed the floe. As aboard the schooner, he considered many things—then leaped to a small berg. Unconsciously Walton found himself considering the skin of seal-oil, and wondering if he could drink it. Of course the native possessed it, along with the ivory-headed spear and walrus-hide, but he was aged and weak, while Walton was young and strong. Age must sleep sometime. Walton leaped to the berg. Neither man spoke.
The berg floated alone in the blue lead, fringed by floes on three sides. Hour after hour, the strange pair huddled in the scant protection of a small ice-hummock while the berg drifted. The Eskimo drew the walrus-hide about him to break the wind seeking access to his age-weary limbs. The spear lay on the ice in front of him within reach. He continued to ignore the white man; yet it was apparent he tried to read his thoughts. Walton found some solace in his pipe. His tobacco-pouch was nearly full; the matchbox had been refilled that morning. Hours dragged slowly, but darkness came too soon.
Walton had read that men freeze to death without realizing what is taking place, but he found the cold aroused him even when he dozed. Then he would leap to his feet and stamp about until warmth was restored. He was desperately hungry, but not hungry enough to drink seal-oil. In any event, when starvation drove him to the point of drinking the nauseous stuff, the Eskimo would have finished the last of it.
Day came, sunless. The sky was over-cast with the dreary gray of a casket. The native stirred slightly and leaped to his feet. The calculation he had made the day before was correct; the berg had become a part of another floe, the vastness of which the eye could not measure.
The Eskimo squirmed cautiously to the highest point in the immediate vicinity, then as cautiously returned, his eyes gleaming, the spear gripped tightly. He grunted in dialect, and glanced about; then Walton understood. A polar bear had sensed their presence and was making his way to them, hunting instead of being hunted. The native gripped his spear tighter as the bear drew near. It was an ordeal a strong man would have shunned.
“Give me your knife; it’s our only chance,” cried Walton. “We’ve got to eat!”
Suspicion flashed into the dark eyes; he waved the white man aside. Walton picked up a block of ice. “I’ll do what I can!” Again the native waved him back, then crawled toward the beast in an effort to gain some advantage in position. In a twinkling Walton had been thrust back into the ages ten thousand years. He watched the impending struggle entranced. The Eskimo steeled himself, gathered together the last ounce of strength in his withered frame and put it all in one vicious lunge of the spear.