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“No, but it’s the best we have”
The captain bit at his lip in worry, not about himself but about his crew
Two crewed out of his smoke-infused clothes but whose face remained streaked with soot They fitted a sheet of plywood already cut to size over the brokenThe relief from the cold and as alnets to secure soh the back of the radio roo When the as done, Bell and Fyrie went over their plan andharpooner understood the risks If he was concerned, he gave no indication
Two tension-filled hours later, they were still working to get into the proper position It was a ga the role of queen, and the expanse of icebergs as the board deter which moves were possible Twice the French ship had appeared fro and opened fire with its cannon They weren’t trying to sink the whaler—otherwise, they’d lose the prize—but the shots roared by the pilothouse close enough to burn off paint and singe the e rattled the s and left the men temporarily deafened
Tohad descended, lacy and a-swirl, deadening noise so that everything soundedof the ice becaht they spotted the Lorient, it turned out to be a s off the face of a taller berg sent jolts of adrenaline through Bell’s body At one point, as the afternoon wore on, a big iceberg lost in the ravity shifted and it flipped entirely over in the water, splashing and thrashing like a drowning victim
The fact that they were being hunted in a ship that was taking on water without any visible reeBut Captain Fyrie acquitted hi the best of a horrendous situation and re in full co around his ship
During what seeh the fog and the air turning crystalline, Bell went below to check on theforced to stay in the ents of th
e Société des Mines, staying in the dining area was for their own safety As he talked, he couldn’t help but think one of thee the blaze could grow He’d risked a conflagration that could have killed them all That the arsonist was a native Coloradan, a e especially fiendish He had no co his fellow miners dead so his French conspirators could take possession of the byzanium ore
Such reptilian disdain was chilling
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Bell felt a renewed tension as soon as he cli icebergs ahead of the away from the whaler They’d surely spotted the quarry, but in the confines between the pair of bergs there wasn’t enough room in the sea to turn the ship and launch another attack
“This could be our chance,” Fyrie said
“Not if they reach the end of the bergs and co the binoculars to his eyes “We’ll be trapped like a rat in a sewer pipe”
“Then let’s hope Ivar’s plug holds” The captain ratcheted the engine telegraph, asking for full power
Down in the engine roo their own labor to the auto bucket after bucket of crushed coal into the firebox so the heat swelled and the pressures rose The ship’s acceleration wasn’t very dramatic, but it did come