“I can’t do it,” was all that Walter could say. “Let’s hunt farther, go around to the other side of that iceberg and then come back here if—if—we have to.”
Det’s only reply was a reduction of speed. Then he looked ahead carefully to avoid striking any of the floating bodies. Pretty soon Walter observed a small raft—the only raft in sight—a hundred feet distant, with two bodies lying on it. The face of one was toward him, and a chill of dread seized him as he recognized, or thought he recognized, the features.
He signaled his suspicion to Det, who nodded his head. The yacht ran close to the raft and stopped, and Tony rushed on deck to see what had happened. Walter leaned over the rail and gazed at the face. Then he straightened up and announced with evident relief:
“That isn’t Guy.”
Det and Tony also agreed that the body of the young man on the raft was not that of their missing friend. But it was of about the same size, and the facial contour, though not the features, was similar to that of Walter’s brother.
Det put on full speed again. The run around the berg was uneventful, except that it revealed to them, far to the southward, another and far greater mountain of ice, which they had not observed before. Walter scanned the sea as far as his glasses would reach, south, east, and west, but without fruitful result. Then he said:
“We’ve got just about enough time to go back and examine those bodies before dark. Let’s do that and in the morning start toward home, running farther to the south than we ran on our way here.”
Just as they were about to start back for the sea-surface graveyard, Tony reported trouble with the engine, and Walter and Det made an investigation. The engine was spitting and coughing and behaved as if something was choking it. An examination of the carburetor disclosed that the latter was flooding and considerable gas was being wasted.
Walter turned off the petcock on the feed line and then set to work to find out what was the cause of the flooding. He removed the carburetor and took it apart. Then he and Det looked over each part carefully to discover if there was any dirt or other interference preventing the closing of the needle valve. No trouble of this nature was disclosed. Walter then substituted a new needle valve, reassembled the carburetor, and put it back in position. As he turned on the gasoline, everything seemed to be O K; so he started the engine, but half a minute later it choked again.
In this manner they worked over the engine several hours, taking the carburetor apart half a dozen times. The last time they discovered the real cause of the trouble, which consisted of several metal filings in the hole in which the needle valve was intended to fit.