A second idea came to him as he pocketed the gun. Reaching downward he searched for a knife, which should have been in the binocular case of the crow’s-nest. With it he could cut the lines leading to all the sails on the foremast, which ran by the crow’s-nest and up the topmast. The knife was missing!
"I’m beat!" he said. "The _Bear_ will never catch us!"
The _Bear_ had one fact in its favour: the two ships were driving for the Bering Strait. The Strait was less than forty miles from headland to headland, and between the two capes lay the Diomede Islands. It was possible that the _Bear_ would head off the _Pole Star_ before reaching the Arctic Ocean.
Stirling studied the situation with scant hope. The Russians, urged to desperation, had succeeded in getting every turn that was possible from the screw. Steam plumed in the pipe aft of the funnel; the ship throbbed and racked; the clang of doors and the lurid light which streamed from the engine-room companion and the open hatches told of frantic work by the leader who had a firm grip on the revolutionists.
The Diomede Islands rose out of the sea and stood with their rocky walls black against the sun. Far-off Cape Prince of Wales seemed a cloud bank of sombre aspect. Stirling climbed to the top of the crow’s-nest and studied the picture. The fast-flying _Bear_ had held her own. The distance between the two ships was not more than eight miles; this, however, was beyond range of the _Bear’s_ guns.
"A stern chase," he said, with a glance at the horizon ahead. "We’ll make the Arctic."
The _Pole Star_ crashed through light floe ice and sheered abeam of the Diomedes. She headed almost west by the compass, which course would bring her in sight of Herald Island and Wrangel Land.
Heavier ice fields loomed ahead, and Stirling watched them with concern. The Russian wheelsman peered over the barricade and took his orders from the leader; the ship ported and starboarded, then steadied with clumsy steering. The crash of ancient floes against her stem, and the grating as the ice slipped alongside, caused the revolutionists to cry aloud. They swarmed over the forepeak and pointed excitedly.
Stirling glanced aft. The _Bear_ had not been so fortunate in choosing a passage through the ice, and had dropped back in the chase. He acted with sudden inspiration.