Havelok The Dane, Charles Whistler [interesting books to read TXT] 📗

sort of groan. "Put up your weapons, men, for it is no good fighting now."

They did so, growling; and as we neared the longship, her oars took the water, and she flew alongside of us, and a grappling hook flung deftly from her bows caught our after gunwale, and at once she dropped astern, and swung to its chain as to a tow line. We were not so much as bidden to strike sail now, and the Vikings began to crowd forward in order to board us by the stern, as the grappling chain was hove short by their windlass.

"Hold on," my father cried to them "we give up. Where is your chief?"

Now the men were making way for him when a strange thing happened. Out of the after cabin ran Havelok when he heard that word, crying that it was not the part of good warriors to give up while they could wield sword--words that surely he had learned from Gunnar, his father. And after him came his mother, silent, and terrified lest he should be harmed.

Havelok ran up the steps to my father, and the queen followed. I have said that there was a little sea running, and this made the ships jerk and strain at the chain that held them together fiercely, now that it was so short. And even as the queen came to the top step, where there was no rail, for the steps were not amidships, but alongside the gunwale, one of these jerks came; and in a moment she was in the sea, and in a moment also Arngeir was after her, for he was a fine swimmer.

The Vikings cried out as they saw this, but the poor queen said no word, nor did she ever rise again after the first time. It is likely that she was drawn under the longship at once.

So for a little while there was no talk of terms or fighting, but all held their breath as they watched to see if the queen floated alongside anywhere; but there was only Arngeir, who swam under the lee of the Viking, and called to her men for guidance. They threw him a rope's end as he came to the stern, and he clung to it for a little while, hoping to see the flash of a white hood that the queen wore, over the white wave crests: but at last he gave up, and the Vikings hauled him on board, praising him for his swimming, as he had on his mail.

Then the chief turned to my father, and spoke to him across the few fathoms of water that were between the ships.

"We meet again, Grim, as time comes round; and now I have a mind to let you go, though I have that old grudge against you, for I think that your wife is loss enough."

"Not my wife, Arnvid, but a passenger--one whom I would not have lost for all that you can take from me."

"Well, I am glad it is no worse. But it seems that you are in ballast. How comes it that you have no cargo for me, for you owe me one?"

Then my father told him shortly that he had fled from Hodulf; and all those doings were news to the Viking, so that they talked in friendly wise, while the men listened, and the ships crept on together down the wind.

But when all was told, save of the matter of Havelok, and who the lost lady was, the Viking laughed shortly, and said, "Pleasant gossip, Grim, but not business. What will you give us to go away in peace? I do not forget that you all but ran us down just now, and that one or two of us have arrows sticking in us which came from your ship. But that first was a good bit of seamanship, and there is not much harm from the last."

"Well," said my father, "it seems to me that you owe me a ship, for it is certain that I once had that one, and gave her back to you."

The Viking laughed.

"True enough, and therefore I give you back your ship now, and we are quits. But I am coming on board to see what property I can lift."

My father shrugged his shoulders, and turned away, and at once the Vikings hauled on the chain until their dragon head was against our quarter, when the chief and some twenty of his men came on board. The way in which they took off the hatches without staying to question where they should begin told a tale of many a like plundering.

Then, I do not know how it was rightly, for I was aft with my father, there began a quarrel between the Vikings and our men; and though both Grim and the chief tried to stop it, five of our few were slain outright, and three more badly hurt before it was ended. The rest of our crew took refuge on the fore deck, and there bided after that. The whole fray was over in a few minutes, and it seemed that the Vikings half expected somewhat of the sort.

Then they took all the linen and woollen goods, and our spare sails, and all the arms and armour from the men and from the chests to their own ship. Only they left my father and Arngeir their war gear, saying that it were a shame to disarm two brave men.

Then the chief said, "Little cargo have you, friend Grim, and therefore I am the more sure that you have store of money with you. Even flight from Hodulf would not prevent you from taking that wherewith to trade. So I must have it; and it rests with you whether we tear your ship to splinters in hunting for your hiding place or not."

"I suppose there is no help for it, but I will say that the most of what I have is not mine," said my father.

"Why, what matter? When one gives gold into the hands of a seafarer, one has to reckon with such chances as this. You must needs hand it over."

So, as there was naught else to do, Grim brought out the jarl's heavy bag, and gave it to the chief, who whistled to himself as he hefted it.

"Grim," he said, "for half this I would have let you go without sending a man on board. What is this foolishness? You must have known that."

"The gold is not mine," my father answered; "it was my hope that you would have been content with the cargo."

"Well, I have met with an honest man for once," the Viking said; and he called his men, and they cast off and left us.

But we were in no happy plight when he had gone away to the eastward on his old course. Half our men were gone, for the wounded were of no use, and the loss of the queen weighed heavily on us. And before long it began to blow hard from the north, and we had to shorten sail before there was real need, lest it should be too much for us few presently, as it certainly would have been by the time that darkness fell, for the gale strengthened.

Then, added to all this, there was trouble in the cabin under the after deck, for since his mother was lost, Havelok had spoken no word. I had brought him down to my mother from the deck, and had left him with her, hoping that he did not know what had happened; but now he was in a high fever, and sorely ill. Perhaps he would have been so in any case, after the long days of Hodulf's cruelty, but he had borne them well. A child is apt, however, to give up, as it were, suddenly.

So, burdened with trouble, we drove before the gale, and the only pleasant thing was to see how the good ship behaved in it, while at least we were on our course all the time. Therefore, one could not say that there was any danger; and but for these other things, none would have thought much of wind or sea, which were no worse than we had weathered many a time before. We had sea room, and no lee shore to fear, and the ship was stanch, and no sailor can ask for more than that.

CHAPTER V. STORM AND SHIPWRECK.

The gale held without much change through the night, and then with morning shifted a few points to the westward, which was nothing to complain of. The sea rose, and a few rain squalls came up and passed; but they had no weight in them, and did not keep the waves down as a steady fall will. And all day long it was the same, and the ship fled ever before it. There was no thought now of reaching any port we might wish, but least of all did we think of making the Lindsey shore, which lies open to the north and east. When the gale broke, we must find harbour where we could; and indeed; to my father at this time all ports were alike, as refuge from Hodulf. When darkness came again one of the wounded men died, and Havelok was yet ill in the after cabin, so that my mother was most anxious for him. The plunging ship was no place for a sick child.

Now it was not possible for us to tell how far we had run since we had parted from the Viking, and all we knew was that we had no shore to fear with the wind as it was, and therefore nothing but patience was needed. But in the night came a sudden lull in the gale that told of a change at hand, and in half an hour it was blowing harder than ever from the northeast, and setting us down to the English coast fast, for we could do naught but run before such a wind. It thickened up also, and was very dark even until full sunrise, so that one could hardly tell when the sun was above the sea's rim.

I crept from the fore cabin about this time, after trying in vain to sleep, and found the men sheltering under the break of the deck and looking always to leeward. Two of them were at the steering oar with my father, for Arngeir was worn out, and I had left him in the cabin, sleeping heavily in spite of the noise of waves and straining planking. Maybe he would have waked in a moment had that turmoil ceased.

It was of no use trying to speak to the men without shouting in their ears, and getting to windward to do that, moreover, and so I looked round to see if there was any change coming. But all was grey overhead, and a grey wall of rain and flying drift from the wave tops was all round us, blotting out all things that were half a mile from us, if there were anything to be blotted out. It always seems as if there must be somewhat beyond a thickness of any sort at sea. But there was one thing that I did notice, and that was that the sea was no longer grey, as it had been yesterday, but was browner against the cold sky, while the foam of the following wave crests was surely not so white as it had been, and at this I wondered.

Then I crawled aft and went