It turned out, however, that this was one of those short-lived squalls, not uncommon in the Arctic regions, which burst forthwith unwonted fury, sweep madly over the plains of the frozen seas, rush up into the valleys of the land, and then suddenly stop, as though they felt that all this energy was being spent in vain. In a short time, which however seemed interminable to the watchers on the hillside, the wind began to abate and the wild gusts were less frequent. Then it calmed down; finally it ceased altogether; and the storm-cloud, passing away to the south-east, left the dark sky studded with the myriad constellations of the starry host.
Uncovering Gartok’s face to see how it fared with him, and hoping that he slept, Cheenbuk found that he was wide awake, but in a condition that made him more anxious than ever. He looked up at the face of his protector with a faint but grateful smile.
“I have always been your enemy,” he said, in a low voice, “but you have been my friend.”
“That does not matter now,” replied Cheenbuk. “I have never been your enemy. We will be friends from this time on.”
Gartok closed his eyes for a few seconds, but did not speak. Then he looked up again earnestly.
“No,” he said, with more of decision in his tone; “we shall neither be friends nor enemies. I am going to the country where all is dark; from which no sound has ever come back; where there is nothing.”
“Our people do not talk in this way. They think that we shall all meet again in the spirit-land, to hunt the seal, the walrus, and the bear,” returned Cheenbuk.
“Our people talk foolishness. They think, but they do not know,” rejoined this Hyperborean agnostic, as positively and as ignorantly as if he had been a scientific Briton.
“How do you know that there is ‘nothing’ in the place where you are going?” asked Cheenbuk, simply.
Gartok was silent. Probably his logical faculty told him that his own thinking, and coming to a conclusion without knowing, was as foolish in himself as in his comrades.