"But can"t something be done, boys? Must we just fold our hands, and meet our fate?" demanded Jack. "What are you thinking about, Tom, for I can see a look in your face that we ought to know? Have you an idea--is there yet a hope that we can get a grip on this danger, and choke it?"
Tom"s face was still colorless, but there was a gleam in his eye, which Jack had discovered. Perhaps after all it might be only the light of desperation, a determination to die game if a cruel fortune decreed that their time had come. Jack could not tell.
"Yes, I have a plan," said Tom quickly. "Perhaps you"ll both call it a wild idea, and think I"m crazy; but desperate cases call for equally desperate remedies, and at the worst we"ll have a chance."
"Good boy, Tom!" cried Jack. "Just like you to hit on a plan! Haven"t I known you to come to the front many times when things looked very black for us?"
"Tom, tell your scheme!" demanded Beverly. "Things may develop faster than we suspect now, and if there"s any way to get around this trouble the sooner we start the better."
"Of course," Tom replied, "we"ll be taking the risk of smashing the nose of our craft when we strike, unless luck favors us. I"ve landed on every sort of ground, from smooth velvety turf to b.u.mpy stuff that almost joggled me to pieces; but I never before tried dropping on an ice-floe!"
Beverly and Jack stared hard at each other. Apparently the idea struck them like a sudden blow, showing that neither had as yet contemplated such a thing.
Then they turned and stared down at the wide field of floating ice that was attached to the towering bulk of the mighty berg, as though weighing the possibility of Tom"s amazing suggestion in their minds.
Jack gave a shout.
"Tom, you"re a genius, that"s what you are!" he almost shrieked in the intensity of his emotion. "I honestly believe it can be done successfully."
"We"d have to drop a whole lot lower, so as to take a closer survey, and learn just how smooth the surface of the floe is," Tom continued.
"I"ve looked through the gla.s.ses," replied Jack. "And as far as I could make out it seemed fairly decent. I know we"ve landed on worse ground many a time, and without being wrecked."
"Look again then, while I"m dropping down," urged Tom.
All of them were tremendously excited, as may readily be believed. And who would not have been under similar conditions? Although army air pilots are accustomed to taking great risks, and seldom go up without the thought flitting through their minds that their hour may be close at hand, still they are human, and when the dreadful crisis springs upon them they can feel the chilly hand that seems to clutch the heart.
Jack soon made his report.
"Yes, it looks good to me!" he cried, with a hopeful ring to his voice.
"I can see a crack or two that would be bad for us to run into; but there"s a clear field over on the north side of the floe. I"m sure we could make it without getting badly shaken up. Then it"s our only chance; if we miss this what else could we do?"
"Nothing," Tom replied quietly. "But I"m going to circle the berg, and see what lies on the other side."
"Whatever we decide to do," remarked Beverly, who seemed to have recovered to a great extent from his first perturbation, "we must lose no time about carrying it out. That feed pipe might become fully clogged at any minute, you know. Then besides, the sun is ready to dip down behind the sea horizon, when we"ll soon be plunged into darkness."
"Yes," agreed Tom, "we mustn"t fool away our time. It"s going to be no easy job to make a safe landing on the ice, something none of us has ever practiced. But it"d be still worse to go at it haphazard."
The others knew what was in Tom"s mind. Should they seriously injure the big bombing plane there would be no way of making repairs. On land it could be turned over to the repair-shop, and inside of a week perhaps emerge once more in as good shape as ever. No such convenience could be looked for out there in mid-Atlantic!
In a short time they had circled the great ma.s.s of ice. They all fully realized now how cold it was, and why the sea water must be affected for a mile or more all around such a tremendous bit of the Arctic regions.
They found that most of the floe lay on the north side of the berg; and decided that their best chance for landing must be in that quarter.
"The old berg looks top-heavy," Jack at one time called out. "You can see that it leans toward the north; and sometimes I"ve thought it wobbled considerably, though that may have been the plane waving up and down."
"No, you were right, Jack," said Beverly. "Its leaning that way tells that the warmer sea water has begun to eat at its base. Before a great while the berg will roll over, and smash all that floe into bits."
"I hope not when we"re on it, working at our motor!" Jack could not keep from exclaiming, looking with more interest than ever at the monster berg that had come all this distance from some glacier a thousand miles away, perhaps several times that distance, and would sooner or later lose itself in sub-tropical waters.
Lower still Tom took them. All eyes continued to survey the field of ice, particularly in that extreme northern sector where Jack had reported lay the best place for landing.
"Once more in a circle so as to face the wind," said Tom, "and then I mean to put it to the test."
"Good luck to you, Tom!" said Jack. "If ever you dropped as if you were falling on eggs, let it be now. I"m going to hold my breath when we strike the ice, and only hope we don"t keep gliding along until we shoot off the edge into the sea!"
"Leave that to me, Jack," came the a.s.surance of the pilot.
After that no one said a word, for both Lieutenant Beverly and Jack Parmly realized that it would be dangerous to distract Tom"s attention from his work just at the most critical moment.
The sun had reached the horizon, and inside of a few minutes must vanish from view. At that moment Tom shut off the engine, and made ready to alight!
CHAPTER XX
ON THE ICE FLOE
If ever Tom Raymond had need of skill and care it was then, for what might be an ordinary mishap ash.o.r.e must be a fatal accident under the conditions by which they were faced.
But almost as lightly as a snowflake touches the ground he brought the wheels under the big bomber in contact with the ice. Indeed, Jack could not tell for a certainty when the actual contact occurred; though immediately afterwards he found himself being shaken more or less as the heavy plane b.u.mped along over the ice.
One peril still menaced them, which was that their momentum, unless halted, might carry them to the terminus of the floe, and plunge them over. But Tom had taken all precautions, and allowed for everything, even an unusual slide on account of the smooth surface under the wheels.
Slower grew their progress, though the b.u.mping continued unabated. And finally they had come to a full stop, with still some little stretch of the ice field ahead.
Then Jack tried to yell, cowboy fashion; but, to his surprise and disgust, he could hardly make a sound above a whisper, his voice having failed him through sheer nervous excitement.
He jumped from his seat, and immediately sat down with a rude jar on the ice; but, nothing daunted, he quickly scrambled to his feet and began to dance like a wild Indian might when the war tocsin sounds through the village, and all his primeval instincts are aroused by the thought of fighting and plunder.
Tom and Lieutenant Beverly also hastened to leave their seats. They too found that their legs were cramped and almost useless, through having maintained a sitting position during so many weary hours.
Jack"s exuberant spirits caused him to fairly hug his chum.
"Didn"t I know you could do it, Tom?" he cried. "See how the old luck keeps hanging over us, will you? It"s always been this way, Colin; and to have Tom along means success every time."
"That may be," the lieutenant replied, giving Tom a fond look; "but if I were you I"d call it something more than just luck. It takes brains to think up such schemes as this one, brains and a lively imagination in the bargain; and Tom"s rich in both of those requirements."
"Let"s get busy, and see about fixing that feedpipe," broke out the modest object of all this praise. "We have only a short time of daylight to work in, and after that must depend on our little searchlight torch."
All were willing to start work. Jack found himself shivering slightly, although they had not been on the ice-floe many minutes.
"Gee, but it"s certainly cold, for a fact!" he exclaimed. "I"d hate to be marooned here any length of time, let me tell you, even if we did have grub enough to last over a week. Why, we"d freeze to death; not to mention what would become of us when the old berg crashed over and scattered all this floe ice!"
"Let"s hope that our stay will be of short duration then," said Beverly, with a quick and apprehensive glance in the direction of the towering iceberg, upon the peak of which the last rays of the sinking sun glinted until it seemed to be frosted with a million diamonds.