Under the Sea to the North Pole (25 page)

Two of them, frightened at the sound of the fire-arms, returned up the ladder much more quickly than they had come.

The third, also thoroughly frightened, mistook the way and rushed into the passage leading to the cabins.

This was where the sick were installed. At the moment Isabelle was seated near her nurse, endeavouring to console the poor woman. A pious conversation was in progress between them, and Isabelle was talking to the Breton of the strengthening hope of immortality.

“Life is short, my good nurse; all of us must leave it some day. Happily it is but a journey, and beyond the grave we enter the true life where mourning and suffering are unknown, where we rejoice in limitless happiness in the presence of those we have loved in this world.”

She was speaking thus, wiping away the tears which flowed from the poor woman’s eyes, putting all her heart in her words. And the dying woman was comforted, and thought of these things with a smile, and replied in the language she had been accustomed to use in her early years.

“Ah, my dear little child,-” she said, “you have always been to me what you used to be long ago, the kind, good, little girl, loving God, and pitying and helping the poor! I am happy to die with you near me, I feel that in your hands, under your eyes, and in your hearing, death will be less painful for me.”

Suddenly the report of fire-arms made the two women jump.

Isabelle sprang up, left her chair, and ran to the door, which she half opened.

She recoiled terror-stricken and screaming.

The bear was but a yard away, seeking a way to escape. At the sight of the half-open door he rushed at it.

Isabelle, fortunately, had time to shut it, and, palpitating with fear, stood with her back against it to diminish as much as possible the effect of the animal’s push.

The push never came.

Had the bear changed his mind, or had he retreated?

While she was wondering, the drama she had just escaped was being enacted at the end of the passage, and resulting in an unexpected catastrophe.

It was here that was situated the cabin of the chemist Schnecker.

The traitor, notwithstanding the mercy that had been shown him, had in no way abjured his hatred or his resentment. Since he had been informed of his fate as soon as the
Polar Star
was in French waters, he had lived only for his anger, and was slowly preparing his vengeance.

“Death for death,” he said to himself. “I may as well die in my own way in destroying every trace of this expedition which will confer so much glory on the men who have sentenced me, and whom I execrate.”

The opportunity came for him to put his infernal project into execution.

The order had been given to put out the fires for a few minutes, to allow the external air to purify the atmosphere, and consequently the stoves remained ready to resume combustion, and the tubes remained open with the gas still passing into the expansion chamber.

All that Schnecker had to do was to get at this, open the tap, and bring a flame near it to bring about a frightful catastrophe. A formidable explosion would follow, and the hydrogen, on account of the carburets of which it is the generator, and which are known among miners under the comprehensive name of fire-damp, would expand in whirlwinds of flame, destroying everything as it passed and burning the ship and all she held.

Everything favoured the plan. The crew were posted at all the points where their presence was necessary, and the unexpected arrival of the bears had concentrated them in one spot. The chemist could thus reach the engine-room without being interfered with. It was empty.

But when he got there he saw that, as a precautionary measure, Hubert D’Ermont had disconnected the tube from the expansion chamber. In the pipes there was only the hydrogen that had not reached the stoves When the tap was turned. To get at that one of the pipes must be broken, and that could only be done with a violent ‘blow. i Schnecker had no tools in his hand.

He returned to his cabin at a run, forgetting to shut the door behind him, and seized a hammer. and a pair of pincers.

Suddenly a gruff breath, a sort of grunt, made him turn round. . He stopped, livid, voiceless, his hair standing on end.

The bear, seeking an outlet, and not finding one at Isabelle’s door, had pushed in. The traitor had never expected such a violation of his domicile.

Then a dreadful scene occurred.

The angry brute rose on his hind legs, filling up the narrow cabin with the enormous volume of his body.

Schnecker uttered a piercing inarticulate cry. He tried to escape.

But the monster, thinking doubtless he was about to be attacked, became the aggressor. A furious struggle began. It did not last long. It could not. In a moment or so the chemist was knocked over, seized in the bear’s paws, and crushed in the powerful arms. And twice did the hideous mouth close on Schnecker’s head and reduce it to pulp. The animal roused by this giving him a feast where he sought only an escape, set to work to devour the chemist’s body.

However, his cry had been heard. The men came running up from all parts.

But before all, Isabelle de Keralio, carried away by her generous bravery, had flown to the help of the miserable traitor.

She had seized from the shelf at the head of the patient’s bed the revolver which formed part of the general arsenal of the ship. To load it and run outside took but an instant.

But prompt as were her movements, she had been preceded.

Salvator, the faithful Salvator, had understood that those he loved were in great danger.

And with an impulse, without thinking of the danger he was facing, he had leapt straight at the bear’s throat.

But the poor dog had rated his strength too high. Brave as he

might be, he could not emerge victorious from such a strife. The monster had caught him under his enormous paw, and threatened to crush him under its pressure, and Salvator only owed his safety to a very ordinary circumstance.

The bear being disturbed in his occupation, which was that of devouring the miserable Schnecker, had risen for an instant, and falling back on his paws, had knocked over the dog under him. And Salvator, who was half suffocated, just escaped the fatal hug.

At this moment Isabelle very opportunely intervened.

The revolver did marvels. Isabelle fired four shots, and these all lodged in the bear’s head and neck.

One would have been enough, had it been well placed. Unfortunately these wounds, although serious, only exasperated the animal. He rose for the third time, shook the dog, and threw himself on Isabelle.

It would have been all up with her, if at the moment Guerbraz had not risen before her armed with an axe.

Brandished by his herculean hand, the weapon cut one of the monster’s paws clean off, and while howling with pain, he fell on the ground, a second blow split open his head. This time the huge beast fell never to rise, burying beneath his mass the mutilated corpse of the chemist.

By the open hatchway the external air had penetrated only too well. Intense cold reigned in the parts of the ship which had been so warm. It was urgent to light the fires again.

As quickly as possible they closed the dangerous opening, and allowed the gas to enter the pipes.

At ease for the future, regarding the consequences of this invasion, the men of the
Polar Star
could take counsel together as to what next was to be done. The plan was promptly decided on. It was necessary as soon as possible to get rid of this “vermin,” to use the picturesque expression of the Canadians.

It was again Guerbraz who volunteered to go out in search of information.

The doors from the saloon to the stern gallery were carefully opened. The bold sailor, armed with a magazine rifle, and a six-shot

revolver, climbed up to the level of the deck.

The news he brought was satisfactory. Surprised and frightened at the reports, the bears had hastened away from this abode of trepidations and sinister sounds, and only two were left on the deck.

Guerbraz went up again with Hubert, Captain Lacrosse, and Lieutenants Pol and Hardy, as an escort. Three well-aimed bullets sufficed to lay the bears low; after which the three detachments, notwithstanding the severity of the cold, resumed their deck duties, for any further attempt on the part of the bears had to be rendered impossible.

Since the equinox they had again entered into the period of continual day.

In the rays of the midnight sun, they had, except for half an hour of darkness, no want of light. The danger was evidently much less than it had been during the polar night. Nevertheless, short as the night might be, a careful watch had to be kept during its brief duration.

Electric projectors were installed on the main-deck, whence powerful search rays were directed over the misty surface of the ice-field.

At the same time two Hotchkiss revolving guns were prepared for action, and at their first discharge into a group of the fierce plantigrades, killed six of the vanguard in the midst of their companions.

The cold, after so cruel an increase, began to yield, and on the 28th of March the mercury suddenly thawed and rose without a pause to 10 degrees. On the 29th, a violent storm from the south, with its attendant echoes of the cracking of the ice and the dismal groans of the bergs, awoke fresh hope in an approaching break up; and it drove the bears away for some hours.

On the 31st the effects of the storm were visible. The
Polar Star,
sinking on her cradle, had bent open the steel straps, so that she rested on the ice underneath her keel. A deep crack had appeared in front of her bow. Deliverance was evidently at hand.

But the famished bears again came into sight. There were forty of them, and their watch became more attentive than ever. It was easy to see that the brutes, rendered desperate by hunger, would soon make another attempt on the steamer.

It took place on the next day but one, and the attack was so complete, so unanimous, that after slaying with the guns and revolver cannons a dozen of the assailants, the men had again to beat a retreat and carry on the battle from inside the ship.

In the interval, the corpse of Schnecker had been thrown overboard. The traitor did not even have the honours of burial, and the bears devoured his remains. The scene was horrible enough, but no one complained of the fate of the criminal who had fallen at the very moment he was hastening to the perpetration of the worst of his crimes.

The six bears that had been killed had been carefully skinned and cut up, and the proverb that there is some good in everything evil was justified to the letter, inasmuch as the adventure had given the crew some excellent furs besides an ample provision of fresh meat.

But it was necessary at all costs to get rid of the surviving bears.

The chemist’s idea for the destruction of the ship was adopted by Hubert for her safety. With this object he would have to sacrifice a tube of liquefied hydrogen, and, after consulting his companions, it was decided to burn it on the deck and be ready to put the fire out immediately afterwards.

The method was very simple. The pipes by which the gas was distributed inside the ship were for the moment put in communication with the outside, and so arranged that the current could be interrupted at the first signal. Then all the taps were opened at once and four hundred cubic metres of gas were set free on the deck. A flame from a torch placed at the end of a long pole was then introduced and the hydrogen immediately exploded.

A sheet of flame swept the ship from end to end with a furious deflagration and a roar as of the wind in a chimney. The stays and shrouds being of iron, as well as the’ other parts of the ship, suffered only slightly from the burst of fire. But the bears on deck, who seemed to have taken up a residential position thereon, were horribly burnt, and leaving twelve of their number dead or dying, fled for their lives with a wild roar of pain and terror.

This was the end of the long siege which had lasted a ^fortnight. The means employed yielded from their very violence the most fortunate and at the same time the most unexpected of results. Under the action of this. temperature of 1700 degrees the ice was melted to a depth of three feet and the
Polar Star
again found the road of retreat open to her. What had been but a crack the day before was now a large strip of water. The April sun assisted with its more lasting warmth in the effect produced by this violent experiment.

From the tops Captain Lacrosse could see the ocean freeing itself and huge masses of the ice-field drifting off.

The bears had fled. The men descended to the ice and removed section after section of the iron scaffolding which had preserved the ship from the effects of shock and pressure. The steamer, breaking through the thin crust that remained, again floated in clear water.

At last, on the 15th of April, the channel was sufficiently open. Everything was prepared for the departure.

The boilers of the
Polar Star
were kept in steam for two days before the screw was started. The steel prow with its copper facing drove its ram into the broken blocks and the battle with the floebergs began.