“Not so fast,” advised Watson, with a contradictory gesture. “Those people are not from the Herculanea. See, they’re dressed in furs. If I’m not mistaken, they’re not of our race even; they’re—”
He hesitated before expressing the opinion in his mind and looked more intently at the two strange inhabitants of the floating island of ice.
“What?” Guy asked eagerly.
“Eskimos!”
CHAPTER XVII
The Eskimos
Presently a few more of the castaways arrived at the top of the stairway and the rest of the men were either on their way up or were hastening toward the steps of ice. They ascended single file, as much of the upward passage was not wide enough for two or more to walk abreast.
Among the first to reach the upper landing was an anthropological professor of a New England college, Dr. Olaf Anderson. He was a Dane and had made studies of the human race in all the northern countries of Europe and Asia and in Arctic America, including Iceland and Greenland. No sooner did he get a view of the two fur-clad strangers a hundred and fifty feet below than he forgot his hunger and physical weariness. Here was something that aroused a more lively interest in him than could even prospects of food or home. It did not take him long to verify Watson’s suspicion.
“Innuits!” he exclaimed. “How did they get here?”
“You ought to explain that better than anybody else, professor,” said Watson, who had made the acquaintance of the anthropologist on the steamer.
“They must have been trapped here in some way,” declared the latter. “And in that case, they couldn’t have been here less than several weeks.”