An Antarctic Mystery Jules Verne (children's ebooks online txt) 📖

the secret got out, or was this apprehension on the part of Dirk Peters purely imaginary?

“Explain yourself,” I said.

“Understand me, Mr. Jeorling, I am a bad hand at explaining. Yes, yesterday⁠—I have thought of nothing else since⁠—Martin Holt took me aside, far from the others, and told me that he wished to speak to me⁠—”

“Of the Grampus?”

“Of the Grampus⁠—yes, and of his brother, Ned Holt. For the first time he uttered that name before me⁠—and yet we have sailed together for nearly three months.”

The half-breed’s voice was so changed that I could hardly hear him.

“It seemed to me,” he resumed, “that in Martin Holt’s mind⁠—no, I was not mistaken⁠—there was something like a suspicion.”

“But tell me what he said! Tell me exactly what he asked you. What is it?”

I felt sure that the question put by Martin Holt, whatsoever its bearing, had been inspired by Hearne. Nevertheless, as I considered it well that the half-breed should know nothing of the sealing-master’s disquieting and inexplicable intervention in this tragic affair, I decided upon concealing it from him.

“He asked me,” replied Dirk Peters, “did I not remember Ned Holt of the Grampus, and whether he had perished in the fight with the mutineers or in the shipwreck; whether he was one of the men who had been abandoned with Captain Barnard; in short, he asked me if I could tell him how his brother died. Ah! how!”

No idea could be conveyed of the horror with which the half-breed uttered words which revealed a profound loathing of himself.

“And what answer did you make to Martin Holt?”

“None, none!”

“You should have said that Ned Holt perished in the wreck of the brig.”

“I could not⁠—understand me⁠—I could not. The two brothers are so like each other. In Martin Holt I seemed to see Ned Holt. I was afraid, I got away from him.”

The half-breed drew himself up with a sudden movement, and I sat thinking, leaning my head on my hands. These tardy questions of Holt’s respecting his brother were put, I had no doubt whatsoever, at the instigation of Hearne, but what was his motive, and was it at the Falklands that he had discovered the secret of Dirk Peters? I had not breathed a word on the subject to anyone. To the second question no answer suggested itself; the first involved a serious issue. Did the sealing-master merely desire to gratify his enmity against Dirk Peters, the only one of the Falkland sailors who had always taken the side of Captain Len Guy, and who had prevented the seizure of the boat by Hearne and his companions? Did he hope, by arousing the wrath and vengeance of Martin Holt, to detach the sailing-master from his allegiance and induce him to become an accomplice in Hearne’s own designs? And, in fact, when it was a question of sailing the boat in these seas, had he not imperative need of Martin Holt, one of the best seamen of the Halbrane? A man who would succeed where Hearne and his companions would fail, if they had only themselves to depend on?

I became lost in this labyrinth of hypotheses, and it must be admitted that its complications added largely to the troubles of an already complicated position.

When I raised my eyes, Dirk Peters had disappeared; he had said what he came to say, and he now knew that I had not betrayed his confidence.

The customary precautions were taken for the night, no individual being allowed to remain outside the camp, with the exception of the half-breed, who was in charge of the boat.

The following day was the 31st of January. I pushed back the canvas of the tent, which I shared with Captain Len Guy and West respectively, as each succeeded the other on release from the alternate “watch,” very early, and experienced a severe disappointment.

Mist, everywhere! Nay, more than mist, a thick yellow, mouldy-smelling fog. And more than this again; the temperature had fallen sensibly: this was probably a forewarning of the austral winter. The summit of our ice-mountain was lost in vapour, in a fog which would not resolve itself into rain, but would continue to muffle up the horizon.

“Bad luck!” said the boatswain, “for now if we were to pass by land we should not perceive it.”

“And our drift?”

“More considerable than yesterday, Mr. Jeorling. The captain has sounded, and he makes the speed no less than between three and four miles.”

“And what do you conclude from this?”

“I conclude that we must be within a narrower sea, since the current is so strong. I should not be surprised if we had land on both sides of us within ten or fifteen miles.”

“This, then, would be a wide strait that cuts the antarctic continent?”

“Yes. Our captain is of that opinion.”

“And, holding that opinion, is he not going to make an attempt to reach one or other of the coasts of this strait?”

“And how?”

“With the boat.”

“Risk the boat in the midst of this fog!” exclaimed the boatswain, as he crossed his arms. “What are you thinking of, Mr. Jeorling? Can we cast anchor to wait for it? And all the chances would be that we should never see it again. Ah! if we only had the Halbrane!”

But there was no longer a Halbrane!

In spite of the difficulty of the ascent through the half-condensed vapour, I climbed up to the top of the iceberg, but when I had gained that eminence I strove in vain to pierce the impenetrable grey mantle in which the waters were wrapped.

I remained there, hustled by the northeast wind, which was beginning to blow freshly and might perhaps rend the fog asunder. But no, fresh vapours accumulated around our floating refuge, driven up by the immense ventilation of the open sea. Under the double action of the atmospheric and antarctic currents, we drifted more and more rapidly, and I perceived a sort of shudder pass throughout the vast bulk of the iceberg.

Then it was that I felt myself under the dominion