Transcriber's Note:

 This etext was produced from Astounding Stories January 1933. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U. S. Copyright on this publication was renewed. 

 The Table of Contents is not part of the original magazine. 

 A Sequel to "Seed of the Arctic Ice"

 Under Arctic Ice

 _A Complete Novelette_

 By H. G. Winter

 * * * * *

 Contents

 I An Empty Room II The Crash III The Fate of the Peary IV "No Chance Left" V Last Assault VI In a Biscuit Can VII The Awakening VIII The Duel

 * * * * *

[Sidenote: Ken Torrance races Poleward to the aid of the submarine_Peary_, trapped in an icy limbo of avenging sealmen. ]

CHAPTER I

_An Empty Room_

The house where the long trail started was one of gray walls, grayrooms and gray corridors, with carpets that muffled the feet which atintervals passed along them. It was a house of silence, broodingwithin the high fence that shut it and the grounds from a landscapetorpid under the hot sun of summer, and across which occasionallydrifted the lonely, mournful whistle of a train on a nearby railroad. Inside the house there was always a hush, a heavy quiet--restful tothe brain. 

But now a voice was raised, young, angry, impatient, in one of thegray-walled rooms. 

"Yes, I rang for you. I want my bags packed. I'm leaving thisminute!"

The face of the man who had entered showed surprise. 

"Leaving, Mr. Torrance? Why?"

"Read this!"

[Illustration: _She was fastened in the mud of the gloomy sea-floor. _]

As if, knowing and therefore dreading what he would see, the attendanttook the newspaper held outstretched to him and followed the pointingfinger to a featured column. He scanned it:

 Deadline Passed for Missing Submarine

 Point Barrow, Aug. 17 (AP): Planes sent out to search for the missing polar submarine _Peary_ have returned without clue to the mystery of is disappearance. The close search that has been conducted through the last two weeks, involving great risks to the pilots, has been fruitless, and authorities now hold out small hope for Captain Sallorsen, his crew and the several scientists who accompanied the daring expedition. 

 If the _Peary_, as is generally thought, is trapped beneath the ice floes or embedded in the deep silt of the polar sea-floor, her margin of safety has passed the deadline, it was pointed out to-day by her designers. Through special rectifiers aboard, her store of air can be kept capable of sustaining life for a theoretical period of thirty-one days. And exactly thirty-one days have now elapsed since last the _Peary's_ radio was heard from a position 72° 47' N, 162° 22' W, some twelve hundred miles from the North Pole itself. 

 In official circles, hope was practically abandoned for the missing submarine, though attempts will continue to be made to locate her.... 

"I'm sorry, Mr. Torrance, " said the attendant nervously. "This papershould--"

"Should never have reached me, eh? Through some slip of the people whocensor my reading matter here, I read what I wasn't supposedto--that's what you mean?"

"It was thought better, Mr. Torrance, by the doctors, and--"

"Good God! Thought better! Through their sagacity, these doctors haveprobably condemned the men on this submarine to death! I haven't hearda word about the expedition; didn't even know the _Peary_ was upthere, much less missing!"

"Well, Mr. Torrance, " the attendant stammered, more and moreunsettled, "the doctors thought that--that any news about itwould--well, upset you. "

The young man laughed bitterly;

"Bring on my old 'trouble, ' I suppose. The doctors have beenconsiderate, but I won't concern them any more. I'm through. I'mleaving for the north--right now. There's a bare chance I might stillbe in time. "

"I'm sorry, Mr. Torrance, but you can't. "

"Can't?"

The attendant had retreated to the door. His eyes were nervous, hisface pale. 

"It's orders, Mr. Torrance. You've been under observation treatment, and the doctors left strict orders that you must stay. "

The young man throbbed with dangerous anger. His hands clenched andunclenched. He burst out, in a last attempt at reason:

"But don't you see, I've _got_ to get to the _Peary_! It's the lasthope for those men! The position she was last heard from is rightwhere I--"

"You can't leave, Mr. Torrance! I'm sorry, but I'll have to call aguard!"

For a minute their eyes held. With an effort, the young man said morecalmly:

"I see. I see. I'm a prisoner. All right, leave me. "

The attendant was more than willing. The young man heard the door'slock click. And then he lowered his head and pressed his hands hardinto his face. 

But a second later he was looking up again, at the single wide windowwhich gave out on the lonely landscape over which sometimes camedrifting the distant cry of a train's whistle. 

 * * * * *

Two months before, Kenneth Torrance had returned to the whalingsubmarine _Narwhal_, of which he was first torpooner, with a confusedstory of men who were half-seals that lived in mounds under the Arcticice, [1] who had captured him and--he found--had also captured thesecond torpooner, Chanley Beddoes. In breaking free from theirmound-prison, Beddoes had killed one of the sealmen and had beenhimself slain minutes later by a killer whale, one of the fiercescavengers of the sea which the sealmen trapped for food even as the_Narwhal_ sought them for oil. Ken Torrance alone came back. 

[Footnote 1: See the February, 1932, issue of Astounding Stories. ]

Over their doubts, he had stuck to his story. Later, he had repeatedit to officials of the Alaska Whaling Company, who worked thesubmarine and several surface ships. They in return had sent him to aprivate sanitarium in the State of Washington for a rest which theyhoped would "iron out the kink" in his brain. 

Here Ken had been for six weeks, while the exploring submarine _Peary_nosed her way northward toward the Pole. Here he had been, allunknowing, while the world hummed with reports of the _Peary's_disappearance in that far-off ever-shrouded sea of mystery. 

She might, Ken knew, have struck a shaft of underwater ice, sendingher to the bottom; some of her machinery might have cracked up, paralyzing her; the ice-fields under which she cruised might haveshifted suddenly, crushing her ribs--of these perils the world knew aswell as he. But the submarine's crew was prepared for them; the_Peary_ was equipped with a circular saw for cutting up through theice from beneath, and she carried sea-suits which would allow her men, if she were wrecked on the bottom, to leave her and get up on the iceand wait for the first searching plane. 

Why, then, had not the planes which scoured the region found thesurvivors?

That was the mystery--but not to Ken Torrance. There was anotherperil, of which he alone knew. Not far from where the _Peary's_ lastradio report had come, a group of hollowed-out mounds lay on thesea-floor, swarming with brown-skinned, quick-swimming creatures. Sealmen, they were--men who, like the seals, had gone back to the sea. Months ago, Second Torpooner Chanley Beddoes had killed one of them. They were intelligent; they could remember; they were capable of hateand fear; they would be desirous of leveling the debt!

There, Ken felt sure, lay the reason for the _Peary's_ bafflingsilence, for the non-appearance of her men. 

There might still be time. No one of course would listen to him andbelieve, so he would have to go in search of the _Peary_ and her crewhimself. 

Standing by the window, Kenneth Torrance quickly planned the severalsteps which would take him to the Arctic and its silent ice-coatedsea. 

And when, some two hours later, after a short warning rap on the door, the individual who served as Mr. Torrance's attendant entered hisroom, he was confronted, not by the gentleman whose dinner he carried, but by an empty room, a stripped bed, an open window, and a rope ofsheets dangling from it toward the ground two stories beneath. 

That was at seven o'clock in the evening. 

CHAPTER II

_The Crash_

At a few minutes before eight o'clock, Air Mail Pilot Steve Chapmanwas enjoying a quiet cigarette while waiting for the mechanics to warmup the five hundred horses of his mail plane satisfactorily. Halfwaythrough, he heard, from behind, a quick patter of feet, and, turning, he observed a figure clad in flannel trousers and sweater. Thecigarette dropped right out of his mouth as he cried:

"Ken! Ken Torrance!"

"Thank God you're here!" said Kenneth Torrance. "I gambled on it. Steve, I've got to borrow your own personal plane. "

"What?" gasped Steve Chapman. "What--what--?"

"Listen, Steve. I haven't been with the whaling company lately; beenresting, down here--secluded. Didn't know that submarine, the _Peary_, was missing. I just learned. And I know damned well what's happened toit. I've got to get to it, quick is I can, and I've got to have aplane. "

Steve Chapman said rather faintly:

"But--where was the _Peary_ when they last heard from her?"

"Some twelve hundred miles from the Pole. "

"And you want to get there in a plane? From here?"

"Must!"

"Boy, you stand about one chance in twenty!"

"Have to take it. Time's precious, Steve. I've got to stop in at theAlaska Whaling Company's outpost at Point Christensen, then right onup. I can't even begin unless I have a plane. You've got to help me onmy one chance of bringing the _Peary's_ men out alive! You'll probablynever see the plane again, Steve, but--"

"To hell with the plane, if you come through with yourself and thosemen, " said the pilot. "All right, kid, I don't get it all, but I'mplaying with you. You're taking my own ship. "

He led Ken to a hangar wherein stood a trim five-passenger amphibian;and very soon that amphibian was roaring out her deep-throated song ofpower on the line, itching for the air, and Steve Chapman was shoutinga few last words up to the muffled figure in the enclosed controlcockpit. 

"Fuel'll last around forty hours, " he finished. "You'll find twohundred per, easy, and twenty-five hours should take you clear toPoint Christensen. I put gun and maps in the right pocket; food inthat flap behind you. Go to it, Ken!"

Ken Torrance gripped the hand outstretched to his and held it tight. He could say nothing, could only nod--this was a real friend. He gavethe ship the gun. 

Her mighty Diesel bellowed, lashed the air down and under; theamphibian spun her retractable wheels over the straight hard grounduntil they lifted lightly and tilted upward in a slow climb foraltitude. With fiery streams from the exhaust lashing her flanks, shefaded into the darkness to the north. 

"Well, " murmured Steve Chapman, "I've got her instalments left, anyway!" And he grinned and turned to the mail. 

 * * * * *

That night passed slowly by; and the next day; and all through nightand day the steady roar of beating cylinders hung in KennethTorrance's ears. At last came Point Christensen and a descent; sleepand then quick, decisive action; and again the amphibian rose, heavilyloaded now, and droned on toward the ice and the cold bleak skies ofthe far north. On, ever on, until Point Barrow, Alaska's northernmostspur, was left behind to the east, and the world was one of driftingice on gray water. Muscles cramped, mind dulled by the everlastingroar, head aching and weary, Ken held the amphibian to her steadycourse, until a sudden wind shook her momentarily from it. 

A rising wind. The skies were ugly. And then he remembered that themen at Point Christensen had warned him of a storm that was brewing. They'd told him that he was heading into disaster; and theirsurprised, rather fearful faces appeared before him again, as he hadseen them just before taking off, after he had told them where he wasgoing. 

Of course they'd thought him crazy. He had brought the amphibian downin the little harbor off the whaling company's base, gone ashore andgreeted his old friends. There was only a handful of men stationedthere; the _Narwhal_ was being overhauled in a shipyard at SanFrancisco, and it wasn't the season for surface whalers. They knewthat he, Ken, had been put in a sanitarium; all of them had heard hiswild story about sealmen. But he concocted a plausible yarn to accountfor his arrival, and they had fed him and given him a berth in thebunkhouse for the night. 

For the night! Ken Torrance grinned as he recalled the scene. In themiddle of the night he had risen, quickly awakened four of thesleeping men, and with his gun forced them to take a torpoon from theoutpost's storehouse and put it inside the amphibian's passengercompartment. 

It was robbery, and of course they'd thought him insane, but theydidn't dare cross him. He had told them cheerfully he was going afterthe _Peary_, and that if they wanted the torpoon back they were todirect the searching planes to keep their eyes on the place where thesubmarine was last heard from.... 

 * * * * *

Ken came back to the present abruptly as the plane lurched. The windwas getting nasty. At least he did not have much farther to go; anhour's flying time would take him to his goal, where he must descendinto the water to continue his search. His search! Had it been, hewondered, a useless one from the start? Had the submarine's crew beenkilled before he'd even read of her disappearance? If the sealmen gotthem, would they destroy them immediately?

"I doubt it, " Ken muttered to himself. "They'd be kept prisoners inone of those mounds, like I was. That is, if they haven't killed anyof the creatures. It hangs on that!"

An hour's time, he had reckoned; but it was more than an hour. Forsoon the world was blotted out by a howling dervish of wind and drivensnow that time and time again snatched the amphibian from Ken'scontrol and hurled it high, or threw it down like a toy toward theinferno of sea and ice he knew lay beneath. He fought for altitude, for direction, pitched from side to side, tumbled forward and back, gaining a few hundred feet only to feel them plucked breathtakinglyout from under him as the screaming wind played with him. 

Now and again he snatched a glance at the torpoon behind. Thegleaming, twelve-foot, cigar-shaped craft, with its directionalrudders, propeller, vision-plate and nitro-shell gun lay safelysecured in the passenger compartment, a familiar and reassuring sightto Ken, who, as first torpooner of the _Narwhal_, had worked one foryears in the chase for killer whales. Soon, it seemed, he would haveto depend on it for his life. 

For all the Diesel's power, it was not enough to cope with the deadweight of ice which was forming over the plane's wings and fuselage. He could not keep the altimeter up. However he fought, Ken saw thatfinger drop down, down--up a trifle, quivering as the racked planequivered--and then down and down some more. 

He saw that the plane was doomed. He would have to abandon it--in thetorpoon--if he could. 

He was some thirty miles from his objective. The sea beneath would behalf hidden under ragged, drifting floes. In fair weather he couldhave chosen a landing space of clear water, but now he could notchoose. The altitude dial said that the water was three hundred feetbeneath, and rapidly rising nearer. 

A margin of seconds in which to prepare! Ken locked the controls andscrambled back into the passenger compartment. Steadying himself onthe bucking floor, he opened the torpoon's entrance port and slid in;quickly he locked the port and strapped the inner body harness aroundhim; and then he waited. 

Now it was all chance. If the plane crashed into clear water, he wassafe; but if she hit ice.... He put that thought from him. 

The locked controls held the amphibian for perhaps thirty seconds. Then with a scream the storm-giant took her. A mad up-current of windhurled her high, whirled her dizzily, toyed with her--and then shespun and dove. Down, down, down; down with a speed so wild Ken grewfaint; down through the core of a maelstrom of snow till she crashed. 

Kenneth Torrance knew a sudden shaking impact; for an instant therewas uncertainty; and then came all-pervading quiet.... 

CHAPTER III. 

_The Fate of the Peary_

Quiet, and utter, liquid darkness. 

Liquid! Around him, Ken heard a gurgling, at first loud and close, then subsiding to a low whispering of currents. The amphibian had hitwater. 

Gone in an instant was the shriek and fury of the storm and in itsplace the calm, slow-heaving silence of underwater. The plane wasshattered in a dozen places, but the torpoon had easily stood it. 

Ken turned to action. He switched on the torpoon's dashboard lightsand twin bow-beams, and saw that the shell was wedged in the fuselage. The plane was apparently entirely under the surface, and her interiorfilled with water. 

Holding the propeller in neutral, he revved up the powerful electricmotor. Then he bit the propeller in, slowly. The torpoon nudged backfor inches. Then, throwing the gear into forward, Ken gave her fullspeed. The torpoon leaped ahead, crunched through the weakened cornerahead and was free. 

It was a world of drab tones that she came into. Down below wasimpenetrable blackness, shading softly overhead into blue-gray whichwas mottled by lighter areas from breaks in the floes above. All wascalm. There was no sign of life save for an occasional vague shadowthat, melting swiftly away, might have been a fish or seaweed. Placidalways, would be this shrouded sea of mystery, no matter what furioustempest raged above over the flat leagues of ice and water. 

But the seeming peacefulness was but a mask for danger. KennethTorrance's face was set in sober lines as he sped the slim torpoonnorthward, her bow lights shafting long white fingers before her. Fornow there was only one path--and that lay ahead. He could not turnback. Storm and water had destroyed the plane that could take him backto land. He could not possibly reach any outpost of civilization inthe torpoon, for her cruising radius was only twenty hours. He hadplanned to land the amphibian on the ice above the spot where the_Peary_ had disappeared, then find a break in the ice and slide downbelow in the torpoon on his quest--to return to the plane if it provedfruitless. But now there was no retreat. It was succeed, or die. 

And with that realization a more dreadful thought flashed into hismind. All those men, of the whaling company and the sanitarium, thought him a little crazy. And, since lunatics are always convincedof the reality of their visions, what if the sealmen--his adventureamidst them--had been but a dream, a nightmare, an hallucination? Whatif he were in truth crazy? The fear grew rapidly. What if he were?God! He, hunting for the _Peary_, when all those planes and men hadfailed! He, expecting to achieve what those searchers, with fargreater resources, had not been able to! Did not that give evidencethat his mind was twisted? Creatures, half-seal, half-men, livingunder the ice--it certainly seemed a lunatic's obsession. 

Then something within him rose and fought back. 

"No!" he cried aloud. "I'll go bugs if I think like that! Thosesealmen were real--and I know where they are. I'm going on!"

And, an hour later, the dashboard's shaded dials told him he was onthe exact spot where the _Peary_ had last reported.... 

 * * * * *

Here was the real Arctic, the real polar sea. No sun, no breath of theworld above could reach it through its eternal mask of solid ice. Asone of the few unfamiliar aspects of the earth, it was as far removedfrom the imagination of man as if it were part of a far planet hungspinning millions of miles out in space. Men could reach it in shellsof metal, but it was not meant for him, and was always hostile. Adozen times a daring one could cross safely its cold lonely reaches, but the thirteenth time it would snare and destroy him for theunwanted trespasser he was. 

It was here that the _Peary_ had stepped off into mystery. At thispoint her hull had throbbed with air, movement, life; at this pointall had been well. And then, minutes or hours later, close to here, the sea devil had sprung. 

What had happened? What had trapped her? What, even more baffling, hadkept her men with their manifold safety devices from even reaching andclimbing up on the ice above to signal the searching planes?

Ken Torrance, oppressively alone in the hovering torpoon, gazedthrough its vision-plate of fused quartz around him. Gray sea, filtering to black beneath; distant eerie shadows, probably meaningnothing, but possibly all important; ceiling of thick ice above, roughand in places broken by a sharp down-thrusting spur--these were hissurroundings. These were what he must hunt through, until he came uponthe crumpled remnant of a submarine, or the murky, rounded hillockswhich gave habitation to the creatures he suspected of capturing thatsubmarine's crew. 

 * * * * *

He began the search systematically. He angled the torpoon down to aposition halfway between sea-floor and ice-ceiling, then swung her inan ever-widening circle. Soon his orbit had a diameter of a half-mile;then a mile; then two. 

The torpoon slipped through the water at full speed, her light-beamslike restless antennae, now stabbing to the right to dissolve aformless shadow, now to the left to throw into blinding white relief aschool of half-transparent fish which scurried with frantic wrigglingsof tails from the glare, now slanting up to bathe the cold glassy faceof an inverted ice-hill, now down to dig two white holes in the deepergloom. 

Ken continued this routine for hours. Steadily and low the electricmotor droned in the ears of the watchful pilot, and the stubbypropeller's blades flashed round in a blur of speed between theslightly slanted rudders. Somewhere, miles away, a splinteredamphibian plane was slipping down to her last landing, and above, perhaps, the white hell of storm which had brought her low stillbowled over the trackless wastes; but here were only shadows andshifting gloom, straining the alert eyes to soreness and tensing thewatcher's brain with alarms that, one after another, were only false. 

Until at last he found her. 

Immediately he shut off all his lights. He no longer needed them. Farin the distance, and below, wavered a faint yellow glow. It was nofish; it could mean only one thing--the lights of a submarine. 

And lights meant life! There would be none burning in a desertedsubmarine. His heart beat fast and his tight, sober lips widened in aquick grin. He had found the _Peary_! And found her with some lifestill aboard her! He was in time!

So Ken rejoiced while he slid the torpoon down to a level just a fewfeet above the silty sea bottom, reducing her to quarter-speed. Therewas an urge inside him to switch on his bow-beams, reach them outtoward the submarine's hull to tell all within that help was at lastat hand; he wanted to send the torpoon ahead at full speed. Butcaution restrained him to a more deliberate course. He was in therealm of the sealmen, and he did not wish to attract the attention ofany. So he advanced like a furtive shadow slinking along the darksea-bottom, deep in the covering gloom. 

Nearer and nearer, while the distant blur of yellow light grew. Nearerand nearer to the long-trapped men, while the consciousness that hehad succeeded intoxicated him. He alone had found them! Sealmen or nosealmen, he had found the _Peary_! And found her with lights lit andlife inside! Nearer and nearer.... 

And then suddenly Ken halted the torpoon and stared with wide, alarmedeyes. For the submarine was now plainly visible in detail--and he sawher real plight and with it knew the answer to the mystery of her longsilence and the non-appearance of her men on the ice field above. 

 * * * * *

The _Peary_ was a spectacle of fantastic beauty. It was as if a huge, rounded piece of amber, mellow, golden, lay in the murk of thesea-floor. Not steel, hard and grim, but of transparent, shimmeringstuff she was built, all coated a soft yellow by her lights, clearlyvisible inside. Ken had known something of her radical construction;knew that a substance called quarsteel, similar to glass and yet fullyas tough as steel, had been used for her hull, making her a perfectvehicle for undersea exploration. Her bow was capped with steel, andher stern, propellers, diving rudders; her port-locks, for thereleasing of torpoons, were also of steel, as were the struts thatbraced her throughout--but the rest was quarsteel, glowing and goldenas the heart of amber. 

Beautiful with a wild yet scientific beauty was the _Peary_, but shewas not free. She was trapped. She was fastened to the mud of thegloomy sea-floor. 

Ropes held her down; and Ken Torrance knew those ropes of old. Theywere tough and strong, woven of many strands of seaweed, and twenty orthirty of them striped the _Peary's_ two hundred feet of hull. Unevenly spaced, stretched clear over the ship from one side to theother, they were caught around her up-jutting conning tower, fastenedthrough her rudders, and holding tight in a score of places. They heldthe submarine down despite all the buoyancy of her emptied tanks andthe power of her twin propellers. 

And the sealmen swam around her. 

 * * * * *

Restless dark shadows against the golden hull, they wavered and dartedand poised, totally unafraid. Another in Kenneth Torrance's placewould have put them down as some strange school of large seals, inordinately curious but nothing more; but the torpooner knew them asmen--men remodeled into the shape of seals; men who, ages ago, hadforsaken the land for the old home of all life, the sea; who, throughthe years, had gradually changed in appearance as their flesh hadbecome coated with layers of cold-resisting blubber; whose movementshad become adapted to the water; whose legs and arms had evolved intoflippers; but whose heads still harbored the now faint spark ofintelligence that marked them definitely as men. 

Emotions similar to man's they had, though dulled; friendliness, curiosity, anger, hate, and--Ken knew and feared--even a capacity forvengeance. Vengeance! An eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth--the oldlaw peculiar to man! Chanley Beddoes had slain one of them; if onlythe _Peary's_ crew had not killed more! If only that, there might behope!

First he must get inside the submarine. Warily, like a stalking cat, Ken Torrance inched the torpoon toward the great shining ship. Atleast he was in time. Within her he could see figures, most of themstretched out on the decks of her different compartments, but one ofwhom occasionally moved--slowly. He understood that. For weeks now the_Peary_ had lain captive, and her air had passed beyond the aid ofrectifiers. Tortured, those survivors inside were, constantlystruggling for life, with vitality ever sinking lower. Some mightalready be dead. But at least he could try to save the rest. 

He approached her from one side of the rear, for in the rearcompartment were her two torpoon port-locks. The one on his side wasempty, its outer door open. The torpoon it had held had been sent out, probably for help, and had not returned. It provided a means ofentrance for him. 

At perhaps a hundred feet from the port-lock, Ken halted again. Hisslim craft was almost indistinguishable in the murk: he feltreasonably safe from discovery. For minutes he watched the swimmingsealmen, waiting for the best chance to dart in. 

 * * * * *

It was then, while studying the full length of the submarine moreclosely, that he saw that one compartment of her four was filled withwater. Her steel-caped bow had been stove in. That, he conjectured, had been the original accident which had brought her down. It was nota fatal accident in itself, for there were three other compartments, all separated by watertight bulkheads, and the flooded one could berepaired by men in sea-suits--but then the sealmen had come and ropedher down where she lay. Some of the creatures, he saw, were actuallyat that time inside the bow compartment, swimming around curiouslyamidst the clustered pipes, wheels and levers. It was a weird sight, and one that held his eyes fascinated. 

But suddenly, through his absorption, danger prickled the short hairsof his neck. A lithe, sinuous shadow close ahead was wavering, andlarge, placid brown eyes were staring at him. A sealman! He wasdiscovered! And instinctively, immediately, Ken Torrence brought thetorpoon's accelerator down flat. 

The shell jumped ahead with whirling propeller. The creature that hadseen him doubled around and sped in retreat. In brief snatches, as thetorpoon streaked across the hundred-foot gap to the empty port-lock, Ken glimpsed his discoverer gathering a group of its fellows, and sawbrown-skinned bodies swarm after him with nooses of seaweed-rope--andthen the great transparent side wall of the _Peary_ was before him, and the port-locks dark opening. Ken threw his motor into reverse, slid the torpoon slightly to one side, and there was a jerk, a jar, and a sensation of something moving behind. 

He turned to see the port-lock's outer door closing, activated bycontrols inside the submarine--and just in time to shut out the firstof his pursuers. Then the port-lock's pumps were draining the waterfrom the chamber, and the inner door clicked and opened. 

Kenneth Torrance climbed stiffly from the torpoon to enter theinterior of the long-lost and besieged exploring submarine _Peary. _

CHAPTER IV

"_No Chance Left_"

His entrance was an unpleasant experience. He had forgotten thecondition of the air inside the submarine, and what its effect on him, coming straight from comparatively good and fresh air, would be, untilhe was seized by a sudden choking grip around his throat. He reeledand gasped, and was for a minute nauseated. Lights flashed around him, and teetering backward he leaned weakly, against some metal objectuntil gradually his head cleared; but his lungs remained tortured, andhis breathing a thing of quick, agonised gulps. 

Then came sounds. Figures appeared before him. 

"From where--" "Who are you?"

"What--what--what--" "How did you?"

The half-coherent questions were couched in whispers. The men aroundhim were blear-eyed and haggard-faced, their skins dry and bluish, andnot a one was clad in more than undershirt and trousers. Alive andbreathing, they were--but breathing grotesquely, horribly. They madeawful noises at it; they panted, in quick, shallow sucks. Some lay onthe deck at his feet, outstretched without energy enough to attempt torise. 

Beautiful and slumber-like the submarine had appeared from outside, but inside that effect was lost. There were the usual appurtenances: amaze of pipes, wheels, machinery, all silent now, and cold; here werethe two port-locks for torpoons; the emergency steering controls; thesmall staterooms of the _Peary's_ officers. Looking forward, stillstriving for complete clear-headedness and normality, Ken could seethe two intact forward compartments, silent and apparently lifeless, with dim lamps burning. They ended with the watertight bulkhead whichstood between them and the flooded bow compartment. 

Ken at last found words, but even his short query cost a sickeningeffort. 

"Where's--the commander?" he asked. 

 * * * * *

A man turned from where he had been leaning against a nearby wheelcontrol. He was stripped to the waist. His tall body was stooped, andthe skin of his ruggedly cut face drawn and parchment-like. His facehad once been dignified and authoritative, but now it was that of aman who nears death after a long, bitter fight for life. The smilewhich he gave to Ken was painful--a mockery. 

"I am, " he said faintly. "Sallorsen. Just wait, please. A minute. Iworked port-lock. Breath's gone.... "

He sucked shallowly for air and let his smile go. And standing there, beside him, gazing at the worn frame, Ken felt strength come back. Hehad just entered; this man and the others had been here for weeks!

"I'm Sallorsen, " the captain went on at last. All his words wereclipped off, to cost minimum effort. "Glad you got through. Afraidyou're come to prison, though. "

"No!" Ken said emphatically. He spoke to the captain, but what he saidwas also for all the others grouped around him. "No, Captain! I'mKenneth Torrance. Once torpooner with Alaska Whaling Company. Theythought me crazy--crazy--'cause I told about sealmen. Put me insanitarium. I knew they had you--when--heard you were missing. " Hepointed at the brown-skinned creatures that clustered close around thesubmarine outside her transparent walls. "I got free and came. Just intime. "

"In time? For what?"

Another voice gasped out the question. Ken turned to abroad-shouldered man with a ragged growth of beard that had been atrim Van Dyke; and before the torpooner could answer, Sallorsen said:

"Dr. Lawson. One of our scientists. In time for what?"

"To get you and the submarine free, " said Ken. 

"How?"

 * * * * *

Ken paused before replying. He gazed around--out the side walls ofglistening quarsteel into the sea gloom, into the thick of the smooth, lithe, brown-skinned shapes that now and again poised pressing againstthe submarine, peering in with their liquid seal's eyes. Dimly hecould see the taut seaweed ropes stretching down from the top of the_Peary_ to the sea-bottom. It looked hopeless, and to these men insideit was hopeless. He knew he must speak in confident, assured tones todrive away the uncaring lethargy holding them all, and he frameddefinite, concise words with which to do it. 

"These creatures have caught you, " he began, "and you think they wantto kill you. But look at them. They seem to be seals. They're not. They're men! Not men like us--half-men--sealmen, rather--changed intopresent form by ages of living in the water. I know. I was captured bythem once. They're not senseless brutes; they have a streak of man'sintelligence. We must communicate with that intelligence. Must reasonwith them. I did once. I can do it again. 

"They're not really hostile. They're naturally peaceful; friendly. Butmy friend--dead now--killed one of them. Naturally they now think allcreatures like us enemies. That's why they trapped your sub. 

"They think you're enemies; think you want to kill them. But I'll tellthem--through pictures, as I did once before--that you mean them noharm. I'll tell them you're dying and must have air--just as theymust. I'll tell them to release submarine and we'll go away and notdisturb them again. Above all I must get across that you wish them noharm. They'll listen to what my pictures will say--and let usgo--'cause at heart they're friendly!"

 * * * * *

He paused--and with a ghastly, twisted smile, Captain Sallorsenwhispered:

"The hell you say!"

His sardonic comment brought a sudden chill to Kenneth Torrance. Hefeared one thing that would render his whole value useless. He askedquickly:

"What have you done?"

"Those seals, " Sallorsen's labored voice continued "--they've killedeight of us. Now they're killing all. "

"But have you killed any of them?" Breathless, Ken waited for theanswer be feared. 

"Yes. Two. "

The men were all staring at Ken, so he had to hide the awful dejectionwhich clamped his heart. He only said:

"That's what I feared. It changes everything. No use trying to reasonwith them now. " He fell silent. "Well, " he said at last, trying toappear more cheerful, "tell me what happened. Maybe there's somethingyou've overlooked. "

"Yes, " Sallorsen whispered. He started to come forward to thetorpooner, but stumbled and would have fallen had not Ken caught himin time. He put one of the captain's arms around his shoulder, and oneof his own around the man's waist. 

"Thanks, " Sallorsen said wryly. "Walk forward. Show you whathappened. "

 * * * * *

There were men in the second compartment, and they still fought tolive. From the narrow seamen's berths that lined the walls came thesound of breathing even more torturous than that of the men in therear. In the single bulb's dim light Ken could see their shapesstretched motionlessly out, panting and panting. Occasionally handsreached up to claw at straining necks, as if to try and rid throats ofstrangling grasps. Two figures had won free from the long struggle. They lay silent and still, the outline of their dead bodies showingthrough the sheets pulled over them. 

Slowly Sallorsen led Ken through this compartment and into the next, which was bare of men. Here were the ship's main controls--her helm, her central multitude of dials, levers and wheels, her televisiscreenand old-fashioned emergency periscope. A metal labyrinth it was, alllong silent and inactive. Again the weird contrast struck Ken, foroutside he could still see the scene of vigorous, curious life thatthe sealmen constituted. Close they came to the submarine's sheerwalls of quarsteel, peering in stolidly, then flashing away with aneffortless thrust of flippers, sometimes for air from some break inthe surface ice. 

Like men, the sealmen needed air to live, and got it fresh and cleanfrom the world above. Inside, real men were gasping, fighting, hopelessly, yielding slowly to the invisible death that lay in thepoisonous stuff they had to breathe.... 

Ken felt Sallorsen nudge him. They had come to the forward end of thecontrol compartment, and could go no farther. Before them was thewatertight door, in which was set a large pane of quarsteel. Thecaptain wanted him to look through. 

Ken did so, knowing what to expect; but even so he was surprised bythe strangeness of the scene. In among the manifold devices of thefront compartment, its wheels and pipes and levers, glided slowly thesleek, blubbery shapes of half a dozen sealmen. Back and forth theyswam, inspecting everything curiously, unhurried and unafraid; and asKen stared one of them came right up to the other side of the closedwatertight door, pressed close to the pane and regarded him with largeplacid eyes. 

Other sealmen entered through a jagged rip in the plates on thestarboard side of the bow. At this Sallorsen began to speak again inthe short, clipped sentences, punctuated by quick gasps for air. 

 * * * * *

"Crashed, bow-on, " he said. "Underwater ice. Outer and inner platescrumpled like paper. Lost trim and hit bottom. Got this door closed, but lost four men in bow compartment. Drowned. No chance. Sparks among'em, at his radio. That's why we couldn't radio for help. " He paused, gasping shallowly. 

"Could've got away if we'd left immediately. One flooded compartmentnot enough to hold this ship down. But I didn't know. I sent two menout in sea-suits--inspect damage. Those devils got them. 

"The seal-things came in a swarm. God! Fast! We didn't realize. Theyhad ropes, and in seconds they'd lashed us down to the sea-floor. Lashed us fast!" Again he paused and sucked for the poisoned air, andKen Torrance did not try to hurry him, but stood silent, lookingforward to the squashed bow, and out the sides to where he could seethe taut black lines of the seaweed-ropes. 

"The two men put up fight. Had crowbars. Useless--but they killed oneof the devils. That did it. They were torn apart in front of us. Ripped. Mangled. By spears the things carry. Dead like that. "

"Yes, " murmured Ken, "that would do it.... "

"I quick tried to get away, " gasped Sallorsen. "Full-speed--back andforth. No good. Ropes held. Couldn't break. All our power couldn't! Sothen--then I acted foolishly. Damn foolish. But we were all a littlecrazy. A nightmare, you know. Couldn't believe our eyes--those sealsoutside, mocking us. So I called for volunteers. Four men. Put 'em insea-suits, gave 'em shears and grappling prongs. They went out. 

"They went out laughing--saying they'd soon have us free! Oh, God!" Itseemed he could not go on, but he forced the words out deliberately. "Killed without a chance! Ripped apart like the others! No chance!Suicide!"

Ken felt the agony in the man, and was silent for a while beforequietly asking:

"Did they kill any more of the sealmen?"

"One. Just one. That made two of them--six of us. What the hell arethe rest of them waiting for?" Sallorsen cried. "They killed eight inall! To our two! That's enough for them, isn't it?"

"I'm afraid not, " said Ken Torrance. "Well, what then?"

"Sat down and thought. Carefully. Hit on a plan. Took one of our twotorpoons. Lashed on it steel plates, ground to sharp cutting edges. Spent days at it. Thought torpoon could go out and cut the ropes. Haines volunteered and we shot him and torpoon out. "

"They got the torpoon?" Ken asked. 

Sallorsen's arm raised in a pointing gesture. "Look. "

 * * * * *

Some fifty feet away from the _Peary_, on the side opposite to the oneKen Torrance had approached, a dimly discernible object lay in themud. In miniature, it resembled the submarine: a cigar-shaped steelshell, held down to the sea-bottom by ropes bound over it. Cuttingedges of steel had been fastened along its length. 

"I see, " said Ken slowly. "And its pilot?"

"Stayed in the torpoon thirty-six hours. Then went crazy. Put onsea-suit and tried to get back here. Whisk--they got him. Killed andmangled while we watched!"

"But didn't his torpoon have a nitro-shell gun? Couldn't he havefought them off for a time?"

"Exploring submarine, this! No guns in torpoons like whalers. Gunwouldn't help, anyway. These devils too fast. No use. No hopeanywhere.... " Sallorsen sank back against the bulkhead, his lipsmoving but no sound coming forth. Dully he stared ahead, through thesubmarine, for a moment before uttering a cackling mockery of a laughand going on. 

"Even after that, still hoped! Blew every tank on ship; blew out most ofher oil. Threw out everything not vital. Lightened her as much as could. Machinery--detachable metal--fixtures--baggage--instruments--knives, plates, cups--everything! She rose a couple of feet--no more! Put motorsat full speed--back and forth--again, again, again. Buoyancy--power--nogood. No damn good!

"And then we tried the last chance. Explosives. Had quite a store, Nitromite, packed in cases; time-fuses to set it off. Had it forblasting ice. I sent up a charge and blew hole in the ice overhead, for our other torpoon. 

"Nothing else left. Knew planes must be nearby, searching. Lasttorpoon was to shoot up to the hole--pilot to climb on ice and staythere to signal a plane. "

"Did he get there?"

"Hell no!" Sallorsen cackled again. "It was roped like the other. Pilot tried to get back, but they got him like first. There's thetorpoon--out ahead. "

Ken could just make it out. It lay ahead, slightly to port, lasheddown like its fellow by seaweed-ropes. His eyes were held by it, evenwhen Sallorsen continued, in an almost hysterical voice:

"Since then--since then--you know. Week after week. Air getting worse. Rectifiers running down. No night, no day. Just the lights, and thosedamned devils outside. Wore sea-suits for a while; used twenty-nine oftheir thirty hours air-units. Old Professor Halloway died, and anotherman. Couldn't do anything for 'em. Just sit and watch. Head aching, throat choking--God!... 

"Some of the men went mad. Tried to break out. Had to show gun. Quickdeath outside. Here, slow death, but always the chance that--Chance, hell! There's no chance left! Just this poison that used to be air, and those things outside, watching, watching, waiting--waiting for usto leave--waiting to get us all! Waiting.... "

"Something's up!" said Ken Torrance suddenly. "They've got tired ofwaiting!"

CHAPTER V

_The Last Assault_

Sallorsen turned his head and followed the torpooner's intent, amazedgaze. 

Ken said:

"There's proof of their intelligence! I've been watching--didn'trealize at first. Look, here it comes!"

Several sealmen, while Sallorsen had been talking, had come droppingdown from the main mass of the horde, and had grouped around theabandoned torpoon which lay some feet ahead of the submarine's bow. Expertly they had loosened the seaweed-ropes which bound it to thesea-floor, then slid back, watching alertly, as if expecting thetorpoon to speed away of its own accord. Its batteries, of course, hadworn out weeks before, so the steel shell did net budge. The sealmencame down close to it again, and lifted it. 

They lifted it easily with their prehensile flipper-arms, and withmaneuvering of delicate sureness guided it through the gash in the_Peary's_ bow. Inside, they hesitated with it, midway between deck andceiling of the flooded compartment. They poised for perhaps a fullminute, judging the distance, while the two men stared; and thenquickly their powerful tail flippers lashed out and the torpoon jumpedahead. It sped straight through the water, to crash its tough nose ofsteel squarely into the quarsteel pane of the watertight door, thenrebounded, and fell to the deck. 

"My God!" gasped Sallorsen. But Ken wasted no words then. He pressedcloser to the quarsteel and examined it minutely. The substance showedno visible effect, but the action of the sealmen destroyed whateverhope he had felt. 

The sealmen had swerved aside at the last minute; and now, picking upthe torpoon again and guiding it back to the other end of thecompartment, they hurled it once more with a resounding crash into thequarsteel pane. 

"How long will it last under that?" Ken asked tersely. 

Obviously, Sallorsen's wits were muddled at this turn. He remainedgaping at the creatures and at the torpoon, now turned against itsmother submarine. Ken repeated the question. 

"How long? Who knows? It's as strong as steel, but--there's thepressure--and those blows hit one spot. Not--long. "

 * * * * *

Capping his words, there re-echoed again the loud crash of thetorpoon's on the quarsteel. The sealmen were working in quick routinenow; back and quickly forward, and then the crash and thereverberation; and again and again.... 

The ominous crash and ringing echoes regularly repeated, seemed todisorganise Ken's mind as he looked vainly for something with which tobrace the door. Nothing unattached was left--nothing! He ran andexamined the quarsteel pane again, and this time his brain heated inalarm. A thin line had shot through the quarsteel--the beginning of acrack. 

"Back!" Ken shouted to the still staring Sallorsen. "Back to the thirdcompartment. This door's going!"

"Yes, " Sallorsen mumbled. "It'll go. So will the others. They'll smashthem all. And when this is flooded--no hope of running the submarineagain. Controls in here. "

"That's too damned bad!" Ken said roughly. "Are there any sea-suits, food, supplies in here?"

"Only food. In those lockers. "

"I'll take it. Get into that third compartment--hear me?" orderedKenneth Torrance. "And have its door ready to close!"

He shoved Sallorsen away, opened the indicated lockers and piled hisarms with the tins revealed. He had time for no more than one load. Hejumped back into the third compartment of the _Peary_ just as asplintering crash sounded from behind. The door between was swungclosed and locked just as the one being battered crashed inward. 

Turning, Ken saw that the torpoon had cracked through the weakenedquarsteel and tumbled in a mad cascade of water to the deck of theabandoned second compartment. In dread silence, he, with Sallorsen andthose of the men who had strength and curiosity enough to comeforward, watched the compartment rapidly fill--watched until they sawthe water pressed high against the door. And then horror swept overKen Torrance. 

 * * * * *

Water! There was a trickle of water down the quarsteel he was leaningagainst! A fault along the hinge of the door--either its construction, or because it had not been closed properly. 

Ken pointed it out to the captain. 

"Look!" he said. "A leak already--just from the pressure! This doorwon't last more than a couple of minutes when they start on it--"

Sallorsen stared stupidly. As for the rest; Ken might not have spoken. They were as if in a trance, watching dumbly, with lungs automaticallygasping for air. 

One of the seal-creatures eeled through the shattered quarsteel of thefirst door and swam slowly around the newly flooded compartment. Atonce it was joined by five other lithe, sleek shapes which, withplacid, liquid eyes, inspected the compartment minutely. They came ina group right up to the next door that barred their way and, with novisible emotion, stared through the quarsteel pane at the humans whostared at them. And then they gracefully turned and slid to thebattered torpoon. 

"Back!" Ken shouted, "You men!" He shook them, shoved them roughlyback toward the fourth, and last, compartment. Weakly, like automatonsthey shuffled into it. The torpooner said bruskly to Sallorsen:

"Carry those tins of food back. Hurry! Is there anything stored inhere we'll need? Sallorsen! Captain! Is there anything--"

The captain looked at him dully; then, understanding, a cackle camefrom his throat. "Don't need anything. This is the end. Lastcompartment. Finish!"

"Snap out of it!" Ken cried. "Come on, Sallorsen--there's a chanceyet. Is there anything we'll need in here?"

"Sea-suits--in those lockers. "

Ken Torrance swung around and rapidly opened the lockers. Pulling outthe bulky suits, he cried:

"You carry that food back. Then come and help me. "

 * * * * *

But of the corner of his eye, as he worked, he could see the ominouspreparations beyond in the flooded compartment--the sealmen raisingthe torpoon, guiding it back to the far end; leveling it out. Ken wassure the door could not stand more than two or three blows at themost. Two or three minutes, that meant--but all the sea-suits had togo back into the fourth compartment!

He was in torment as he worked. For him, the conditions were just asbad as for the men who had lived below in the submarine for a month;the poisonous, foul air racked him just as much; what breath he got hefought for just as painfully. But in his body was a greater store ofstrength, and fresher muscles; and he taxed his body to its verylimit. 

Panting, his head seeming on the point of splitting, Ken Torrancestumbled through into the last compartment laden with a pile ofsea-suits. He dropped them clattering in a pile around his feet andforced himself back again. Another trip; and another.... 

It would never have been done had not Sallorsen and Lawson, thescientist, come to his aid. The help they offered was meager, andslow, but it sufficed. Laden for the fifth time, Ken heard what he hadbeen anticipating for every second of the all too short, agonizingminutes: a sharp, grinding crack, and the following reverberation. Hesnatched a glance around to see the torpoon falling to the deck of thesecond compartment--the sealmen lifting it swiftly again--and a thinbut definite sliver in the quarsteel of the door. 

But the last suit was gotten into the fourth compartment, and theconnecting door closed and carefully locked and bolted. The removal ofthe suits, had been achieved--but what now?

Panting, completely exhausted, Ken forced his brain to the question. From every side he attacked the problem, but nowhere could he find theloophole he sought. Everything, it seemed, had been tried, and hadfailed, during the _Peary's_ long captivity. There was nothing left. True, he had his torpoon, and its nitro-shell gun with a clip ofnineteen shells; but what use were shells? Even if each one accountedfor one of the sealmen, there would still remain a swarm. 

And the sea-suits. He had struggled for them and had saved them, butwhat use could he put them to? Go out leading a desperate final sallyfor the hole in the ice above? Death in minutes!

No hope. Nothing. Not even a fighting chance. These seal-creatures, strange seed of the Arctic ice, had trapped the _Peary_ all too well. On the roll of mysteriously missing ships would her name go down; andhe, Ken Torrance, would be considered a lunatic who had soughtsuicide, and found it.... 

 * * * * *

Of the twenty-one survivors of the _Peary's_ officers and crew, only adozen had the will to watch the inexorable advance of the sealmen. Therest lay in various attitudes on the deck of the rear compartment, showing no sign of life save torturous, shallow pantings for air and, occasionally, spasmodic clutchings at their throats and chests, asthey tried to fight off the deadly, invisible foe that was slowlystrangling them. 

Ken Torrance, Sallorsen, the scientist, Lawson, and a few others werepressed together at the last watertight door, peering through thequarsteel at the sea-creatures' systematic assault on the door leadinginto the third compartment. A straight, hard smash at it; anotherfinal splintering smash--and again the torpoon pushed through in thevan of a cascade of icy, greenish water, which quickly claimed thecontrol compartment for the attackers behind. The creatures weregrowing bolder. More and more of them had entered the submarine, andsoon each open compartment was filled from deck to ceiling with theslowly turning, graceful brown bodies, inspecting minutely thecountless wheels and levers and gauges, and inspecting also, inturns, the pale, worn faces that stared with dull eyes at themthrough the sole remaining door. 

There was no further retreat, now. Behind was only water and the swarmthat passed to and fro through it. Water and sealmen--ahead, above, tothe sides, behind--everywhere. Cooped in their transparent cell, thecrew of the submarine _Peary_ waited the end. 

 * * * * *

Once more, as well as he could with his throbbing head and heavy, choking body, Kenneth Torrance tracked over the old road that hadbrought him nowhere, but was the only road open. Carefully he tookstock of everything he had that he might possibly fight with. 

There were sea-suits for the men, and in each suit an hour's supply ofartificial but invigorating air. Two port-locks, one on each side ofthe stern compartment. A torpoon, with a gun and nineteen shells. Nothing else? There seemed to be, in his mind, a vague memory ofsomething else ... Something that might possibly be of use ... Something.... But he could not remember. Again and again the agony ofslow strangulation he was going through drove everything but theconsciousness of pain from his shirking mind. But there was somethingelse--and perhaps it was the key. Perhaps if he could only rememberit--whatever it was--whether a tangible thing or merely a passing ideaof hours ago--the way out would be suddenly revealed. 

But he could not remember. He had the sea-suits, the port-locks andthe torpoon: what possible pattern could he weave them into to bringdeliverance?

No, there was nothing. Not even a girder that could be unfastened intime to brace the last door. No way of prolonging this last stand!

Beside Ken, the strained, panting voice of Lawson whispered:

"Getting ready. Over soon now. All over. "

All save five of the sealmen had left the third compartment, to jointhe swarm constantly swimming around and over the submarine outside. The five remaining were the crew for the battering ram. With measuredand deliberate movements they ranged their lithe bodies beside thetorpoon, lifted it and bore it smoothly back to the far end of thecompartment. There they poised for a minute, while from the menwatching sounded a pathetic sigh of anticipation. 

As one, the five seal-creatures lunged forward with their burden. 

_Crash!_ And the following dull reverberation. 

The last assault had begun. 

CHAPTER VI

_In a Biscuit Can_

Ken Torrance glanced with dull, hopeless eyes over the compartment hestood in. Figures stretched out all over the deck, gasping, panting, strangling--men waiting in agony for death. His head sank down, and hewiped wet hands across his aching forehead. Nothing to do butwait--wait for the end--wait as the patient horde outside had beenwaiting in the sea-gloom for their moment of triumph, when the softbodies inside the _Peary_ would be theirs to rip and mangle.... 

A dragging sound brought Ken's eyes wearily up and to the side. One ofthe crew who had been lying on the deck was dragging his bodypainfully toward a row of lockers at one side of the compartment. Theman's eyes were feverishly intent on the lockers. 

Ken watched his progress dully, without thinking, as inch by inch heforced himself through the other bodies sprawled in his way. He sawhim reach the lockers, and for a minute, gasping, lie there. He saw aclawing arm stretch almost up to the catch on one locker, while theman whimpered like a child at his lack of quick success. 

_Crash!_ The grinding blow of the torpoon hitting the quarsteelclanged out from behind. But Ken's mind was all on the reaching man'sstrange actions. He saw the fingers at last succeed in touching thecatch. The door of the locker opened outward, and eagerly the manreached inside and pulled. With a thump, a row of heavy objects strungtogether rolled out onto the deck--and Ken Torrance sprang suddenly tothe man's side:

"What are you doing?" he cried. 

The man looked up sullenly. He mumbled:

"Damn fish--won't get me. I'll blow us all to hell, first!"

At that the connection struck Ken. 

"Then that's nitromite!" he shouted. "That's the idea--the nitromite!"

And stooping down, he wrenched the rope of small black boxes whichcontained the explosive from the man who had worked so painfully toget them. 

"I'll do the blowing, boy!" he said. "Don't worry; I'll do itcomplete!"

 * * * * *

Ken, holding the rope of explosives, crossed the deck and pulledSallorsen and Lawson around. Their worn faces, with lifeless, bloodshot eyes, met his own strong features, and he said forcefully:

"Now listen! I need your help. I've found our one last chance forlife. We three are the strongest, and we've got to work like hell. Understand?"

His enthusiasm and the vigor of his words roused them. 

"Yes, " said Lawson. "What--we do?"

"You say there's an hour's air left in the sea-suits?" Torrance askedthe captain. 

"Yes. An hour. "

"Then get the men into the suits, " the torpooner ordered. "Help theweaker ones; slap them till they obey you!" There came the ugly, deafening crash of the hurled torpoon into the compartment door. Kenfinished grimly: "And for God's sake, hurry! I'll explain later. "

Sallorsen and Lawson unquestioningly obeyed. Ken had reached thespirit in them, the strength not physical, that had all but beendriven out by the long, hopeless weeks and the poisonous stuff thatpassed for air, and it had risen and was responding. Sallorsen'svoice, for the first time in days, had his old stern tone of commandin it as, calling on everything within him, he shouted:

"Men, there's still a chance! Everyone into sea-suits! Quick!"

A few of the blue-skinned figures lying panting on the deck looked up. Fewer moved. They did not at once understand. Only four or fivedragged themselves with pathetic eagerness towards the pile ofsea-suits and the little store of fresh air that remained in them. Sallorsen repeated his command. 

"Hurry! Men--you, Hartley and Robson and Carroll--your suits on!There's air in them! _Put 'em on!_"

 * * * * *

And then Lawson was among them, shaking the hopeless, dying forms, rousing them to the chance for life. Several more crawled to obey. Bythe time the next crash of the torpoon came, eleven out of thetwenty-one survivors were working with clumsy, eager fingers at theirsea-suits, pushing feet and legs in, drawing the tough fabric up overtheir bodies, sliding their arms in, and struggling with quick pantingbreaths to raise the heavy helmets and fasten them into place. Then--air!

Again the ear-shattering crash. The scientist and the captain drove atthe rest of the crew. They stumbled, those two fighting men, and twiceLawson went down in a heap as his legs gave under him; but he got upagain, and they began dragging the suits to the men who had not eventhe strength to rise, shoving inert limbs into place, switching on theair-units inside the helmets and, gasping themselves, fastening thehelmets down. Theirs was a conflict as cruel, as hard and brutal asmen smashing at each other with fists, and they then proved theirright to the shining roll of honor, wherever and whatever that rollmay be. They fought on past pain, past sickness, past poisoning, thatman of action and men of the laboratory. 

And outside that foul transparent pit the tempo quickened also. Thesledging blows at the last door came quicker. All around the captive_Peary_ the sleek brown bodies stirred uneasily. For weeks there hadbeen but little activity inside the submarine; now, all at once, threeof the figures that were men whipped the others into action, rousingthose lying dying on the deck--working, working. Observing this, thelithe seal bodies moved with new nervous, restless strokes, to andfro, never pausing--passing up and down in a milling stream the lengthof the craft, clustering closest outside the walls of the fourthcompartment, where they pressed as close as they could, their widebrown eyes already on the haggard forms that worked inside, theirsmooth bodies patterned by the constantly shifting shadows of theirfellows above and behind. 

So they watched and waited, while in the third compartment thebattered torpoon was slung at the last door, and drawn back, and slungagain--waited for the final moment, the crisis of their month-longsiege beneath the floes of the silent Arctic sea!

 * * * * *

Kenneth Torrance worked by himself. 

He saw that Sallorsen and Lawson had answered his call; man after manwas clad in his suit and sucking in the incomparably fresher, thoughartificial, air of the units. As he had hoped, that air wasrevitalizing the worn-out bodies rapidly, giving them new strength andclearing their brains. His plan required that--strength for the men tomove and act for themselves--sane heads!

The plan was basically simple. Bringing his best concentration to theall-important details, Ken started to build the road to the worldabove. 

First he opened the inner door of the starboard port-lock, wherein layhis torpoon. Opening the entrance panel of the steel shell, he quicklytransferred within the cans of compressed food retrieved from thesecond compartment. When he had finished, there was left barely roomfor the pilot's body. 

And then the nitromite. 

The explosive was carried by the _Peary_ for the blasting of such icefloes as might trap her. It was contained for chemical stability in ahalf dozen six-inch-square, water-proof boxes, strung one afteranother on an interconnecting wired rope. Ken would need them all; hewished he had five times as many. It would not matter if the whole ofthe _Peary_ were shattered to slivers. 

Ken tied the rope of boxes into a strong unit, as small as it could bemade. Firing and timing mechanisms were contained in each unit: hewould only have to set one of them. He wrapped the whole charge, except for one small corner, in several pieces of the men's discardedclothing--monkey jackets, thick sweaters, a dirty towel--and stuffedit in an empty tin container for sea-biscuits. 

 * * * * *

All this had taken only minutes. But in those minutes the quarsteel ofthe watertight door had been subjected to half a dozen smashing blows, and already a flaw had appeared in the pane. Another grinding crunch, and there would be the visible beginning of a crack. Three more, perhaps, and the door would be down. 

But the plan was laid, the counter move ready; and, as Sallorsen andLawson, last of them all, got into suits, Ken Torrance, in short, gasping sentences, explained it. 

"All the nitromite's in this, " Ken said. "I hope it's enough. In amoment I'll set the timing to explode it in one minute--then eject itfrom the empty torpoon port-lock. It's a gamble, but I think theexplosion should kill every damned seal around the sub. Water carriessuch shocks for miles, so it should stun, if not kill, all the otherswithin a long radius. See? We're inside sub, largely protected. Whenthe stuff explodes, you and men make for the hole you blew in the iceabove. "

Another crash sent echoes resounding through the remainingcompartment. All around the three were suit-clad figures, grotesqueclumsy giants, all feeling new strength as they gulped with leathernthroats and lungs at the artificial air which was giving them arespite, however brief, from the death they had been sinking into. Inthe third compartment of the _Peary_, five seal-like creatures withswift and beautiful movements picked up their torpoon battering ramagain; while all around the outside of the _Peary_ their hundreds ofwatching fellows pressed in closely. 

 * * * * *

"Yes!" cried Lawson, the scientist. "But the explosion--it mightshatter the ship!"

"No matter; I expect it to!" answered Ken. "Then you can leave througha crack instead of a port-lock. "

"Yes--but you!" objected the captain. "Get on a suit!"

"No; I'm jumping into my torpoon in the other port-lock. I've got thefood in it. Now, Sallorsen, this is your job. I'll be in my torpoon, but I won't be able to let myself out the port. You open it, rightafter the explosion. Understand?"

"Yes, " replied Sallorsen, and Lawson nodded. 

"All right, " gasped Ken Torrance. "Empty the chamber. " As the captaindid so, Ken opened the lid of the biscuit can and adjusted the timingdevice on the exposed unit in the clothing-wrapped bundle. Then hereplaced it, ticking, in the can and thrust the can bodily into theemptied chamber of the port-lock. He closed the inner door of thechamber, and said to the men by him:

"Close your face-plates!"

And Ken pushed the release button: and then he was running to theother port-lock and to his torpoon, and harnessing himself in. 

His brain teemed with the possibilities of the situation as he laystretched out in the torpoon, waiting. How much would the submarine besmashed? Would the charge of nitromite, besides killing the sealmen, kill everyone inside the _Peary_? For that matter, would it affect thesealmen at all? How much could the creatures stand? And would thefiring mechanism work? And then would he himself be able to get out;or would the lock in which the torpoon lay be damaged by the explosionand trap him there?

Seconds, only seconds, to wait, small fractions of time--but they weremore important than the days and the weeks that the _Peary_ had lain, a lashed-down captive, under the Arctic ice; for in these seconds wasto be given fate's final answer to the prayer and courage of them all. 

Time for Ken expanded. Surely the charge should have gone off longbefore this! The pulse beat so loudly in his brain that he could hearnothing else. He counted: "... Nine, ten, eleven--" Had the fusefailed? Surely by now--"... Twelve, thirteen, fourteen--"

On that the submarine _Peary_ leaped. Ken Torrance, himself inside thetorpoon, felt a sharp roll of thunder made tangible, and then completedarkness took him.... 

CHAPTER VII

_The Awakening_

He had no idea of how long he had been unconscious when, his fullsenses returning, he eagerly peered ahead through the torpoon'svision-plate. For some seconds he could see nothing; but he knew, atleast, that the torpoon had survived the shock, for he was dry andsnug in his harness. And then his eyes became accustomed to thedarkness, and he saw that he was outside the submarine. Sallorsen hadfollowed his orders; had opened the port-lock! The undersea reacheslay ahead of him, and the way was clear. 

Ken stared into a gray, silent sea, no longer shadowed with movingbrown-skinned bodies. He tried his motors. Their friendly, rhythmichum answered him, and carefully he slipped into gear and crept up offthe sea-floor. He did not dare use his lights. 

The _Peary_ was a great, blurred shadow, a dead thing without glow ormovement, with no figures of sealmen around her. As Ken's eyes gainedgreater vision, he was able to make out a wide, long rent runningclear across the top of the fourth compartment of the submarine. Theexplosion had done that to her, but what had it done to her crew? Whathad it done to the sealmen?

He saw the sealmen first. Some were quite close, but in the murk hehad missed them. Silent specters, they were apparently lifeless, strewn all around at different levels, and most of them floatingslowly up toward the dim ice ceiling. 

But up under the ice was movement! Living figures were there! And atthe sight Kenneth Torrance's lips spread in their first real grin fordays. The plan had worked! The sealmen had been destroyed, and alreadysome of the _Peary's_ men were up there and fumbling clumsily acrossthe hundred feet which separated them from the hole in the ice thatwas the last step to the world above. 

 * * * * *

A ghostly gray haze of light filtered downward through the water fromthe hole. Ken counted twelve figures making their way to it. As hewondered about the rest of the crew, he saw three bulging, swayingshapes suddenly emerge from the split in the top of the _Peary_, andbegin an easy rise toward the ice ceiling ninety feet above. There wasno apparent danger, and they went up quite slowly, with occasionalbrief pauses to avoid the risk of the bends. Clasped together, thegroup of three were, and when they were halfway to the glassy ceilingof the ice, three more left the rent in the submarine and followedlikewise. Twelve men were at the top; six others were swimming up;three more were yet to leave the submarine--and after they hadabandoned her, he, Ken, would follow with the torpoon and the food itcontained. 

So he thought, watching from where he lay, down below, and there wasin him a great weariness after the triumph so bitterly fought for hadbeen achieved. He rested through minutes of quiet and relaxation, watching what he had brought about; but only minutes--for suddenlywithout warning all security was gone. 

From out the murky shadows to the left a sleek shape came flashingwith great speed, to jerk Ken Torrance's eyes around and to widen themwith quick alarm. 

A sealman! A sealman alive, and moving--and vengeful! A sealman whichthe explosion of nitromite had not reached!

Doubtless the lone creature was surprised upon seeing all its fellowsmotionless, drifting like corpses upward, and the men of the _Peary_escaping. With graceful, beautiful speed, a liquid streak, it flashedinto the scene, eeling up and around and down, trying to understandwhat extraordinary thing had happened. But finally it slowed down andhovered some thirty feet directly above the dark hull of the _Peary_. 

The men rising toward the ice had seen the sealman at the same timeKen Torrance had, and at once increased their efforts, fearingimmediate attack. Quickly the two groups shot to the top where theother twelve were, and began a desperate fumbling progress over towardthe hole that alone gave exit. But the sealman paid no attention tothem. It was looking at something below. 

Ken saw what it was. 

The last three men were leaving the _Peary_. Awkward, swaying objects, they rose up directly in front of the hovering creature. 

 * * * * *

With an enraged thrust of flippers, it drove at them. The threehumans--Sallorsen, Lawson and one other, Ken knew they must be--wereclasped together, and the long, lithe, muscular body smote themsquarely, sent them whirling and helpless in different directions inthe sea-gloom. One of them was driven down by the force of the blow, and that one the sealman chose to finish first. It lashed at him, itsstrong teeth bared to rip the sea-suit, concentrating on him all therage and all the thirst for vengeance it had. 

But by then, down below, the torpoon's motors were throbbing at fullpower; the thin directional rudders were slanting; the torpoon wasturning and pointing its nose upward; and Ken Torrance, his face bleakas the Arctic ice, was grasping the trigger of the nitro-shell gun. 

He might perhaps have saved the doomed man had he swept straight upthen and fired, but a quick mounting of the odds distracted him for afatal second. Out of the deeper gloom at the left came a swiftlygrowing shadow, and Ken, with a sinking in his stomach, knew it for asecond sealman. 

Then another similar shadow brought his eyes to the right. 

Two more sealmen! Three now--and how many more might come?

At once Ken knew what he must do before ever he fired a shell at oneof the brown-skinned shapes. The man just attacked had to besacrificed in the interests of the rest. The torpoon swerved, thrustup toward the ice ceiling under the full force of her motors; and whenhalfway to it, and her gun-containing bow was pointed at a spot in theice only twenty feet in front of the foremost of the men strokingdesperately towards the distant exit-hole, Ken pressed the trigger;and again, and again and again.... 

Twelve shells, quick, on the same path, bit into the ice. Almostimmediately came the first explosion. It was swelled by the others. The ice shivered and crumbled in jagged splinters--and then there wasa new column of light reaching down from the world of air and lifeinto the darkness of the undersea. A roughly circular hole gaped inthe ice sixty or seventy feet nearer the swimming men than the oldone. 

"That'll give 'em a chance, " muttered Kenneth Torrance. He plunged thetorpoon around and down. "And now for a fight!"

 * * * * *

Without pause, now, there was, straight ahead, a hard, desperate duel, a fitting last fight for any torpoon or any man riding one. Each ofthe seven shells left in the nitro-gun's magazine had to count; andthe first of them gave a good example. 

Ken turned down in time to see the death of the man first attacked. His suit was ripped clean across, his air of life went up in bubbles, and the water came in. The seal-creature lunged at its falling victima last time, and as it did so its smooth brown body crossed Ken'ssights. The torpooner fired, and saw his shell strike home, for thebody shuddered, convulsed, and the sealman, internally torn, wentsinking in a dark cloud after the human it had slain. 

That sight gave pause to the other two creatures that had arrived, andgave Ken Torrance a good second chance. Motor throbbing, the torpoonturned like a thing alive. Its snout and gun-sights swerving straighttoward the next target. But, when just on the point of pressing thetrigger, Ken's torpoon was struck a terrific blow and tumbled over andover. The whole external scene blurred to him, and only after a momentwas he able to bring the torpoon back to an even keel. 

He saw what had happened. While he had been sighting on the secondseal-creature, the third had attacked the torpoon from the rear bystriking it with all the strength of its heavy, muscular body. But itdid not follow up its attack. For it had crashed in to the whirlingpropeller, and now it was hanging well back, its head horribly gashedby the steel blades. 

For a moment the three combatants hung still, both sealmen staring atthe torpoon as if in wonder that it could strike both with its bow andstern, and Ken Torrance rapidly glancing over the situation. Theremaining two of the last group of three men, he saw, had reached thetop, and the foremost of the _Peary's_ crew were within several feetof the new hole in the ice. In a very short time all would be out andsafe. Until then he had to hold off the two sealmen. 

Two? There were no longer only two, but five--ten--a dozen--and more. The dead were coming to life!

Here and there in the various levels of drifting, motionless brownbodies that he thought the explosion had killed, one was stirring, awakening! The explosion had but stunned many or most of them, _andnow they were returning to consciousness_!

CHAPTER VIII

_The Duel_

Upon seeing this, all hope for life left Ken. He had only six shellsleft, and at best he could kill only six sealmen. Already, there weremore than twenty about him, completely encircling the torpoon. Theyseemed afraid of it, and yet desirous of finishing it--they hung back, watching warily the thing that could strike and hurt from either end;but Ken knew, of course, that he could not count on their inactionlong. One concerted charge would mean his quick end, and the death ofmost of the men above. 

Well, there was only one thing to do--try to hold them off until thosemen above had climbed out, every one. 

With this plan in mind, he maneuvered for a commanding position. Quietly he slid his motor into gear, and slowly the torpoon rose. Atthis first movement, the wall of hesitating brown bodies broke back alittle. It quickly pressed in again, however, as the torpoon came to ahalt where Ken wanted it--a position thirty feet beneath, and slightlyto one side, of the escaping men above, with an angle of firecommanding the area the sealmen would have to cross to attack them. 

Almost at once came action. One of the surrounding creatures swervedsuddenly up toward the men. Instinctively angling the torp, Ken sent anitro-shell at it; and the chance aim was good. The projectile caughtthe sealman squarely, and, after the convulsion, it began to driftdownward, its body torn apart. 

"That'll teach you, damn you!" Ken muttered savagely, and, to heightenthe effect he had created, he brought his sights to bear on anothersealman in the circle around him--and fired and killed. 

This sight of sudden death told on the others. They grew obviouslymore fearful and gave back, though still forming a solid circle aroundthe torpoon. The circle was ever thickening and deepening downward asmore of those that the explosion had rendered unconscious returned tolife. 

And then, above, the first man reached the hole, clawed at its roughedges and levered himself through. 

That was a signal. From somewhere beneath, two brown bodies flashedupward in attack. Fearing a general rush at any second, Ken firedtwice swiftly. One shell missed, but the other slid to its mark. Almost alongside its fellow, one of the creatures was shattered andtorn, and that evidently altered the other's intentions, for itabandoned the attack and sought safety in the mass of its fellows onthe farther side. 

Another respite. Another man through the hole. And but twonitro-shells left!

 * * * * *

The deadly circle, like wolves around a lone trapper who crouchesclose to his dying fire, pressed in a little; and by their ominousquietness, by the sight of their eyes all turned in on him, theirconcerted inching closer, Ken sensed the nearness of the charge thatwould finish him. All this in deep silence, there in the gloomyquarter-light. He could not yell and brandish his fists at them as thetrapper by the fire might have done to win a few extra minutes. Theonly cards he had to play were two shells--and one was needed now!

He fired it with deliberate, sure aim, and grunted as he saw itsvictim convulse and die, with dark blood streaming. Again the swarmhesitated. 

Ken risked a glance above. Only three men left, he saw; and one waspulled through the hole as he watched. Below, in one place, severalseal-creatures surged upward. 

"Get back, damn you!" he cursed harshly. "All right--take it! That'sthe last!"

And the last shell hissed out from the gun even as the last man, above, was pulled through up into the air and safety. 

Ken felt that he had given half his life with that final shell. Completely surrounded by a hundred or more of the sealmen, he couldnot possibly hope to maneuver the torpoon up to the hole in the iceand leave it, without being overwhelmed. He had held off the swarmlong enough for the others to escape, but for himself it was the end. 

So he thought, and wondered just when that end would come. Soon, heknew. It would not take them long to overcome their fear when they sawthat he no longer reached out and struck them down in sudden bloodydeath. Now it was their turn. 

"Anyway, " the torpooner murmured, "I got 'em out. I saved them. "

But had he? Suddenly his mind turned up a dreadful thought. He hadsaved them from the sealmen, but they were up on the ice without food. There had been no time to apportion rations in the submarine; all thesupplies were stacked around him in the torpoon!

Searching planes would eventually appear overhead, but if he could notget the food up to the men it meant their death as surely as if theyhad stayed locked in the _Peary_!

But how could he do it without shells, and with that living walledging inch by inch upon him, visibly on the brink of rushing him. Some carried ropes with which they would lash the torpoon down as theyhad the others. Must all he and those men had gone through, be invain? Must he die--and the others? For certainly without food, thosemen above on the lonely ice fields, all of them weakened by the longsiege in the submarine, would perish quickly.... 

And then a faintly possible plan came to him. It involved an attemptto bluff the seal-creatures. 

 * * * * *

Thirty feet above the lone man in the torpoon was the hole he hadblasted in the ice. He knew that from the cone of light which filtereddown; he did not dare to take his eyes for a second from the creaturesaround him, for all now depended on his judging to a fraction justwhen the lithe, living wall would leap to overwhelm him. 

Now the torpoon was enclosed by what was more a sphere of brown bodiesthan a circle. But it was not a solid sphere. It stretched thinly towithin a few feet of the ice ceiling where, in one place, was the holeKen had blown in the ice. 

He began to play the game. He edged the gears into reverse, gentlyangled the diving-planes, and slowly the torpoon tilted in responseand began to sink back to the dark sea-floor. 

Motion appeared in the curved facade of sleek brown heads and bodiesin front and to the sides. The creatures behind and below, Ken couldnot see; he could only trust to the fear inspired by the damage hispropeller had wreaked on one of them, to hold them back. However, hecould judge the movements of those behind and below by thesynchronized movements of those in front; for the sealmen, in thistense siege, seemed to move as one--just as they would move as onewhen a leader got the courage to charge across the gap to the torpoon. 

In reverse, slowly, the torpoon backed downward. Every minute seemed aseparate eternity of time, for Ken dared not move fast at thisjuncture, and he needed to retreat not less than fifty feet. 

Fifty feet! Would they hold off long enough for him to make it?

Foot by foot the torpoon edged down at her forty-five-degree angle, and with every foot the watching bodies became visibly bolder. Therewas no light inside the torpoon--inner light would decrease thevisibility outside--but Ken knew her controls as does the musician hisinstrument. Slowly the propeller whirled over, the torpoon dropped, slowly the diffused light from the hole above diminished--and slowlythe eager wall of sealmen followed and crept in. 

Twenty-five feet down; and then, after a long time, thirty-five feet, and forty. Seventy feet up, in all, to the hole in the ice.... 

Ken wanted seventy-five feet, but he could not have it. For the wallof sleek bodies broke. One or two of the creatures surged forward;other followed; they were coming!

The slim torpoon leaped under the unleashed power of hermotors--forward. 

 * * * * *

For one awful moment Ken thought he was finished. The vision of thehole was obscured by a twisting, whirling maelstrom of bodies, and thetorpoon quivered and shook like a living thing in agony under glancingblows. 

But then came a patch of light, a pathway of light, leading straightup at a forty-five-degree angle to the hole in the ice above. 

Sealmen and torpoon had leaped forward at the same moment. Doubtlessthe creatures had not expected the shell to move so suddenly anddecisively ahead, so that when it did, those in the van swerved toescape head-on contact. 

The torpoon gained speed all too slowly for her pilot. It naturallytook time to gain full forward speed from a standing start. But shemoved, and she moved fast, and after her poured the full tide ofsealmen, now that they saw their prey running in retreat. 

From somewhere ahead appeared a rope, noosed to catch the fleeingprey. It slipped off the side. Another touched the bow, but it too wasthrown off. The torpoon's forward momentum was now great; she wassweeping up at the full speed Ken had gone back to be able to attain. He needed full speed! The plan would fail at the last moment withoutit!

Another rope; but it was the seal-creature's last gesture. Through theside plates of quarsteel the light grew fast; the ice was only tenfeet away; a slight directional correction brought the hole deadahead--and at full speed, twenty-four miles an hour, the torpoonpassed through and into the thin air of the world of light and life. 

Right out of the hole, a desperate fugitive from below, she leaped, her propeller suddenly screaming, and arched high through the airbefore she dove with a rending, splintering crash onto the upper sideof the sheet ice. 

And the sun of a cloudless, perfect Arctic day beat down on her; andmen were all around, eagerly reaching to open her entrance port. Itwas done. 

 * * * * *

Kenneth Torrance, dazed, battered, hurting in every joint butconscious, found the torpoon's port open, and felt hands reach in andclasp him. Wearily he helped them lift him out into the thin sunlight. Sitting down, slitting his eyes against the sudden glare, he peeredaround. 

Captain Sallorsen was beside him, supporting him with one hand andpounding him on the back with the other; and there in front was thebearded scientist, Lawson, and the rest of the men. 

Ken took a great gulp of the clean, cold air. 

"Gosh!" was all he could say. "Gosh, that tastes good!"

"Man, you did it!" shouted Sallorsen. "How, in God's name, I don'tknow--but you did it!"

"He did!" said Lawson. "And he did it all himself. Even to the food, which should keep us till a plane comes by. If they haven't stoppedsearching for us. "

His words reminded Ken of something. 

"Oh, there'll be a plane over, " he said. "Forgot to tell you, but Istole this torpoon--see?--and told the fellows they could come and getit somewhere right around here. "

Kenneth Torrance grinned, and glanced down at the battered steel shellwhich had borne him out of the water below. 

"And here it is, " he finished. "A little damaged--but then I didn'tpromise it would be as good as new!"

 * * * * *