Part 14 (2/2)

Still, I was not yet out of the trouble. Thorgils had gone to some place that I knew nothing of, and I had yet to learn if there was any hope from Evan's sh.o.r.e going, which might make things easier or might not. I could hear no one moving about the s.h.i.+p, so I pushed the door open for an inch or two, and looked out into the moonlight, with my drawn sword ready in my hand.

We were in a strange place. The s.h.i.+p's bows were landward, so that as I looked aft I could see that we lay just inside the mouth of a little cove, whose guarding cliffs towered on either side of the water for not less than ten-score feet above the fringe of breakers, falling sheer to the water with hardly so much as a jutting rock at their feet. There was no sign of house or man at the hilltop, so that it was plain that we were not at Tenby.

Then I was able to see that we were alongside a sort of landing place that was partly natural and partly hewn and smoothed from the living rock into a sort of wharf at the foot of the cliff. From this landing place a steep road, hewn with untold labour at some ancient day, slanted sharply upward and toward the head of the cove along the face of the rocks, which were somewhat less steep on this side than across the water. I could not see the top of this road, but no doubt it was that along which Thorgils and the princess had gone, and no doubt also Evan thought to carry me up it before long.

I had a hope that my friend would return too soon for that, but it was a slender one. It was plain that he had gone too far for me to call to him. Yet could I win clear of the s.h.i.+p I might find or fight my way up after him, and that seemed easy with only these three Welshmen against me, and they expecting no attack.

I looked for the two who were left if I slew Evan. One sat under the weather gunwale, wrapped in a great cloak, and seemed to be sleeping. The other was not far off on the landing place, watching Evan, who was speaking with a dozen men at the foot of the rock-hewn road. I suppose that the coming in of the s.h.i.+p had drawn idlers from the camp I had heard of to see her, for they all had arms of some sort.

This was bad, for it seemed certain that the whole crowd would join with Evan in falling on me if he called on them. If I came forth now I had full twenty yards to cover before I reached them from the s.h.i.+p's side after I had settled with the men on watch. In that s.p.a.ce all would be ready for me, and they were too many for me to cut through to the roadway. I thought too that I heard the voices of more who came downward toward the s.h.i.+p, though I could not see them whence I was.

Then it came into my mind that if there was any place where I could hide myself on deck I would try to creep to it while none had their eyes on the s.h.i.+p. Then Evan, as he went to the cabin to seek me, would have to deal with me from the rear. But that I soon saw was hopeless. The deck was clear of lumber big enough to shelter me, and the moonlight was almost as bright as day on everything, and all the clearer for the snow that covered all the land. So I began to turn over many other plans in my mind, and at last it seemed that the only thing was to wait in the cabin for the best chance that offered. Most likely Evan would do even as he had said, and try and get away at once, with all he could lay hands on. If so, I thought it would be certain that in his hurry he would bring all these men on board in order to get his goods, and maybe those belonging to Thorgils also, out and away with all haste, and so I could cut through them with a rush that must take them unawares, and so win to the camp with none to hinder me. There might be sentries who would stay me, but I should be within calling distance of my friend. Moreover, a sentry would see that I was some sort of a leader of men, and might help me. So I began to wish for Evan to act, for my fingers itched to get one downward blow at him.

I had not long to wait. He finished his talk with the men, and they all came to the s.h.i.+p, even as I had hoped. But only half of them came on board, leaving the rest alongside on the rock so that they might help the goods over the side. That was not all that I could have wished, but I thought that I might get through them in the surprise that was waiting for them. So I drew my sword, and for want of s.h.i.+eld wrapped the blanket from the floor round my left arm, and stood by for the rush.

Evan walked in a leisurely way toward the door, talking to one of the newcomers as he came. The rest straggled behind him.

”I wonder how my sick man fares now,” he said, and set his hand to the latch.

Then he opened the door and I shouted and sprung forth, aiming a blow at him as I came. But I was not clear of the low deck, and my sword smote the beam overhead so that I missed him, and he threw himself on the deck out of reach of a second blow, howling. I was sorry, but I could not stop, for I had to win to the sh.o.r.e and to the road yet.

The other men shrank from me, and I went through them easily, and so reached the sh.o.r.eward gunwale. There I was stayed, for Evan had never ceased to cry to his fellows to stop me, and there was a row of ready swords waiting for me. And there were more men coming down the path, Welshmen as I could see by their arms, and by their white tunics which glimmered in the moonlight. So that was closed to me, and it seemed that here I must fight my last fight.

Then as I could not go over the side I went to the high stern and leapt on it, half hoping that the men on sh.o.r.e might not be quick enough to stay me from a leap thence, but they were there alongside before me. Evan was up now, and cheering on the men on deck to attack me, but not seeming to care to lead them. They gathered together and came aft to me slowly, planning, as it would seem, how best to attack me, for the steering deck on which I was raised me four feet or so above them. The men on sh.o.r.e could not reach me at all unless I got too near the gunwale, when some of them who had spears might easily end me.

Something alongside the s.h.i.+p caught my eyes, and I glanced at it with a thought that here might be fresh foes. But it was only the little boat that belonged to the s.h.i.+p. The wind had caught her, and was drifting her at the length of her painter as if she wanted to cross the cove to its far side. Perhaps the men saw that my eyes were not on them for that moment, for they made a rush from the deck to climb the steering platform.

Then I had a good fight for a few minutes, until I swept them back to their place. Two had won to the deck beside me, and there they stayed. Now I had a hope that the men on sh.o.r.e would come round to the s.h.i.+p and leave the way clear for me, but Evan called to them to bide where they were. He had not faced me yet, and I bade him do so, telling him that this was his affair, and that it was nidring to risk other men's lives to save his own skin. But even that would not bring him on me.

Now the men whom I had seen coming down from the cliffs' top had hurried to see what all the shouting meant, and I saw that they were well-armed warriors and mostly spearsmen. Evan cried to them to come and help, and they ranged up alongside. He told them that I was a Norseman who had gone berserk, and must needs be slain.

”That is easily managed,” said the leader. ”Get to your bows, men.”

I saw half a dozen unslinging them, and I knew that without s.h.i.+eld I was done, and in that moment a thought came to me. I suppose that danger sharpens one's wits, for I saw that in the little boat was my last chance. I had not time to draw her to the side, and so I cut her painter, which was fast to a cleat close to me, and as I did so the first arrow missed my head.

Then I shouted and leapt from the high stern straight among the crowd at Evan, felling one of his outlaw comrades as I lit on the deck. But I could not reach him, and in a few seconds I should have been surrounded. So I cleared a way to the seaward side and went overboard, amid a howl from my foes. I thought that I should never stop sinking, for I had forgotten my mail; but I came to the surface close to the s.h.i.+p, and looked for the boat. She was drifting gently away from me, and I knew that I should have all that I could do to reach her before the bowmen got to work again from the s.h.i.+p's deck. Some one threw an axe at me as I swam, which was waste of a good weapon, and I hoped that it was not Thorgils'

best. Strange what thoughts come to a man when in a strait.

The water struck icy cold to me, and I felt that I could not stand it long, but I gained on the boat with every stroke, though it was hard work swimming in my mail and with a sword in my hand. I got rid of the blanket that was hampering my left arm, and by that time I was far enough from the s.h.i.+p for my foes to be puzzled by it. The moonlight was bright on the water, but the little waves tossed it so that it must have been hard for them to know which was I and which the floating stuff. Certainly, the first arrows that were shot when the bowmen got a chance at me from the s.h.i.+p or over her were aimed at the blanket, for I heard them strike it. Then one leapt from wave to wave past me.

I won to the boat just in time, for I could not have held on much longer. The cold was numbing me, and if I stopped swimming I must have sunk with the weight of mail. None of our old summer tricks of floating and the like were of any use with that weight on me. The arrows were coming thickly by that time, and I was glad to get to the far side of the boat and rest my hand on the gunwale, while I managed to sheathe my sword. The men could not see plainly where I was, and the arrows pattered on the planks of the boat and hissed into the water still, on the chance of hitting me. So I thought it well to get out of range before I tried to get on board, and so held the gunwale with one hand and paddled on with the other, until the arrows began to fall short, and at last ceased. A Welshman's bow has no long range, so that I had not far to go thus. But all the while I feared most of all to hear the plash of oars that would tell me that they had put off another boat in chase of me.

A little later and I should have been helpless, as I found when I tried to get into the boat. The cold was terrible, and it had hold of my limbs in spite of the swimming. It was hard work climbing over the bows, as I must needs do unless I wanted to capsize the light craft as I had overset a fisher's canoe more than once, by boarding her over the side, as we sported in the Glas...o...b..ry meres in high summer; but I managed it, and was all the better for the struggle, which set the blood coursing in my veins again. Then I got out the oars and began to pull away from the s.h.i.+p, with no care for direction so long as I could get away from her.

The foe had no boat, for they were all cl.u.s.tered in the s.h.i.+p or close to her on the rock, and there was a deal of noise going on among them. When I was fairly out of their way, and I could no longer make out their forms, I began to plan where I had best go, and at first I thought of a little beach that I had seen on the far side of the cove, thinking that I could get up what seemed a gorge to the cliff's top, and so hide inland somewhere. But when I could see right into the gorge, I found that it was steep and higher than I thought. My foes would be able to meet me by the time I was at the top.

There was no other place that I could see, for none could climb from the foot of the cliffs elsewhere, since if he reached the rocks he would have to stay where he leapt to them. So as there was no help for it, I headed for the open sea. No doubt, I thought, I should find some landing place along the coast before I had gone far, and meanwhile I was getting a fair start of the enemy, who would have to follow the windings of the cliffs if they cared to come after me.

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