During those seven long, weary days they only left the hut when forced to do so to obtain food, wood, or water. Serge went as far as the wreck of their boat, where he obtained several oak ribs and half a dozen nails. The latter were ground, or, rather, rubbed down to sharp points by his companions, while he busied himself in cutting out two of the great clumsy-looking wooden [halibut-hooks], such as are used by the Indians about Sitka, and specimens of which are brought from there by every Alaskan tourist. At the proper point in each of these he inserted one of the sharpened nails, and Jalap Coombs lashed them solidly into place with bits of twine.
Phil ridiculed these, and said that any fish stupid enough to be hooked by them deserved to be caught; but Serge only smiled the superior smile of one who knows, and answered: “All right, we’ll see!”
When the gale finally blew itself out Phil did see, and marvelled at the facility with which codfish and flounders were caught by these same despised wooden hooks, which he was forced to admit were as deadly as the finest sproats or Limerick bends he had ever used.
One morning, at the beginning of their second week of captivity, the castaways were awakened by a burst of sunshine, and sprang from their couch of moss to be greeted by as glorious a July day as any of them had ever seen. It was made up of sunshine, blue sky, a dimpled landscape of plain, foot-hill, and snow-capped mountains all glowing with the yellows, reds, purples, and greens of mosses, lichens, and volcanic cliffs. Above all, Shishaldin reared his lofty crest that his filmy smoke-plumes might stream out bravely in the crisp morning breeze.
During the week just past our friends had discussed over and over again their plans for the future, and had decided that the first thing was to attract the attention of some passing vessel that might be induced to take them and their seal-skins to Oonalaska. This place, although lying many miles to the westward, was the nearest settlement and trading-post, and also the point of departure for the monthly steamer to Sitka. At Oonalaska they would dispose of their furs. Phil and Serge would engage passage for the destination they so longed to reach, and Jalap Coombs’s future would be laid out according to circumstances. But first they must catch their schooner.
As vessels were more likely to be seen on the Pacific than on the Bering Sea side of the island, they decided first of all to climb a very considerable elevation that rose almost directly from Krenitzin Strait, and a couple of miles south of their camp. From this they hoped to see both waters. During their walk they caught glimpses of several small bands of caribou, and of one or two distant moving objects that Phil was certain must be bear. Never had he wished for a rifle so much as now. Venison and bear meat! How good either or both of them would taste! How he hated fish and longed for meat! But there was probably no gun of any kind within a hundred miles of him save those that he knew of at the bottom of the sea; so what was the good of wishing for one?
They were disappointed to find that the Pacific was hidden from the elevation they ascended by another rising beyond it. As they descended into the valley between the two, with the intention of climbing the second hill, they were startled by the ringing report of a rifle-shot. A moment later three caribou came flying up the valley with the speed of the wind, rushed past them so close that they involuntarily stepped back for fear of being trampled underfoot, and disappeared. A fourth who was lagging behind, evidently wounded, stumbled, and halted but a short distance from them. Ere he could resume his flight, a second shot, still from some unseen source, stretched him dead at their feet.