It was a despairing cry that rang over those dismal, freezing waters. “Help!”
It was too late—no help from the “Gazelle” could save the boy in his frail craft. The current had swept him beyond the reach of any one on board, even if a soul had been awake to hear his call for help.
The grinding, crushing, gnashing sound of the crumbling ice on the gorge grew nearer and nearer.
Kenneth scrambled to a sitting posture, and searched with groping hands in the darkness for the oars. At last he found them. No—only one—a misplaced brace deceived him. Again he searched, with desperate haste. He could hear the lap of the water on the piled-up floes now. The other oar was not there; he dimly remembered now that he dropped it when he fell backward.
Putting out his one oar he began to scull with it, but the boat had drifted round broadside to the current, and he could not head it away from the inexorable wall of ice now so close. At last he gave the struggle up and trusted to Providence. He comprehended how puny and futile his own strength was compared to the power of these mighty odds. The boat drifted nearer and nearer to what seemed certain destruction. Ransom crouched low, prepared to spring to any cake that might bear his weight—it was his only chance. He grasped the painter of the boat in his hand, and as soon as he felt the first bump of the broken ice against “His Nibs’s” side, he sprang at a white surface that showed dimly before him. By some lucky chance, or rather owing to a merciful God, it was a large floe, which, though it tottered and tipped dangerously, did not capsize. It bore the boy’s weight bravely. For a minute Kenneth paused for breath, then he noticed that “His Nibs” was being battered and ground by the constant action of the ice. He peered into the darkness to see how large his floating island was, and stepped cautiously this way and that to test its stability. It swayed frightfully, but the boy determined to risk adding the extra weight of the small boat. Inch by inch he drew it over the slippery surface, and deeper and deeper sank the ice island on that side until it was submerged a half a foot or so. Kenneth stood on the sharply inclined slippery ice in imminent danger of sliding off. Though it was zero weather, the perspiration stood out on his forehead in beads, and ran into his eyes till it blinded him. Gradually “His Nibs” was hauled up till it rested beside him, for the time, at least, secure.
For a space he rested his aching limbs and bruised back. The white shape of the “Gazelle” could be faintly made out through the gloom, so near and yet absolutely unattainable. Never before had the boy—the designer, builder and owner of the craft—so yearned for her. She was cold, cheerless, and in extreme peril herself, but she seemed a very haven of rest and security to the castaway.
Kenneth knew that he must fight for his own life and that no aid would be forthcoming from the yacht, and he began to study the situation. Grim enough he found it. A strong current bore down on the gorge, carrying ice and débris of every kind, grinding away at the edge of Ransom’s floe. It was evident that it would break up eventually, and the boy prayed that it would last till he should find some other refuge. He noticed that bits of wood and fragments of ice floated off to the right after colliding with the obstruction. This set him to thinking. There must be some break through, that caused the current to swerve. He looked long and intently to the right, but could make out nothing in the darkness. He felt sure, however, that there must be a channel somewhere, and he determined to find it. With great and laborious care he launched the boat and sprang into it. Fending off from the teeth of the gorge with his oar, he worked his way gradually to the right. Twice he had to jump to a floe and haul his boat out from between two grinding cakes. But in spite of the labor, of darkness, of weary limbs, and hands numbed with cold, he gained, until at last he reached the gap and was carried through. He floated nearly a mile before he could make his way to shore. It was bleak enough, but he uttered a fervent “Thank God” as he set foot on solid ground. The river bordered a cornfield at this point, and many of the rotting stacks were still standing. Kenneth made for one of these and burrowing into it, sank down to rest. He was desperately weary and almost unbearably cold, but thankful to his heart’s core for his escape.
“If I could only rest here till morning,” he thought. It was a sheltered spot, and he began to feel the reaction following his tremendous exertions. He was languid and drowsy, and his fast stiffening muscles cried out for rest. It was a temptation the sorely tried boy found hard to resist; but the thought of his friends aboard the yacht, their state of mind when they discovered his absence, and the loss of their only means of reaching shore, urged him on and gave him no peace. His imagination pictured the hazardous things the boys might do if he was not there to calm them. As he lay curled up on the frozen ground, under the stiflingly dusty stalks, visions rose of the boys jumping overboard and attempting to swim ashore; of their setting the “Gazelle” adrift in the hope that she would reach the bank. Many other waking dreams disturbed him, most of them absolutely impracticable, but to his overtired and excited imagination painfully real, and his anxiety finally drove him out of his nest into the biting cold again.
Then Kenneth stopped to think, to plan, a minute. He had but one oar—he could not row against the strong current and floating ice—he could not drag the boat through the water, the shore was too uneven and fringed, moreover, with ice. Bare fields and brown waters surrounded him, there was no sign of human habitation, there was no help to be had, and he must reach the yacht that night—but how? He studied hard, and could think of but one way—to drag the boat overland till he was above the “Gazelle’s” anchorage, then launch it and drift down with the current.
How great the distance was he did not know, but he realized that it was a long way and that the journey could only be made by the hardest kind of work, under the most trying of circumstances.