Chapter 19: Westward Ho!

Fate meant that they should live, those two lone wanderers on the face of the great desolation; and, though night had gathered now and all was cloaked in gloom, they landed with no worse than a hard shake-up on a level strip of beach that edged the confines of the unknown lake.

Exhausted by the strain and the long fight with death, chilled by that sojourn in the upper air, drenched and stiffened and half dead, they had no strength to make a camp.

The most that they could do was drag themselves down to the water’s edge and--finding the water fresh, not salt--drink deeply from hollowed palms. Then, too worn-out even to eat, they crawled under the shelter of the biplane’s ample wings, and dropped instantly into the long and dreamless sleep of utter weariness.

Mid-morning found them, still lame and stiff but rested, cooking breakfast over a cheery fire on the beach near the machine. Save for here and there a tree that had blown down in the forest, some dead branches scattered on the sands, and a few washed-out places where the torrent of yesterday’s rain had gullied the earth, nature once more seemed fair and calm.

The full force of the terrific wind-storm had probably passed to northward; this land where they now found themselves--whatever it might be--had doubtless borne only a small part of the attack. But even so, and even through the sky gleamed clear and blue and sunlit once again, Stern and the girl knew the hurricane had been no ordinary tempest.

“It must have been a cyclone, nothing less,” judged the engineer, as he finished his meal and reached for his comforting pipe. “And God knows where it’s driven us to! So far as judging distances goes, in a hurricane like that it’s impossible. This may be any one of the Great Lakes; and, again, it may not. For all we know, we may be up in the Hudson Bay region somewhere. This may be Winnipeg, Athabasca, or Great Slave. With the kind of storms that happen nowadays, anything’s possible.”

“Nothing matters, after all,” the girl assured him, “except that we’re alive and unhurt; and the machine can still travel, for--”

“Travel!” cried Stern. “With about a quart of fuel or less! How far, I’d like to know?”

“That’s so; I never thought of that!” the girl replied, dismayed. “Oh, dear, what shall we do now?”

Stern laughed.

“Hunt for a town, of course,” he reassured her. “There, there, don’t worry! If we find alcohol, we’re all right, anyhow. If not, we’re better off than we were after the maelstrom almost got us, at any rate. Then we had no arms, ammunition, tools, or means to make fire, while now we’ve got them all. Forgive my speaking as I did, little girl. Don’t worry--everything will come right in the end.”

Reassured, she sat before the fire, and for an hour or more they drew maps and diagrams in the sand, made plans, and laid out their next step in this long campaign against the savage power of a deserted world.

At last, their minds made up, they wheeled the plane back to the forest, where Stern cut out among the trees a space for its protection. And, leaving it here, covered with branches of the thick-topped fern-tree, they took provisions and once more set out on their exploration.

But this time they had an ax and their two rifles, and as they strode northward along the shore they felt a match for any peril.

An hour’s walk brought them to the ruins of a steel recreation-pier, with numerous traces of a town along the lake behind it.

“That settles the Hudson Bay theory,” Stern rejoiced, as they wandered among the debris. “This is certainly one of the Great Lakes, though which one, of course, we can’t tell as yet. And now if we can round up some alcohol we’ll be on our way before very long.”

They found no alcohol, for the only ruin where drugs or liquors had evidently been sold had caved in, a mass of shattered brickwork, smashing every bottle in the place. Stern found many splintered shards of glass; but that was all, so far as fuel was concerned. He discovered something else, however, that proved of tremendous value--the wreck of a printing-office.

Presses and iron of all kind had gone to pieces, but some of the larger lead types and quads still were recognizable. And, the crucial thing, he turned up a jagged bit of stereotype-sheet from under the protection of a concrete plinth that had fallen into the cellar.

All corroded and discolored though it was, he still could make out a few letters.

“A newspaper head, so help me!” he exclaimed, as with a trembling finger he pointed the letters out to Beatrice: “Here’s an ‘H’--here’s ‘mbur’--here’s ‘aily, ‘ and ‘ronicl’! Eh, what? ‘Chronicle, ‘ it must have been! By Jove, you’re right! And the whole thing used to spell ‘Hamburg Daily Chronicle, ‘ or I’m a liar!”

He thought a moment--thought hard--then burst out:

“Hamburg, eh? Hamburg, by a big lake? Well, the only Hamburg by a lake that I know of used to be Hamburg, New York. I ought to remember. I drew the plans for the New York Central bridge, just north of here, over the Spring Creek ravine.

“Yes, sir, this certainly is Hamburg, New York. And this lake must be Erie. Now, if I’m correct, just back up there on that hill we’ll find the remains of the railway cut, and less than ten miles north of here lies all that’s left of Buffalo. Some luck, eh? Cast away, only fifteen miles or so from a place like that. And we might have gone to Great Bear Lake, or to--h-m!--to any other place, for all the cyclone cared.

“Well, come on now, let’s see if the railway cut is still there, and my old bridge; and if so, it’s Buffalo for ours!”

It was all as he had said. The right-of-way of the railroad still showed distinctly, in spite of the fact that ties and rails had long since vanished. Of the bridge nothing was left but some rusted steel stringers lying entangled about the disintegrated concrete piers. But Stern viewed them with a melancholy pride and interest--his own handiwork in the very long ago.

They had no time, however, for retrospection; but, once more taking the shore, kept steadily northward. And before noon they reached the debris of Buffalo, stark and deserted by the lake where once its busy commerce and its noisy life had thronged. By four o’clock that afternoon they had collected fuel enough for the plane to do that distance on, and more. Late that night they were again back at the spot where they had landed the night before.