He stayed up the whole night, until a gray dawn spread over the sky; but still he did not hear the sound he was waiting for.
At last a singing, monotonous murmur was borne upon the night air, a rocking, caressing sound as of distant music.
Then the skipper hurried across the rowers" thwarts amidships to the lofty forecastle where his crew slept. "Turn out," he called to them, "and take your oars and boat-hooks! The time is almost come when we shall be free. I hear the roar of open water. I hear the song of the free waves."
The men left sleeping and came out at once. They posted themselves along the ship"s sides, while the day slowly dawned.
When at last it was light enough for them to see what changes the night had brought, they found that all the creeks and channels were open far out to sea, but in the bay where they were frozen in not a fissure could be seen in the ice, which lay firm and unbroken.
And in the channel which led out of this bay the ice had piled itself up into a high wall. The waves in their free play outside continually cast up floating ice upon it.
In the sound between the skerries there was a swarm of sails. All the fishing-boats which had lain icebound off Marstrand were now streaming out. The sea ran high and blocks of ice still floated among the waves, but the fishermen seemed to think they had no time to wait for safe and calm water, and they had set sail. They stood in the bows of their boats and kept a sharp lookout. Small blocks of ice they fended off with an oar, but when the big ones came they put the helm over and bore away. On the high p.o.o.p of the gallias the skipper stood and watched them. He could see that they had their troubles, but he saw too that one boat after another wriggled through and came out into the open sea.
And when the skipper saw the sails gliding over the blue water, he felt his disappointment so bitterly that tears came into his eyes.
But his ship lay still, and before him the wall of ice was piling up higher and higher.
The sea outside bore not only ships and boats, but sometimes small white icebergs came floating past. They were big ice-floes that had been thrown one upon another and were now sailing southward.
They shone like silver in the morning sun, and now and then they showed as pink as though they had been strewed with roses.
But high up among the whistling of the wind loud cries were heard, now like singing voices, now like pealing trumpets. There was a sound of jubilation in these cries, swelling the heart of him who heard them. They came from a long flight of swans on their way from the south.
But when the skipper saw the icebergs moving southward and the swans flying to the north such longing seized him that he wrung his hands. "Woe"s me, that I must lie here!" he said. "Will the ice never break up in this bay? I may lie waiting here many days yet."
Just as he said this, he saw a man come driving on the ice. He came out of a narrow channel on the Marstrand side, and he drove as calmly on the ice as if he did not know the waves had begun once more to carry ships and boats.
As he drove under the stern of the gallias he hailed the skipper: "Ho, you there, frozen in the ice, do you lack food aboard? Will you buy my salt herring or dried ling or smoked eel?"
The skipper did not trouble to answer him. He only shook his fist at him and swore.
Then the fish hawker stepped off his load. He took a bunch of hay from the sledge and laid it in front of his horse. Then he climbed up on the deck of the gallias. When he faced the skipper he said to him very earnestly:
"Today I have not come to sell fish. But I know that you are a G.o.d-fearing man. Therefore I have come to ask your help to find a maiden whom the Scotsmen brought out to your ship with them yester-night."
"I know naught of their bringing any maiden with them," said the skipper. "I have heard no woman"s voice aboard the ship tonight."
"I am Torarin the fish hawker," said the other; "maybe you have heard of me? It was I who supped with Herr Arne at Solberga parsonage the same night he was murdered. Since then I have had Herr Arne"s foster daughter under my roof, but last night she was stolen away by his murderers, and they have surely brought her with them to your vessel."
"Are Herr Arne"s murderers aboard my vessel?" asked the skipper in dismay.
"You see that I am a poor and feeble man," said Torarin. "I have a palsied arm, and therefore I am fearful of taking upon myself any bold and hazardous thing. I have known these many days who were Herr Arne"s murderers, but I have not dared to bring them to justice. And because I have held my peace they have made their escape and have found occasion to carry the maiden with them. But now I have said to myself that I will have no more of my conscience in this matter. At least I will try to save the little maid."
"If Herr Arne"s murderers are on board my ship, why does not the watch come out and arrest them?"
"I have begged and prayed them all this night and morning," said Torarin, "but the watch durst not come out. They say there are a hundred men-at-arms on board, and with them they durst not contend. Then I thought, in G.o.d"s name I must come out here alone and beg you help me to find the maiden, for I know you to be a G.o.d-fearing man."
But the skipper paid no heed to his question of the maiden; his mind was full of the other matter. "What makes you sure that the murderers are on board?" he said.
Torarin pointed to a great oaken chest which stood between the rowers" thwarts. "I have seen that chest too often in Herr Arne"s house to be mistaken," he said. "In it is Herr Arne"s money, and where his money is, there you will find his murderers."
"That chest belongs to Sir Archie and his two friends, Sir Reginald and Sir Philip," said the skipper.
"Ay," said Torarin, looking at him fixedly; "that is so. It belongs to Sir Archie and Sir Philip and Sir Reginald."
The skipper stood silent awhile and looked this way and that.
"When think you the ice will break up in this bay?" he said to Torarin.
"There is something strange in it this year," said Torarin. "In this bay we have always seen the ice break up early, for there is a strong current. But as it shapes now you must have a care that you be not thrust against the land when the ice begins to move."
"I think of naught else," said the skipper.
Again he stood silent for a while and turned his face toward the sea. The morning sun shone high in the sky, and the waves reflected its radiance. The liberated vessels scudded this way and that, and the sea birds came flying from the south with joyous cries. The fish lay near the surface and glittered in the sun as they leapt high out of the water, wanton after their long imprisonment under the ice. The gulls, which had been circling out beyond the edge of the ice, came in great flocks toward land to fish in their old waters.
The skipper could not endure this sight. "Shall I be counted the friend of murderers and evildoers?" he said. "Can I close my eyes and refuse to see why G.o.d keeps the gates of the sea barred against my vessel? Shall I be destroyed for the sake of the unrighteous who have taken refuge with me?"
And the skipper went forward and said to his men: "Now I know why we have been held back while all other ships have put to sea. It is because we have murderers and evildoers on board."
Then the skipper went to the Scottish men-at-arms, who still lay asleep in the ship"s hold. "Listen," he said to them; "keep you quiet yet awhile, no matter what cries or tumult you may hear on board. We must follow G.o.d"s commandment and not suffer evildoers amongst us. If you obey me I promise to bring you the chest which holds Herr Arne"s money, and you shall share it among you."
But to Torarin the skipper said: "Go down to your sledge and cast your fish out on the ice. You shall have other freight anon."
Then the skipper and his men broke into the cabin where Sir Archie and his friends slept. And they threw themselves upon them to bind them while they still lay asleep.
And when the three Scotsmen tried to defend themselves, they smote them hard with their axes and handspikes, and the skipper said to them: "You are murderers and evildoers. How could you think to escape punishment? Know you not that it is for your sake G.o.d keeps all the gates of the sea closed?"
Then the three men cried aloud to their comrades, bidding them come and help them.
"You need not call to them," said the skipper. "They will not come. They have gotten Herr Arne"s h.o.a.rd to share amongst them, and are even now measuring out silver coin in their hats. For the sake of this money the evil deed was done, and this money has now brought retribution upon you."
And before Torarin had finished unloading the fish from his sledge, the skipper and his men came down on to the ice. They brought with them three men securely bound. They were grievously hurt and fainting from their wounds.
"G.o.d has not called on me in vain," said the skipper. "As soon as His will was clear to me, I hearkened to it."
They laid the prisoners on the sledge, and Torarin drove with them by creeks and narrow sounds where the ice still lay firm, until he came to Marstrand.
Now late in the afternoon the skipper stood on the lofty p.o.o.p of his vessel and looked out to seaward. Nothing was changed around the vessel, and the wall of ice towered ever higher before her.
Then the skipper saw a long procession of people coming out to his ship. All the women of Marstrand were there, both young and old.
They all wore mourning weeds, and they brought with them a group of boys who carried a bier.
When they were come to the gallias, they said to the skipper: "We are come to fetch a young maiden who is dead. Those murderers have confessed that she gave her life to hinder their escape, and now we, all the women of Marstrand, are come to bring her to our town with all the honour that is her due."
Then Elsalill was found and brought down to the ice and borne in to Marstrand; and all the women in the place wept over the young maid, who had loved an evildoer and given her life to destroy him she loved. But even as the line of women advanced, the wind and waves broke in behind them and tore up the ice over which they had but lately pa.s.sed; and when they came to Marstrand with Elsalill, all the gates of the sea stood open.
THE END
FOREWORD