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Page 21
'"Not by my father Guthrum's head," said he. "The Gods sent ye into my
ship for a luck-offering."
'At this I quaked, for I knew it was still the Danes' custom to
sacrifice captives to their Gods for fair weather.
'"A plague on thy four long bones!" said Hugh. "What profit canst thou
make of poor old pilgrims that can neither work nor fight?"
'"Gods forbid I should fight against thee, poor Pilgrim with the Singing
Sword," said he. "Come with us and be poor no more. Thy teeth are far
apart, which is a sure sign thou wilt travel and grow rich."
'"What if we will not come?" said Hugh.
'"Swim to England or France," said Witta. "We are midway between the
two. Unless ye choose to drown yourselves no hair of your head will be
harmed here aboard. We think ye bring us luck, and I myself know the
runes on that Sword are good." He turned and bade them hoist sail.
'Hereafter all made way for us as we walked about the ship, and the ship
was full of wonders.'
'What was she like?' said Dan.
'Long, low, and narrow, bearing one mast with a red sail, and rowed by
fifteen oars a-side,' the knight answered. 'At her bows was a deck under
which men might lie, and at her stern another shut off by a painted door
from the rowers' benches. Here Hugh and I slept, with Witta and the
Yellow Man, upon tapestries as soft as wool. I remember'--he laughed to
himself--'when first we entered there a loud voice cried, "Out swords!
Out swords! Kill, kill!" Seeing us start Witta laughed, and showed us it
was but a great-beaked grey bird with a red tail. He sat her on his
shoulder, and she called for bread and wine hoarsely, and prayed him to
kiss her. Yet she was no more than a silly bird. But--ye knew this?' He
looked at their smiling faces.
'We weren't laughing at you,' said Una. 'That must have been a parrot.
It's just what Pollies do.'
'So we learned later. But here is another marvel. The Yellow Man, whose
name was Kitai, had with him a brown box. In the box was a blue bowl
with red marks upon the rim, and within the bowl, hanging from a fine
thread, was a piece of iron no thicker than that grass stem, and as
long, maybe, as my spur, but straight. In this iron, said Witta, abode
an Evil Spirit which Kitai, the Yellow Man, had brought by Art Magic out
of his own country that lay three years' journey southward. The Evil
Spirit strove day and night to return to his country, and therefore,
look you, the iron needle pointed continually to the South.'
'South?' said Dan suddenly, and put his hand into his pocket.
'With my own eyes I saw it. Every day and all day long, though the ship
rolled, though the sun and the moon and the stars were hid, this blind
Spirit in the iron knew whither it would go, and strained to the South.
Witta called it the Wise Iron, because it showed him his way across the
unknowable seas.' Again Sir Richard looked keenly at the children. 'How
think ye? Was it sorcery?'
'Was it anything like this?' Dan fished out his old brass
pocket-compass, that generally lived with his knife and key-ring. 'The
glass has got cracked, but the needle waggles all right, sir.'
The knight drew a long breath of wonder. 'Yes, yes! The Wise Iron shook
and swung in just this fashion. Now it is still. Now it points to the
South.'
'North,' said Dan.
'Nay, South! There is the South,' said Sir Richard. Then they both
laughed, for naturally when one end of a straight compass-needle points
to the North, the other must point to the South.
'T�,' said Sir Richard, clicking his tongue. 'There can be no sorcery if
a child carries it. Wherefore does it point South--or North?'
'Father says that nobody knows,' said Una.
Sir Richard looked relieved. 'Then it may still be magic. It was magic
to _us_. And so we voyaged. When the wind served we hoisted sail, and
lay all up along the windward rail, our shields on our backs to break
the spray. When it failed, they rowed with long oars; the Yellow Man sat
by the Wise Iron, and Witta steered. At first I feared the great
white-flowering waves, but as I saw how wisely Witta led his ship among
them I grew bolder. Hugh liked it well from the first. My skill is not
upon the water; and rocks and whirlpools such as we saw by the West
Isles of France, where an oar caught on a rock and broke, are much
against my stomach. We sailed South across a stormy sea, where by
moonlight, between clouds, we saw a Flanders ship roll clean over and
sink. Again, though Hugh laboured with Witta all night, I lay under the
deck with the Talking Bird, and cared not whether I lived or died. There
is a sickness of the sea which for three days is pure death! When we
next saw land Witta said it was Spain, and we stood out to sea. That
coast was full of ships busy in the Duke's war against the Moors, and we
feared to be hanged by the Duke's men or sold into slavery by the Moors.
So we put into a small harbour which Witta knew. At night men came down
with loaded mules, and Witta exchanged amber out of the North against
little wedges of iron and packets of beads in earthen pots. The pots he
put under the decks, and the wedges of iron he laid on the bottom of the
ship after he had cast out the stones and shingle which till then had
been our ballast. Wine, too, he bought for lumps of sweet-smelling grey
amber--a little morsel no bigger than a thumbnail purchased a cask of
wine. But I speak like a merchant.'
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