The boys worked with desperation—stayed up late at night and rose at daybreak, hoping for a rise of water or a favorable slant of wind. The increased cold made it necessary to keep the oil stove burning, and the fuel began to get low. While sailing along the river, whose banks were lined with towns, the boys did not lay in a great stock of provisions; they thought it better to get them in fresh as frequently as possible.
“Well, Ken,” Clyde remarked the third day of their imprisonment on the bar, “we will have to live on raw potatoes and river water pretty soon. My oil is about gone, and everything else is almost eaten up.”
“There is one more thing to do,” the captain said at length. “Throw out our pig iron ballast. I hate to lose it, but it is the only thing left to do.”
All of the boys showed the effects of tremendously hard work, of the fight with cold and ice, with wind and water, but Kenneth was particularly worn. On him fell the responsibility. The others were in his care, and if anything happened to them he knew he would be held accountable. The constant strain, the lack of sleep—he was up all hours of the night—and his anxiety, told on even his rugged health. He grew perceptibly thinner in three days, dark rings showed under his eyes, and little things vexed him unwarrantably. They were all irritable, and it speaks well for their closely knit friendship that no words arose between them.
“Well, boys,” Kenneth said, cheerfully enough, “let’s play our last card. Let’s turn to and throw over the ballast.”
It was hard work lugging the heavy sash weights that made up the ballast from below and throwing them over the side. There was at least half a ton to be discarded, and by the time the last of it was overboard the boys thought that there must have been tons.
Guess, then, how their hearts leaped with joy when at last, after three weary days, the “Gazelle” floated over the bar and into deeper water. But it was a short-lived triumph, for they speedily found that there was another bar across the channel—the low water almost bared it, and they realized that they were trapped in a little basin a half-mile from shore, with absolutely no protection from the ice, which was running heavier and heavier.
To anchor and wait, trusting to Providence, was all that they could do. So two anchors were dropped, and the boys faced the situation. The weather continued piercing cold. The oil gave out altogether, and then the crew had to live on cold things and exist as best they could in the cold cabin.
“SAW THE GREAT CAKES OF ICE GO RACING BY.”