lord, or else they had no choice but
to do his bidding. Maybe that last is most likely.

Now we had to wait for their signal that all was ready for us, and
how long that might be we could not tell. It depended mostly on
where the king was holding his court, which the fishers did not
know. In the end it came to pass that we had to wait four days
here, and I will not say that they went at all quickly.

Dalfin waxed moody before the next day was over. He was one of
those who loved excitement, and are only happy when one thing
follows another fast, caring not what it may be so long as there is
somewhat, even danger. I think it was as well that he was a mighty
sleeper, being content to lie on a warm sand hill and slumber
between his meals. Bertric and I built a pig stye out of wreck wood
for the hermits, which pleased them mightily, and was certainly
better than doing nothing. Gerda watched us quietly, and then we
would climb to the top of the hill and look out toward the land in
hopes of seeing the fire which the fishers were to light when all
was in order for our going.

So it chanced on the second day that she and I had been up the hill
together, and were coming back to Bertric and his work down the
little glen, when we came suddenly on the old superior, who was
walking with bent head among the trees of a clearing, musing. We
had not seen him since the day when we came ashore.

He started when he saw us, and looked at us as if it was the first
time that he had met us; and we were about to pass him quickly,
with a little due reverence. But he spoke, and we stopped.

"I remember," he said. "You are the Lochlannoch who were cast
ashore. Is all well with you?"

"In every way, father," I answered in the Gaelic.

He looked hard at me for a moment, and his face flushed slowly. It
had been white before with the whiteness that comes of a dark cell
and long biding within it. Only the warm sun had taken him out
today, for Phelim said that he was close on ninety years of age.
Then he set forth his hand to me, and laid it on my arm.

"Tell me who you are," he said.

"We are Norse folk, cast ashore here by mischance in the gale."

"Norse?" he said. "Yet you speak the tongue of my childhood--the
kindly Gaelic of the islands which is not that altogether of the
Erse of today. It is full sixty years since I heard it."

"My mother was a Scottish lady," I answered. "My own name is
Malcolm."

"Tell me more," he said eagerly. "