Change your mind, Frank. Stay here with me."
Again Wardour interfered. Again he called out, "Leave him alone!" more roughly than ever. Still deaf and blind to every consideration but one, Crayford pressed his entreaties on Frank.
"You owned yourself just now that you were not well seasoned to fatigue," he persisted. "You feel (you _must_ feel) how weak that last illness has left you? You know (I am sure you know) how unfit you are to brave exposure to cold, and long marches over the snow."
Irritated beyond endurance by Crayford's obstinacy; seeing, or thinking he saw, signs of yielding in Frank's face, Wardour so far forgot himself as to seize Crayford by the arm and attempt to drag him away from Frank. Crayford turned and looked at him.
"Richard," he said, very quietly, "you are not yourself. I pity you. Drop your hand."
Wardour relaxed his hold, with something of the sullen submission of a wild animal to its keeper. The momentary silence which followed gave Frank an opportunity of speaking at last.
"I am gratefully sensible, Crayford," he began, "of the interest which you take in me--"
"And you will follow my advice?" Crayford interposed, eagerly.
"My mind is made up, old friend," Frank answered, firmly and sadly. "Forgive me for disappointing you. I am appointed to the expedition. With the expedition I go." He moved nearer to Wardour. In his innocence of all suspicion he clapped Wardour heartily on the shoulder. "When I feel the fatigue," said poor simple Frank, "you will help me, comrade--won't you? Come along!"
Wardour snatched his gun out of the hands of the sailor who was carrying it for him. His dark face became suddenly irradiated with a terrible joy.
"Come!" he cried. "Over the snow and over the ice! Come! where no human footsteps have ever trodden, and where no human trace is ever left."
Blindly, instinctively, Crayford made an effort to part them. His brother officers, standing near, pulled him back. They looked at each other anxiously. The merciless cold, striking its victims in various ways, had struck in some instances at their reason first.
Everybody loved Crayford. Was he, too, going on the dark way that others had taken before him? They forced him to seat himself on one of the lockers. "Steady, old fellow!" they said kindly--"steady!" Crayford yielded, writhing inwardly under the sense of his own helplessness. What in God's name could he do?
Could he denounce Wardour to Captain Helding on bare suspicion--without so much as the shadow of a proof to justify what he said? The captain would decline to insult one of his officers by even mentioning the monstrous accusation to him. The captain would conclude, as others had already concluded, that Crayford's mind was giving way under stress of cold and privation. No hope--literally, no hope now, but in the numbers of the expedition. Officers and men, they all liked Frank. As long as they could stir hand or foot, they would help him on the way--they would see that no harm came to him.
The word of command was given; the door was thrown open; the hut emptied rapidly. Over the merciless white snow--under the merciless black sky--the exploring party began to move. The sick and helpless men, whose last hope of rescue centered in their departing messmates, cheered faintly. Some few whose days were numbered sobbed and cried like women. Frank's voice faltered as he turned back at the door to say his last words to the friend who had been a father to him.
"God bless you, Crayford!"
Crayford broke away from the officers near him; and, hurrying forward, seized Frank by both hands. Crayford held him as if he would never let him go.
"God preserve you, Frank! I would give all I have in the world to be with you. Good-by! Good-by!"
Frank waved his hand--das hed away the tears that were gathering in his eyes--and hurried out. Crayford called after him, the last, the only warning that he could give:
"While you can stand, keep with the main body, Frank!"
Wardour, waiting till the last--Wardour, following Frank through the snow-drift--stopped, stepped back, and answered Crayford at the door:
"While he can stand, he keeps with Me."
Third Scene The Iceberg.
