That took only a few minutes, but in them I cannot tell how many wild plans for Gerda's safety went through my mind. Beyond the bare chance which lay in getting to the hillside and trying to keep out of sight of the men when they landed, there seemed to be nothing we could do. Now, along the little shore path came Gerda to seek us, smiling at our haste. The boat she missed at once, and looked round for it. "Why, what has become of the boat?" she asked. "I thought you landed here." Bertric looked at me, and I at him, and Gerda caught the glance. "There is something which you fear to tell me," she said steadily. "Let it be spoken at once, for we have faced danger together ere this, have we not?" "Have you not seen a large boat down the strait?" I asked lamely. "No," she said, and was stepping forward to the edge of the water, past the screen of low shore bushes to look, but I stayed her. "It is the boat which we fear," I said. "There are Danes in her, and we think they are seeking the wreck." She looked me in the face for a moment, and read what was written there. "We might welcome the coming of honest Vikings," she said, "whether Dane or Norse. They know how to befriend a woman who needs help. These men whom you fear and who seek the wreck can only be the men of our enemy." Then Bertric said: "I cannot mistake the boat which I have helped to pull so many a weary time. It is Heidrek's. He has followed us, and has somewhere heard of the fate of the ship. We have sunk the little boat, lest the sight of it should bring them ashore straightway." "Then we must hide somewhere," she said, looking round her as if to see what place might be. "Aye, we must hide. There will be fifteen men, or more, in the boat. Malcolm and I cannot stay their landing." Gerda caught her breath suddenly. "What of the hermits?" she said. "We waste time," said I. "Come and let us tell them. They may have some hiding place." Then we went swiftly to the cells. Once we looked back to the strait, from the little rise behind which the cells were sheltered, and saw the boat still working against the tide along the far shore. Heidrek had certainly not heard that the wreck was on the island itself. Most likely it was thought that we had made for the shelter of the strait, and had gone ashore in trying to reach it. Unless the ship which we had seen knew the coast well, her crew could hardly have told that an island was here. There were no hermits to be seen, for they were either in their cells, or at their tasks about the place. So I went to the first cell and looked in, and finding it empty, went to the next. Fergus sat there, writing in some beautiful book which he was busied with. One never found a brother idle. "Father," I said, "I must disturb you. There is danger at hand, I fear."