It made him cough.

And then he laughed again, scanning the narrowing sweep of the lake ahead of him.
He felt like a boy, and he chuckled as he thought of the definite reason for it.

For twenty-three months he had been like a piece of rubber stretched to a tension--sometimes almost to the snapping point.
Now had come the reaction, and he was going HOME.

Home! It was that one word that caused a shadow to flit over his face, and only once or twice had he forgotten and let it slip between his lips.

At least he was returning to civilization--getting AWAY from the everlasting drone of breaking ice and the clack-clack tongue of the Eskimo.
With the stub of a pencil Philip had figured out on a bit of paper about where he was that morning.