Precisely before that moment—when his feet were first free—he dropped flat on his gaff. Having in this way distributed his weight—avoided its concentration on a small area—he was borne up. And he withdrew his feet and waited for the sea to fall in again and compress the ice.
When the next wave fell in Billy Topsail started across the ice like a bob-cat.
Doctor Luke lay inert through two waves. When the third fell he jumped up and ran towards the base of Deep Water Cliff. Again the sea caught him unaware. His flesh was creeping again. Horror of the stuff underfoot—the treacherous insecurity of it—drove him. The shore was close. He was too eager for the shore—he ran too far; and his foot went down again—foot and leg to the thigh. As instinctively he tried violently to extract the leg by stepping up on the other foot—that leg went down to the knee.
A fall to the arm-pits impended—a drop clean through and overhead. The drop would inevitably be the result of a flash of hesitation. Doctor Luke cried out. And as he cried he plunged forward—a swift, conscious effort to fall prone on his gaff. There was a blank. Nothing seemed to happen. He was amazed to discover that the gaff upheld him. It occurred to him, then, that his feet were trapped—that he could not withdraw his legs from the sucking slush.
Nor could he. They were caught. And he perceived that they were sinking deeper—that he was slowly slipping through the slush.
He was conscious of the night—the dark and snow and wind; and he fancied that he heard a voice of warning.
"Cotch hold——"
It was a voice.
"Cotch hold o' the gaff!"
Doctor Luke seized the end of Billy Topsail's gaff and drew himself out of the grip of the slush. When the sea came in again he jumped up and joined Billy Topsail on the broken base of Deep Water Cliff. He was breathing hard. He did not look back. Billy Topsail said that they had better make haste—that somebody would "cotch a death o' cold" if they did not make haste. And they made haste.