The earnestness in Stirling's strong voice showed Cushner where his heart lay, and he glanced at the low-swinging sun which was going down on a long arc that marked the end of a Northern day.
"Good-night," he said. "Go turn in and forget bowheads. I don't think the old man is thinking about them. He's full of seals. He asked me a thousand questions about them. Darn sealing, says I! Whaling's a man's game! Many an old bowhead has fought back. Many a boat's been smashed by a bull whale—up here or in the South Pacific."
Stirling nodded his head in complete understanding, for he realized the call which was in the big mate's blood. He watched him disappear into the galley-house, then followed, after a glance about the deck. Many of the crew were still out upon the ice.
His cabin seemed strangely small and constricted, and he opened a porthole which overlooked the deck and rail and sea to the south. He examined his few possessions with wistful eyes—a bomb gun, brightly polished, standing in one corner of the cabin, a sextant and ancient chronometer resting upon a shelf, a Bowditch and well-thumbed almanac which comprised his library. His clothes were but few and worn.
He turned in, after undressing, snapping off his light and rolling over on his right arm. He drowsed with the music of the grinding floes in his ears, then heard a racking shiver which came from the north and east; it was the great North pack breaking along its entire length.
He awoke like a startled child. Cushner's pointed beard was thrust through the open porthole, and the second mate's wide-set eyes were intent and hard.
"Climb out of your bunk!" he said. "Get in your boots and join me on the ice. I'll be right by the hummock where the shore line is."
Stirling hastily dressed and wrapped a great sea coat, with shell buttons, about his form. He stepped out on the dark deck with firm stride, glancing intuitively aft as he threw one leg over the port rail, after rounding the deck house.
Nothing showed on the poop. A faint light, however, struck upward and brought out the lacery of the after standing rigging. This light vanished suddenly, then a companion hatch slammed.
Stirling dropped to the ice and crawled over its surface till he reached a towering hummock. Behind this Cushner was crouching, and the big mate laid a finger across his whiskered lips.