“Of chy. Tell him a chy peet is what I want. He will understand.”
“Aye, aye, sir! Chy it is, and you shall have it if there’s a drop to be found aboard the boat.”
Serge laughed at the order, and hastened to fill it; while Phil followed him, curious to see what he would make.
“Why, that’s tea you are putting into the pot!” he exclaimed, a few minutes later.
“Certainly,” replied Serge; “chy is tea, and tea is chy, and the teapot is chynik, and chy peet is a lunch of tea and bread. So there’s a lesson in Russian that I know you won’t forget in a hurry. Now, if you will carry it up to him I will get back to the furnace door, for poor Isaac is just about used up.”
So the young captain acted as steward, and then, taking the wheel while his guest drank cup after cup of the scalding liquid, became quartermaster, and was finally restored to his original rank by having the missionary ask his permission to send the Chimo into the ice. “It may injure the hull somewhat,” he said, “and probably will; but we’ve either got to risk it or leave her to winter out here in the middle of the river; for we are abreast of Anvik now. You will see the houses in a few minutes, for dawn is close at hand.”
“Of course we must put her into the ice, and rush her just as far as she will go,” answered Phil. “We can afford to damage her hull to a very considerable extent better than we can afford to leave her out here to be crushed by the spring break-up of the ice.”
So in the first flush of morning the brave little boat was headed towards the western bank, and began directly to crash through the thin ice fringing the channel. For some distance she cut her way as though it had been so much window-glass; then her progress became slower and slower, until finally she came to a dead stop, though the big wheel was still lashing the turbid waters into foam behind her.