Then I pulled my horse round and rode ahead. As I went, my ears being very quick, I heard the other two talking together. At least, I suppose that I heard them; at any rate, I know what they said, although, strangely enough, nothing at all comes back to me of their tale of an attack upon a ship or of what then I did or did not do. “It is not wise to jeer at Olaf,” said Steinar, “for when he is stung with words he does mad things. Don’t you remember what happened when your father called him ‘niddering’ last year because Olaf said it was not just to attack the ship of those British men who had been driven to our coast by weather, meaning us no harm?” “Aye,” answered Ragnar. “He leapt among them all alone as soon as our boat touched her side, and felled the steersman. Then the British men shouted out that they would not kill so brave a lad, and threw him into the sea. It cost us that ship, since by the time we had picked him up she had put about and hoisted her large sail. Oh, Olaf is brave enough, we all know that! Still, he ought to have been born a woman or a priest of Freya who only offers flowers. Also, he knows my tongue and bears no malice.” “Pray that we get him home safe,” said Steinar uneasily, “for if not there will be trouble with your mother and every other woman in the land, to say nothing of Iduna the Fair.” “Iduna the Fair would live through it,” answered Ragnar, with a hard laugh. “But you are right; and, what is more, there will be trouble among the men also, especially with my father and in my own heart. After all there is but one Olaf.” At this moment I held up my hand, and they stopped talking. CHAPTER II THE SLAYING OF THE BEAR Leaping from their horses, Ragnar and Steinar came to where I stood, for already I had dismounted and was pointing to the ground, which just here had been swept clear of snow by the wind. “I see nothing,” said Ragnar. “But I do, brother,” I answered; “who study the ways of wild things while you think I am asleep. Look, that moss has been turned over; for it is frozen underneath and pressed up into little mounds between the bear’s claws. Also that tiny pool has gathered in the slot of the paw; it is its very shape. The other footprints do not show because of the rock.” Then I went forward a few paces behind some bushes and called out: “Here runs the track, sure enough, and, as I thought, the brute has a split claw; the snow marks it well. Bid the thrall stay with the horses and come you.” They obeyed, and there on the white snow which lay beyond the bush we saw the track of the bear stamped as if in wax. “A mighty beast,” said Ragnar. “Never have I seen its like.”