“Yes, just the same, lad. Come down if you want to have some of the sport.”
The captain stepped into one boat, and Steve followed, the doctor going off in the other with Jakobsen and the crew.
The next minute the word was given to sit fast and be silent, and the boats were rowed rapidly toward the great shoal, which must have numbered a thousand or fifteen hundred, while the water was one mass of foam.
“Are these good, these white whales?” said Steve to the captain, as the boat cut through the water, and Johannes stood ready with his harpoon, a very different implement from that provided for the walrus, being barbed so as to form a kind of hook, and, once through, could not be withdrawn from the gutta-percha-like side, of which it would take up a loop tough enough to hold the stoutest sea-horse they could strike. The harpoon used for the white whale was lighter, and had a head which somewhat resembled a half-moon, fitted to work at the end of the shaft, and slight, so that one point of the half-moon would stand in a line with the pole, while the other was secured by a band to the shaft. When the harpoon was driven into the whale, the band which held the second point of the head down to the pole was pushed off in passing through the skin and flesh, while at the first tug upon the line attached to the harpoon the loose head would be drawn crosswise, forming instead of a spear a double barb, which was strong enough to hold in the flesh without being drawn out.
The captain was too intent upon the shoal to answer Steve’s question, which he repeated.
“Good, my lad? Yes. The oil is the purest and best to be had, and very valuable; but of course not to be obtained in such quantities as are procured from the larger whales. I hope we shall get three or four, though. They will help to fill up our tanks.”
“I wish he’d think more of finding the Ice Blink than of filling the tanks,” thought Steve; but the next moment he, too, was thinking of nothing but the shoal of fish, as the men called them, though they were air-breathing animals instead; for now the chase became exciting. The belugas seemed to take no notice of the boats, but they were going rapidly through the water in chase of their prey, and when a fine one was selected it dived and went away swiftly beneath the water, so that it was difficult to tell where the creature would rise again.
Johannes gave his orders to the men, so that they might row toward the spot where the whale was likely to rise, and so give him a chance to hurl his harpoon before the animal had time to dive again. But this was not easy. Whether the curious blunt-nosed, white-skinned, active creature, with its back clear of all fish-like fin, was on the alert for the coming harpoon or for the meal it was seeking it is impossible to say, but certainly it showed a remarkable activity in keeping just out of reach. It would rise just exactly where not expected, and the whole business of the chase had to be gone through again and again.
Steve was too much occupied with the efforts of their own harpooner to pay any heed to what was going on aboard the other boat, and divided his time between watching the tall, active Norseman and the spot where it was anticipated that the whale would rise.
At last, after hard pulling, fortune favoured the men’s efforts. They had had a long tug, and there being no sign of the quarry they sought Johannes bade the rowers rest, while he stood with one foot resting upon the gunwale expectant.