THE SEVENTH MAN.
In a one-roomed hut, high within the Arctic Circle, and only a little
south of the eightieth parallel, six men were sitting--much as they had
sat, evening after evening, for months. They had a clock, and by it
they divided the hours into day and night. As a matter of fact, it was
always night. But the clock said half-past eight, and they called the
time evening.
The hut was built of logs, with an inner skin of rough match-boarding,
daubed with pitch. It measured seventeen feet by fourteen; but opposite
the door four bunks--two above and two below--took a yard off the
length, and this made the interior exactly square. Each of these bunks
had two doors, with brass latches on the inner side; so that the owner,
if he chose, could shut himself up and go to sleep in a sort of
cupboard. But as a rule, he closed one of them only--that by his feet.
The other swung back, with its brass latch showing. The men kept these
latches in a high state of polish.
Across the angle of the wall, to the left of the door, and behind it
when it opened, three hammocks were slung, one above another. No one
slept in the uppermost.
But the feature of the hut was its fireplace; and this was merely a
square hearth-stone, raised slightly above the floor, in the middle of
the room. Upon it, and upon a growing mountain of soft grey ash, the
fire burned always.
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