ula is on the other side of the bend. So the answer is quite simple. We
go up the river. Piper has a boat waiting for us--"

"I have already paid many and have sworn them to silence," Piper
interrupted. "But it will be a dangerous business. I would not dare
it at all except that it will be five years before I am eligible for
tax-gatherer, and the waiting is killing me. A city of my own--"

Piper, Jack Odin gathered, was a very ambitious man.

The boat moved up-river in darkness. There were beacons upon the shore,
turning this way and that, but they seemed to be trained a bit high this
night.

Once a motor-boat passed them, going at a fast clip, and somebody called
out that he saw a shadow over toward the far side of the river. And another
voice answered. "You're always seeing things. A log, maybe. Didn't I tell
you that I found some money in the street? And aren't we going to have the
best meal that money can buy? Do you want to stay here with an empty belly
on this cold river all night? Our watch is nearly over. I'm tired. Let's
get along--"

Later, some one hailed them from the bank and threatened to shoot if they
did not pull in. Then there was a loud scream that died in a weltering
gurgle. They heard a splash as something hit the water--and then all was
still. They waited. A peculiar little whistle sounded three notes from the
darkness.

As though reassured, Piper took up his oars.

"That was the last guard," Gunnar whispered. "It took a ruby the size of a
sparrow's egg to get him killed. Oh, well, blame Grim Hagen. He shouldn't
have gouged these people so hard--" And then, to Piper: "You're bright
enough, I guess, but you don't know how to row a boat. Give me the oars."

He took them and slid them into their hole-pins. "Now, give Gunnar room."
He bowed his broad head, leaning forward almost to his toes. Then he dug
the oars into the water and straightened up and bent backward like a
machine. Noiselessly the oars came up again. He bent forward and dipped
them into the river again. And as he worked faster he began to count to
himself in a panting whisper: "Huh--huh--huh--huf!"

The boat streaked across the river's surface like a water-bug.

At last they slid into some thick cat-tails. Gunnar got a hand-hold and
propelled them forward until the prow grounded in the shallows.

"This is as far as I can go," Piper told them in a sweating voice. "Over
there is the tomb."

* * * *