But what I chiefly noticed as we were led aft, was that the ale was passing freely, and, as I should have thought, too often for good seamanship. That, however, was not my business, if it did seem to explain why Asbiorn separated us. Seven desperate men might do much among a helpless crowd, once they had snatched the arms they could reach from those who had forgotten to guard them. The young chief paid no heed to us as we passed into the darkness of the low cabin. The door was closed and barred after us, and we were left to our own devices, though in a few minutes some man on the after deck took off the little square hatch cover which let the light into the place. It was half full of plunder of all sorts, and there was barely room, if soft stowage, for us. "Well," I said to Dalfin, "if we can sleep, let us do so. I know that every word we speak can be heard on deck." Whereon he answered me in Erse, and I could understand him well, for the old tongues of Scot of Ireland and Scot of Caithness are the same, if ages have wrought some changes in the way of speaking them here and there. "Let these Danes make what they can of that," he said. "It will take a man born to the Gaelic to catch aught of it through yon hole, if he thinks he understands it in the open." So in the Erse we spoke for a little while, and it was a hopeless talk at best. Only we agreed that we would stand by one another through whatever might come, and that the first chance of escape was to be taken, be it what it might. All the while that we talked thus the noise of the men who drank grew wilder and more foolish. It was a cask of our old heather ale which they had broached, and that is potent, if to the unwary it seems harmless enough. Once or twice Asbiorn called to the noisiest to be still, but they heeded him little. Soon, however, the noise ceased, and we thought that most of the men slept. After that was no sound but the wash of the waves, and the hum of the sail, and the creak of the great steering oar as Asbiorn met the luff of the ship across the long, smooth sweep of the waves. We, too, grew drowsy, for the cabin was close and warm beneath the sunny decks. All that could be said was said, and so we slept, if it were but uneasily. Chapter 2: Men Of Three Kingdoms.