Kak, the Copper Eskimo

by Vilhjalmur Stefansson; Violet Irwin

Conditions showed that the wind blowing against them all the way along must have been here a heavy, continuous gale. It had piled more ice into the western mouth of the straits than had ever been known before. The coast rose high. From its cliffs Kak beheld great masses of ice filling the whole expanse, rolling away billow on billow like a prairie country, goodness knew how deep under the trackless, gleaming snow.

“Jimminy!” thought the boy. “This old sea is going to take some crossing!”

He questioned if Omialik had started and felt a pang considering how near his hero might be at that minute and he unable to reach him. Then recollection of Okak brought a grin. “Our neighbor wanted it thick and he’s got it—perhaps he’ll be sorrier yet we didn’t travel by the eastern straits. I wonder what the going really is like out there?”

To think was to act with Kak. He immediately scrambled down the cliffs and a half hour later was walking alone over the corrugated ice field.

It was a shimmering sort of day. The sun struggled to penetrate the clouds, but did not quite emerge. The world lay trackless, formless, shadowless, a vast expanse of gray-white sky and gray-white snow. This kind of light is far harder on the eyes than bright sunshine, and since his snowblindness Kak had been very nervous about eyes. He kept his screwed up, not looking intently at anything, nor paying much attention to where he went, for he counted on the cliffs to guide him back. He only wanted to get a general impression of what their next march would be like and so strolled carelessly up a high ridge for a better view.

All at once Kak felt himself falling. He instantly thrust out his elbows so they would catch on the edges of the ice, for he knew what had happened. Stepping heedlessly he had walked on to the snow roof of a crevasse and had gone through into the crack. This is a common form of Arctic accident. The boy expected to stop when he had fallen as far at his waist, and to be able to hoist himself out, none the worse for his adventure; but to his surprise and horror he kept right on falling. The width of this chasm was so great that his elbows did not reach the walls. For an instant Kak felt helplessly angry—then the serious side broke on him. He was falling, falling—where to? On what would he strike—ice or water? How far would he fall? How hard would he strike? Sick with fear he tried to use his frenzied wits. It darted into his mind like a javelin that they would not know at home where he had gone, for snow so hard-driven by the gale was trackless as a rock. How he wished now he had taken either of the dogs, or both! He thought of Omialik, regretting Herschel Island, and in the middle of his keenest sorrow for the young marksman who would never be, both feet hit suddenly, smack on glare ice, flew from under him, and pitched him shoulder on against the solid wall. He slid down, smashing the back of his head, and lay still. Pain mingled with relief. It seemed for a moment as if nothing again could ever be so bad as that falling sensation. But the brief happiness passed. He realized he was lying captive between two high, hard, slippery sides, which towered above his head in twilight to the snow roof of the crevasse, offering no way out of that strange, cold prison. Above he could see the jagged hole he had torn in falling, and beyond it the gray sky. Through a fresh tide crack in the ice floor he saw water. Fear gripped him again when he thought how a little less frost would have allowed him to go right splash into it; for when an ice cake cracks it splits from top to bottom, leaving open ocean. Had the storm which roofed the tunnel over brought a spell of warm weather instead of cold, as storms often do, there would have been no floor formed in the crevasse. Bad as his plight was, things might have been infinitely worse. Suppose he had been floundering and freezing now—drowning, down in the bottom of that dismal jail without means of escape or alarm. Again, and this time in a very different mood, he regretted leaving his faithful dog. Sapsuk would have had sufficient intelligence to run and fetch Taptuna.

Kak knew very well nobody would come to help him, so he must help himself. As a beginning he took stock of his condition. One hip and shoulder were badly bruised and painful, and a goose egg was already developing on his head; but no bones seemed to be broken, nor could he find sprains or dislocations. So far so good. His first idea was to cut steps in the face of the ice wall and climb out. Putting his hand to his belt he found both knife and sheath had been torn away. “Still, it must be here,” the boy said bravely, and commenced looking around. The tide crack mocked him like an open, laughing mouth. “Foxes! If it has gone in there!” he cried, fumbling frantically under the snow which had showered down with his fall. Presently his fingers rapped on a horn handle. He made one grab and almost wept for joy. Just then his knife seemed his salvation; but five minutes later it had lost half of its value. On trial he found the sides were too far apart for him to support himself by a braced arm or knee as he climbed, and walking straight up a perpendicular, slippery surface by toe holes is an utter impossibility.

Kak now understood getting away was going to take all his invention and nerve and strength. The first step was to learn his surroundings. This crack might run smaller or lower at some other point. He set out exploring. It was an eerie sort of business to turn his back on the pool of light striking through the roof hole, and crawl over glare ice, between those blue-white walls, into the very heart of the stupendous jam he had so recently viewed with wonder from the cliffs. On hands and knees the boy began his strange and thrilling tour. His position brought him close to the floor, and once beyond the showered snow he saw tracks in the hoarfrost on the ice which made him flinch. He had company in the tunnel. The footsteps went both ways, as if some poor trapped creature had run to and fro, to and fro, in a crazy hunt for freedom. Kak knew very well what tracks these were. Acute dread shuddered over him. “But the crevasse may be long,” he comforted himself. “With luck I may get out before we meet.”

He crawled for thirty yards, stood up, and tried to guess the height of his prison. The snow roof looked thick and solid here, and though some light filtered through it, and doubtless a little through the ice itself, the gloom was sufficiently thick to confuse calculation. Space seemed to yawn above him; Kak felt rather than saw those walls were higher and wider apart; so he retreated to his first position and, only waiting to take one long look up at the friendly sky, set out in the opposite direction.

There was no question about it, the walls lowered toward this end. Fired with hope our boy scuttled along like a crab. The ice lay perfectly smooth, slippery as a ballroom floor. He crawled a few feet and stopped to glance above, and crawled on, and stopped, till familiarity made him careless. Very soon he was crawling and gazing upward together, forgetful of everything but his anxiety to climb out. Then suddenly the advanced arm plunged down splash into another tide crack. Kak uttered a yap of surprise, snatched back his hand, peeled off the wet mitt and dried his fingers quickly on his clothes. It had not gone in above the wrist, but a wet mitt was going to be less comfortable than a dry one; the captive felt vexed at his stupidity, blamed his position for it and scrambling to his feet walked slowly, steadying himself with his right arm against the wall, which bent at a gentle angle. Soon he spied ahead a second pool of light, a second scattering of snow from a hole in the ceiling. For an instant Kak felt glad—misery loves company—then it dawned on him what had fallen through, and his teeth chattered. This snow, packed and trodden down, looked several days old. Would he find a dead thing here entombed with him—or worse, a hungry living thing?