He was some thirty miles from his objective. The sea beneath would be half hidden under ragged, drifting floes. In fair weather he could have chosen a landing space of clear water, but now he could not choose. The altitude dial said that the water was three hundred feet beneath, and rapidly rising nearer.
A margin of seconds in which to prepare! Ken locked the controls and scrambled back into the passenger compartment. Steadying himself on the bucking floor, he opened the torpoon's entrance port and slid in; quickly he locked the port and strapped the inner body harness around him; and then he waited.
Now it was all chance. If the plane crashed into clear water, he was safe; but if she hit ice.... He put that thought from him.
The locked controls held the amphibian for perhaps thirty seconds. Then with a scream the storm-giant took her. A mad up-current of wind hurled her high, whirled her dizzily, toyed with her—and then she spun and dove. Down, down, down; down with a speed so wild Ken grew faint; down through the core of a maelstrom of snow till she crashed.
Kenneth Torrance knew a sudden shaking impact; for an instant there was uncertainty; and then came all-pervading quiet....
CHAPTER III.
The Fate of the Peary
Quiet, and utter, liquid darkness.
Liquid! Around him, Ken heard a gurgling, at first loud and close, then subsiding to a low whispering of currents. The amphibian had hit water.