Seaman dragged him into the cabin, hid in the dark cabin, and waited for the sailors to pass by before disappearing on the steps to the deck.
"Is it possible that it just drifted towards us?" The companion answered his own question with another unclear question. His eyes glanced around, searching for the landing point, and finally focused on Seaman.
It could be seen that he needed a little recognition, a nod, or a word of affirmation, but Seaman couldn't give it to him.
I have never seen a large iceberg, but I can see a lot of large ice floes. Ice floes can often be used as a reference for movement. They have no sails, and their limited movement is nothing compared to the speed of the ship. After a while, they will be
After throwing it behind them, the crew members knew that they were getting closer to their destination.
He has never seen an iceberg, but he feels that icebergs should be no exception. From a simple logical reasoning point of view, the answer must be negative, but Seaman does not want to admit this, "Who knows? Maybe they are not the same one at all."
This statement effectively convinced his companions, as well as Seaman himself. The probability of encountering two large icebergs in succession on the sea, which is not seen for ten years, is too small to be calculated, but it is much greater than the possibility of icebergs moving at the speed of a ship.
The two of them returned to the cabin with the last bit of light and decided to get some sleep. The manager of this batch of shifts was the captain himself, the trustworthy Binghai veteran helmsman Becker. Maybe the matter would be solved as soon as they woke up?
With this idea in mind, Seaman combed his dry hay bed, shared yesterday's leftover frozen meat with his companions in the dark, went to sleep separately, and prayed that he would not see it again when he got up early tomorrow morning.
The tiring day's work failed to make the night more peaceful, and the bumps and ups and downs of the ocean often interrupted his tossing and turning sleep. He heard scattered footsteps coming from the deck above him, which should be adjusting the sail again.
The things he saw during the day emerged from his memory more than once, and were recalled when sleepiness came over, and they overlapped with the panic expressions of his companions. He recalled those scenes, the sails were unfolded, the ship was moving at full speed, throwing away pieces of ice floes.
to the back of the head.
The thing on the horizon has not been thrown away. It is too far away, too far to see any details, far enough for Seaman to cope with himself and his companions by assuming that what he sees in the morning and evening are different.
In the corner of his mind that was difficult to detect, there was an idea that he was glad he had only seen it twice, otherwise he would not be able to find an excuse to avoid it. But he couldn't realize this himself, and he was talking about two icebergs that happened to appear in the same direction.
, trying hard to clear away the complicated memories.
Waking up from his light sleep for the third time, Seaman heard the chatter from other sailors who had gone to bed earlier. They thought they had lowered their voices. In the gap between the waves, these voices were just like the patches of moonlight shining through the small window.
Likewise, the environment determines that they will be noticed no matter how weak they are.
The content of the conversation was something that I dared not say when I could see the sea surface and the sails. The waves that occasionally hit the cabin partially covered it up, and the first half of the whisper was swallowed up, while the second half flowed in like cold water drops and was eavesdropped silently.
of human ear holes.
"...It seems to have gotten a little bigger in the afternoon?"
Inadvertent words got into Seaman's mind. He couldn't wait to compare the memories of looking at the icebergs in the morning and evening. He forgot that he had comforted himself just now that they were two different ones. The black shadows bordered by the afterglow of the setting sun seemed really different.
What I saw in the morning was that it was a lot bigger.
The sleepiness that had accumulated for half a night was gone. Only then did he face his heart and admit that he could not deceive himself and treat what he saw in the morning and what he saw in the evening as two different things.
Ximan felt that the hay spread under him was damp, and the water stains had soaked a large area of his underwear. He touched behind him and found that the surface of the leather jacket was as dry as ever, and there was cold sweat that had oozed out from unknown time on his body.
He turned over and reached out to wake up his companion, but found that he was not asleep either. There was no snoring, instead there were irregular and long breathing sounds, which showed that he was not peaceful inside.
Not only here, the cabin that used to be filled with snoring was so quiet that you could hear all the whispers. I don't know how many sleepless people were listening to the late-night conversations, recalling the foreign object that was inconvenient to talk about in a place where they could see the sails and the horizon.
, without saying a word.
"Heavenly Father bless you." Seaman opened his collar, held the double-winged ring amulet hanging around his neck, put it on his forehead, plugged his ears and waited for dawn.
The same call to prayer came from beside him, and Seaman knew it was from other sailors. He hoped that the power of Heavenly Father could be extended to this wild land without a church, drive away evil, and protect him from seeing it again when he stands on the deck tomorrow morning.
An atmosphere was contagious in the cabin, and whispers of prayers were heard everywhere, some of which were one or two simple verses. Usually more pious people could recite exorcism excerpts from the holy scriptures.
The sacred hymns provided some psychological comfort, as if this small space had returned to the civilized world, and the glory of the Heavenly Father protected His believers, although the witnesses to these pious prayers were only the dark and narrow cabin, not the icon on the church dome.
After getting some comfort, feeling tired, Seaman made a promise to go to the church to donate money when he returned safely. He closed his eyes and heard footsteps scattered on the deck, chants in unison, pulling the cable, and the sail was adjusted again.
…
Seaman thought he would be woken up at dawn by the urging of the changing sailors, but he was woken up by the chill on his exposed skin.
The light that shines through the small window is no longer moonlight, but it is not as bright as normal daytime. It is like passing through a layer of gauze, becoming soft and weak, only providing the minimum lighting.
Habitually holding on to the bulkhead, the slippery feeling almost caused him to fall back into the hay. Seaman took a deep breath, and the low-temperature water vapor, so thick that it made breathing sluggish, floated, as if he was sneaking underwater.
"What's going on?" The humidity was heavier than before the storm. Seaman wiped his hands on his pants, and the clothes he wiped were stained with cold dampness. The cold and wet feeling seeped into the untied collar.
The sweat from last night has not completely dried, and my clothes are sticky against my back.
Lowering his head to avoid his sleeping partner, with hands and feet spread across the floor, Seaman held on to the bulkhead and walked towards the exit to the deck.
The unclear lighting conditions took him more time to watch the road carefully, and he spent several times the effort to find the stairs.
Looking up, Seaman did not see the faint morning light that he thought, but a chaotic white color. The light above passed through a long barrier, and by now it was at the end of its power and was exhausted.
Rubbing his eyes in confusion, Seaman moved toward the deck, climbed up the slippery wooden steps soaked in water on his hands and knees, and climbed onto the unusually quiet deck.
He finally knew what the heavy cold water vapor in his breath was.
Boundless mist surrounded them, and the rolling thick white color rushed towards the ship, with the sharp and sharp chill characteristic of the ice sea, covering all surfaces that could condense, passing the coldness to the skin and everyone's mood at this time, which was at the bottom of the valley.
What is limited along with the field of vision is the speed of the ship. The wind speed is too weak to blow away the fog. There is no need for reference. It can be seen from the sluggish sails that their speed will not be able to get out of this boundless ice fog for a while.
.
What on earth is going on? Seaman really wanted to ask the sailors nervously watching the sides of the ship on both sides so loudly, but the people on the stern of the ship made him give up this idea.
Captain Becker leaned on the wheel, stared ahead, and performed his duty of controlling the rudder. Hearing the footsteps, he glanced at Seaman and waved his hand with a straight face to signal him to take over.
Such captains are rare. Most of the time, Becker is an easy-going and talkative person. He likes to be lazy and let the first mate and bosun take over, go back to the captain's cabin to enjoy leisure time, and chat with the sailors on the deck.
.
There were no undercurrents of reefs on the ice sea, and no matter how poor his vision was, he could still go straight ahead. Hitting an ice floe with at least slight bumps was not worthy of his full attention.
"Go to your post, Seaman. This is not your first day on the ship." Seeing that Seaman was still hesitating, Becker reminded him, and the eyes under the brim of his hat seemed to see through his thoughts, "Some fog, you can see
too much."
Seaman walked up behind the nearest sailor and patted him on the shoulder. The man turned his head, his hand still firmly grasping the edge of the boat, unwilling to leave. His red fingers that had stayed up all night in the cold fog unconsciously exerted force, as if
To snap into the wood.
He glanced at Seaman and then at the captain, and would rather continue to freeze than leave.
"Shift change, don't stop!" Becker yelled at them. Everyone could tell that this laid-back good old man was not very patient today. Something was consuming most of his energy and he had no time to solve the sailors' minor problems.
Forced by the captain's dignity, the man reluctantly let go of the edge of the ship, his nervous and fearful eyes never leaving the white mist, until he left the deck under the captain's order and disappeared through the hatch.
"If you see something on the sea, remind me to turn around in time." Becker ordered.
This sentence was a bit redundant, and Seaman could definitely see what everyone was on guard about. He took advantage of the captain's gaze to move away, and touched the sailor next to him who was holding the hand of the ship's edge, "What are you looking for?"
He didn't think that this visibility distance would allow the captain to detect small things like ice floes in time, and he wouldn't be able to avoid them dexterously if he found them.
His frozen lips murmured the answer he had already guessed:
"That thing yesterday."
"Heavenly Father bless you." The prayer was blurted out habitually, and Seaman immediately discovered the bad humor in it. To a certain extent, yesterday's prayer was fulfilled in a weird way.
As the saying goes, everything is answered. The sailors hoped not to see that thing on the horizon again today. Unexpectedly, the cold fog suddenly dropped overnight. Not only could they not see it, but they could not see anything at all.
"last night……"
"Closer." He knew exactly what Seaman was going to ask, so he interrupted the question with a short answer, staring intently into the fog, as if he could penetrate the barrier and see its whereabouts.
An iceberg they had never seen before, or something that looked like an iceberg, was coming towards them in the cold fog of the vast sea of ice that made them unable to see anything.
Seaman touched the water on the edge of the boat and held it horizontally in the air, but did not feel the wind he wanted.
