Then they turned and stared down at the wide field of floating ice that was attached to the towering bulk of the mighty berg, as though weighing the possibility of Tom’s amazing suggestion in their minds.

Jack gave a shout.

“Tom, you’re a genius, that’s what you are!” he almost shrieked in the intensity of his emotion.  “I honestly believe it can be done successfully.”

“We’d have to drop a whole lot lower, so as to take a closer survey, and learn just how smooth the surface of the floe is,” Tom continued.

“I’ve looked through the glasses,” replied Jack.  “And as far as I could make out it seemed fairly decent.  I know we’ve landed on worse ground many a time, and without being wrecked.”

“Look again then, while I’m dropping down,” urged Tom.

All of them were tremendously excited, as may readily be believed.  And who would not have been under similar conditions?  Although army air pilots are accustomed to taking great risks, and seldom go up without the thought flitting through their minds that their hour may be close at hand, still they are human, and when the dreadful crisis springs upon them they can feel the chilly hand that seems to clutch the heart.

Jack soon made his report.

“Yes, it looks good to me!” he cried, with a hopeful ring to his voice.  “I can see a crack or two that would be bad for us to run into; but there’s a clear field over on the north side of the floe.  I’m sure we could make it without getting badly shaken up.  Then it’s our only chance; if we miss this what else could we do?”

“Nothing,” Tom replied quietly.  “But I’m going to circle the berg, and see what lies on the other side.”

“Whatever we decide to do,” remarked Beverly, who seemed to have recovered to a great extent from his first perturbation, “we must lose no time about carrying it out.  That feed pipe might become fully clogged at any minute, you know.  Then besides, the sun is ready to dip down behind the sea horizon, when we’ll soon be plunged into darkness.”

“Yes,” agreed Tom, “we mustn’t fool away our time.  It’s going to be no easy job to make a safe landing on the ice, something none of us has ever practiced.  But it’d be still worse to go at it haphazard.”

The others knew what was in Tom’s mind.  Should they seriously injure the big bombing plane there would be no way of making repairs.  On land it could be turned over to the repair-shop, and inside of a week perhaps emerge once more in as good shape as ever.  No such convenience could be looked for out there in mid-Atlantic!

In a short time they had circled the great mass of ice.  They all fully realized now how cold it was, and why the sea water must be affected for a mile or more all around such a tremendous bit of the Arctic regions.

They found that most of the floe lay on the north side of the berg; and decided that their best chance for landing must be in that quarter.