CHAPTER XII

Fortunately there was a good deal of broken timber thrown up at
"high-water" mark, and with a stack of this at the mouth of the little
cave a pleasant fire was soon made by help of a flint pebble and the
steel back of my sword. It was a hearty blaze and lit up all the near
cliffs with a ruddy jumping glow which gave their occupants a marvellous
appearance of life. The heat also brought off the dull rime upon the
side of my recess, leaving it clear as polished glass, and I was a little
startled to see, only an inch or so back in the ice and standing as erect
as ever he had been in life, the figure of an imposing grey clad man.
His arms were folded, his chin dropped upon his chest, his robes of
the finest stuff, the very flowers they had decked his head with frozen
with immortality, and under them, round his crisp and iron-grey hair,
a simple band of gold with strange runes and figures engraved upon it.

There was something very simple yet stately about him, though his face was
hidden and as I gazed long and intently the idea got hold of me that he
had been a king over an undegenerate Martian race, and had stood waiting
for the Dawn a very, very long time.

I wished a little that he had not been quite so near the glassy surface
of the ice down which the warmth was bringing quick moisture drops.
Had he been back there in the blue depths where others were sitting and
crouching it would have been much more comfortable. But I was a sailor,
and misfortune makes strange companions, so I piled up the fire again,