It was a desperate venture, for the first bear was lumbering along and had nearly reached the turning; in fact, would have passed it before the boy could reach the haven of comparative safety if it had not stopped suddenly in surprise at seeing the quarry so suddenly turn round and seem to charge. Instead, then, of running to meet him, the bear suddenly raised itself up, and, with outstretched claws, awaited Steve’s approach. It was all over in a moment or two: the boy had to go so close to the waiting bear that the beast struck at him with its right paw, and nearly touched the boy’s shoulder; but the next instant he was beyond reach, and running up the defile.
There was no bounding over the ground, though, here, for the place was, as has been shown, encumbered with fallen blocks; and Steve’s heart, which the moment before rose with a leap at the way in which he had eluded the bears, sank once more like lead, for he knew enough of the natural history of these beasts and their construction to feel that, though they had left the ice for a prowl among the rocks, they would be thoroughly at home over such ground as he was traversing.
“I’ve only put it off for a bit,” he said to himself; “and they’ll run me down.”
This thought only roused him.
“They shan’t find it an easy task, though,” he muttered, and, forced as he was to slacken his speed, he had the satisfaction of seeing, on glancing back along the gloomy passage, that the bears were also compelled to slacken their pace and climb over intervening rocks as he had done. And it was plural, for the second one had joined the first, and they were coming steadily on, their light coats showing with terrible plainness in the gloom among the rocks.
The breathless rush, then, was over; but the progress, though slow, was terribly hard work, and that which depressed the lad most was to see that the great brutes made no hurry or fuss over their pursuit, but came deliberately on, as if quite sure of the result, and prepared to follow even if it were for days.
“And I thought it so glorious to be always daylight and sunshine,” said Steve. Oh, if it would only come on now the blackest, darkest night ever known, so that he could take advantage of the many hiding-places he could see right and left, and crawl into one of them till the bears had passed!
He looked back just as this idea crossed his mind, and once more a chill of dread came over him. For the defile was a little more open at the top just then, so that he could see the actions of the bears plainly as they came on some sixty yards behind; and he grasped the knowledge now that they were not hunting him by sight, but by scent, and that though, as a rule, they came along with their noses in the air, every now and then they lowered their muzzles and snuffled eagerly about some block of stone, uttering low, pig-like grunts.
“Why, that’s where my hot, moist hands touched,” said Steve in dismay. “Darkness would be of no use if they hunt like that.”
For some minutes now the boy’s legs felt heavy and began to drag, his breath came short, and the feeling of dread rose round him as if it were water in which he was about to drown.