Hemmingway took up the theme to add that if the supply of food looked like giving out before the spring came round they could eke out their tinned goods with stews of seeds and roots from their own stores of these, many of which were edible. Moreover, the fact that they had discovered a motor tractor that morning showed that the land was farmable; so, although it would mean hard work to clear the snow, there was no reason why they should not sow some patches of cereals and root-crops during the next few weeks before the land had frozen solid and the real Arctic winter set in.
For the hundredth time they congratulated themselves on their forethought in stocking the Ark with so many items and implements which would now prove more valuable than gold and ensure their being able to maintain themselves even in such a terrible climate. The Ark and its contents were their fortress and their salvation.
It was four o'clock when they came over the last crest and sighted it; a huge snowball in a flat field half a mile away. They were still a quarter of a mile off when a sudden cry of dismay burst from the whole party. A great tongue of flame, red, fierce and curling, had leapt from the doorway of the sphere, lighting up the snow all round with a lurid glare.
Instantly they began to run towards it. They had not covered a dozen yards when a human figure appeared right in the centre of the flame. It was Fink-Drummond. With a piercing scream he leapt down the snow-steps and raced away across the field.
His clothes were on fire and his shrieks of agony could have been heard a mile away as he floundered down the slope away from them.
Derek, who was leading the party, turned a little in his stride and raced after him while the others ran straight on towards the Ark. When they reached it they drew to an abrupt halt and stood there panting, their faces expressing every shade of fear, horror and distress.
Either deliberately in a fit of lunacy, or through some accident, Fink-Drummond must have set light to the petrol tanks in the bilge of the Ark. Its interior was now a white-hot furnace. There was no way in which they could enter it, except by the door, and that was a roaring sheet of flame so fierce that they had to stand twenty yards away to prevent themselves being scorched.
There was nothing whatever that they could do. They were compelled to stand there in helpless misery, watching while the angry fire devoured all their possessions and all those stores which meant their very hope of life.
Five minutes later, Derek came panting back to them. 'He's dead,' he gasped. 'He fell before I caught up with him. If only the poor fool had had the sense to roll in the snow instead of running away like that he might have saved himself; but every stitch he had on was burnt to a cinder. The shock must have killed him.'
The flames issuing from the Ark gradually grew less fierce. After a time they died down to a flicker and Gervaise, mounting the snow-bank which had only partially melted, peered over the charred platform into the Ark's interior. The deck was gone, the partitions had disappeared; all that was left was a heap of glowing ashes. He stumbled down the bank again and joined the others.
They were still standing there half an hour later, robbed of initiative, utterly stricken by this appalling catastrophe. The brief wintry afternoon was nearly over; night was approaching. They had nothing but the clothes they stood up in and they were alone, friendless, foodless, fireless, in the grim, snowbound Arctic,
The Frozen World
They were at their wit's end to know what to do. All Hemmingway's academic knowledge was now completely useless. Sam's flair for dealing with obstreperous shareholders of company meetings and shaking world markets left him with no more idea than a child how to cope with the situation. Derek's knowledge of the countryside at home in England could not help him to maintain the party in this totally different climate. Margery could cook but she was helpless without food and fire. Even Lavina, whose presence would have cheered most people who were temporarily stranded, had not the power to raise their spirits now that it seemed that they were condemned to die there. It was Gervaise who showed his natural capacity for leadership.
'Come,' he said, rousing at last, 'it's no good our remaining here. We must seek shelter for the night.'
Margery shrugged despairingly. 'What shelter is there? We've spent two days looking for the house Sam and Hemmingway saw when we first arrived here, but we haven't found it; so we certainly shan't be able to in the darkness.'
'I didn't suppose we could,' Gervaise replied shortly; 'but we still have an hour's twilight and we've got to find shelter somewhere from this wind, even if it's only under a hedge.'
Turning on his heel, he led them back towards the higher ground and selected a place half a mile from the burnt-out Ark where two snow-banks, covering high hedges, met at right-angles in the corner of a field. Derek and Hemmingway still had the spades so he set them to dig out the snow from the drift and pack it into a third wall. He then sent Sam and the two girls off to collect any broken branches or brushwood they could find by turning up the snow under the nearest large trees.
As they brought it in he arranged it just outside the opening of the three-sided pen which the two younger men were forming. Soon there was a big enough pile and he managed to light some dead twigs from some old papers they had in their pockets and a petrol lighter. Even when the bonfire blazed up he would not allow the party to rest, but made them continue gathering wood so that they should have a sufficient supply to keep the fne going throughout the night.
Except for the wind, from which they were protected in their pen. the weather was clement. Darkness fell and the stars came out overhead, but Gervaise was still not satisfied. He made them strip the half-decayed leaves from the branches that had been brought in until they had two big piles apiece; one to use as a pillow on the snow-ledge that Hemmingway had fashioned, and the other, a much larger one, in which to bury their feet.
He then ordered them to take off their outer coats. Margery's, Lavina's and his own he spread on the ground, after which he said that they must lie down in a row as close as they could get to one another, spread the remaining three coats over them and pile up the heaps of leaves over their feet and ankles. Derek and Hemmingway took the two outside places in the row, as they had volunteered to watch alternately and keep the fire going through the night with fresh supplies of fuel. Gervaise and Sam came next, with the two girls in the centre.
As they had hollowed out places for their hips they were not uncomfortable and, crowded close together, they were surprised at the warmth they obtained from each other's bodies when they were lying at full length under the shelter of the hedges and the wall.
Once they had time to think, their thoughts were chaotic. Nightmarish speculations about their impending fate through cold or starvation flickered through their brains. Unless they could find some human habitation it did not seem possible that they could manage to exist for long under such terrible conditions, and, even if they could find a house, where were they to get food with which to support themselves through the long Arctic winter? But they were very tired after their long day's tramp, the shock of- seeing their refuge and all it