Eilert felt queer, for the Draug's mouth
gaped ominously wide, and showed a greenish pointed row of teeth, with a
long interval between each tooth, so that they resembled a row of boat
stakes.

The Merman drained keg after keg, and with every keg he grew more
communicative. With an air as if he were thinking in his own mind of
something very funny, he looked at Eilert for a while and blinked his
eyes. Eilert didn't like his expression at all, for it seemed to him to
say: "Now, my lad, whom I have fished up so nicely, look out for a
change!" But instead of that he said, "You had a rough time of it last
night, Eilert, my boy, but it wouldn't have gone so hard with you if you
hadn't streaked the lines with corpse-mould, and refused to take my
daughter to church"--here he suddenly broke off, as if he had said too
much, and to prevent himself from completing the sentence, he put the
brandy-keg to his mouth once more. But the same instant Eilert caught
his glance, and it was so full of deadly hatred that it sent a shiver
right down his back.

When, after a long, long draught, he again took the keg from his mouth,
the Merman was again in a good humour, and told tale after tale. He
stretched himself more and more heavily out on the sail, and laughed and
grinned complacently at his own narrations, the humour of which was
always a wreck or a drowning. From time to time Eilert felt the breath
of his laughter, and it was like a cold blast. If folks would only give
up their boats, he said, he had no very great desire for the crews. It
was driftwood and ship-timber that he was after, and he really couldn't
get on without them. When his stock ran out, boat or ship he _must_
have, and surely nobody could blame him for it either.

With that he put the keg down empty, and became somewhat more gloomy
again. He began to talk about what bad times they were for him and her.
It was not as it used to be, he said. He stared blankly before him for a
time, as if buried in deep thought. Then he stretched himself out
backwards at full length, with feet extending right across the floor,
and gasped so dreadfully that his upper and lower jaws resembled two
boats' keels facing each other. Then he dozed right off with his neck
turned towards the sail.

Then the girl again stood by Eilert's side, and bade him follow her.

They now went the same way back, and again ascended up to the skerry.
Then she confided to him that the reason why her father ha