Page:The Iron Pirate 1905.djvu/221

Rh window and observed the cause of the confusion, for there, ahead of us a mile or more, was one of the largest icebergs I have ever seen. The mighty mass, from whose sides the water was rushing as in little cataracts, towered above the sea to a height of four or five hundred feet, rising up in three snow-white pinnacles which caught the crimson light of the sinking sun and gave it back in prismatic hues, all dazzling and beautiful. As a great island of ice, all rich in waving colour and superb majesty, the berg passed on, and the screw of the steamer was heard again. I watched intently, hoping to see other bergs, or, indeed, any ships that should tell me how far we had gone towards the north; but the night fell suddenly, and the negro served dinner, asking me if I had warmth enough? My curt answer seemed to astonish him but the truth was that I was thinking of the man Paolo's words when sick upon my own ship. He had cried, "Ice, ice," more than once in his delirium; but none of us then had the meaning of his cry. Yet I had it, and with it a notion of the second secret of Captain Black. For surely he was running to hiding; and his hiding-place lay to the north, far above the course even of Canadian-bound vessels, as I knew by the number of days we had been steaming.

This new surmise on strange openings did