I scrambled to my feet, and made my way uncertainly to the saloon. The remains of a meal stood uncleared upon the table, and I began to satisfy a hunger which had got stupendous. Then back up the pitching companion-steps I tottered, and strode out upon the deck.
The seas were still leaping along our sides, but not quite so strongly. Up on the bridge I recognized Janson’s burly figure, and perceived with thankfulness that Waller had at last surrendered his post. In the bow Gerry and Lessaution were clutching the foremost stays, and pointing excitedly before them. I wormed my way along the deck and joined them.
Standing out blue-white above the froth of the boiling sea a great iceberg was rearing its head. It hung there haughtily and unmoved, despising the rage that made the breakers raven at its feet. The wind shrieked about its pinnacles, thrusting one now and again from its seat upon the ice buttresses, and sending it crashing into the deep. But the main mass of the white mountain stayed motionless, a mighty breakwater sheltering the leeward surface into a rippling pool.
Janson raised his hand to his mouth, and roared some indistinguishable order to the watch on deck. The men came racing forward, and hauled at the sheets. The sails came lumbering down, and as we lost the steadiness of their grip upon the wind we began to pitch and tumble again.
Not for long. The wheel spun in the mate’s hands, and with our way still swift upon us we began to turn. We nosed in towards the white pyramid. We swung past its leeward edge. Our cutwater broke a burnished line across the stillness of the sheltered pool. In a very instant the travail of our storm-hunted vessel ceased. We swung, heaved to, upon the calm, gently swaying to the ripples, while outside the storm still bellowed for our lives.
Behind this sudden refuge we lay almost motionless, looking up wonderingly at the shining peaks above. Baines and the cook accepted the altered conditions with surprise and thankfulness, making immediate preparations for a meal which should obliterate the discomforts of the past eight-and-forty hours. The smoke began to curl anew from the galley, and various tinned victuals were disinterred from the pantry wreckage.
Within five minutes of our finding this unexpected harbor the door of the captain’s cabin opened, and Waller strode forth, gaping upon our changed surroundings. The sixth sense that lies in the seaman’s brain had warned him, sleeping as he was, that we no longer dipped and tossed amid the breakers. A glance to starboard, and he understood, giving Janson a quick nod as the other pointed to the ice. He stayed still a moment, watching the edge of the berg curiously, and then climbed up and joined the mate.
I could not hear the words they exchanged, but I saw a shake of Waller’s head as he jerked his thumb over his shoulder. They strode together to one end of the bridge, and the captain gesticulated toward the berg again. A half-smile crossed Janson’s face. He was evidently meeting his chief’s arguments with a polite incredulity. Following the line of Waller’s pointing finger, I was in time to see a strange thing happen.
The edge of the ice rose slowly, but perceptibly, mounting from the water-level with a heavy swish. I looked up in amazement, and saw the topmost pinnacles bow slantingly across the drifting clouds. There was a suck and a wash as the water rolled in toward the ice to fill the vacuum. The berg lurched slowly back again, and a big breaker gathered itself up, and crested out toward us. There was a line of foam across the pool.
An order roared from between Waller’s lips, and Janson came at a bound from the bridge to wake the watch below. His face was white with terror. He shrieked into the foc’sle in a shrill, unnatural voice.