Chapter IV: Part 4

I was very weak; now they brought me meat and strong, flame-coloured water to drink; and the meat did me much good, but the flame-coloured water sent me to sleep under one of the forward benches, out of the arrows' flight. And when I waked a new dawn was breaking, and I heard the shouting of men outside the ship, the shouting of men in the language of those countries; and I lifted my sick head and gazed at them, but they curved and numbered and unnumbered themselves, till at last I heard in my brain a twanging of bows, and looking upward to the fore-deck, I saw our few men gathered there, crouching, and sending their arrows fast. The sea had not gone down, but the wind did not whistle, and in the west the clouds looked like heavy rain and thunder. As the mist that is over the sea-beach in those countries in the morning cleared off, I looked again, and I found that the men who disputed with us from the beach were few, they being but six knights in half-armour. Now, lying and watching, for I felt that I could do nothing till the world was level again, I saw the fifteen of our men jump from the fore-deck at a word from the oar-captain, and thrusting the long oars over the sides, strain on them in the sand as each wave came in, and as they strained upon them the ship would lift and glide out more, and faster; till at last we were quite afloat and the great waves took us, and turned us about, like a piece of bark. Then the men fell into their places and we headed the white seas, the half-armed men on the beach riding knee-high on their horses into the foam, and calling curses at us. So, after weary rowing, and every man of us wet as the sea, we came out of that bay and rode the great smooth waves that had been white the day before.

Well, we kept far from the land, only seeing, one dusk, a white cliff on our right from a distance; then the gale took us again and drove us westward and then northward, till the men would throw down their oars and cry out to the gods of the sea, to say which one of them should be sacrificed to their hate.

We were half mad with the drink we had in the ship--for we had no beer--and as we lurched and swayed in the depth between two seas, or as we climbed up sideways and balanced for a moment while the foam flew and then surged down with sick motion, the men would trail their oars on the water and sink their heads on the handles. So, for many days we were driven as the wizards drive the storm-ships across the face of the icy moon, as the waves kiss her wet sides and the clouds break over her. So northward we went, till the cold struck into our bones and we ate fried fat like the savages of Finland; and we passed great ice-fields sometimes, at night, when the moon shone on them for miles and gave them smoothness which the sun took all away again, and made them grey and rugged and small.

Still we went north; our water was almost gone and we had only the devil's drinks, and the wet bread and fish. Now, when we passed the ice-fields the oar-captain would order us to fasten to them, and we would bring into the ship great chunks of ice and melt them in the cauldron by the mast-foot. But there came a time when for three days we saw no ice and the men's tongues were stiff for thirst. Their eyes looked cruel and sad. Thus, one night, as I lay at my place under the forward seat, wrapped in a bear-skin, I saw the black figure of a man on the rail at the other side of the ship. He crept to where the rail ends in the lift of the fore-deck. Then, dropping to the bench under which I lay, he crawled to the cauldron where a little water was left, and putting in his hand he broke off, little by little, pieces, until I could see by the long time that his hand rested in the cauldron that there was no more there. Then I reached out and grasped him by the leg and pulling him off the bench I rolled myself about him and called out for the oar-captain. The oar-captain came and all the men came after and they lit a light, and I lay off him, and we saw his face; and the oar-captain said--and to every man it seemed just--

"You have stolen the last of our water, more than your share, therefore you shall go to join your comrades under the sea; when you are ready."

The man drew himself up and walked the length of the ship stepping from bench to bench, we all following, our feet making a clatter as we went. He came to the upper-deck and climbed up, and went to the rail and stood there and looked on the moveless sea under the moonlight.

"Are you ready?" asked the oar-captain.

"Get out your oars," answered the man.

Some half of the men went to their places and shoved the oars out.

"When I go, row!" he said, in a loud voice.

Then, climbing across the bulwark, he stood at the edge a moment his hands on his hips, then suddenly he raised his clenched fists in the air, and in perfect silence met the sea. As we rowed away, we could see his dark head in the moonlight as he swam, and until we had shifted the position of the ship many times we could not lose it, as the men rowed on, the oars creaking, and the indifferent moonlight silvering their slow dips.

* * * * *

We are bound in by the ice, and the ship lies high in the bow, white, like a lord's tomb in the snow. It has been snowing all day, and the oar-captain makes us tramp one after the other round the half-buried ship till we can walk no more, when we sleep in the skins under the fore-deck till a comrade shakes us, and we groan and rouse and walk again. The dull sky has turned to the colour of ashes. Sometimes the air lifts for a moment into a slight wind that sends the frost-lace scurrying over the ice-blocks, and then falls still again. Our feet leave great tracks; we can hardly see through the white drift, we are silent in the wonderful white feathers ... and the silence!

Lars puffs near me, swinging his arms. The Icelander is staring out into the storm, with his hands thrust into his belt. When at last we rest in our furs, we are huddled, leaning, against one another for warmth. We cannot see the sunset; only a dying-out of the pale half-light of the snow-drift. The men grow superstitious, and begin to talk of robbing churches, and making no restitution to the widows of killed men; and they mutter about old days--talking crossly of things we have long forgotten.

On the third night, Kai, a good man, died; on the fourth night three other men, on the fifth night, none; on the sixth day we had eaten the last of our fish, and Rudolf of Schleswig went out into the mist with his cross-bow to see if he could find anything. So, we lost him, for though he was a very strong man he never came back. It was on this same day that one of the men, Hans, a man from the south countries, little liked, went mad, and became a child again, till he wandered off and I think killed himself by a fall from a great ice-block, for we saw his black figure there, and then we heard a sound as of something striking on the ice; then more men died, I do not know, until old Ole, the oar-captain, and I only were left strong. The rest ate snow and wandered off cursing the sacking of churches or prattling nonsense of house affairs; sometimes they would come back, but I do not know if I spoke to them, for they were very dim.

It was some time in the light, when, after sitting against the side of the ship for a few moments I got up to walk again, that I saw come hopping toward me over the snow a white rabbit with white eyes.

He hops almost to my feet and then jumps into the ship; then comes a snow-ball rolling itself, of the height of a small man, and when it comes just before me it breaks into smoke and I cannot see through the smoke for a moment.

Music--light music, daintily, faintly playing.... It comes from far away ... it is just over my head ... then it tinkles, trills, breaks, and jingles, and falls down into the inside of my head making darkness. Now comes a long waste of clouds over the snow-fields, and the ship seems to rise to them as they billow under her bows.

They come, innumerable long fat white clouds; clouds of no shape; clouds that I hate.

I awake; I am leaning against the side of the ship; I stagger; we are tramping on the old path. A fine snow sifts down into my neck; my skin is so hot and my bones are so cold. There is no sky, only something that moves above there. Then, as I turn to the stern of the ship, I seem to hear in the distance the sound of great drinking, and the echoing of the warm beer-tankards as they strike in the air, and there comes a small and weak voice beyond me neither above nor below:

"I am Odin, the thunder-holder, and I speak to you greeting, thus, passing on."

And again the voice comes as I lean against the ship with my arms outspread.

"I am Thor, of the hammer; hail to you, man, passing on."

The sounds of the mirth of the gods die down. Then a voice speaks deeply, with no ringing in it as was in the voice of Thor, and I do not understand. The snow comes driving into my eyes, and the ship seems to lean toward me, and then away again, then all is still.

The snow comes into my eyes again, and I hear faint music as of churches and sweet voices singing, and it seems to me when I can see again that there are dim ships before me; ships whose names only I have learnt from scanty books no more; and all those gods come dancing toward me; then the music breaks, and there is great cracking of the ice, and I fall down. There is no voice of Christian God, for I have sacked his churches. The snow is in my eyes, and I am mad. I lean my head against the ship. There is no warmth, and I am afraid, alone.

THE END.

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TRANSCRIBER'S NOTES

The spelling of four names has been simplified in order for the file to be encoded in ASCII. The names are:

Foen--original has a macron over 'o'
Ole--original has a macron over 'e'
Snore--original has a macron over 'e'
Uffe--original has a macron over 'e'

End of Project Gutenberg's The Sentimental Vikings, by Richard Voorhees Risley