Adventure Magazine Cover — page 92: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

848 weakness in the knees made it easier to sit down on the sleeping-bag again in the col- lapse of astonishment. There was no box of provisions to the right of him; there was no fire to the left of him. Before him, on the pale glittering sea, there was no boat. Within the most Titanic call, there was no man to answer him. If he needed anything to tell him what it all meant, the rough bundle lying beside _ him half open, containing a few strips of dried fish, would have done so. But in the silence that followed his shout he had real- ized the situation in detail. Convulsed with another attack of super- stitious terror, the men had stampeded, de- serted. He was alone on the Vatna Jokull which no man could cross! He was alone on ‘“‘the surface of the moon!” He laughed shortly and took up the bun- dle of dried fish. There was enough, per- haps, he decided, turning the strips of leathery stuff over in his fingers, to last a week, with very careful economy. It was curious to hold in one’s hands all that stood between one and death! It was strange that a man, young and stalwart, should be dependent upon a handful of such matter for his breath of life! He found it hard, as he stood there just where he had slept in the unconsciousness that had made their desertion possible, not to allow himself to hope that they would return. It was hard not to permit himself to speculate upon the possibilities of escape, to doubt the experience of other explorers who had attempted the overland journey, to contemplate the chance of a vessel pass- ing within signal. The sense of security, so long as one is upon the solid earth, is so rudimentary an emotion that it was difficult to realize he could and probably would starve to death slowly sitting there in the cage of the Vatna. There was not even coarse grass to feed — on. There was not palatable water to drink. The eiderducks and the seals would require a strong, armed adversary, and Stuart’s pistols had disappeared with his provisions and his boat. It was so very complete in all details that he laughed again. He thought of Svéatur and the men, now with violent hatred and now with a tolerant amusement. Had he been bestially abandoned, or had he been an ass to expect thoroughly frightened, thoroughly super- Adventure stitious men to accompany him on a terrify- ing cruise to an accursed place? He was so uncertain of the answer that he left it a question. One notion that persistently annoyed him was that it was going to be a terrible bore. ‘‘Bored to death,” he said aloud with a grin. “And the question is, Shall I eat all of this delicate viand to-day and so accomplish my lame and impotent conclu- sion more expeditiously?” He examined the dried fish again with the same wonder- ing interest as before. “I seem to remem- ber that they pound it into a consistency that might pass for a crude imitation of human food. I dare say that with a few hours’ labor I can so reduce this.”? He spoke aloud cheerfully, but he looked upon his sole article of diet with a dull eye. Naturally he had no intention of sitting on the shingle watching for the grizzly phantom to come riding over the waves. He rolled the remains of the fish carefully in a handkerchief and stowed it away. In the other pocket of his coat was his tobacco- pouch, as lean as Cassius, and a few matches and his pipe. ‘‘It was pretty low down to go off with the stuff,’ said Stuart, as ever aloud. ‘I notice the superstitious fear of the Vatna Jokull was not so overpowering as to render them insensible to the merits of my tobacco and brandy, and the infinite superiority of canned tomato as compared to dried stock.’”’ He put a miserly pinch of tobacco into the pipe and lighted it. ‘‘One match gone!” he said with a laugh as he tossed it away. He rolled his sleeping bag into its small- est possible compass and, with his leather belt fastened over one shoulder and under the other, managed to wear the burden on his back like a knapsack, leaving his hands free. Then he set forward upon the beach, climbing the moraine of the glacier. “T feel largely defrauded,” said Mark Stuart to Mark Stuart. ‘“‘In all the tales I’ve read of this sort of thing a man is usually given some sort of show to prove his ingenuity. He is allowed to botanize a bit about edible roots and plants. He is encouraged to weave mattresses of soft fibers and build him a little house of logs and leaves. He is provided with a catch- able, tamable goat or pigeon as a com- panion. He is led on to discover sweet mussels and to catch fish in a net made from the leavings of the mattress. He CO MICLOOOKS C©