The Vinland Champions

For four days the Wind-Raven had drifted blindfold in a fog, and now the fifth day had dawned with no prospect of release and the explorers were hard put to it for amusement. On the after-deck the helmsman had sought comfort in his ale horn; spread over the benches below, the two-score men of the crew were killing time with chess games; and the twenty-odd boys who completed the company had turned the forepart of the ship into a swimming beach around which they sported with the zest of young seals. On the murky waves their yellow heads bobbed like so many oranges.

The forecastle swarmed with them as they chased one another across it, their wet bodies glimmering moth-like in the grayness. And the first two benches were covered with those whom lack of breath had induced to pause and burrow in the heaps of clothing scattered there.

The center of the group of loungers was a brown-haired brown-eyed brown-cheeked boy relating with a grin of appreciation a story of Viking horse-play. The laughter which applauded him ceased only when a lad with a sword approached and set the laughers to dodging thrusts.

"Your noses are as blue as Gudrid's eyes," the newcomer scoffed, sprinkling them with tosses of his dripping red mane. "Rouse up, Alrek of Norway, and have a bout with me to set your blood to moving."

The brown-eyed boy looked around without enthusiasm; and from the others rose a disparaging chorus:

"There are more chances that you will set your own blood to running--" "Hallad once had the same belief in--" "Perhaps the water has blurred the Red-Head's memory so he thinks it was he who won the dwarfs' sword last winter."

The Red-Haired became also the Red-Cheeked; he was overgrown and undisciplined and his temper appeared to be hung as loosely as his limbs. "If you allow him to think," he cried, "that we twenty Greenlanders are afraid to fight him because he was bred in a Viking camp while we are farm-reared, I will challenge him where I stand." He was swelling his chest as if to devote his next breath to defiance, when he was prevented by Alrek of Norway himself.

"I will not fight you, but you may have your way about fencing," the young Viking consented, rising leisurely and laying aside his cloak of soldier scarlet. Emerging from its folds, it could be seen that besides his brownness he was distinguished among his companions for the soldierly erectness with which he bore his broad-shouldered thin-flanked young body, and the compactness of the muscles that played under his burnished skin with the strong grace of a young tiger's.

While he dug up his dwarf-made weapon from the mound of his clothing, the Red One ran up to the forecastle and kicked clear of ropes and garments a space in the center; and the loungers hitched themselves around to face the deck, and joined in elbowing off the swimmers as they came splashing in to see the sport.

Sport it unquestionably was at the beginning, for the camp-bred boy set the tune to a tripping measure that made the graceful blades seem to be kissing each other. Back and forth and up and down they went as in a dance, parry answering thrust so evenly that the ear grew to anticipate the clash and keep time to it as to music. But presently this very forbearance nettled the farm-bred lad so that he broke the rhythm with an unexpected stroke. Passing Alrek's guard, it opened a red wound upon his brown breast. He accepted it with a grimace as good-humored as his fencing, but his opponent was unwise enough to let fly a cry of triumph. Alrek's expression changed. The next time the Greenlander made use of that thrust, his blade was met with a force that jarred his arm to the shoulder. Under the hurt of it, he struck spitefully. Alrek answered in kind. Slowly, the even beat gave way to jerks of short sharp clatter, separated by pauses during which the two worked around each other with squaring mouths and kindling eyes.

With the beginning of the clatter, a short old man called Grimkel One-Eye and a long young man known as Hjalmar Thick-Skull, sitting at chess behind the mast, had put down their pieces to listen. Now, the discord continuing, old Grimkel left his place and strolled forward to the forecastle steps. Spying blood spots on the Greenlander's white shoulders, he made Alrek of Norway a sign of warning. But the Viking boy did not even see him.

Over the spectators such stillness had fallen that the scuffle and slap of the bare feet upon the boards sounded with sickening distinctness. The in-drawn breaths made a hiss when, more swiftly than eye could follow, Alrek's blade described a new curve which the other's sword could not meet. To save himself from being spitted, the Greenlander was forced to leap backward. Leaping, his back came against the gunwale with a crash which told that further retreat would be impossible. From the watchers burst a cry, but no recollection relaxed the terrible intentness of the young Viking's eyes as a second time he drew back his arm to speed that lightning stroke. The Red One's rashness would have been his bane if the old man had not sprung upon the deck and caught Alrek's elbow.

"Do you remember that you are playing?" he growled.

If he needed an answer he had it in the savage force with which the boy tore himself free, and the fierceness with which he whirled, before the meaning of the words came home to him so that he lowered his point.

"You guess well," he muttered. "I had altogether forgotten." Half angrily he turned back to the Greenlander. "Why, in the Fiend's name, did you not remind me?"

Though much blood from his scratches was on the Red One's body and little was in his cheeks, he still tried to swagger. "I am no coward," he proclaimed. But on the last word his voice broke so hysterically that Grimkel thought it the part of kindness to interfere, and did so, his kindness masking as usual under gruff severity.

"You are a fool, which is worse," the old man snapped, pushing him roughly down the steps, while with his head he motioned those below to disperse. "Go put on sense with your clothes. Get dressed, all of you. If you do not do as I tell you, you will feel it." When he had shaken his fist at them once or twice and finally seen himself obeyed, he turned back where Alrek stood drying his weapon on a cloak he had thrown around him. "You! Listen! I have a warning I want to speak to you."

"You would do better to warn the Red-Head against stirring me up again," the young Viking returned, still half angrily; but the One-Eyed heard him as a rock hears a wave-splash.

"Before now, I have reminded you that your father was an outlaw--"

"That you have!" Alrek assented. "Six times have I heard the tale since I touched Greenland, though I lived eight years in the camps without hearing it once! In Norway, men remember only that my father was the bravest of the Earl's Vikings."

"In Iceland, they remember that before he became a Viking he was an outlaw," the old man went on imperturbably, "and so like your father are you in looks that every eye is watching to find his unruliness in you. Now what I would tell you is that if you do not bridle this Viking fierceness, you will ruin yourself with Karlsefne."

The boy uttered a sudden short laugh. "Is it possible that I could get less honor with him?" he jeered; and polished awhile in tight-lipped silence. At last he straightened to meet the other's gaze and his eyes showed fire, while his voice was deep with resentment. "I am Karlsefne's brother's son, but I get less praise from him than his thralls. He notices his dogs more often than he notices me. It is difficult to know what he expects of me. I believe that he hated my father."

Grimkel rubbed his bristly chin upon his palm. "It cannot be said that Karlsefne has a fondness for outlaws. So great is his love for the law that he was called 'the Lawman' before ever the chiefs who came with him on this expedition chose him to be over-chief in Vinland. Yet neither can it be said that he hated his brother. While they were young their love was great toward each other; and when Ingolf, your father, broke the Iceland law, Karlsefne gave half his property to pay the fine. And when Ingolf died, Karlsefne brought you into his following--"

"Where he shows every day that he holds me in dishonor for being his brother's son," Alrek finished.

The old man spat over the gunwale with explosive impatience. "Simpleton! He holds you neither in honor nor dishonor-yet. He but waits to see which you will earn."

Slowly, understanding dawned in the boy's face; turning away he stood kicking at a pile of walrus-hide thongs coiled on the deck before him.

Grimkel concluded his plea earnestly; "You cannot say that this is unfair. It lies with you to take whichever you want. For my part, I believe that you will do him credit in every respect. It is because I believe this, and because I loved your father in the days when he was your height and I taught him spear-throwing, that I speak."

After a while, Alrek said gravely, "I take it as very friendly of you."

He said nothing further, finishing his rubbing in silence and in silence descending the steps, but his advice-giver needed no more than one eye to see that at last he understood the difficulties of his position.

* * *

Meanwhile, something was happening aft. Over his horn the helmsman discovered that a thin place in the fog vail was wearing into a hole, through which could be seen a low coast ending far ahead in a cloud-like hill.

"The Cape of the Crosses!" he broke the news, and the word was caught and tossed along like a ball.

"The Cape of the Crosses! The last point we must touch at!" the men cheered as they hurried to get up sail and put about for the opening door.

And the twenty lads, busy settling beltfuls of knives over tunics of deerskin, plunged into such eager anticipation of the joys of the landing that it was no time at all before they were scuffling with the Red One, whose smarting wounds made him particularly perverse. By the time Alrek had got into his tunic and buckled on the beautiful weapon that gave him his nickname of "the Sword-Bearer," he was obliged to weather a storm of nutshells in order to join the group. It took all the persuasion of the stout comely fellow called Erlend the Amiable to bring them back to peaceful discussion.

"We were talking of going ashore to-morrow and considering about whether there is any good chance that Skraellings may be there now," he explained, when he could make himself heard.

The subject attracted Alrek. Strolling over to the Amiable One's bench, he stretched himself upon it and made his head comfortable on Erlend's gay blue cloak. "Now it had fallen out of my mind," he mused, "that it was here that the inhabitants killed Thorwald Ericsson, when he went up on land and found three boats with three men hiding under each--"

"What is your tongue wagging about?" Ketil the Glib interrupted. "It was not those men that killed him; he killed all of them but one, who escaped in a boat. It was the host which that one brought back that shot arrows into him until-" He was interrupted in his turn by a piece of sail-cloth which the red-haired boy threw over his head.

"Gabbler! He knew that story before you had chipped the shell," the Red One snubbed him. "Go on, Alrek, and say whether you think it is to be expected that we will see any."

The Sword-Bearer shrugged his shoulders. "You should have the best judgment about that, Brand Erlingsson, for you were visiting your brother Rolf at Brattahlid when Thorwald's men brought back the tidings of his death. You know whether or not it is their belief that Skraellings live on the Cape."

The Red One-who, it appeared, answered also to the name of Brand Erlingsson-replied earnestly. He said that Thorwald's men did not believe that the creatures lived there, but that they inhabited the mainland and only visited the Cape for clams or something; that the Cape was no more than a thin land-neck, that ended in a kind of cross-bar composed of a beach connecting two hills; and that it could not possibly have anything of interest on it; whereas, if they could go on to Keel Cape--

But there the shell shower recommenced, amid a protesting chorus; "Do not let him get started-" "End his noise!" "He is always sputtering!" And Strong Domar extinguished the last sputter by a wild whoop as he tossed up his cap in celebration.

"However it stands, our chance for catching some there on a visit is as good as Thorwald's! Luck be with us!" he shouted. Whereupon he tossed up his neighbor's cap-being much given to good-natured jests of the fists-and the jubilee would have been general if it had not suddenly been discovered that Alrek was slowly shaking his head on its blue pillow.

"Why not?" they paused to demand.

When he had taken his full time about chewing and swallowing a mouthful of nuts, he told them; "Because we lack Thorwald's energy at the helm. He went ashore so soon after he cast anchor that the men on the Cape did not have time to get away. We shall remain quiet a whole night after we come to anchor. If it should happen that any Skraellings are there, they would have plenty of light to see us by, and the whole night to escape in. Little danger is there that the Weathercock will break the Lawman's order to keep peace with the inhabitants; but if Karlsefne is to be any better off about news of them, he will find it needful to put a shrewder man at the steering oar."

The celebration died in mid-air; no more chance was there of denying the argument than of remedying the fact. What comfort they could get out of blaming the helmsman, they took; then returned one by one to a gloomy munching of nuts from the store under the benches. In the lull, Brand of Greenland found opportunity to vent the rest of his dissatisfaction.

"Neither will any good come to us out of these trips, while the Weathercock steers!" he burst out, shaking the hair from his bright impatient eyes. "These five months, we have gone ashore only when there was no chance for adventure to result from it; and so have I tired of this trough that I could gnaw the edge of it as a horse gnaws his stall! Sooner than I shall make another voyage under his leadership, I will paddle back to Greenland in a skin-boat!"

The fact that they all agreed with him did not prevent them from jeering through their mouthfuls. Even his loyal younger brother, Olaf the Fair, showed a merry face under his yellow curls.

"You speak too small words! Say that you would build a dragon-ship and have sole power over it," he mocked,-then scrambled discreetly out of reach as Brand turned on him.

"Well-I could!" the Red One defied the universe. "King Half owned a ship and headed a band when he was no more than twelve winters old--"

Jeers cut him short. "King Half! He will liken himself to Olaf Tryggvasson next!" "You great donkey, you!" "No-calf, with the milk of his kinsman's dairy-farm still in him!" cried the unoccupied mouths, while the full ones grinned broadly.

Only Alrek, smiling up at the sky, said whimsically; "Give me leave to travel with you when it is built, champion. I should like to be on a ship that would come and go according to my will. For one thing, I should like to go ashore to-night to see Thorwald Ericsson's grave. The Huntsman told me once, when I laughed at his magic, that if ever I stood beside a grave in the noon of night I should know what fear was. It has long been in my mind to prove him a liar, but no other grave than Thorwald's is in the new land. If we were on your ship now--"

"What is to be said against swimming?" inquired Gard the Ugly, from the bench where he sat weaving fish-nets,-for it was a trace of the thrall blood which was in him, that, although he was free, his great hands were always busy with some service.

"Hallad, Biorn's foster-son, used that expedient once,-and it can not be said that he is of a bold disposition even if he did go with the Huntsman this summer. I am willing to try it. We can slip overboard shortly after it becomes dark, and spend the time before midnight in ranging over the beach,-I would give a ring to get the knots out of my legs! Will you do it?"

Pulling himself up lazily, Alrek sat a while gazing ahead where a second hazy mass, seemingly as far away as the horizon itself, was rapidly pushing out from behind the Cape.

"Why not?" he responded at last. "Only, the swimming part is not to my mind; I find that deerskin dries on me less easily than on deer. Because of what has been told of the shallowness of the harbor, it is unlikely that we shall anchor very near to land; so it is my advice that we take the small boat. We can lower it with little trouble, if there is no moon, while the men are aft drinking their ale."

He rose as he spoke, and Gard leaped up also and clapped him on the back in token that it was a bargain; at which the scoffers quieted into a semblance of interest, and Erlend regarded him with amusement.

"Suppose it does not happen that you get a chance to tell the Huntsman of your experience?" he suggested. "I think it altogether unlikely that he will return from his trip to the south country. Will the entertainment be worth the exertion?"

Alrek gave him a poke between his well-padded ribs. "A man must risk something if he wishes to avoid getting fat," he answered. Whereat the Amiable One came in for his share of gibing; and during it, Gard put his arm through the Sword-Bearer's and drew him forward to look at the land.

The land was worth looking at, certainly, as it revealed itself bit by bit through the mellow haze of the sunset. Skimming toward it in the path of a breeze, it was not long before the sickle-curve of a harbor had drawn out from behind the Cape. Then the inner of the Cape hills looked out from its hiding place beyond the seaward knoll. Next, a streak of white beach unfolded itself between them. Finally the whole began to take on color, gray giving way to grayish green and brown and red, while the cold gleam along the water's edge warmed into faint yellow.

So it lay motionless and soundless in the waning light, the sun fading from it in a drowsy smile, as the helmsman ordered the sail to be lowered and the anchor to be heaved overboard, and the little ship settled into her berth with a groan of satisfaction.

* * *

A means to while away a long evening,-that was how the pair looked upon the trip as they rowed away from the ship's stem while the crew chatted over their ale horns in the torchlight of the stern. Dreamily enjoying the boat's motion and the rhythm of their oars, they swung through the dusk in contented silence; and only once did their thoughts reach the point of speech.

"He is knowing in all kinds of weird matters, your countryman the Huntsman," Alrek said, reminiscently. "Do you remember the time that he was lost in the unsettled places south of here, and, after looking for him far and wide, we found him lying flat upon a rock, mumbling at the sky? He said he was making stanzas to Thor, and that it was an answer when a whale came ashore the next day--"

"If that is the cheer which Thor has to offer, may I never eat at his house!" Gard grunted. "So starved was I that I ate a piece the size of my head, and-excepting the time of my first storm at sea-it has never happened to me before to be so sick! If Thor gives the Huntsman no better help where he is now, it is likely to go hard with him. It is said that the south country is more full of Skraellings than a goat of fleas. He was a headstrong fool to go there with no more than three men and one small boat."

Alrek lifted his shoulders indifferently. "If he never comes back, the sea will be no salter for my tears," he answered; and relapsed into silence which was not broken until their nearness to land obliged him to ask a question about the steering.

If there was a moon, it had stayed sulking somewhere behind something, leaving the world in a dusk which was equally far from light and from darkness. Through the gloom they had been able to steal off with the boat in chuckling security; now its glimmer was still sufficient to guide them to a landing-place upon the pebble-strewn sand, which ran like a shelf around the base of the seaward hill. Beaching their boat they clambered up the slope, tripping more than once over the fist-big stones which studded it, before they entered breathless and laughing into the grove that crowned the crest.

"Who cares about seeing, so long as he can feel earth under him!" Gard cried. And all at once he had dropped upon the leaf-covered ground and was rolling over and over like a horse just freed from a tight girth, while Alrek stretched his cramped muscles in a somersault.

Something in the fragrance of the damp leaf-mold seemed to intoxicate them. Presently, both were whirling on their hands; and from that they went to jumping, and from jumping to wrestling. The shadows had grown a finger's length before they sank down to get their breath.

As the grove was nowhere very thick and the sea gale had winnowed the leaves, they had not looked about them long before they made out the objects which gave the Cape its name,-the two rude crosses of dead bleached wood rising in the center of an open space by the sea. Around it, fanlike pine-boughs swayed heavily, and that was all there was of motion; and the only sound that broke its stillness was the splash of waves on the sand below. Between the Crosses, a low mound rounded black against the gray water. Their hearts gave a little throb as they distinguished it-Thorwald's grave! Amid a chattering throng out in the sunlight, those words had not conveyed much; but here-here they took on meaning. Rising silently, the lads groped their way between the pines until they stood beside it.

Into Gard's voice there came a note of awe. "Thorwald said this cape looked to be a fine place to live in; I wonder how he likes it to be dead here? Strangely still must it seem to him after the battle-din of his life! And strange feelings must have been in his men's minds when they sailed away and left him here, the only white man on this side of the ocean."

"He must have found it lonesome to lie here by himself for four winters," Alrek said very gently. "Surely, if he hears our voices, his heart must welcome the sound. I tell you, Gard, I think I should not be sorry if we found him sitting on his grave when we came back at midnight. If we should tell him that we are his comrades' sons and relate to him all the news, it may well be that he--"

Gard's hand fell on his arm. "Hush!" he entreated. "I do not care what any one says on shipboard, but here-! Suppose he should be listening and take you at your word! Brand says that sooner than go into a witch's den as Leif's Englishman did, he would allow his arm to be hewn off,-and a witch's temper is more to be depended upon than the temper of a dead man. I am not eager to grasp his bony hand, if you are. Let us go down to the beach-But first, I want to find that knife I dropped. Will you feel around that bush-clump where I came down at the last leap, while I look over the slope where I stumbled?"

"Certainly," Alrek consented; and picked his way over the uneven ground to the spot where a clump of sumacs fringed the edge of the hill-crown as it sloped down to the beach. Just before he stooped to feel for the knife, however, he paused to look around.

Seaward, on his left, shone the far-away torches of the ship, a streak of brightness on the gray. Below him stretched the beach, its farther end lost in the looming shadow of a tree-crowned hill-he blinked and leaned forward and blinked again. Out of that shadow, a light had seemed to open on him like an eye! It did not come from the ship; he glanced over his shoulder to reassure himself. It came from the hill across the beach, a dim unwinking eye which up to this time some obstacle had hidden.

For an instant he thought of ghost-fires, and cold trickled down his spine; then came a recollection that smote every nerve like a cry,-the Skraellings! Some had been trapped and had not yet escaped, and it was going to fall to him to get sight of them! To succeed where all the rest had failed! To be the one to give Karlsefne the information he wanted! What wonder that all recollection of the knife-even of Gard-was wiped off his brain like breath-mist off a shield; that he was obliged to press his nails deep into his flesh to get a grip on his excitement!

"I shall wreck the chance if I go about it hotly," he admonished himself. "It was Karlsefne's strong command that we do nothing to offend them. I must steer it so that I see them without their seeing me,-and it is unadvisable to be too slow in acting, either, or they will have made their escape!" He put his body in motion even while his mind was debating, but it did not render him less cautious. He did not let a finger of him stray beyond the shadow of the pines, nor did he venture upon the beach until he saw his way clear before him.

The only objects that offered shelter were the low hummocks, crested with tufts of wiry grass, that stretched in a broken chain between the heights. From link to link of this he crawled, unobtrusive as a serpent; and when the links were wanting and gaps of glimmering sand lay before him, he ran crouching with the light swiftness of a fox, holding his breath in expectation of arrows hissing about his ears. None came, however, and at last the shadow of the second knoll and its spreading tree-crown fell over him like a canopy. There he paused to listen.

Once, an owl wailed tremulously from a distant tree; and once, it seemed to him that he heard brush crackle as under a stealthy tread; then all was silence and the swish of breaking waves. Laying hold of a gnarled root that reached down like a writhen arm, he drew himself noiselessly up the slope. Where it flattened to the crest, a clump of sassafras shoots made a fragrant screen. When he had listened and found the quiet still unbroken, he ventured to peer between the sprouts.

So long did he remain there without moving that the insects he had startled began walking over him in restored confidence. The little nook was empty. Except the patch of embers and a litter of clam shells, there was no sign to prove that living things had ever been there. As a final test, he hung his helmet upon his sword and showed it cautiously above the bushes, and the decoy drew no arrows from the thicket beyond the fire; the spot appeared to be genuinely deserted.

It is not too much to say that his disappointment brought him near to tears. "They must have run away as soon as darkness fell," he muttered. And pushing into the open, he sent the shells flying before a savage kick. "What Troll's luck!"

As the words left his lips, the flying shells uncovered a peculiar bowl-shaped basket woven of reeds. He stooped to it curiously; then, even as his fingers closed on the rim, he took another step forward, staring at the bushes that hedged the further side of the open space.

"It appears that some one has plunged through here in a hurry," he told himself. "The branches are bent as if-Odin!"

There was no need of finishing his thought. His eyes had the answer before them, a shaggy figure crouching among the bushes, so motionless that it might have passed for one of them. An instant he also stood motionless, staring back at the eyes that he could feel without seeing; then Viking training flashed two thoughts to his brain,-that the creature was aiming at him from the darkness, and that he must lose no time in advancing. Clutching his sword-hilt, he sprang forward.

After that there was no chance for reflection. For a second the blade stuck; and in the delay a copper-colored arm shot out and fastened on his wrist, while the other copper-colored arm brandished a stone hatchet over his head. With his left hand he caught that arm and held it off; and they swayed, panting, in the firelight that gave him his first glimpse of the foe all sailors yarned about,-the bristling black hair and wide-rimmed beast-bright eyes, and the skin of unearthly hue showing under the animal hides of the covering. Under the copper-colored skin, the muscles were like copper wire. Strong as he was, Alrek could not twist aside that wrist above his head. He gave up trying, presently, and limited his efforts to freeing his sword-arm. Putting all his force into the wrench, he succeeded at last in loosing it and shooting forth his weapon-and that was all that he had to do! At the bare sight of it, darting glittering from its sheath like lightning from a cloud, the Skraelling uttered a yell of terror, dropped the hatchet from his hand and his hands from their hold, and flung himself backward into the darkness. There was a crackling of brush, the spat of bare feet upon sand, and then-silence.

Gradually the Sword-Bearer's amazement gave way to amusement. "He thought it was magic,-here is a joke of the Fates!" he breathed. "If Thorwald had but shown them steel, it is likely that he could have put the whole host to flight! Never could I have wrested the hatchet from him. Now it is likely that my kinswoman Gudrid will open her eyes when I show her this!" Bending over the embers, he examined the weapon with deep interest; the edge was knife-sharp. "It would have cleft me as if it cut cheese!" he muttered; and was laughing in somewhat unsteady congratulation when the sound of feet scrambling up the slope straightened him to greet Gard.

For a space the Ugly One stared about him, blinking in the firelight; then the eagerness of his swarthy face gave way to bitterest reproach.

"You scared them away before I had a chance to see them?" he cried. "Slipped away, because my back was turned, and got all the sport for yourself? Never would I have believed it of you! Never--"

Alrek threw up his hands in honest compunction. "Gard, I beg of you to forgive me! It is the truth that when I saw the light, I forgot that you were alive. And I feared the Skraellings would get away before I could see them. I intended only to creep up and look, without-" He broke off and stood with his mouth open, staring at the other.

Involuntarily, Gard whirled to dart a glance over his shoulder; and finding nothing, cried out, sharply; "What ails you? Have you got out of your wits?"

Alrek regained his self-control with a short laugh. "I think I have," he answered. "Do you know another thing besides yourself that I forgot? I forgot Karlsefne's command to keep the peace."

* * *