And now, after how many hours I could not tell, I stood clinging to the mast that I might keep my feet and making study of the body of stark Regner. He alone had been left on guard aboard our ship when we cast the grappling hooks, and it was easy to see that he had been slain by a spear thrown vengefully from above, as was revealed in the manner of his transfixion. Surely slight suffering had come to Regner, and little had he felt the shock when I had come down upon him, and the storm tore our ship away from our enemies and hid us in the bosom of its darkness. Certainly bold and careless, though very silent, sailors had been we two as the waves tossed us, and my wonder was that we were yet aboard and the ship afloat unharmed. It was well built and strong, however, and no sail had been up when we made our attack, and so, somehow, and by sheerest fortune, it had floated until the storm subsided and we were now riding on smooth waters. And now I looked all round and away upon the sea more searchingly. To the westward I perceived a dim uplifting, darker than the hue of the water, and, as the breeze carried the ship forward, this dimness became more solid and it was made plain that it was land. Well did I comprehend its meaning. I, alone and wounded and in one of the hated Viking ships, was drifting helplessly upon the shore of Britain. My death, it might be, had been delayed for only a little time, but what of that? Death was the Viking’s brother. A weakness was coming upon me and I slid downward to the deck and slept. When I awakened something of my strength had come back to me, though not that of a strong man, for my head had been hurt most evilly. Yet now I could rise by the mast again and look more calmly and resolutely upon the land I was approaching and which now rose clearly to my sight, and not more than an hour’s passage, at the rate the vessel was now drifting.