"But no," she murmured, "there it is again. They have come for us. They have found us!"
She wanted to scream, to tell the other girls that help was near, but "No, no!" she decided, "not too soon. It might not be. If it is, they"ll see us. The O Moo stands well out of the water."
To still her wildly beating heart, she allowed her gaze to wander off to the right.
Instantly she blinked her eyes.
"It can"t be," she exclaimed, then, "Yes it is--it is! Another."
Turning once more to the left, she found still another surprise. Two of them off there.
Fear began to a.s.sail her. Her forehead grew cold. Her hands trembled. Was it, after all, a false hope?
She had but a moment to wait. Then she knew. The fog had lifted slightly.
She could see farther, could tell what was closing down upon them.
The shock was too much for her. She sank limply to the deck. It was as if she had been wandering in a fog on a rocky hillside searching for sheep, had thought she saw them coming out of the fog, only to discover that the creatures she saw were prowling wolves. The white bulks on the surface of the water were not boats searching for them but cakes of ice. And these, there could be no doubt about it, were fast closing in upon the O Moo.
With the water still heaving, this meant danger--might indeed mean the destruction of their craft.
"I ought," she struggled to her feet, "I ought to tell the girls."
Yet she did not tell them. What was the use? she reasoned. There was nothing to do but wait, and that she could do very well alone.
There is something awe-inspiring about the gathering of great bodies of ice which have been scattered by a storm. They come together as if each had a motor, an engineer and a pilot on board. And yet their coming is in absolute silence. If one cake chances to touch another, the contact is so slight that there is no sound.
And so they a.s.semble. Coming from all points of the compa.s.s, they reunite as a great fleet might after a mighty and victorious battle.
The O Moo chanced to be in the very midst of this particular gathering.
As Florence watched she was thrilled and fascinated. Now the surface was a field of blue cloth with a white patch here and there. Now the white covered half, now two-thirds, now three-fourths of the field. And now a cake brushed the hull of the yacht ever so gently.
Suddenly she realized that a strange thing had happened. The water which had been rolling had ceased to roll.
"The ice did that," she whispered. "Perhaps it"s not dangerous after all."
She watched until the cloth of blue had been almost completely changed to one of white, then burst into the cabin.
To her unbounded surprise, she found her companions sitting on Lucile"s berth with wrapt attention staring out of the window.
"Isn"t it wonderful!" whispered Lucile.
"I--I thought it would be terribly dangerous," said Florence.
"Not now," said Marian. "It may be if we come to sh.o.r.e and the wind crowds the ice, but even then we"ll be safe enough. We can escape over the ice to sh.o.r.e. Only," she added thoughtfully, "in that case the O Moo will be crushed. And that would be too sad after she has carried us through the storm so bravely."
Florence still looked puzzled.
"You see," smiled Marian, "Lucile and I have been in the ice-packs on the Arctic, so we know. Don"t we, old dear?" She patted Lucile on the shoulder.
"Uh--huh," smiled Lucile as she settled back on her pillow.
Ice, as Marian had said, is quite a safe convoy of the sea until some sh.o.r.e is reached.
For twenty-four hours they drifted in the midst of the floe. Now a sea gull came soaring and screaming about the yacht. And now he went skimming away, leaving them to the vast silence of the conquered waters. Fog hung low over the water and the ice. No long-drawn hoot of a fog horn, no shrill siren"s scream greeted their anxious ears. A great silence hung over all.
Then Florence, who was standing on deck, noticed that, almost inperceptibly, the fog was lifting. She had been thinking of the last twenty-four hours. Lucile, who was much better, had left her berth and was sitting on one of the upholstered chairs. Marian was trying for the hundredth time to start the engine.
As Florence thought this through, she found herself at the same time wondering what the lifting of the fog would mean to them. Had they, after all, drifted only a short distance from the city? Would they be able, once the fog had cleared, to distinguish the jagged sh.o.r.e which the city"s sky line cut out of the blue? Would there be some boat nearer than they had dreamed? Or had they really drifted a long way? Would they look upon a sh.o.r.eless expanse of water or would the irregular tree-line of some unknown sh.o.r.e greet them?
The fog was slow in pa.s.sing. She was eager for the unveiling of this mystery. Impatiently she paced the deck.
Then, suddenly, she paused, shaded her eyes, and looked directly before her. Was there some, low, dark bulk appearing off there before the very course the ice was taking?
For a long time she could not be sure. Then with a startled exclamation she leaped to the door of the cabin crying:
"Girls! Marian! Lucile! Look! Land! Land ahead of the ice-floe."
Marian came racing out on deck, followed more slowly by Lucile. For a moment they all stood there looking.
"It"s land all right," said Marian at last, "but not much land. A little sandy island with a great many small evergreen trees growing on it, I should say."
"Or perhaps a point," suggested Lucile hopefully. "You see, if it"s a point we can go back just a little way and find people, people with plenty of food and--and everything." Lucile had had quite enough of this adventure.
"It"s better not to hope for too much," smiled Marian, ""Hope for the best, be prepared for the worst," is my motto. And the worst!" she exclaimed suddenly, "is that the ice will begin to buckle and pile when it touches that sh.o.r.e."
"And it will crush the O Moo," said Florence with a gasp.
"Yes, unless," Marian was studying the situation carefully, "unless we can escape it."
For a moment she said no more. Then suddenly:
"Yes, I believe we could. There are pike-poles in the cabin. Florence, bring them, will you?"
Florence came back presently with two stout poles some twelve feet long.
These were armed with stout iron hooks and points at one end.
"You see," explained Marian rapidly, "we are much nearer the fore edge of the floe than to either side or to the back, and up there some forty feet there is a narrow channel reaching almost through to the edge. All that is necessary is that we crowd the ice to right and left a bit until we reach that channel, then draw the O Moo through it. If we reach the sandy sh.o.r.e before the floe does, the worst that can happen is that the O Moo will be driven aground but not crushed at all, and the best that can happen is that we will find some sort of little harbor where the yacht will be safe until the wind shifts and the ice goes back out to sea."
"But can we move that ice?" Florence"s face showed her incredulity.
"It"s easier than it looks. Come on," ordered Marian briskly. Throwing the rope ladder over the side, she sprang down it to leap out upon a broad ice pan.
Florence shuddered as she followed. This was all new to her.
Marian had said that it was easy, but they did not find it so. True, they did move the O Moo forward. Inch by inch, foot by foot, fathom by fathom she glided forward. But this was accomplished only at the cost of blistered hands, aching muscles and breaking backs.
All this time the ice-floe was moving slowly but surely forward. Now it was a hundred fathoms from the sh.o.r.e, now fifty, now thirty. And now--
But just at this moment the yacht moved out into the open water before the floe. At the same time Marian caught sight of a narrow stream which cut down through the sandy beach some fifty yards from the point where they had broken through.