"Certainly; do you not see that the light is only just fading from the
mountain tops? so it can be but a little past noon. The only difficulty
is that the ice may not be in a condition for us to cross the fiord. A
warm land-wind has been blowing for three days; and even in the North,
where the seal-hunters go, the ice often breaks up under them. But now
allow me to get my bearings. That is the smoke from Brattahlid, behind
us; and yonder I see the roofs of Eric's ship-sheds. Here,--we will go
in this direction until we come to a high point of the bank."

Across the white plain that stretched in that direction, they skimmed
accordingly. Once they came upon a herd of Eric's reindeer, rooting
under the snow for moss; but aside from that, they saw no living thing.
Low-hanging gray clouds seemed to have shut out the world. Now and then,
from far out in the open water came the grinding and crunching of huge
ice-cakes, see-sawing past each other. Once there sounded the
reverberating thunder of two icebergs in a duel.

"If there were any bears on that ice, they have found by this time that
there can be even worse things than men with spears," Sigurd observed,
as he listened.

It is doubtful whether Alwin had heard the noise at all. He answered,
absently: "Yes,--and if we do not wish to come to the subject at once,
we can say that we are cold and dropped in to warm ourselves."

"To say that we are cold will always be truthfully spoken," Sigurd
assented, his teeth chattering like beads. "I do not believe that
Stark-Otter was much chillier when he pulled off his clothes and sat in
a snow-bank."