“We have got to quit,” said Moran despondently. “But I surely want that box.”
“You shall have it, if I can get the sling on,” Bethune replied. “Help me on with the dress as quick as you can.”
He flung a hasty glance about. A long raft of ice with ragged edges was drifting nearer, and the fog, disturbed by the rising breeze, rolled across the sea in woolly streamers.
“It looks as if I had to finish the job this time,” he said with a harsh laugh. “I no longer have the cheap hotel to fall back on.”
When he had been down for some time, Jimmy, turning the pump in obedience to the plucking of the signal line, began to wonder when he would come up. Bethune seemed particular about his air supply, and Jimmy surmised that he found it needful to move the case along the bottom to get a clear lead for the lifting line because the _Cetacea_ had altered her position. Moran put his hand on the crank when required, but at other times he stood motionless, watching the ice with an imperturbable brown face. Indeed, Jimmy, as a relief from the tension, began to speculate about his comrade and wonder what he thought. Though they had toiled hard and faced many perils together with mutual respect and confidence, he felt that he knew very little about the man. Moran’s reserve and stolid serenity were baffling. When strenuous action was required he could be relied upon, but even then he was seldom hurried, and his movements somehow suggested that his splendid frame was endowed with unreasoning, automatic powers. For all that, Jimmy knew that such a conception of his friend was wrong. He had seen the cool judgment and indomitable courage that controlled the man’s strength in time of heavy stress.
All this, however, was not of much consequence. Jimmy fixed his eyes upon the frothing patch of bubbles that broke the troubled surface of the swell. It was stationary, and Bethune had already stayed below an unusual time. He was not in difficulties, because when Jimmy jerked the line he got a reassuring signal in reply. It looked as if the man expected to bring up the case.
In the meanwhile the ice was driving nearer, propelled by wind and tide, and its low height suggested that it had formed in some shallow bight. If this were so, it might not ground before reaching the sloop. Still, its progress was not rapid, and Jimmy did not think there was any urgent need to recall Bethune, particularly as he must finish his task or abandon it.
