“Then you brought the news to Arnkel that she was not burning?”

“So it was.  Whereon he would have us sail at once in chase of her on his account.  As we would not do that, and he would not let us go on our own, there was a small fight.  In the end Arnkel’s men manned your ship and we sailed in company, the bargain being that the treasure was to fall to the finder.  We thought we might have little difficulty in overhauling the vessel, and should have had none if it had not been for you.  Had you picked up a crew of fishers?”

“No; we managed somehow by ourselves.”

“I always told my father that Bertric was the best seaman we had in all our crowd,” Asbiorn said frankly.  “You did well that time.”

Then he told us how they had searched for us much in the way which we had thought likely, and so at last had heard of a wreck when they reached the river Bann.

“Asbiorn,” I said, “did you know that there was a lady on board this ship which was to be burnt?”

“No, on my word,” he said, starting somewhat.  “So that is where the young queen was hidden, after all?  There was wailing when her men found that she was missing, and they said that she must have gone distraught in her grief, and wandered to the mountains.  How was she left on board?”

“Arnkel put her there,” I answered.

“So that explains his way somewhat.  He seemed to want that ship caught, and yet did not.  When we did sail, he steered wide of the course she took, and too far to the northward.”

Then his face grew very black, and he growled:  “Bad we are, but not so bad as Arnkel, who would have men think him an honest man.  Now, if it were but to get in one fair blow at him for this, it were worth joining Hakon.  I take it that he will hear your tale—­and maybe mine.”

“And the lady’s also,” Bertric answered.  “Well—­wait until you know what befalls your ships.”

“And my father,” answered Asbiorn, getting up and looking ahead.  “To say the truth, I am not altogether sorry of an excuse to leave that company, which is bad, though I say it.  Yet he was driven out of his own home by his foes, and thereafter his hand has been against all men.  It is the crew he has gathered which I would leave, not him.”

We had not gained on the two pirate ships.  Now they were rounding that headland whence they had come, and were altering their course.  Asbiorn said that they were making for the river mouth, and half an hour thereafter we opened it out and saw that Heidrek was far within it, heading landward.  The beacon fires blazed up afresh as the watchers knew that he had returned, and presently each fire had a second alongside it.  Men thought that Heidrek had brought us to help him raid the land.

There were Norsemen on board, men from Dublin, who knew the mouth of the river as well as need be, and better than Heidrek, who had been into it but this once before.  One of them piloted the ships after him, for Hakon meant to end the business even as he had said, here and now, if he could, and sent for Bertric that he might tell him more of the enemy.  He heard somewhat of our story at this time, we sitting on the after deck with him, but he said little about it then.