“I will tell you at once, my friend,—­we were brought to opposite an inhuman swamp on the coast of Siberia, fifty miles or more to the west of North-east Cape; and there what remained of the crew made shift to cast anchor; and for a day and night the ragged ship curtsied to the land, like a blind beggar to an empty street, and we only dozed in our corners and wondered at the silence.

“By-and-by the men made a raft, and that took us all ashore.  There was something like a definite coast-line, then; but for long before we touched it the undersides of the planks were scraping and hissing over vegetation.  This was the winter fur of the land—­thick, coarse tundra moss; and on that we pitched a camp, and on that we remained for long weeks while the ship was mending.  It was a weird, lonely time.  Once or twice strange, wandering creatures came our way—­little, belted men, with hairless faces, who rode up on strong horses, and liked to exhibit their skilful management of them.  They talked to us in their chirpy jargon (Toongus, I think it was called); but jargon it must needs remain to us.

“Well, we made a patch of the hulk, and we shipped in her again.  We were fortunate to be able to do that, for, with every stiffish wind blowing inshore, we had feared she would drag her moorings and ground immovably on the swamps.  The land, indeed, was so flat and low that, whenever the sea rose at all, it threshed the very plains and crackled in the moss; and we were glad, despite the risk, to leave so lifeless a place.”

Dinah paused to light another cigarette, and to inhale the ecstasy of the first puff or so before she continued.  Up through the still evening, from a curve of the main road that crooked an elbow to her front garden, came what sounded like the purring of a great cat—­the wind in the telegraph wires.

“And I am now to tell you,” she said, “about the mastodon?”

“As you please,” I answered.

“I do please; for why should I keep it to myself?  It makes no difference; only I warn you, if you quote me, you will be writ down a fool or a maniac.  This relation lacks witnesses, for the whaler—­that I subsequently quitted for another homing vessel—­was never heard of in port any more.”

She looked at me with some serious scrutiny before she went on.

“For these regions, it had been an extraordinarily hot summer—­phenomenally hot, I understand; and to this—­to the melting and breaking away of the ice from hitherto century-locked fastnesses, the captain attributed the wonderful experience that befell us.  The sea was strewn with blocks and bergs, all hurrying onwards in the strong currents, as if in haste to escape the pursuing demon of frost that should re-fetter them; and their multitude kept the steersman’s arms spinning till the man would fall half-fainting over the spoke-handles.