on which I was sitting.

"I think I told you that you were but a few minutes before me in
this matter," he said. "Well, when I heard that Asbiorn would take
the boat, I knew my chance had come. So I dropped six of your
barley loaves into her as she lay alongside the wharf, and stowed
them aft when I went to bale out the rain water that was in her.
The men were too much taken up with the plunder to mind what I was
about. I think your little water breaker is full also. It is there,
and I tried it."

"Why, then, that will carry us far enough," I said. "You are a
friend in need in all truth."

"I wrought for myself. I am glad that things have turned out thus
in the end. Now do you sleep, if you can. You shall wake when need
is."

He came aft and took the oar from me, and I was glad to lie down on
the floor boards amidships and rest. And the first thing that I
noted was that the Saxon sculled better than myself, and
wonderfully easily. Then I slept heavily for maybe three hours.

Bertric roused me about that time. The wind had come, and the sky
had clouded over, and the boat was slipping fast through the water,
looking eastward indeed, but the wind headed us too closely for
that to be of much use. It was blowing from the worst quarter for
us, the southeast, and freshening. The boat was fit for little but
running, and at this time I waxed anxious as to what was before us,
for any Caithness man has heard tales of fishers who have been