"That's our fish," he had chortled as the wounded leviathan leaped high against the sky and spouted blood over the ice. Now when it seemed possible that the mate would be forced to cut loose from the whale to save his boat from destruction, the captain danced about on his crutches in wild excitement. "Don't cut that line! Don't cut that line!" he yelled. Mr. Winchester realized as well as the captain that there was something like $10,000 on the other end of the rope, and he had no idea of cutting loose. Towed by the whale the boat drove toward the ice. The mate worked hard with his steering oar to avoid striking the block. It was impossible. The bow smashed into one end of the ice cake, was lifted out of the water and dragged across to slip back into the sea. A hole was stove in the starboard bow through which the water rushed. The crew thereafter was kept busy bailing. It was evident from the fountains of blood that the whale was desperately wounded, but its vitality was marvelous and it seemed it might escape. When Mr. Landers saw the mate's line being played out so rapidly he should have hurried to the mate's boat and bent the line from his own tub to the end of the mate's line. As an old whaleman Mr. Landers knew what to do in this crisis, but in such ice and in such high seas he preferred not to take a chance. He was a cautious soul, so he held his boat aloof. The mate waved to him frantically. Long John and Gabriel wigwagged frenzied messages with waving arms. As for Captain Shorey on his crutches on the forecastle head, when it seemed certain that the whale would run away with all the mate's line and escape, he apparently suffered temporary aberration. He damned old man Landers in every picturesque and fervent term of an old whaleman's vocabulary. He shook his fist at him. He waved a crutch wildly. "Catch that whale!" he yelled in a voice husky and broken with emotion. "For God's sake, catch that whale!" All this dynamic pantomime perhaps had its effect on Landers. At any rate, his men began to bend to their sweeps and soon his boat was alongside that of the mate. His line was tied to the free end of the rope in the mate's almost exhausted tub just in time. The mate's line ran out and Landers' boat now became fast to the whale. Fortune favored Landers. His boat was dragged over the crests of the seas at thrilling speed, but he managed to keep clear of ice. The whale showed no sign of slowing down. In a little while it had carried away all the line in Mr. Landers' tub. The monster was free of the boats at last. It had ceased to come to the surface to blow. It had gone down into the deep waters carrying with it the mate's harpoon and 800 fathoms of manila rope. It seemed probable it had reached the safety of the ice pack and was lost.