“It cannot be Heidrek’s,” I groaned.

“I know that boat only too well,” answered Bertric; “pull, if you never pulled before.”

The oars bent, and the water boiled round the blades.  Bertric headed straight across, letting the tide have its way with us.  In five minutes we were ashore a hundred yards below where Gerda sat, and then I knew that the bushes must screen her from the view of those who came from the sea.  We leapt out and looked at the boat we feared.  The men in her did not seem to be heeding us, for, at all events, they had not quickened their stroke.  They were keeping over on the far shore.  Either they had not seen us, or took us for no more than fishers—­or else knew that they had us trapped if they wanted us.

“Give me a lift here,” said Bertric, going to a great stone which was a load for any two men.  “We must sink this boat—­we have the other, if that is any good to us.”

Together we hove the great stone into the boat as it rocked on the edge of the tide, starting a plank or two.  I stove in one altogether with an oar, shoved her off with all my might, and saw her fill at once, and sink with the weight in her some twenty yards from shore.  She would not be seen again till dead low water.  Then we hove the oars into the bushes.  Maybe it was all useless, but we would leave nothing to be spied which might bring the men to the island sooner than needful.

That took only a few minutes, but in them I cannot tell how many wild plans for Gerda’s safety went through my mind.  Beyond the bare chance which lay in getting to the hillside and trying to keep out of sight of the men when they landed, there seemed to be nothing we could do.

Now, along the little shore path came Gerda to seek us, smiling at our haste.  The boat she missed at once, and looked round for it.

“Why, what has become of the boat?” she asked.  “I thought you landed here.”

Bertric looked at me, and I at him, and Gerda caught the glance.

“There is something which you fear to tell me,” she said steadily.  “Let it be spoken at once, for we have faced danger together ere this, have we not?”

“Have you not seen a large boat down the strait?” I asked lamely.

“No,” she said, and was stepping forward to the edge of the water, past the screen of low shore bushes to look, but I stayed her.

“It is the boat which we fear,” I said.  “There are Danes in her, and we think they are seeking the wreck.”

She looked me in the face for a moment, and read what was written there.

“We might welcome the coming of honest Vikings,” she said, “whether Dane or Norse.  They know how to befriend a woman who needs help.  These men whom you fear and who seek the wreck can only be the men of our enemy.”

Then Bertric said: 

“I cannot mistake the boat which I have helped to pull so many a weary time.  It is Heidrek’s.  He has followed us, and has somewhere heard of the fate of the ship.  We have sunk the little boat, lest the sight of it should bring them ashore straightway.”