t when he didn't find
us at the inlet." He paused and pointed towards the distant sea. "You
have got to push right on with Lewson as fast as you can while I try to
bring the Siwash along."

Wyllard started within the next few minutes, and afterward never quite
forgot the strain and stress of that arduous march. The journey that he
had made with Overweg had been difficult enough, but they had then
traversed rising ground from which most of the melting snow had drained
away. Now, however, as they approached the more level littoral there
were wide tracts of mire and swamp to be painfully floundered through,
while every ravine and hollow was swept by a frothing torrent, and they
had often to search for hours for a place where it was possible to
cross. To make things worse, they were drenched with rain half the time,
and trails of dingy mist obscured their path, but they toiled on
stubbornly through every obstacles, though it was only by the tensest
effort that Wyllard kept pace with his companion. The gaunt, long-haired
Lewson seemed proof against physical weariness, and there was seldom any
change in the expression of his grim, lined face. Now and then Wyllard
felt a curious shrinking as he glanced at Lewson, for his fixed look
suggested what he had borne in the awful solitudes of the frozen North.

Slowly, with infinite toil, they crossed the weary leagues, lying at
night with a single skin between them and the soil, for they traveled
light. Wyllard was limping painfully, with his boots worn off his feet,
when one morning they came into sight of a low promontory which rose
against a stretch of gray lifeless sea. His heart throbbed fast as he
realized that behind it lay the inlet into which Dampier had arranged to
bring the _Selache_. He glanced at Lewson, who said nothing, and they
plodded forward faster than before.

The misty sun was high in the heavens when they reached the foot of the
steep rise, and Wyllard gasped heavily as they crept up the ascent. He
was making a severe muscular effort; but it was the nervous tension that
troubled him most, for he knew that he would look down upon the inlet
from the summit. He blamed himself bitterly for not sending a messenger
to Dampier immediately after he fell in with Overweg. There had
certainly been difficulties in the way, for the increase in the
scientist's party had made additional packers necessary, and Wyllard
felt that he could not reasonably compel the man who had s