I now began to feel anxious about finding a way in the
blurring storm. Stickeen showed no trace of fear. He was still the same
silent, able little hero. I noticed, however, that after the
storm-darkness came on he kept close up behind me. The snow urged us to
make still greater haste, but at the same time hid our way. I pushed on
as best I could, jumping innumerable crevasses, and for every hundred
rods or so of direct advance traveling a mile in doubling up and down in
the turmoil of chasms and dislocated ice-blocks. After an hour or two of
this work we came to a series of longitudinal crevasses of appalling
width, and almost straight and regular in trend, like immense furrows.
These I traced with firm nerve, excited and strengthened by the danger,
making wide jumps, poising cautiously on their dizzy edges after
cutting hollows for my feet before making the spring, to avoid possible
slipping or any uncertainty on the farther sides, where only one trial
is granted--exercise at once frightful and inspiring. Stickeen followed
seemingly without effort.
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