“The devil!” he cried, “we are too weak.”
And he hastened to close the loophole. Thus matters went for an hour, without any end appearing probable. The chances of a sortie were discussed; they seemed slight, for the bears could not be fought singly. Nevertheless, Hatteras and his companions, being anxious to finish it, and, it must be said, very much confused at being thus imprisoned by the beasts, were about to try a direct attack, when the captain thought of a new means of defence.
He took the poker and plunged it into the stove; then he made an opening in the wall, but so as to keep a thin coating of ice outside. His companions watched him. When the poker was white hot, Hatteras said—
“This bar will drive away the bears, for they won’t be able to seize it, and through the loophole we will be able to fire at them, without their taking our guns away from us.”
“A good idea!” cried Bell, going towards Altamont.
Then Hatteras, withdrawing the poker from the stove, pushed it through the wall. The snow, steaming at its touch, hissed sharply. Two bears ran to seize the bar, but they roared fearfully when four shots were fired at once.
“Hit!” shouted the American.
“Hit!” repeated Bell.
“Let us try again,” said Hatteras, closing the opening for a moment.
The poker was put again into the fire; in a few minutes it was red hot.
Altamont and Bell returned to their place after loading their guns; Hatteras again pushed the poker through the loophole. But this time an impenetrable substance stopped it.
“Curse it!” cried the American.
“What’s the matter?” asked Johnson.
“The matter! These cursed animals are heaping up the ice and snow so as to bury us alive!”
“Impossible!”
“See, the poker can’t go through! Really, this is absurd!”
It was more than absurd, it was alarming. Matters looked worse. The bears, which are very intelligent beasts, employed this method of suffocating their prey. They heaped the ice in such a way as to render flight impossible.
“This is hard,” said Johnson, with a very mortified air. “It’s well enough to have men treat you in this way, but bears!”
After this reflection two hours passed by without any material change in their situation; a sortie became impossible; the thickened walls deadened all sound without. Altamont walked to and fro like a bold man in face of a danger greater than his courage. Hatteras thought anxiously of the doctor, and of the great danger awaiting him when he should return.
“Ah,” shouted Johnson, “if Dr. Clawbonny were only here!”
“Well, what would he do?” asked Altamont.
“Oh, he would be able to help us!”
“How?” asked the American, with some asperity.
“If I knew,” answered Johnson, “I shouldn’t want him here. Still, I can think of a piece of advice he would give us at this moment.”
“What is that?”
“To take some food. It can’t hurt us. What do you think, Mr. Altamont?”
“Let us eat if you care to,” was the answer; “although our condition is stupid, not to say disgraceful.”
“I’ll bet,” said Johnson, “that we’ll find some way of driving them off after dinner.”
They made no reply, but sat down to dinner. Johnson, as a pupil of the doctor, tried to be a philosopher in the face of danger, but he succeeded ill; his jokes stuck in his throat. Besides, they began to feel uncomfortable; the air was growing bad in this hermetically sealed prison; the stovepipe drew insufficiently, and it was easy to see that in a short time the fire would go out; the oxygen, consumed by their lungs and the fire, would be replaced by carbonic acid, which would be fatal to them, as they all knew. Hatteras was the first to detect this new danger; he was unwilling to hide it from the others.
“So, at any risk we must get out!” said Altamont.
“Yes,” answered Hatteras; “but let us wait till night; we will make a hole in the snow that we may get fresh air; then one shall take his place here and fire at the bears.”
“It’s the only thing we can do,” said the American.
Having agreed on this, they waited for the time of action; and during the following hours, Altamont did not spare imprecations against a state of things in which, as he put it, “there being men and bears concerned, the men were getting the worst of it.”
XIII
The Mine
Night came, and the lamp began to burn dimly in the close air of the room. At eight o’clock they made their final preparations. The guns were carefully loaded, and an opening was begun in the roof of the snow-house. Bell worked cleverly at this for a few minutes, when Johnson, who had left the bedroom, where he was on guard, for a few minutes, returned rapidly to his companions. He seemed disturbed.
“What is the matter?” the captain asked.
“The matter? nothing!” answered the old sailor, hesitatingly, “yet—”
“What is it?” asked Altamont.
“Hush! Don’t you hear a strange sound?”
“On which side?”
“There! There is something happening to the wall of that room.”
Bell stopped his work; each one listened. A distant noise could be heard, apparently in the side wall; someone was evidently making a passageway through the ice.
“It’s a tearing sound!” said Johnson.
“Without a doubt,” answered Altamont.
“The bears?” asked Bell.
“Yes, the bears,” said Altamont.
“They have changed their plan,” continued the sailor; “they’ve given up trying to suffocate us.”
“Or else they think they’ve done it,” added the American, who was getting very angry.
“We shall be attacked,” said Bell.
“Well,” remarked Hatteras, “we shall fight against them.”
“Confound it!” shouted Altamont; “I prefer that decidedly! I’ve had enough working in the dark! Now we shall see one another and fight!”
“Yes,” answered Johnson; “but with our guns it is impossible in so small a space.”
“Well, with a
