CHAPTER XXIII OF THE COMING OF EARL THORFINN Rolf shut the storehouse door, and Frodi held it until it was barred. The Scots could move neither Frodi nor the bars, and knew not what to do. All within was dark, save for light from the crack of the door; and when the Scots who stood before the crack felt Frodi's bill, they stood back. Then Rolf shot arrows out through the crack, and the Scots stood aside, so that those within could do no more. They heard the Scots say that no time should be wasted for three men. "Now," said Frodi, "they will go away." "Be not too hopeful," said Grani. When smoke began to puff in, they knew that the thatch had been fired over their heads. "So," quoth Frodi, "I shall be burned in the Orkneys after all. Seest thou, Grani, why no Icelander loves thy land?" They sat there a while and the place grew hot; then Grani began to pace up and down. "Would that I," he said at last, "had never seen the Orkneys!" "What is this?" asked Rolf. Grani said after a silence: "I shall never speak again to my father, whom I have not seen these many years." Next he said: "My sister must be almost a woman." After that said he: "Peaceful was our home." Frodi tried to comfort him, but Grani would not listen. "Let us die in the open," he cried, "and give an account of ourselves!" But when they tried to leave that smothering place, they found the Scots had braced the door, and it could not be moved. Then a corner of the roof fell down, and burned inside the storehouse. "Now," cried Grani in despair, "would I were once more on the home-field of Fellstead, looking abroad on old Broadfirth and the peaceful dales!" "A wonderful thing thou sayest!" exclaimed Rolf. "Let wonders be," said Frodi. "But since we cannot leave this place by the front door, why not by the rear?" "How do that?" asked Grani. Frodi drew aside the heavy hide which hung at the back of the storehouse, against the rock of the hillside; there were a carved stone doorway and a black cave. "Now," cried Grani, "rightly is this place called the Vale of the Hermit; this was his house, though I never knew of it till now. Let us be quick!" So they went into that cave and sat there, while the fire burned the storehouse quite away, and its roof-beams fell across the door of the cave and hid it. Moreover the green hide did not burn through, and kept out the smoke; and a little air came in through a fissure of the rock. Then the Scots who watched went their way, and Kiartan with them. When they were gone, those three thrust the hide and the beams aside from the cave-mouth, and leaped out over the embers. They were near stifled, and weak from the heat.