Billy Topsail, M.D.: A Tale of Adventure With Doctor Luke of the Labrador

by Norman Duncan

  CHAPTER XXV

  _In Which a Stretch of Slush is to be Crossed and Billy Topsail Takes the Law in His Own Hands_

  It was falling dusk and blowing up when Doctor Luke and Billy Topsail,gaffs in hand, left the heads of Candlestick Cove for the ice of Ships'Run; and a spit of frosty snow--driving in straight lines--was in thegale. Amen Island, lying nearly in the wind's eye, was hardlydistinguishable, through the misty interval, from the blue-black skybeyond.

  There was more wind in the northeast--more snow and a more penetratingdegree of frost. It was already blowing at the pitch of half a gale: itwould rise to a gale in the night, thick with snow, it might be, andblowing bitter cold--the wind jumping over the point of Amen Island on adiagonal and sweeping down the Run.

  Somewhere to leeward of Candlestick Cove the jam had yielded to therising pressure of the wind. The floe was outward bound from the Run.It was already moving in the channel, scraping the rocks of bothshores--moving faster as the pans below ran off to open water andremoved their restraint.

  As yet the pans and hummocks were in reasonably sure contact all the wayfrom Candlestick Cove to Come-Along Point of Amen Island; but the icewas thinning out with accelerating speed--black water disclosing itselfin widening gaps--as the compression was relieved. All the while, thus,as Doctor Luke and Billy Topsail made across, the path was diminishing.

  * * * * *

  In the slant of the wind the ice in the channel of Ships' Run was blownlightly against the Candlestick coast. About the urgent business of itsescape to the wide water of Great Yellow Bay the floe rubbed theCandlestick rocks in passing and crushed around the corner of Dead Man'sPoint.

  Near Amen Island, where the wind fell with less force, there was aperilous line of separation. In the lee of the Amen hills--closeinshore--the ice was not disturbed: it hugged the coast as before; butoutward of this--where the wind dropped down--a lane of water wasopening between the inert shore ice and the wind-blown main floe.

  As yet the lane was narrow; and there were pans in it--adrift andsluggishly moving away from the Amen shore. When Doctor Luke and BillyTopsail came to this widening breach they were delayed--the course wasfrom pan to pan in a direction determined by the exigency of the moment;and when they had drawn near the coast of Amen--having advanced in ageneral direction as best they could--they were halted altogether.

  And they were not then under Come-Along Point, but on a gathering ofheavy Arctic ice, to the north, at the limit of Ships' Run, under thatexposed head of Amen, called Deep Water Head, which thrusts itself intothe open sea.

  "We're stopped, sir," Billy Topsail declared. "We'd best turn back, sir,while there's time."

  A way of return was still open. It would be laborious--nothing worse.

  "One moment----"

  "No chance, sir."

  "I'm an agile man, Billy. One moment. I----"

  Billy Topsail turned his back to a blast of the gale and patientlyawaited the issue of Doctor Luke's inspection of the path.

  "A man can't cross that slush, sir," said he.

  Past Deep Water Head the last of the floe was driving. There is a widelittle cove there--it is called Deep Water Cove; and there is deepwater--a drop of ten fathoms (they say)--under Deep Water Cliff. Therewas open water in both directions beyond the points of the cove. Adetour was thus interrupted.

  Doctor Luke and Billy Topsail confronted the only ice that was still incontact with the shore. At no time had the floe extended far beyond DeepWater Head. A high sea, rolling in from the northeast, had played underthe ice; and this had gone on for three days--the seas running in andsubsiding: all the while casting the ice ponderously against the rocks.

  Heavy Arctic ice--fragments of many glacial bergs--had caught thelesser, more brittle drift-pans of the floe against the broken base andsubmerged face of Deep Water Cliff and ground them slowly to slush inthe swells. There were six feet of this slush, perhaps--a depth of sixfeet and a width of thirty.

  It was as coarse as cracked ice in a freezer. It was a quicksand.Should a man's leg go deep enough he would not be able to withdraw it;and once fairly caught--both feet gripped--he would inevitably dropthrough. It would be a slow and horrible descent--like sinking in aquicksand.

  It was near dark. The snow--falling thicker--was fast narrowing thecircle of vision.

  "I might get across," said Doctor Luke.

  "You'll not try, sir," Billy Topsail declared, positively. "You'll startback t' Candlestick Cove."

  "I might----"

  "You'll not!"

  There was something in Billy Topsail's tone to make Doctor Luke lift hisbrows and stare.

  "What's that?" said he, smiling grimly.

  "I says you'll not try."

  Doctor Luke laughed uneasily.

  "No?"

  "No, sir."

  Billy Topsail was a big boy. Doctor Luke measured his length and breadthand power with new interest and recalled that he had always admired thelusty proportions of the lad. Decidedly--Billy Topsail was a bigfellow! And Billy Topsail's intentions were plain.

  "Now----" the Doctor began, argumentatively.

  "'Tis no use, sir. I knows you."

  Doctor Luke moved off a step. "But Billy, you see, my dear fellow----"

  "No, sir!" Billy Topsail moved within reach.

  "I'm quite sure----"

  "No."

  Doctor Luke stared at the breach of slush. He faced away, then,abruptly. "Wel-ll," he admitted, with a shrug, "no doubt you're right,Billy. I----"