"Watch the lad," said Billy. "I'll try my hand."
Toby was lying down. Jonathan caught him up from the ice and held him in his arms.
"Quick!" he cried. "He've fell asleep. Ah, he's freezin'!"
It was coming dark fast. There was no time to waste in the gale that was blowing. The frost was putting Toby to sleep. Billy sped. He searched the drifts like a dog for a dead man. And soon he had luck. He found Long Jerry Cuff, of Providence Arm, a chunk of ice, poor man!—lying in a cuddle, arms folded and knees drawn up, like a child snuggled in bed. Long Jerry had been in the water, soaked to the skin, and he was solid and useless. And then Billy came on a face and a fur cap in a drift of snow. It was George Hunt, of Bullet Bight, with whom Billy had once sailed, in fishing weather, to Thumb-and-Finger of the Labrador.
Long Jerry was lying flat on his back with his arms flung out and his legs spread. And he was frozen fast to the floe. Billy could not budge him. No. Billy caught him by the head and lifted—he was stiff as a plank; and Billy failed. And Billy took him by the foot and pried a leg loose—and ripped at it with all his might; and again he failed. Solid as stone! They must all have been solid like that. And then Billy knew that it was no use to try any more—that they could not strip the clothes from a dead man if they had a dead man to strip.
And then he went disconsolate to Jonathan.