Part 31

Elated with the result of his experiment, he hastily stripped the shirt from his back, fastened it to one end of his staff, and raising it over his head began moving it back and forth.

It was an ingenious idea to make a flagstaff from the bones of dogs' legs. Hardly one man in a thousand would have thought of it. It was an exemplification of Grenfell's resourcefulness, and in the end it saved his life.

As he had hoped, men were out upon the rocky bluffs scanning the sea for seals. The keen eyes of one of them discovered, far away, something dark and unusual. The men of this land never take anything for granted. It is a part of the training of the woodsman and seaman to identify any unusual movement or object, or to trace any unusual sound, before he is satisfied to let it pass unheeded. Centering his attention upon the distant object the man distinguished a movement back and forth. Nothing but a man could make such a movement he knew, and he also knew that any man out there was in grave danger. He called some other fishermen, manned a boat and Dr. Grenfell and his surviving dogs were rescued.

XXI

WRECKED AND ADRIFT

It happened that it was necessary for Dr. Grenfell to go to New York one spring three or four years ago. Men interested in raising funds to support the Labrador and Newfoundland hospitals were to hold a meeting, and it was essential that he attend the meeting and tell them of the work on the coast, and what he needed to carry it on.

This meeting was to have been held in May, and to reach New York in season to attend it Dr. Grenfell decided to leave St. Anthony Hospital, where he then was, toward the end of April, for in any case traveling would be slow.

It was his plan to travel northward, by dog team, to the Straits of Belle Isle, thence westward along the shores, and finally southward, down the western coast of Newfoundland, to Port Aux Basque, from which point a steamer would carry him over to North Sydney, in Nova Scotia. There he could get a train and direct railway connections to New York. There is an excellent, and ordinarily, at this season, an expeditious route for dog travel down the western coast of Newfoundland, and Grenfell anticipated no difficulties.

Just as he was ready to start a blizzard set in with a northeast gale, and smash! went the ice. This put an end to dog travel. There was but one alternative, and that was by boat. Traveling along the coast in a small boat is pretty exciting and sometimes perilous when you have to navigate the boat through narrow lanes of water, with land ice on one side and the big Arctic ice pack on the other, and a shift of wind is likely to send the pack driving in upon you before you can get out of the way. And if the ice pack catches you, that's the end of it, for your boat will be ground up like a grain of wheat between mill stones, and there you are, stranded upon the ice, and as like as not cut off from land, too.

But there was no other way to get to that meeting in New York, and Grenfell was determined to get there. And so, when the blizzard had passed he got out a small motor boat, and made ready for the journey. If he could reach a point several days' journey by boat to the southward, he could leave the boat and travel one hundred miles on foot overland to the railroad.

This hike of one hundred miles, with provisions and equipment on his back, was a tremendous journey in itself. It would not be on a beaten road, but through an unpopulated wilderness still lying deep under winter snows. To Grenfell, however, it would be but an incident in his active life. He was accustomed to following a dog team, and that hardens a man for nearly any physical effort. It requires that a man keep at a trot the livelong day, and it demands a good heart and good lungs and staying powers and plenty of grit, and Grenfell was well equipped with all of these.

The menacing Arctic ice pack lay a mile or so seaward when Grenfell and one companion turned their backs on St. Anthony, and the motor boat chugged southward, out of the harbor and along the coast. For a time all went well, and then an easterly wind sprang up and there followed a touch-and-go game between Dr. Grenfell and the ice.

In an attempt to dodge the ice the boat struck upon rocks. This caused some damage to her bottom, but not sufficient to incapacitate her, as it was found the hole could be plugged. The weather turned bitterly cold, and the circulating pipes of the motor froze and burst. This was a more serious accident, but it was temporarily repaired while Grenfell bivouaced ashore, sleeping at night under the stars with a bed of juniper boughs for a mattress and an open fire to keep him warm.

Ice now blocked the way to the southward, though open leads of water to the northward offered opportunity to retreat, and, with the motor boat in a crippled condition, it was decided to return to St. Anthony and make an attempt, with fresh equipment, to try a route through the Straits of Belle Isle.

They were still some miles from St. Anthony when they found it necessary to abandon the motor boat in one of the small harbor settlements. Leaving it in charge of the people, Grenfell borrowed a small rowboat. Rowing the small boat through open lanes and hauling it over obstructing ice pans they made slow progress and the month of May was nearing its close when one day the pack suddenly drove in upon them.

They were fairly caught. Ice surrounded them on every side. The boat was in imminent danger of being crushed before they realized their danger. Grenfell and his companion sprang from the boat to a pan, and seizing the prow of the boat hauled upon it with the energy of desperation. They succeeded in raising the prow upon the ice, but they were too late. The edge of the ice was high and the pans were moving rapidly, and to their chagrin they heard a smashing and splintering of wood, and the next instant were aware that the stern of the boat had been completely bitten off and that they were adrift on an ice pan, cut off from the land by open water.

An inspection of the boat proved that it was wrecked beyond repair. All of the after part had been cut off and ground to pulp between the ice pans. In the distance, to the westward, rose the coast, a grim outline of rocky bluffs. Between them and the shore the sea was dotted with pans and pieces of ice, separated by canals of black water. The men looked at each other in consternation as they realized that they had no means of reaching land and safety, and that a few hours might find them far out on the Atlantic.

In the hope of attracting attention, Dr. Grenfell and William Taylor, his companion, fired their guns at regular intervals. Expectantly they waited, but there was no answering signal from shore and no sign of life anywhere within their vision.

For a long while they waited and watched and signalled. With a turn in the tide it became evident, finally, that the pan on which they were marooned was drifting slowly seaward. If this continued they would soon be out of sight of land, and then all hope of rescue would vanish.

"I'll tell you what I'll do, now," suggested Taylor. "I'll copy toward shore. I'll try to get close enough for some one to see me."

To "copy" is to jump from one pan or piece of ice to another. The gaps of water separating them are sometimes wide, and a man must be a good jumper who lands. Some of the pieces of ice are quite too small to bear a man's weight, and he must leap instantly to the next or he will sink with the ice. It is perilous work at best, and much too dangerous for any one to attempt without much practice and experience.

They had a boat hook with them, and taking it to assist in the long leaps, Taylor started shore-ward. Dr. Grenfell watched him anxiously as he sprang from pan to pan making a zigzag course toward shore, now and again taking hair-raising risks, sometimes resting for a moment on a substantial pan while he looked ahead to select his route, then running, and using the boat hook as a vaulting pole, spanning a wide chasm. Then, suddenly, Dr. Grenfell saw him totter, throw up his hands and disappear beneath the surface of the water. In a hazardous leap he had missed his footing, or a small cake of ice had turned under his weight.

XXII

SAVING A LIFE

It was a terrible moment for Grenfell when he saw his friend disappear beneath the icy waves. Would the cold so paralyze him as to render him helpless? Would he be caught under an ice pan? A hundred such thoughts flashed through Grenfell's mind as he stood, impotent to help because of the distance between them. Then to his great joy he saw Taylor rise to the surface and scramble out upon a pan in safety.

The ice was too far separated now for Taylor either to advance or retreat, and the pan upon which he had taken refuge began a rapid drift seaward. He had made a valiant effort, but the attempt had failed.

Grenfell resumed firing his gun, still hoping that some one might hear it and come to their rescue. Time passed and Taylor drifted abreast of Grenfell and finally drifted past him. Then, in the far distance, Grenfell glimpsed the flash of an oar. The flash was repeated with rhythmic regularity. The outlines of a boat came into view. The men shouted the good news to each other. Help was coming!

The signals had been heard, and in due time, and with much thankfulness, Dr. Grenfell and William Taylor were safely in the boat and on their way to St. Anthony.