“Of course you could not for the ice.”
“That’s right,” said Johannes; “and so it is year by year. By about August the floe has broken up, and part of it is melted, and one can sail a little way farther north, not very far some years, at others for a long distance; but the time always comes when the ice is solid and the ship cannot pass, and then at nights it begins to freeze again, and you have to hurry back for fear of being frozen up.”
“What’s the matter?” cried Steve, for the Norseman suddenly raised his spy-glass and directed it eastward, where the sea looked to be one dazzling sheen of damasked silver.
There was no answer for some moments, and then the man turned to the glass.
“Look yonder,” he said, “about a couple of points away to the south of the ship’s jib-boom.”
Steve seized the glass, and gazed through it, carefully sweeping the sea far and wide.
“Can you make it out?”
“No.”
“Try a little more to the south.”
“Can’t see anything. Yes, I can; a ship’s boat bottom upward miles away. It must be a big boat. Why, it’s a small ship capsized.”