"What are you going to do, Roland?" said she, as he rose to leave the room.

"I am going to find the depth of the hole that shell has made. It ought to be filled up, and I must calculate how many loads of earth and stones it will take to do it."

That afternoon he came to Mrs. Raleigh's house.

"Margaret," he exclaimed, "I have lowered a lead into that hole with all the line attached which we have got on the place, and we can touch no bottom. I have telegraphed for a lot of sounding-wire, and I must wait until it shall arrive before I do anything more."

"You must be very, very careful, Roland, when you are doing that work," said Margaret. "Suppose you should fall in!"

"I have provided against that," said he. "I have laid a floor over the hole with only a small opening in it, so there is no danger. And another curious thing I must tell you-our line is not wet: we have struck no water!"

When Margaret visited the Works the next day she found Roland Clewe and a number of workmen surrounding the flooring which had been laid over the hole. They were sounding with a windlass which carried an immense reel of wire. The wire was extremely thin, but the weight of that portion of it which had already been unwound was so great that four men were at the handles of the windlass.

Roland came to meet Margaret as she entered.

"The lead has gone down six miles," he said, in a low voice, "and we have not touched the bottom yet."

"Impossible!" she cried. "Roland, it cannot be! The wire must be coiling itself up somewhere. It is incredible! The lead cannot have gone down so far!"

"Leads have gone down as far as that before this," said he. "Soundings of more than six miles have been obtained at sea."

She went with him and stood near the windlass. For an hour she remained by his side, and still the reel turned steadily and the wire descended into the hole.

"Shall you surely know when it gets to the bottom?" said she.

"Yes," he answered. "When the electric button under the lead shall touch anything solid, or even anything fluid, this bell up here will ring."

She stayed until she could stay no longer. She knew it would be of no use to urge Roland to leave the windlass. Very early the next morning a note was brought to her before she was up, and on it was written:

"We have touched bottom at a depth of fourteen and an eighth miles."

When Roland came to Mrs. Raleigh's house, about nine o'clock that morning, his face was pale and his whole form trembled.

"Margaret," he cried, "what are we going to do about it? It is wonderful; I cannot appreciate it. I have had all the men up in the office this morning and pledged them to secrecy. Of course they won't keep their promises, but it was all that I could do. I can think of no particular damage which would come to me if this thing were known, but I cannot bear that the public should get hold of it until I know something myself. Margaret, I don't know anything."

"Have you had your breakfast?" she asked.

"No," he said; "I haven't thought of it."

"Did you eat anything last night?"

"I don't remember," he answered.

"Now I want you to come into the dining-room," said she. "I had a light breakfast some time ago, and I am going to eat another with you. I want you to tell me something. There was a man here the other day with a patent machine for making button-holes—you know the old-fashioned button-holes are coming in again—and if this is a good invention it ought to sell, for nearly everybody has forgotten how to make button-holes in the old way."

"Oh, nonsense!" said Roland. "How can you talk of such things? I can't take my mind—"

"I know you can't," she interrupted. "You are all the time thinking of that everlasting old hole in the ground. Well, I am tired of it; do let us talk of something else."

Margaret Raleigh was much more than tired of that phenomenal hole in the earth which had been made by the automatic shell; she was frightened by it. It was something terrible to her; she had scarcely slept that night, and she needed breakfast and change of thought as much as Roland.

But it was not long before she found that it was impossible to turn his thoughts from that all-absorbing subject. All she could do was to endeavor to guide them into quiet channels.

"What are you going to do this morning?" she asked, towards the close of the breakfast.

"I am going to try to take the temperature of that shaft at various points," said he.

"That will be an excellent thing," she answered; "you may make valuable discoveries; but I should think the heat at that great depth would be enough to melt your thermometers."

"It did not melt my lead or my sounding-wire," said he. And as he said these words her heart fell.

The temperature of this great perforation was taken at many points, and when Roland brought to Margaret the statement of the height of the mercury at the very bottom she was astounded and shocked to find that it was only eighty-three degrees.

"This is terrible!" she ejaculated.

"What do you mean?" he asked in surprise. "That is not hot. Why, it is only summer weather."

But she did not think it terrible because it was so hot; the fact that it was so cool had shocked her. In such temperature one could live! A great source of trust and hope had been taken from her.

"Roland," she said, sinking into a chair, "I don't understand this at all. I always thought that it became hotter and hotter as one went down into the earth; and I once read that at twenty miles below the surface, if the heat increased in proportion as it increased in a mine, the temperature must be over a thousand degrees Fahrenheit. Your instrument could not have registered properly; perhaps it never went all the way down; and perhaps it is all a mistake. It may be that the lead did not go down so far as you think."

He smiled; he was becoming calmer now, for he was doing something: he was obtaining results.

"Those ideas about increasing heat at increasing depths are old-fashioned, Margaret," he said. "Recent science has given us better theories. It is known that there is great heat in the interior of the earth, and it is also known that the transmission of this heat towards the surface depends upon the conductivity of the rocks in particular locations. In some places the heat comes very near the surface, and in others it is very, very far down. More than that, the temperature may rise as we go down into the earth and afterwards fall again. There may be a stratum of close-grained rock, possibly containing metal, coming up from the interior in an oblique direction and bringing the heat towards the surface; then below that there may be vast regions of other rocks which do not readily conduct heat, and which do not originate in heated portions of the earth's interior. When we reach these, we must find the temperature lower, as a matter of course. Now I have really done this. A little over five miles down my thermometer registered ninety-one, and after that it began to fall a little. But the rocks under us are poor conductors of heat; and, moreover, it is highly probable that they have no near communication with the source of internal heat."

"I thought these things were more exact and regular," said she; "I supposed if you went down a mile in one place, you would find it as hot as you would in another."

"Oh no," said he. "There is nothing regular or exact in nature; even our earth is not a perfect sphere. Nature is never mathematically correct. You must always allow for variations. In some parts of the earth its heated core, or whatever it is, must be very, very far down."

At this moment a happy thought struck Margaret.

"How easy it would be, Roland, for you to examine this great hole! I can do it; anybody can do it. It's perfectly amazing when you think of it. All you have to do is to take your Artesian, ray machine into that building and set it over the hole; then you can light the whole interior, all the way down to the bottom, and with a telescope you can see everything that is in it."

"Yes," said he; "but I think I can do it better than that. It would be very difficult to transfer the photic borer to the other building, and I can light up the interior perfectly well by means of electric lights. I can even lower a camera down to the very bottom and take photographs of the interior."

"Why, that would be perfectly glorious!" cried Margaret, springing to her feet, an immense relief coming to her mind with the thought that to examine this actual shaft it would not be necessary for anybody to go down into it.

"I should go to work at that immediately," said he, "but I must have a different sort of windlass—one that shall be moved by an engine. I will rig up the big telescope too, so that we can look down when we have lighted up the bottom."

It required days to do all that Roland Clewe had planned. A great deal of the necessary work was done in his own establishment, and much machinery besides was sent from New York. When all was ready many experiments were made with the electric lights and camera, and photographs of inexpressible value and interest were taken at various points on the sides of this wonderful perpendicular tunnel.

At last Clewe was prepared to photograph the lower portion of the shaft. With a peculiar camera and a powerful light five photographs were taken of the very bottom of the great shaft, four in horizontal directions and one immediately below the camera. When these photographs were printed by the improved methods then in vogue, Clewe seized the pictures and examined them with eager haste. For some moments he stood silent, his eyes fixed upon the photographs as if there was nothing else in this world; but all he saw on each was an irregular patch of light. He thrust the prints aside, and in a loud, sharp voice he gave orders to bring the great telescope and set it up above the hole. The light was still at the bottom, and the instant the telescope was in position Clewe mounted the stepladder and directed the instrument downward. In a few moments he gave an exclamation, and then he came down from the ladder so rapidly that he barely missed falling. He went into his office and sent for Margaret. When she came he showed her the photographs.

"See!" he said. "What I have found is nothing; even a camera shows nothing, and when I look down through the glass I see nothing. It is just what the Artesian ray showed me; it is nothing at all!"

"I should think," said she, speaking very slowly, "that if your sounding-lead had gone down into nothing, it would have continued to go down indefinitely. What was there to stop it if there is nothing there?"

"Margaret," said he, "I don't know anything about it. That is the crushing truth. I can find out nothing at all. When I look down through the earth by means of the Artesian ray I reach a certain depth and then I see a void; when I look down through a perfectly open passage to the same depth, I still see a void."

"But, Roland," said Margaret, holding in her hand the view taken of the bottom of the shaft, "what is this in the middle of the proof? It is darker than the rest, but it seems to be all covered up with mistiness. Have you a magnifying-glass?"

Roland found a glass, and seized the photograph. He had forgotten his usual courtesy.

"Margaret," he cried, "that dark thing is my automatic shell! It is lying on its side. I can see the greater part of it. It is not in the hole it made itself; it is in a cavity. It has turned over, and lies horizontally; it has bored down into a cave, Margaret—into a cave—a cave with a solid bottom—a cave made of light!"

"Nonsense!" said Margaret. "Caves cannot be made of light; the light that you see comes from your electric lamp."

"Not at all!" he cried. "If there was anything there, the light of my lamp would show it. During the whole depth of the shaft the light showed everything and the camera showed everything; you can see the very texture of the rocks; but when the camera goes to the bottom, when it enters this space into which the shaft plainly leads, it shows nothing at all, except what I may be said to have put there. I see only my great shell surrounded by light, resting on light!"

"Roland," said Margaret, "you are crazy! Perhaps it is water which fills that cave, or whatever it is."

"Not at all," said Roland. "It presents no appearance of water, and when the camera came up it was not wet. No; it is a cave of light."

He sat for some minutes silently gazing out of the window. Margaret drew her chair closer to him. She took one of his hands in both of hers.

"Look at me, Roland!" she said. "What are you thinking about?"

He turned his face upon her, but said nothing. She looked straight into his eyes, and she needed no Artesian ray to enable her to see through them into his innermost brain. She saw what was filling that brain; it was one great, overpowering desire to go down to the bottom of that hole, to find out what it was that he had discovered.

"Margaret, you hurt me!" he exclaimed, suddenly. In the intensity of the emotion excited by what she had discovered, her finger-nails had nearly penetrated through his skin. She had felt as if she would hold him and hold him forever, but she released his hand.

"We haven't talked about that button-hole machine," she said. "I want your opinion of it." To her surprise, Roland began immediately to discuss the new invention of which she had spoken, and asked her to describe it. He was not at all anxious now to tell Margaret what he was thinking of in connection with the track of the shell.



CHAPTER XVII

CAPTAIN HUBBELL DECLINES TO GO WHALING

The most impatient person on board the Dipsey was Captain Jim Hubbell. Sarah Block was also very anxious to go home as soon as matters could be arranged for the return journey, and she talked a great deal of the terrible fate which would be sure to overtake them if they should be so unfortunate as to stay until the season of the arctic night; but, after all, she was not as impatient as Captain Hubbell. She simply wanted to go home; but he not only greatly desired to return to his wife and family, but he wanted to do something else before he started south; he wanted to go whaling. He considered himself the only man in the whole world who had a chance to go whaling, and he chafed as he thought of the hindrances which Mr. Gibbs was continually placing in the way of this, the grandest of all sports.

Mr. Gibbs was a mild man, and rather a quiet one; but he thoroughly understood the importance of the investigations he was pursuing in the polar sea, and placed full value upon the opportunity which had come to him of examining the wonders of a region hitherto locked up from civilized man. Captain Hubbell was astonished to find that Mr. Gibbs was as hard and unyielding as an iceberg during his explorations and soundings. It was of no use to talk to him of whaling; he had work before him, and he must do it.

But the time came when Mr. Gibbs relented. The Dipsey had sailed around the whole boundary of the polar sea; observations, surveys, and maps had been made, and the general geography of the region had been fairly well determined. There still remained some weeks of the arctic day, and it was desirable that they should begin their return journey during that time; so Mr. Gibbs informed Captain Jim that if he wanted to do a little whaling, he would like him to lose no time.

Almost from the time of their arrival in the polar sea the subject of whales had greatly interested everybody on the Dipsey. Even Rovinski, who had been released from his confinement after a few days, because he had really committed no actual crime except that of indulging in overleaping ambition, had spent every available minute of leisure in looking for whales. It was strange that nothing in this Northern region interested the people on the Dipsey (with the sole exception of Mr. Gibbs) so much as these great fish, which seemed to be the only visible inhabitants of the polar solitudes. There were probably white bears somewhere on the icy shores about them, but they never showed themselves; and if birds were there, they did not fly over that sea.

There was reason to suppose that there were a good many whales in the polar sea. Wherever our party sailed, lay to, or anchored for a time, they were very sure, before long, to see a whale curving his shining black back into the light, or sending two beautiful jets of water up into the air. Whenever a whale was seen, somebody on board was sure to remark that these creatures in this part of the world seemed to be very tame. It was not at all uncommon to see one disport himself at no great distance from the vessel for an hour or more.

"If I could get among a school of whales anywhere around Nantucket and find 'em as tame as these fellers," said Captain Jim, "I'd give a boom to the whale-oil business that it hasn't had for forty years."

But not long before Mr. Gibbs told the captain that he might go whaling if he felt like it, the old sailor had experienced a change of mind. He had become a most ardent student of whales. In his very circumscribed experience when a young man he had seen whales, but they had generally been a long way off; and as the old-fashioned method of rowing after them in boats had even then been abandoned in favor of killing them by means of the rifled cannon, Captain Hubbell had not seen very much of these creatures until they had been towed alongside. But now he could study whales at his leisure. It was seldom that he had to wait very long before he would see one near enough for him to examine it with a glass, and he never failed to avail himself of such opportunities.

The consequence of this constant and careful inspection was the conclusion in Captain Hubbell's mind that there was only one whale in the polar sea. He had noticed, and others had noticed, that they never saw two at once, and the captain had used his glass so often and so well that one morning he stamped his foot upon the deck and said to Sammy:

"I believe that's the same whale over and over and over ag'in. I know him like a book; he has his ways and his manners, and it isn't reasonable to suppose that every whale has the same ways and manners. He comes just so near the vessel, and then he stops and blows. Then he suns his back for a while, and then he throws up his flukes and sounds. He does that as regular as if he was a polar clock. I know the very shape of his flukes; and two or three days ago, as he was soundin', I thought that the tip of the upper one looked as if it had been damaged—as if he had broken it floppin' about in some tight place; and ever since, when I have seen a whale, I have looked for the tip of that upper fluke, and there's that same old break. Every time I have looked I have found it. It can't be that there are a lot o' whales in here and each one of 'em with a battered fluke."

"That does look sort o' queer," said Sammy, reflectively.

"Sammy Block," said Captain Jim, impressively, "it's my opinion that there's only one whale in this here polar sea; an', more than that, it's my opinion that there's only one whale in this world, an' that that feller we've seen is the one! Samuel Block, he's the last whale in the whole world! Now you know that I wanted to go a-whalin'—that's natural enough—but since Mr. Gibbs has got through, and has said that I could take this vessel an' go a-whalin' if I wanted to—which would be easy enough, for we have got guns aboard which would kill any right-whale—I don't want to go. I don't want to lay on my dyin' bed an' think that I'm the man that killed the last whale in the world. I'm commandin' this vessel, and I sail it wherever Mr. Gibbs tells me to sail it; but if he wants the bones of a whale to take home as a curiosity, an' tells me to sail this vessel after that whale, I won't do it."

"I'm with you there," said Sammy. "I have been thinkin' while you was talkin', an' it's my opinion that it's not only the last whale in the world, but it's purty nigh tame. I believe it's so glad to see some other movin' creature in this lonely sea that it wants to keep company with us all the time. No, sir, I wouldn't have anything to do with killin' that fish!"

The opinions of the captain and Sammy were now communicated to the rest of the company on board, and nearly all of them thought that they had had such an idea themselves. The whale certainly looked very familiar every time he showed himself.

To Mr. Gibbs this lonely creature, if he were such, now became an object of intense interest. It was evidently a specimen of the right-whale, once common in the Northern seas, skeletons of which could be seen in many museums. Nothing would be gained to science by his capture, and Mr. Gibbs agreed with the others that it would be a pity to harm this, the last of his race.

In thinking and talking over the matter Mr. Gibbs formed a theory which he thought would explain the presence of this solitary whale in the polar sea. He thought it very likely that it had gotten under the ice and had pursued its northern journey very much as the Dipsey had pursued hers, and had at last emerged, as she had, into the polar sea at a place perhaps as shallow as that where the submarine vessel came out from under the ice.

"And if that's the case," said Captain Hubbell, "it is ten to one that he has not been able to get out again, and has found himself here caught just as if he was in a trap. Fishes don't like to swim into tight places. They may do it once, but they don't want to do it again. It is this disposition that makes 'em easy to catch in traps. I believe you are right, Mr. Gibbs. I believe this whale has got in here and can't get out—or, at least, he thinks he can't—and nobody knows how long it's been since he first got in. It may have been a hundred years ago. There's plenty o' little fish in these waters for him to eat, and he's the only one there is to feed."

The thought that in this polar sea with themselves was a great whale, which was probably here simply because he could not get out, had a depressing effect upon the minds of the party on the Dipsey. There was perhaps no real reason why they should fear the fate of the great fish, but, after all, this subject was one which should be very seriously considered. The latter part of their passage under the ice had been very hazardous. Had they struck a sharp rock below them, or had they been pierced by a jagged mass of ice above them, there probably would have been a speedy end of the expedition; and now, having come safely out of that dangerous shallow water, they shrank from going into it again.

It was the general opinion that if they would sail a considerable distance to the eastward they could not fail to find a deep channel by which the waters of this sea communicated with Baffin's Bay; but in this case they would be obliged to leave the line of longitude by which they had safely travelled from Cape Tariff to the pole and seek another route southward, along some other line, which would end their journey they knew not where.

"I am cold," said Sarah Block. "At first I got along all right, with all these furs, and goin' down-stairs every time I felt chilly, but the freezin' air is beginnin' to go into my very bones like needles; and if winter is comin' on, and it's goin' to be worse than this, New Jersey is the place for me. But there's one thing that chills my blood clammier than even the cold weather, and that is the thought of that whale follerin' us. If we get down into those shaller places under the ice an' he takes it into his head to come along, he'll be worse than a bull in a china-shop. I don't mean to say that I think he'll want to do us any harm, for he has never shown any sign of such a feelin', but if he takes to bouncin' and thrashin' when he scratches himself on any rocks, it'll be a bad box for us to be in."

None of the others shared these special fears of Mrs. Block, but they were all as much disinclined as she was to begin another submarine voyage in the shallow waters which they had been so glad to leave.

It was believed, from the general contour of the surrounding region, that if the ice were all melted away it would be seen that a cape projected from the American continent eastward at the point where they had entered the polar sea, and that it was in crossing the submerged continuation of this cape that they had found the shallow water. Beyond and southward they knew that the water was deep and safe. If they could reach that portion of the sea without crossing the shallow point, they would have no fears regarding their return voyage. They knew how far south it was that that deep water lay, and the questions before them related to the best means of reaching it.

At a general council of officers, Sammy and Captain Hubbell both declared that they were not willing to take any other path homeward except one which led along the seventieth line of longitude. That had brought them safely up, and it would take them safely down. If they went under the ice at some point eastward, how were they to find the seventieth line of longitude? They could not take observations down there; and they might have to go south on some other line, which would take them nobody knew where. Mr. Gibbs said little, but he believed that it would be well to go back the way they came.

At last a plan was proposed by Mr. Marcy, and adopted without dissent. The whole country which lay in the direction they wished to travel seemed to be an immense plain of ice and snow, with mountains looming up towards the west and in the far southeast. In places great slabs of ice seemed to be piled up into craggy masses, but in general the surface of the country was quite level, indicating underlying water. In fact, a little east of the point where they had entered the polar sea great cracks and reefs, some of them extending nearly a mile inward, broke up the shore line. The party on the Dipsey were fully able to travel over smooth ice and frozen snow, for this contingency had been thought of and provided for; but to take the Dipsey on an overland journey would, of course, be impossible. By Mr. Marcy's plan, however, it was thought that it would be quite feasible for the Dipsey to sail inland until she had reached a point where they were sure the deep sea lay serenely beneath the ice around them.



CHAPTER XVIII

Mr. MARCY'S CANAL

The twelve men and the one woman on board the Dipsey, now lying at anchor in the polar sea, were filled with a warming and cheering ardor as they began their preparations for the homeward journey, although these preparations included what was to all of them a very painful piece of work. It was found that it would be absolutely necessary to disengage themselves from the electric cord which in all their voyaging in these desolate arctic regions, under water and above water, had connected them with the Works of Roland Clewe at Sardis, New Jersey. A sufficient length of this cord, almost too slight to be called cable, to reach from Cape Tariff to the pole, with a margin adequate for all probable emergencies, had been placed on board the Dipsey, and it was expected that on her return these slender but immensely strong wires would be wound up, instead of being let out, and so still connect the vessel with Mr. Clewe's office.

But the Dipsey had sailed in such devious ways and in so many directions that she had laid a great deal of the cable upon the bottom of the polar sea, and it would be difficult, or perhaps impossible, to sail back over her previous tracks and take it up again; and there was not enough of it left for her to proceed southward very far and still keep up her telegraphic communication. Consequently it was considered best, upon starting southward, that they should cut loose from all connection with their friends and the rest of the world. They would have to do this anyway in a short time. If they left the end of the wire in some suitable position on the coast of the polar sea, it might prove of subsequent advantage to science, whereas if they cut loose when they were submerged in the ocean, this cable from Cape Tariff to the pole must always be absolutely valueless. It was therefore determined to build a little house, for which they had the material, and place therein a telegraph instrument connected with the wire, and provided with one of the Collison batteries, which would remain in working order with a charge sufficient to last for forty years, and this, with a ground-wire run down through the ice to the solid earth, might make telegraphic communication possible to some subsequent visitor to the pole.

But apart from the necessity of giving up connection with Sardis, the journey did not seem like such a strange and solemn progress through unknown regions as the northern voyage had been. If they could get themselves well down into the deep sea at a point on the seventieth line of longitude, they would sail directly south with every confidence of emerging safely into Baffin's Bay.

The latest telegrams between Sardis and the polar sea were composed mostly of messages of the warmest friendship and encouragement. If Mr. Clewe and Mrs. Raleigh felt any fears as to the success of the first part of the return journey, they showed no signs of them, and Sammy never made any reference to his wife's frequently expressed opinion that there was good reason to believe that the end of this thing would be that the Dipsey, with everybody on board of her, would suddenly, by one of those mishaps which nobody can prevent, be blown into fine dust.

Mr. Marcy's plan was a very simple one. The Dipsey carried a great store of explosive appliances of various patterns and of the most improved kinds, and some of them of immense power, and Mr. Marcy proposed that a long line of these should be laid over the level ice and then exploded. The ice below them would be shivered into atoms, and he believed that an open channel might thus be made, through which the Dipsey might easily proceed. Then another line of explosives would be laid ahead of the vessel, and the length of the canal increased. This would be a slow method of proceeding, but it was considered a sure one.

As to the progress over the snow and ice of those who were to lay the lines of shells, that would be easy enough. It had been supposed that it might be necessary for the party to make overland trips, and for this purpose twenty or more electric-motor sledges had been provided. These sledges were far superior to any drawn by dogs or reindeer; each one of them, mounted on broad runners of aluminium, was provided with a small engine, charged at the vessel with electricity enough to last a week, and was propelled by means of a light metal wheel with sharp points upon its outer rim. This wheel was under the fore part of the sledge, and, revolving rapidly, its points caught in the ice or frozen snow and propelled the sledge at a good rate of speed. The wheel could be raised or lowered, so that its points should take more or less hold of the ice, according as circumstances demanded. In descending a declivity it could be raised entirely, so that the person on the sledge might coast, and it could at any time be brought down hard to act as a brake.

As soon as it was possible to get everything in order, a party of six men, on electric sledges, headed by Mr. Marcy, started southward over the level ice, carrying with them a number of shells, which were placed in a long line, and connected by an electric wire with the Dipsey. When the party had returned and the shells were exploded, the most sanguine anticipations of Mr. Marcy were realized. A magnificent canal three miles long lay open to the south.

Now the anchor of the Dipsey was weighed, and our party bade farewell to the polar sea. The great ball buoy, with its tall pole and weathervane, floated proudly over the northern end of the earth's axis. The little telegraph-house was all in order, and made as secure as possible, and under it the Dipsey people made a "cache" of provisions, leaving a note in several languages to show what they had done.

"If the whale wants to come ashore to get somethin' to eat and send a message, why, here's his chance!" said Sammy; "but it strikes me that if any human beings ever reach this pole again, they won't come the way we came, and they'll not see this little house, for it won't take many snow-storms—even if they are no worse than some of those we have seen—to cover it up out o' sight."

"I don't believe the slightest good will ever result on account of leaving this instrument here," said Mr. Gibbs; "but it seemed the right thing to do, and I would not be satisfied to go away and leave the useless end of the cable in these regions. We will set up the highest rod we have by the little house, and then we can do no more."

When the Dipsey started, everybody on board looked over the stern to see if they could catch a glimpse of their old companion, the whale. Nearly all of them were sorry that it was necessary to go away and desert this living being in his lonely solitude. They had not entered the canal when they saw the whale. Two tall farewell spouts rose into the air, and then his tail with its damaged fluke was lifted aloft and waved in a sort of gigantic adieu. Cheers and shouts of good-bye came from the Dipsey, and the whale disappeared from their sight.

"I hope he won't come up under us," said Mrs. Block. "But I don't believe he will do that. He always kept at a respectful distance, and as long as we are goin' to sail in a canal, I wouldn't mind in the least if he followed us. But as for goin' under water with him—I don't want anybody to speak of it."

Our exploring party now found their arctic life much more interesting than it had lately been, for, from time to time, they were all enabled to leave the vessel and travel, if not upon solid land, upon very solid ice. The Dipsey carried several small boats, and even Sarah Block frequently landed and took a trip upon a motor sledge. Sometimes the ice was rough, or the frozen snow was piled up into hillocks, and in such cases it was easy enough to walk and draw the light sledges; but as a general thing the people on the sledges were able to travel rapidly and pleasantly. The scenery was rather monotonous, with its everlasting stretches of ice and snow, but in the far distance the mountains loomed up in the beautiful colors given them by an arctic atmosphere, and the rays of the sun still brightened the landscape at all hours. Occasionally animals, supposed to be arctic foxes, were seen at a great distance, and there were those in the company who declared that they had caught sight of a bear. But hunting was not encouraged. The party had no need of fresh meat, and there was important work to be done which should not be interfered with by sporting expeditions.

There were days of slow progress, but of varied and often exciting experiences, for sometimes the line of Mr. Marcy's canal lay through high masses of ice, and here the necessary blasting was often of a very startling character. They expected to cease their overland journey before they reached the mountains, which on the south and west were piled up much nearer to them than those in other quarters, but they were surprised to find their way stopped much sooner than they had expected it would be by masses of icebergs, which stood up in front of them out of the snowy plain.

When they were within a few miles of these glittering eminences they ceased further operations and held a council. It was perfectly possible to blow a great hole in the ice and descend into the sea at this point, but they would have preferred going farther south before beginning their submarine voyage. To the eastward of the icebergs they could see with their glasses great patches of open water, and this would have prevented the making of a canal around the icebergs, for it would have been impossible to survey the route on sledges or to lay the line of bombs.

A good deal of discussion followed, during which Captain Hubbell strongly urged the plan of breaking a path to the open water, and finding out what could be done in the way of sailing south in regular nautical fashion. If the Dipsey could continue her voyage above water he was in favor of her doing it, but even Captain Jim Hubbell could give no good reason for believing that if the vessel got into the open water the party would not be obliged to go into winter-quarters in these icy regions; for in a very few weeks the arctic winter would be upon them. Once under the water, they would not care whether it was light or dark, but in the upper air it would be quite another thing.

So Captain Hubbell's plan was given up, but it was generally agreed that it would be a very wise thing, before they took any further steps, to ascend one of the icebergs in front of them and see what was on the other side.

The mountain-climbing party consisted of Mr. Gibbs, Mr. Marcy, and three of the most active of the men. Sammy Block wanted to go with them, but his wife would not allow him to do it.

"You can take possession of poles, Sammy," said she, "for that is the thing you are good at, but when it comes to slidin' down icebergs on the small of your back you are out of place; and if I get that house that Mr. Clewe lives in now, but which he is goin' to give up when he gets married, I don't want to live there alone. I can't think of nothin' dolefuler than a widow with a polar rheumatism, and that's what I'm pretty sure I'm goin' to have."

The ascent of the nearest iceberg was not such a difficult piece of work as it would have been in the days when Sammy Block and Captain Hubbell were boys. The climbers wore ice-shoes with leather suckers on the soles, such as the feet of flies are furnished with, so that it was almost impossible for them to slip; and when they came to a sloping surface, where it was too steep for them to climb, they made use of a motor sledge furnished with a wheel different from the others. Instead of points, this wheel had on its outer rim a series of suckers, similar to those upon the soles of the shoes of the party. As the wheel, which was of extraordinary strength, revolved, it held its rim tightly to whatever surface it was pressed against, without reference to the angle of said surface. In 1941, with such a sledge, Martin Gallinet, a Swiss guide, ascended seventy-five feet of a perpendicular rock face on Monte Rosa. The sledge, slowly propelled by its wheel, went up the face of the rock as if it had been a fly climbing up a pane of glass, and Gallinet, suspended below this sledge by a strap under his arms, was hauled to the top of the precipice.

It was not necessary to climb any such precipices in ascending an iceberg, but there were some steep slopes, and up these the party were safely carried, one by one, by what they called their Fly-foot Sledge.

After an hour or two of climbing, our party safely reached the topmost point of the iceberg, and began to gaze about them. They soon found that beyond them there were other peaks and pinnacles, and that it would have been difficult to make a circuit which would enable them to continue Mr. Marcy's plan of a canal along the level ice. Far beyond them, to the south, ice hills and ice mountains were scattered here and there.

Suddenly Mr. Gibbs gave a shout of surprise.

"I have been here before," said he.

"Of course you have," replied Mr. Marcy. "This is Lake Shiver. Don't you see, away over there on the other side of the open water below us, that little dark spot in the icy wall? That is the frozen polar bear. Take your glass and see if it isn't."



CHAPTER XIX

THE ICY GATEWAY

When Mr. Gibbs and his party returned to the Dipsey, after descending the iceberg, their report created a lively sensation.

"Why, it's like goin' home," said Mrs. Block. "Perhaps I may find my shoes."

It was not a very strange thing that they should have again met with this little ice-locked lake, for they had endeavored to return by a route as directly south as the other had been directly north. But no one had expected to see the lake again, and they were not only surprised, but pleased and encouraged. Here was a spot where they knew the water was deep enough for perfectly safe submarine navigation, and if they could start here under the ice they would feel quite sure that they would meet with no obstacles on the rest of their voyage.

As there was no possible entrance to this lake from the point where the Dipsey now lay at the end of her canal, Sammy proposed that they should make a descent into the water at the place where they were, if, after making soundings, they should find the depth sufficient. Then they might proceed southward as well as if they should start from Lake Shiver.

But this did not suit Mr. Gibbs. He had a very strong desire to reach the waters of the little lake, because he knew that at their bottom lay the telegraphic cable which he had been obliged to abandon, and he had thought he might be able to raise this cable and re-establish telegraphic communication with Cape Tariff and New Jersey.

Sammy thought that Mr. Gibbs's desire could be accomplished by sinking into the water in which they now lay and sailing under the icebergs to the lake, but Mr. Gibbs did not favor this. He was afraid to go under the icebergs. To be sure, they had already sailed under one of them when the Dipsey had made her way northward from the lake, but they had found that the depth of water varied very much in different places, and the icebergs in front of them might be heavier, and therefore more deeply sunken, than those which they had previously passed under.

If it were possible to extend their canal to Lake Shiver, Mr. Gibbs wanted to do it, but if they should fail in this, then, of course, they would be obliged to go down at this or some adjacent spot.

"It's all very well," said Captain Hubbell, who was a little depressed in spirits because the time was rapidly approaching when he would no longer command the vessel, "but it's one thing to blow a canal through fields of flat ice, and another to make it all the way through an iceberg; but if you think you can do it, I am content. I'd like to sail above water just as far as we can go."

Mr. Gibbs had been studying the situation, and some ideas relating to the solution of the problem before him were forming themselves in his mind. At last he hit upon a plan which he thought might open the waters of Lake Shiver to the Dipsey, and, as it would not take very long to test the value of his scheme, it was determined to make the experiment.

There were but few on board who did not know that if a needle were inserted into the upper part of a large block of ice, and were then driven smartly into it, the ice would split. Upon this fact Mr. Gibbs based his theory of making an entrance to the lake.

A climbing party, larger than the previous one, set out for the iceberg, carrying with them, on several sledges, a long and heavy iron rod, which was a piece of the extra machinery on the Dipsey, and some explosives of a special kind.

When the iceberg had been reached, several of the party ascended with a hoisting apparatus, and with this the rod was hauled to the top and set up perpendicularly on a central spot at the summit of the iceberg, the pointed end downward, and a bomb of great power fastened to its upper end. This bomb was one designed to exert its whole explosive power in one direction, and it was so placed that this force would be exerted downward. When all was ready, the electric-wire attachment to the bomb was carried down the iceberg and carefully laid on the ice as the party returned to the Dipsey.

Everybody, of course, was greatly interested in this experiment. The vessel was at least two miles from the iceberg, but in the clear atmosphere the glittering eminence could be plainly seen, and, with a glass, the great iron rod standing high up on its peak was perfectly visible. All were on deck when Mr. Gibbs stood ready to discharge the bomb on top of the rod, and all eyes were fixed upon the iceberg.

There was an explosion—not very loud, even considering the distance—and those who had glasses saw the rod disappear downward. Then a strange grating groan came over the snow-white plain, and the great iceberg was seen to split in half, its two peaks falling apart from each other. The most distant of the two great sections toppled far backward, and with a great crash turned entirely over, its upper part being heavier than its base. It struck an iceberg behind it, slid upon the level ice below, crashed through this, and sank out of sight. Then it was seen to slowly rise again, but this time with its base uppermost. The other and nearest section, much smaller, fell against an adjacent iceberg, where it remained leaning for some minutes, but soon assumed an erect position. The line of cleavage had not been perpendicular, and the greater part of the base of the original iceberg remained upon the nearer section.

When the scene of destruction had been thoroughly surveyed from the deck of the Dipsey, volunteers were called for to go and investigate the condition of affairs near the broken iceberg. Four men, including Mr. Gibbs and Mr. Marcy, went out upon this errand, a dangerous one, for they did not know how far the ice in their direction might have been shattered or weakened by the wreck of the iceberg. They found that little or no damage had been done to the ice between them and the nearer portion of the berg, and, pursing an eastward course on their sledges, they were enabled to look around this lofty mass and see a body of open water in the vicinity of the more distant section almost covered with floating ice. Pressing forward still farther eastward, and going as far south as they dared, they were enabled at last to see that the two portions of the original iceberg were floating at a considerable distance from each other, and that, therefore, there was nothing to prevent the existence of an open passage between them into the lake.

When the party returned with this report work was suspended, but the next day blasting parties went out. The canal was extended to the base of the nearer iceberg, a small boat was rowed around it, and after a careful survey it was found that unless the sections of the iceberg moved together there was plenty of room for the Dipsey to pass between them.

When the small boat and the sledges had returned to the vessel, and everything was prepared for the start along the canal and into the lake, one of the men came to Captain Hubbell and reported that the Pole Rovinski was absent. For one brief moment a hope arose in the soul of Samuel Block that this man might have fallen overboard and floated under the ice, but he was not allowed to entertain this pleasant thought. Mr. Marcy had seized a glass, and with it was sweeping the icy plain in all directions.

"Hello!" he cried. "Someone come here! Do you see that moving speck off there to the north? I believe that is the scoundrel."

Several glasses were now directed to the spot.

"It is the Pole!" cried Sammy. "He has stolen a sledge and is running away!"

"Where on earth can he be running to?" exclaimed Mr. Gibbs. "The man is insane!"

Mr. Marcy said nothing. His motor sledge, a very fine one, furnished with an unusually large wheel, was still on the deck. He rushed towards it.

"I am going after him!" he shouted. "Let somebody come with me. He's up to mischief! He must not get away!"

"Mischief!" exclaimed Mr. Gibbs. "I don't see what mischief he can do. He can't live out here without shelter; he'll be dead before morning."

"Not he," cried Sammy. "He's a born devil, with a dozen lives! Take a gun with you, Mr. Marcy, and shoot him if you can't catch him!"

Mr. Marcy took no gun; he had no time to stop for that. In a few moments he was on the ice with his sledge, then away he went at full speed towards the distant moving black object.

Two men were soon following Mr. Marcy, but they were a long way behind him, for their sledges did not carry them at the speed with which he was flying over the ice and snow.

It was not long before Rovinski discovered that he was pursued, and, frequently turning his head backward, he saw that the foremost sledge was gaining upon him; but, crouching as low as he could to avoid a rifle-shot, he kept on his way.

But he could not help turning his head every now and then, and at one of these moments his sledge struck a projecting piece of ice and was suddenly overturned. Rovinski rolled out on the hard snow, and the propelling wheel revolved rapidly in the air. The Pole gathered himself up quickly and turned his sledge back into its proper position. He did this in such haste that he forgot that the wheel was still revolving, and therefore was utterly unprepared to see the sledge start away at a great speed, leaving him standing on the snow, totally overwhelmed by astonishment and rage.

Marcy was near enough to view this catastrophe, and he stopped his sledge and burst out laughing. Now that the fellow was secure, Marcy would wait for his companions. When the others had reached him, the three proceeded towards Rovinski, who was standing facing them and waiting. As soon as they came within speaking distance he shouted:

"Stop where you are! I have a pistol, and I will shoot you in turn if you come any nearer. I am a free man! I have a right to go where I please. I have lost my sledge, but I can walk. Go back and tell your masters I have left their service."

Mr. Marcy reflected a moment. He was armed, but it was with a very peculiar weapon, intended for use on shipboard in case of mutinous disturbances. It was a pistol with a short range, carrying an ammonia shell. If he could get near enough to Rovinski, he could settle his business very quickly; but he believed that the pistol carried by the Pole was of the ordinary kind, and dangerous.

Something must be done immediately. It was very cold; they must soon return to the vessel. Suddenly, without a word, Mr. Marcy started his sledge forward at its utmost speed. The Pole gave a loud cry and raised his right hand, in which he held a heavy pistol. For some minutes he had been standing, his glove off, and this pistol clasped in his hand. He was so excited that he had entirely forgotten the intense coldness of the air. He attempted to aim the pistol and to curl his forefinger around the trigger, but his hand and wrist were stiff, his fingers were stiff. His pistol-barrel pointed at an angle downward; he had no power to straighten it or to pull the trigger. Standing thus, his face white with the rage of impotence and his raised hand shaking as if it had been palsied, he was struck full in the face with the shell from Marcy's wide-mouthed pistol. The brittle capsule burst, and in a second, insensible from the fumes of the powerful ammonia it contained, Rovinski fell flat upon the snow.

When the Pole had been taken back to the vessel, and had been confined below, Mr. Gibbs, utterly unable to comprehend the motives of the man in thus rushing off to die alone amid the rigors of the polar regions, went down to talk to him. At first Rovinski refused to make any answers to the questions put to him, but at last, apparently enraged by the imputation that he must be a weak-minded, almost idiotic, man to behave himself in such an imbecile fashion, he suddenly blazed out:

"Imbecile!" he cried. "Weak-minded! If it had not been for that accursed sledge, I would have shown you what sort of an imbecile I am. I can't get away now, and I will tell you how I would have been an idiot. I would have gone back to the pole, at least to the little house, where, like a fool, you left the end of your cable open to me, open to anybody on board who might be brave enough to take advantage of your imbecility. I had food enough with me to last until I got back to the pole, and I knew of the 'cache' which you left there. Long, long before you ever reached Cape Tariff, and before your master was ready to announce your discoveries to the world, I would have been using your cable. I would have been announcing my discoveries, not in a cipher, but in plain words; not to Sardis, but to the Observatory at St. Petersburg. I would have proclaimed the discovery of the pole, I would have told of your observations and your experiments; for I am a man of science, I know these things. I would have had the honor and the glory. The north pole would have been Rovinski's Pole; that open sea would have been Rovinski's Sea. All you might have said afterwards would have amounted to nothing; it would have been an old story; I would have announced it long before. The glory would have been mine—mine for all ages to come."

"But, you foolish man," exclaimed Mr. Gibbs, "you would have perished up there—no fire, no shelter but that cabin, and very little food. Even if, kept warm and alive by your excitement and ambition, you had been able to send one message, you would have perished soon afterwards."

"What of that?" said Rovinski. "I would have sent my message; I would have told how the north pole was found. The glory and the honor would have been mine."

When Mr. Gibbs related what was said at this interview, Sammy remarked that it was a great pity to interfere with ambition like that, and Sarah acknowledged to her husband, but to him only, that she had never felt her heart sink as it had sunk when she saw Mr. Marcy coming back with that black-faced and black-hearted Pole with him.

"I felt sure," said she, "that we had got rid of him, and that after this we would not be a party of thirteen. It does seem to me as if it is wicked to take such a creature back to civilized people. It's like carrying diseases about in your clothes, as people used to do in olden times."

"Well," said Sammy, "if we could fumigate this vessel and feel sure that only the bad germs would shrivel, I'd be in favor of doin' it."

In less than two hours after the return of Mr. Marcy with his prisoner, the Dipsey started along the recently made canal, carefully rounded the nearer portion of the broken iceberg, and slowly sailed between the two upright sections. These were sufficiently far apart to afford a perfectly safe passage, but the hearts of those who gazed up on their shining, precipitous sides were filled with a chilling horror, for if a wind had suddenly sprung up, these two great sections of the icy mountain might have come together, cracking the Dipsey as if it had been a nut.

But no wind sprang up; the icebergs remained as motionless as if they had been anchored, and the Dipsey entered safely the harboring waters of Lake Shiver.



CHAPTER XX

"THAT IS HOW I LOVE YOU"

For several days the subject of the great perforation made by the automatic shell was not mentioned between Margaret and Roland. This troubled her a great deal, for she thoroughly understood her lover's mind, and she knew that he had something important to say to her, but was waiting until he had fully elaborated his intended statement. She said nothing about it, because it was impossible for her to do so. It made her feel sick even to think of it, and yet she was thinking of it all the time.

At last he came to her one morning, his face pale and serious. She knew the moment her eyes fell upon him that he had come to tell her something, and what it was he had to tell.

"Margaret," said he, beginning to speak as soon as he had seated himself, "I have made up my mind about that shaft. It would be absolutely wicked if I were not to go down to the bottom and see what is there. I have discovered something—something wonderful —and I do not know what it is. I can form no ideas about it, there is nothing on which I can base any theory. I have done my best to solve this problem without going down, but my telescope reveals nothing, my camera shows me nothing at all."

She sat perfectly quiet, pallid and listening.

"I have thought over this thing by day and by night," he continued, "but the conclusion forces itself upon me, steadily and irresistibly, that it is my duty to descend that shaft. I have carefully considered everything, positively everything, connected with the safety of such a descent. The air in the cavity where my shell now rests is perfectly good; I have tested it. The temperature is simply warm, and there is no danger of quicksands or anything of that sort, for my shell still rests as immovable as when I first saw it below the bottom of the shaft.

"As to the distance I should have to descend, when you come to consider it, it is nothing. What is fourteen miles in a tunnel through a mountain? Some of those on the Great Straightcut Pacific Railroad are forty miles in length, and trains run backward and forward every day without any one considering the danger; and yet there is really more danger from one of those tunnels caving in than in my perpendicular shaft, where caving in is almost impossible.

"As to the danger which attends so great a descent, I have thoroughly provided against that. In fact, I do not see, if I carry out my plans, how there could be any danger, more than constantly surrounds us, no matter what we are doing. In the first place, we should not think of that great depth. If a man fell down any one of the deep shafts in our silver mines, he would be as thoroughly deprived of life as if he should fall down my shaft. But to fall down mine—and I want you to consider this, Margaret, and thoroughly understand it—would be almost impossible. I have planned out all the machinery and appliances which would be necessary, and I want to describe them to you, and then, I am sure, you will see for yourself that the element of danger is more fully eliminated than if I should row you on the lake in a little boat."

She sat quiet, still pale, still listening, her eyes fixed upon him.

"I have devised a car," he said, "in which I can sit comfortably and smoke my cigar while I make the descent. This, at the easy and steady rate at which my engines would move, would occupy less than three hours. I could go a good deal faster if I wanted to, but this would be fast enough. Think of that—fourteen miles in three hours! It would be considered very slow and easy travelling on the surface of the earth. This car would be suspended by a double chain of the very best toughened steel, which would be strong enough to hold ten cars the weight of mine. The windlass would be moved by an electric engine of sufficient power to do twenty times the work I should require of it, but in order to make everything what might be called super-safe, there would be attached to the car another double chain, similar to the first, and this would be wound upon another windlass and worked by another engine, as powerful as the first one. Thus, even if one of these double chains should break—an accident almost impossible—or if anything should happen to one of these engines, there would be another engine more than sufficient for the work. The top of this car would be conical, ending in a sharp point, and made of steel, so that if any fragment in the wall of the tunnel should become dislodged and fall, it would glance from this roof and fall between the side of the car and the inner surface of the shaft; for the car is to be only twenty-six inches in diameter-quite wide enough for my purpose—and this would leave at least ten inches of space all around the car. But, as I have said before, the sides of this tunnel are hard and smooth. The substances of which they are composed have been pressed together by a tremendous force. It is as unlikely that anything should fall from them as that particles should drop from the inside of a rifle-barrel.

"I admit, Margaret, that this proposed journey into the depths of the earth is a very peculiar one, but, after all, it is comparatively an easy and safe performance when compared to other things that men have done. The mountain-climbers of our fathers' time, who used to ascend the highest peaks with nothing but spiked shoes and sharpened poles, ran far more danger than would be met by one who would descend such a shaft as mine.

"And then, Margaret, think of what our friends on board the Dipsey have been and are doing! Think of the hundreds of miles they have travelled through the unknown depths of the sea! Their expedition was fifty times as hazardous as the trip of a few hours which I propose."

Now Margaret spoke.

"But I am not engaged to be married to Samuel Block, or to Mr. Gibbs, or to any of the rest of them."

He drew his chair closer to her, and he took both of her hands in his own. He held them as if they had been two lifeless things.

"Margaret," he said, "you know I love you, and—"

"Yes," she interrupted, "but I know that you love science more."

"Not at all," said he, "and I am going to show you how greatly mistaken you are. Tell me not to go down that shaft, tell me to live on without ever knowing what it is I have discovered, tell me to explode bombs in that great hole until I have blocked it up, and I will obey you. That is how I love you, Margaret."

She gazed into his eyes, and her hands, from merely lifeless things, became infused with a gentle warmth; they moved as if they might return the clasp in which they were held. But she did not speak, she simply looked at him, and he patiently waited. Suddenly she rose to her feet, withdrawing her hands from his hold as if he had hurt her.

"Roland," she exclaimed, "you think you know all that is in my heart, but you do not. You know it is filled with dread, with horror, with a sickening fear, but it holds more than that. It holds a love for you which is stronger than any fear or horror or dread. Roland, you must go down that shaft, you must know the great discovery you have made—even if you should never be able to come back to earth again, you must die knowing what it is. That is how I love you!"

Roland quickly made a step forward, but she moved back as if she were about to seat herself again, but suddenly her knees bent beneath her, and, before he could touch her, she had fallen over on her side and lay senseless on the floor.



CHAPTER XXI

THE CAVE OF LIGHT

Margaret was put into the charge of her faithful house-keeper, and Roland did not see her again until the evening. As she met him she began immediately to talk upon some unimportant subject, and there was that in her face which told him that it was her desire that the great thought which filled both their minds should not be the subject of their conversation. She told him she was going to the sea-shore for a short time; she needed a change, and she would go the next day. He understood her perfectly, and they discussed various matters of business connected with the Works. She said nothing about the time of her return, and he did not allude to it.

On the day that Margaret left Sardis, Roland began his preparations for descending the shaft. He had so thoroughly considered the machinery and appliances necessary for the undertaking, and had worked out all his plans in such detail, in his mind and upon paper, that he knew exactly what he wanted to do. His orders for the great length of chain exhausted the stock of several manufactories, and the engines he obtained were even more powerful than he had intended them to be; but these he could procure immediately, and for smaller ones he would have been obliged to wait.

The circular car which was intended to move up and down the shaft, and the peculiar machinery connected with it, with the hoisting apparatus, were all made in his Works. His skilled artisans labored steadily day and night.

It was ten days before he was ready to make his descent. Margaret was still at the sea-shore. They had written to each other frequently, but neither had made mention of the great shaft. Even when he was ready to go down he said nothing to any one of any immediate intention of descending. There was a massive door which covered the mouth of the pit; this he ordered locked and went away.

The next morning he walked into the building a little earlier than was his custom, called for the engineers, and for Mr. Bryce, who was to take charge of everything connected with the descent, and announced that he was going down as soon as preparations could be made.

Mr. Bryce and the men who were to assist him were very serious. They said nothing that was not necessary. If their employer had been any other man than Roland Clewe it is possible they might have remonstrated with him. But they knew him, and they said and did nothing more than was their duty.

The door of the shaft was removed, the car which had hung high above it was lowered to the mouth of the opening, and Roland stepped within it and seated himself. Above him and around him were placed geological tools and instruments of many kinds; a lantern, food and drink; everything, in fact, which he could possibly be presumed to need upon this extraordinary journey. A telephone was at his side by which he could communicate at any time with the surface of the earth. There were electric bells; there was everything to make his expedition safe and profitable. When he gave the word to start the engines, there were no ceremonies, and nothing was said out of the common.

When the conical top of the car had descended below the surface, a steel grating, with orifices for the passage of the chains, was let down over the mouth of the shaft, and the downward journey was begun. In the floor of the car were grated openings, through which Clewe could look downward; but although the shaft below him was brilliantly illuminated by electric lights placed under the car, it did not frighten him or make him dizzy to look down, for the aperture did not appear to be very far below him. The upper part of the car was partially open, and bright lights shone upon the sides of the shaft.

As he slowly descended, he could see the various strata appearing and disappearing in the order in which he knew them. Not far below the surface he passed cavities which he believed held water; but there was no water in them now. He had expected these, and had feared that upon their edges there might be loosened patches of rock or soil, but everything seemed tightly packed and hard. If anything had been loosened it had gone down already.

Down, down he went until he came to the eternal rocks, where the inside of the shaft was polished as if it had been made of glass. It became warmer and warmer, but he knew that the heat would soon decrease. The character of the rocks changed, and he studied them as he went down, and continually made notes.

After a time the polished rocky sides of the shaft grew to be of a solemn sameness. Clewe ceased to take notes; he lighted a cigar and smoked. He tried to quietly imagine what he would come to when he got to the bottom; it would be some sort of a cave into which his shell had made an opening. He wondered what sort of a cave it would be, and how high the roof of it was from the bottom. He wondered if his gardener had remembered what he had told him about the flower-beds in front of his house; he wanted certain changes made which Margaret had suggested. He tried to keep his mind on the flower-beds, but it drifted away to the cave below. He began to wonder if he would come to some underground body of water where he would be drowned; but he knew that was a silly thought. If the shaft had gone through subterranean reservoirs, the water of these would have run out, and before they reached the bottom of the shaft would have dissipated into mist.

Down, down he went. He looked at his watch; he had been in that car only an hour and a half. Was that possible? He had supposed he was almost at the bottom. Suddenly he thought of the people above, and of the telephone. Why had not some of them spoken to him? It was shameful! He instantly called Bryce, and his heart leaped with joy when he heard the familiar voice in his ear. Now he talked steadily on for more than an hour. He had his gardener called, and he told him all that he wanted done in the flower-beds. He gave many directions in regard to the various operations of the Works. Things had been put back a great deal of late. He hoped soon to have everything going on in the ordinary way. There were two or three inventions in which he took particular interest, and of these he talked at great length with Mr. Bryce. Suddenly, in the midst of some talk about hollow steel rods, he told Bryce to let the engines move faster; there was no reason why the car should go so slowly.

The windlasses moved with a little more rapidity, and Clewe now turned and looked at an indicator which was placed on the side of the car, a little over his head. This instrument showed the depth to which he had descended, but he had not looked at it before, for if there should be anything which would make him nervous it would be the continual consideration of the depth to which he had descended.

The indicator showed that he had gone down fourteen and one eighth miles. Clewe turned and sat stiffly in his seat. He glanced down and saw beneath him only an illuminated hole, fading away at the bottom. Then he turned to speak to Bryce, but to his surprise he could think of nothing to say. After that he lighted another cigar and sat quietly.

Some minutes passed—he did not know how many—and he looked down through the gratings at the floor of the car. The electric light streamed downward through a deep orifice, which did not fade away and end in nothing; it ended in something dark and glittering. Then, as he came nearer and nearer to this glittering thing, he saw that it was his automatic shell, lying on its side, but he could see only a part of it through the opening of the bottom of the shaft which he was descending. In an instant, as it seemed to him, the car emerged from the narrow shaft, and he seemed to be hanging in the air-at least there was nothing he could see except that great shell, lying some forty feet below him. But it was impossible that the shell should be lying on the air! He rang to stop the car.

"Anything the matter?" cried Bryce, almost at the same instant.

"Nothing at all," Clewe replied. "It's all right, I am near the bottom."

In a state of the highest nervous excitement, Clewe gazed about him. He was no longer in a shaft; but where was he? Look out on what side he would, he saw nothing but the light going out from his lamps, but which seemed to extend indefinitely all about him. There seemed to be no limit to his vision in any direction. Then he leaned over the side of his car and looked downward. There was the great shell directly under him, but under it and around it, extending as far beneath it as it extended in every other direction, was the light from his own lamps, and yet that great shell, weighing many tons, lay as if it rested upon the solid ground!

After a few moments Clewe shut his eyes; they pained him. Something seemed to be coming into them like a fine frost in a winter wind. Then he called to Bryce to let the car descend very slowly. It went down, down, gradually approaching the great shell. When the bottom of the car was within two feet of it, Clewe rang to stop. He looked down at the complicated machine he had worked upon so long, with something like a feeling of affection. This he knew, it was his own. Looking upon its familiar form, he felt that he had a companion in this region of unreality.

Pushing back the sliding door of the car, Clewe sat upon the bottom and cautiously put out his feet and legs, lowering them until they touched the shell. It was firm and solid. Although he knew it must be so, the immovability of the great mass of iron gave him a sudden shock of mysterious fear. How could it be immovable when there was nothing under it?

But he must get out of that car, he must explore, he must find out. There certainly could be no danger so long as he could cling to his shell.

He now cautiously got out of the car and let himself down upon the shell. It was not a pleasant surface to stand upon, being uneven, with great spiral ribs, and Clewe sat down upon it, clinging to it with his hands. Then he leaned over to one side and looked beneath him. The shadows of that shell went down, down, down, until it made him sick to look at it. He drew back quickly, clutched the shell with his arms, and shut his eyes. He felt as if he were about to drop with it into a measureless depth of atmosphere.

But he soon raised himself. He had not come down here to be frightened, to let his nerves run away with him. He had come to find out things. What was it that this shell rested upon? Seizing two of the ribs with a strong clutch, he let himself hang over the sides of the shell until his feet were level with its lower side. They touched something hard. He pressed them downward; it was very hard. He raised himself and stood upon the substance which supported the shell. It was as solid as any rock. He looked down and saw his shadow stretching far beneath him. It seemed as if he were standing upon petrified air. He put out one foot and he moved a little, still holding on to the shell. He walked, as if upon solid air, to the foremost end of the long projectile. It relieved him to turn his thoughts from what was around him to this familiar object. He found its conical end shattered and broken.

After a little he slowly made his way back to the other end of the shell, and now his eyes became somewhat accustomed to the great radiance about him. He thought he could perceive here and there faint indications of long, nearly horizontal lines—lines of different shades of light. Above him, as if it hung in the air, was the round, dark hole through which he had descended.

He rose, took his hands from the shell, and made a few steps. He trod upon a horizontal surface, but in putting one foot forward, he felt a slight incline. It seemed to him that he was about to slip downward! Instantly he retreated to the shell and clutched it in a sudden frenzy of fear.

Standing thus, with his eyes still wandering, he heard the bell of the telephone ring. Without hesitation he mounted the shell and got into the car. Bryce was calling him.

"Come up," he said. "You have been down there long enough. No matter what you have found, it is time for you to come up."

Roland Clewe was not accustomed to receive commands, but he instantly closed the sliding door of the car, seated himself, and put his mouth to the telephone.

"All right," he said. "You can haul me up, but go very slowly at first."

The car rose. When it reached the orifice in the top of the cave of light, Clewe heard the conical steel top grate slightly as it touched its edge, for it was still swinging a little from the motion given to it by his entrance; but it soon hung perfectly vertical and went silently up the shaft.



CHAPTER XXII

CLEWE'S THEORY

Seated in the car, which was steadily ascending the great shaft, Roland Clewe took no notice of anything about him. He did not look at the brilliantly lighted interior of the shaft, he paid no attention to his instruments, he did not consult his watch, nor glance at the dial which indicated the distance he had travelled. Several times the telephone bell rang, and Bryce inquired how he was getting along; but these questions he answered as briefly as possible, and sat looking down at his knees and seeing nothing.

When he was half-way up, he suddenly became conscious that he was very hungry. He hurriedly ate some sandwiches and drank some water, and then, again, he gave himself up entirely to mental labor. When, at last, the noise of machinery above him and the sound of voices aroused him from his abstraction, the car emerged upon the surface of the earth, Clewe hastily slid back the door and stepped out. At that instant he felt himself encircled by a pair of arms. Bryce was near by, and there were other men by the engines, but the owner of those arms thought nothing of this.

"Margaret!" cried Clewe, "how came you here?"

"I have been here all the time," she exclaimed; "or, at least, nearly all the time." And as she spoke she drew back and looked at him, her eyes full of happy tears. "Mr. Bryce telegraphed to me the instant he knew you were going down, and I was here before you had descended half-way."

"What!" he cried. "And all those messages came from you?"

"Nearly all," she answered. "But tell me, Roland—tell me; have you been successful? What have you discovered?"

"I am successful," he answered. "I have discovered everything!"

Mr. Bryce came forward.

"I will speak to you all very soon," said Clewe. "I can't tell you anything now. Margaret, let us go. I shall want to talk to you directly, but not until I have been to my office. I will meet you at your house in a very few minutes." And with that he left the building and fairly ran to his office.

A quarter of an hour later Roland entered Margaret's library, where she sat awaiting him. He carefully closed the doors and windows. They sat side by side upon the sofa.

"Now, Roland," she said, "I cannot wait one second longer. What is it that you have discovered?"

"Margaret," said he, "I am afraid you will have to wait a good many seconds. If I were to tell you directly what I have discovered, you would not understand it. I am the possessor of wonderful facts, but I believe also that I am the master of a theory more wonderful. The facts I found out when I got to the bottom of the shaft, but the theory I worked out coming up."

"But give them to me quickly!" she cried. "The facts first—I can wait for the theory."

"No," he said, "I cannot do it; I must tell you the whole thing as I have it, arranged in my mind. Now, in the first place, you must understand that this earth was once a comet."

"Oh, bother your astronomy, I really can't understand it! What did you find in the bottom of that hole?"

"You must listen to me," he said. "You cannot comprehend a thing I say if I do not give it to you in the proper order. There have been a great many theories about comets, but there is only one of them in which I have placed any belief. You know that as a comet passes around the sun, its tail is always pointed away from the sun, so that no matter how rapidly the head shall be moving in its orbit, the end of the tail—in order to keep its position—must move with a rapidity impossible to conceive. If this tail were composed of nebulous mist, or anything of that sort, it could not keep its position. There is only one theory which could account for this position, and that is that the head of a comet is a lens and the tail is light. The light of the sun passes through the lens and streams out into space, forming the tail, which does not follow the comet in the inconceivable manner generally supposed, but is constantly renewed, always, of course; stretching away from the sun!"

"Oh, dear!" ejaculated Margaret. "I have read that."

"A little patience," he said. "When I arrived at the bottom of the shaft, I found myself in a cleft, I know not how large, made in a vast mass of transparent substance, hard as the hardest rock and transparent as air in the light of my electric lamps. My shell rested securely upon this substance. I walked upon it. It seemed as if I could see miles below me. In my opinion, Margaret, that substance was once the head of a comet."

"What is the substance?" she asked, hastily.

"It is a mass of solid diamond!"

Margaret screamed. She could not say one word.

"Yes," said he, "I believe the whole central portion of the earth is one great diamond. When it was moving about in its orbit as a comet, the light of the sun streamed through this diamond and spread an enormous tail out into space; after a time this nucleus began to burn."

"Burn!" exclaimed Margaret.

"Yes, the diamond is almost pure carbon; why should it not burn? It burned and burned and burned. Ashes formed upon it and encircled it; still it burned, and when it was entirely covered with its ashes it ceased to be transparent, it ceased to be a comet; it became a planet, and revolved in a different orbit. Still it burned within its covering of ashes, and these gradually changed to rock, to metal, to everything that forms the crust of the earth."

She gazed upon him, entranced.

"Some parts of this great central mass of carbon burn more fiercely than other parts. Some parts do not burn at all. In volcanic regions the fires rage; where my great shell went down it does not burn at all. Now you have my theory. It is crude and rough, for I have tried to give it to you in as few words as possible."

"Oh, Roland," she cried, "it is absurd! Diamond! Why, people will think you are crazy. You must not say such a thing as that to anybody. It is simply impossible that the greater part of this earth should be an enormous diamond."

"Margaret," he answered, "nothing is impossible. The central portion of this earth is composed of something; it might just as well be diamond as anything else. In fact, if you consider the matter, it is more likely to be, because diamond is a very original substance. As I have said, it is almost pure carbon. I do not intend to say one word of what I have told you to any one —at least, until the matter has been well considered—but I am not afraid of being thought crazy. Margaret, will you look at these?"

He took from his pocket some shining substances resembling glass. Some of them were flat, some round; the largest was as big as a lemon, others were smaller fragments of various sizes.

"These are pieces of the great diamond which were broken when the shell struck the bottom of the cave in which I found it. I picked them up as I felt my way around this shell, when walking upon what seemed to me like solid air. I thrust them into my pocket, and I would not come to you, Margaret, with this story, until I had gone to my office to find out if these fragments were really diamond. I tested them; their substance is diamond!"

Half dazed, she took the largest piece in her hand.

"Roland," she whispered, "if this is really a diamond, there is nothing like it known to man!"

"Nothing, indeed," said he.

She sat staring at the great piece of glowing mineral which lay in her hand. Its surface was irregular; it had many faces; the subdued light from the window gave it the appearance of animated water. He felt it necessary to speak.

"Even these little pieces," he said, "are most valuable jewels."

She still sat silent, looking at the glowing object she held.

"You see, these are not like the stones which are found in our diamond-fields," he said. "Those, most likely, were little, unconsumed bits of the original mass, afterwards gradually forced up from the interior in the same way that many metals and minerals are forced up, and then rounded and dulled by countless ages of grinding and abrasion, due to the action of rocks or water."

"Roland," she cried, excitedly, "this is riches beyond imagination! What is common wealth to what you have discovered? Every living being on earth could—"

"Ah, Margaret," he interrupted, "do not let your thoughts run that way. If my discovery should be put to the use of which you are thinking, it would bring poverty, not wealth, to the world, and not a diamond on earth would be worth more than a common pebble. Everywhere, in civilized countries and in barbaric palaces, people would see their riches vanish before them as if it had been blighted by the touch of an evil magician."

She trembled. "And these—are they to be valued as common pebbles?"

"Oh no," said he; "so long as that great shaft is mine, these broken fragments are to us riches far ahead of our wildest imaginations."

"Roland," she cried, "are you going down into that shaft for more of them?"

"Never, never, never again," he said. "What we have here is enough for us, and if I were offered all the good that there is in this world, which money cannot buy, I would never go down into that cleft again. There was one moment when I stood in that cave in which an awful terror shot into my soul which I shall never be able to forget. In the light of my electric lamps, sent through a vast transparent mass, I could see nothing, but I could feel. I put out my foot and I found it was upon a sloping surface. In another instant I might have slid—where? I cannot bear to think of it!"

She threw her arms around him and held him tightly.



CHAPTER XXIII

THE LAST DIVE OF THE DIPSEY

When the engines of the Dipsey had stopped, and she was quietly floating upon the smooth surface of Lake Shiver, Mr. Gibbs greatly desired to make a connection with the telegraphic cable which was stretched at the bottom of the ocean, beneath him, and to thus communicate with Sardis, But when this matter was discussed in council, several objections were brought against it, the principal one being that the cable could not be connected with the Dipsey without destroying its connection with the little station near the pole; and although this means of telegraphic communication with regions which might never be visited again might well be considered as possessing no particular value, still it was such a wonderful thing to lay a telegraph line to the pole that it seemed the greatest pity in the world to afterwards destroy it.

The friends of this exploring party had not heard from it since it left the polar sea, but there could be no harm in making them wait a little longer. If the return voyage under the ice should be as successfully accomplished as the first submarine cruise, it would not be very many days before the Dipsey should arrive at Cape Tariff. She would not proceed so slowly as she did when coming north, for now her officers would feel that in a measure they knew the course, and moreover they would not be delayed by the work of laying a cable as they progressed.

So it was agreed that it would be a waste of time and labor to stop here and make connection with the cable, and preparations were made for a descent to a safe depth beneath the surface, when they would start southward on their homeward voyage. Mrs. Sarah Block, wrapped from head to foot in furs, remained on deck as long as her husband would allow her to do so. For some time before her eyes had been slowly wandering around the edge of that lonely piece of water, and it was with an unsatisfied air that she now stood gazing from side to side. At last Sammy took her by the arm and told her she must go below, for they were going to close up the hatchways.

"Well," said Sarah, with a sigh, "I suppose I must give 'em up; they were the warmest and most comfortable ones I had, and I could have thawed 'em out and dried 'em so that they would have been as good as ever. I would not mind leavin' 'em if there was a human bein' in this neighborhood that would wear 'em; but there ain't, and it ain't likely there ever will be, and if they are frozen stiff in the ice somewhere, they may stay here, as good as new, for countless ages!"

Of course everybody was very happy, now that they were returning homeward from a voyage successful beyond parallel in history, and even Rovinski was beginning to assume an air of gratified anticipation. He had been released from his confinement and allowed to attend to his duties, but the trust which had been placed in him when this kindness had been extended to him on a previous occasion was wanting now. Everybody knew that he was an unprincipled man, and that if he could gain access to the telegraph instrument at Cape Tariff he would make trouble for the real discoverer of the north pole; so it was agreed among the officers of the vessel that the strictest watch must be kept on him and no shore privileges be allowed him.