“This floe has caught on a larger block of ice somewhere on the other side and it has been turning slowly. Dick, we don’t know where we’re at now.”
“I hope you’re wrong,” Dick hastily rejoined, renewing his efforts at the paddle.
The boys now proceeded to bury their misgivings in hard work on the paddles. Sipsa continued his work at the prow of the craft, his expert handling of the pole avoiding many a dangerous ice jam. Yet as the minutes passed and they failed again and again to raise even a faint shout from the balance of the company, they became certain that they were floating out to sea.
“Oh, if this fog would only lift!” Dick prayed.
They worked on for what seemed to them an hour longer, but which actually could not have been more than fifteen minutes, when it seemed that Dick’s prayer was about to be answered.
“It’s getting lighter, isn’t it?” Sandy said hoarsely, almost afraid to believe his eyes.
“I believe you’re right,” Dick answered, cheering up.
Slowly the fog thinned until they could see almost a hundred feet around them, then, as swiftly as it had enveloped them, the fog bank passed over, leaving them half blinded by the sudden glare of sunlight. Dick and Sandy cried out with joy, and rose up in the umiack to look about.
“Thank heaven!” Dick ejaculated as he feasted his eyes on a welcome scene.
Sandy had been right. The floe which they had been following had touched upon some solider object. It had been the island!