Out of the clear, deep-blue water, now almost smooth as a mirror, for the wind had dropped, there rose majestically the lofty, snow-covered mountains of Bremanjerland. In the hollows of the mountainsides, and on the precipitous, jaggedly outlined pinnacles of rock, the snow glistened in the melting rays of the sun. Here and there, runnels of water streamed down over the naked, gray walls of rock into the sea, or found their way down the deep clefts which ran, darkly outlined as though with black chalk, down the face of the cliffs. To the east, where the mountains were higher, there was a succession of glaciers. One might easily have believed oneself transported to the Alps.
Gradually the numerous islands, which lay like outposts in front of the mainland, became more clearly defined. As there was nothing suspicious to be seen either on land or water—no boat, no human habitation, not even a lighthouse—I held on my course until I was close inshore. Then, with the aid of the charts and sailing directions, which give good silhouettes of this part of the coast, I was soon able to get my exact position.
The sudden change in the weather had, of course, played the deuce with my plans. It would have been madness to attempt to break through the Shetland blockade in weather so clear as this. I therefore decided to keep at a safe distance from the patrol line, and wait for a change of weather. I laid a course for the point—several hundred miles north-east of the Faroes—at which the Polar Circle intersects the meridian of Greenwich.
CHAPTER XI ON THE EDGE OF THE ARCTIC SEA
Towards four o'clock of the following day we had reached the point aforesaid. And now it was hard to know what to do, for the air was still clear, the sea glassy-calm, with no indications of an early change.
So far, we had seen no ice, though we were now on the edge of the Arctic Ocean. From that we might conclude that the route north-about round Iceland was not yet practicable, for the ice had not yet broken up.
To run the blockade was, in existing circumstances, hopeless; especially as it was nearing full-moon, and in these high latitudes there was, properly speaking, no night at all. I decided simply to stop the engines, and lie to all the next day. This kind of weather could not last for ever, and the date of my rendezvous gave me a couple of days to play with. For the moment there was not much danger, for no enemy craft was likely to penetrate so far north.
If the English were to have to look out for German ships up here, they might as well extend their outpost-line to the North Pole. In fact, if there was any risk at all, it came from our own submarines, not all of which could have received a warning about our voyage.