There were ten industrial-size batteries — each the size of a small suitcase. The propeller had come from a fancy yacht that had been damaged in a storm years before. The air-compressors were installed independently — each operating as a backup to the other in case of failure. Ziegfried was still...
In the middle of morning Anna sent Nicola and me up the steps of the lighthouse with a cup of coffee and a plate of cookies for Arturo. My legs were beginning to get sore as I lagged behind Nicola on the way up. When we entered the room at the top, Arturo made a big fuss over us, as if he hadn’t ...
He must have smelled the food. Two-feathers knew he was like a squawking bird carrying a basket of freshly roasted meat on his back. But the smell of the soldier was also distinct and Two-feathers smelled him even before he heard him. He circled around one of the rooms then followed him upstairs....
I should have seen it coming, but didn’t. It wasn’t that we didn’t have any food at all—we still had oats, potatoes, salt, sugar, spices, and tea—but we had run out of powdered milk, the potatoes had roots in them, and we had to eat porridge, without milk, three times a day. It was my own fault b...
He was unconscious. I was afraid to touch him because I didn’t know how badly beaten he was, and didn’t want to make it worse. I knew that if a person has an injury to the spine, they have to be moved very carefully. I bent down close and put my fingers near his mouth. He was still breathing. I f...
We slipped in behind the freighter and stayed in her wake the whole way. I felt like a camel driver. Staying awake on a camel all day is a hard job. I learned that a year ago when we visited North Africa. So is following a freighter up a river. I made lots of tea, kept the radio on, and, after da...
It wasn’t a lesson wasted on me. I was so happy to learn Radji’s name. It amazed me what a difference it made knowing a person’s name. No wonder we all had names. It wasn’t just so that we could tell each other apart; a name gave someone an identity, a whole personality. I...
Bell, Mr. Baldwin, Mr. McCurdy and I walked together down the lane toward the laboratory. Mr. Baldwin and Mr. McCurdy were a lot younger than Mr. Bell, and I could tell they wanted to go faster, but they walked at Mr. Bell’s pace. Mr. Bell smoked his pipe as we went, and he seemed to be in deep t...
It echoed across the sky like thunder. There was a crack in the ice. I jumped to my feet and climbed the portal. In the distance I saw a dark spot. I grabbed the binoculars, strapped on the harness and stood tall on the hatch. About a mile away I saw an icebreaker clearing a path for a tanker. Sh...