Ulric the Jarl: A Story of the Penitent Thief. Stoddard William Osborn
and a hundred heavy spears went hurtling in among the legionaries.
"Follow!" shouted Comus. "Have ready the grapplings! Strike and then board her!"
A good officer was he, and the rowers as well as the legionaries obeyed him angrily, for they deemed the Northmen insolent in assailing such superior force.
"Away!" shouted Ulric. "Hael to thee, O Tostig. Get thee to the stern and pitch thy pebbles among her rowers."
Tostig was toiling hard, and so were other good slingers, of whom the trireme seemed to not have any, but The Sword swept on out of range while her enemy was turning.
"O jarl," said Biorn, "she is not clumsy, but her steersman went down. Let us gain what distance we may. That was a good blow, but we may not strike the next so easily."
The older vikings looked watchfully, as did Biorn, and again they said: "Our jarl is young, but this was well done."
"Westward!" shouted Ulric to Wulf. "We must lead them toward the land. I would I knew this coast."
"That do I," said Biorn, "if we are where I think. There are high cliffs, but there is also much marsh land; and off the coast there are great shallows, worse for a ship than any rocks might be. Watch for them."
"They are our friends," said Ulric, "but they are not friendly to a deep vessel like yonder trireme."
"Aye," said Biorn, "it is our old way of battling such as she is, but there is an evil among these shallows. Hast thou not heard of the sand that is alive? There is much of it hereaway."
"My father warned me of it," replied Ulric. "If horse or man setteth foot upon it, it will seize him and suck him down. But it could not swallow a ship."
"Were she a mountain!" exclaimed Biorn. "The living sand would be worse than a Roman trireme for The Sword to escape from. Yonder is a land line at the sky's edge, and I think I see breakers."
The rowers were rowing well and The Sword had gained a long advantage before the Roman oarsmen had recovered from their confusion. Now, however, Ulric upon the foredeck was measuring distances, wave after wave, and he spoke out plainly to his men.
"Swift is The Sword," he said. "I had thought that no keel on earth could be swifter, but we are laden heavily; so is the trireme, that she turneth not nimbly, but in a straight course she is swifter than are we. She hath many rowers and she is sharp in the prow. She gaineth upon us little by little."
"Woe to her," responded the vikings. "She moveth too fast for her good."
"The land riseth fast," said Biorn. "The breakers are not far away. Under them are sand shoals."
"The Roman is but a hundred fathoms behind us," replied Ulric. "Wulf the Skater, steer thou through the breakers. Let us see if she will dare to follow."
Comus, the trierarch, was overeager, or he would have remembered that which he seemed to have forgotten. They who were with him were stung by the death of Lentulus and by the ravages of the Saxon spears and stones. None counseled him to prudence, and he dashed on in the foaming wake of The Sword.
"Breakers, but no rocks," muttered Wulf, as he grasped his tiller strongly. "Now, if we fill not, we shall dash through. Pull! For the Northland pull!"
Hard strained the rowers. High sprang the curling breakers on either hand. Loud rang the shouts and the war horns. But The Sword rose buoyantly over the crown of a great billow and passed on into smoother water.
"Odin!" roared Biorn the Berserker. "The trireme is but fifty paces – "
"Struck!" shouted Ulric. "On, lest we ourselves may be stranded!"
"Deep water here, Jarl Ulric," calmly responded an old seaman near him. "We have passed the sand bar. It may be the tide is falling. The gods of the sea are against that Roman keel."
"Or they are not with her to-day," said Ulric. "She is held fast. Cease rowing and put the sail up again. We will see if there is aught else that we may do. I like not to let her escape me."
Up went the sail, and for an hour The Sword did but cruise back and forth, only now and then venturing near enough for the hurling of a stone or the sending of an arrow. It was then too far for any harm to the Romans, but they could hear the taunting music of the horns.
"Low tide," said Biorn at last, "and she lieth upon bare sand. We are well away. We can do no more."
"Watch!" said Ulric. "They are troubled."
"She lieth too deeply. What is this?" So asked the Roman seamen of their captain as they leaned over their bulwarks and studied that bed of sand. He answered not, but one, a legionary in full armor, stepped down from the ship to examine more closely – and an unwise man was he. In places the sandy level seemed firm enough, and a horse may gallop along a sandy beach after the tide is out and leave but a fair hoofprint. That way armies have marched and chariots have driven. There were other patches, however, whereon the sand seemed to glisten and to change in the sunlight, and here there was potent witchcraft working. At these had the sailors been gazing, but the soldier did not reach one of them.
"Back!" shouted Comus. "It is the living sand! We are all dead men! Back!"
The legionary strove to wheel at the word of command, but his feet obeyed him not. Even the vikings were near enough to see that the sand was over his ankles.
"The under gods have seized him," muttered Ulric. "It is from them that the sand liveth. They are angry with him.
"Vale! Vale! Vale!" shouted the legionary. "O Comus, I go down! They who dwell below have decreed this. See thou to the ship and follow not the Saxons."
"Follow them?" exclaimed Comus. "Vale, O comrade! But the trireme lieth a handbreadth deeper. She is sinking! O all the gods! Have we come to this ending? Who shall deliver us?"
"None, O Comus," said a man of dark countenance who leaned over the bulwark at his side. "We have offended the gods and they have left us to our fate."
Lower sank the wooden walls of the great vessel, while her helpless crew and the soldiery stared despairingly at the pitiless sand and at the White Horse flag of the vikings dancing lightly over the sea so near them.
"Form!" commanded Comus, and the legionaries fell into ranks all over the vessel. "Put ye the body of Lentulus upon the deck," he said, "and bring me the eagle of the legion. O Lentulus, true comrade, brave friend, we salute thee, for all we who were of thy company go down to meet thee. Behold, we perish!"
Silent sat the rowers at their oars. The standards fluttered in the wind. The trierarch took the eagle and went and stood by the body of Lentulus.
"They are brave men, yonder," said Biorn the Berserker. "They will to die in line. So do the Romans conquer all others except the men of the North."
"They have one trireme the less," replied Tostig the Red. "But they have many more. This is not like burning one. I see no honor to us in this."
"Honor to the gods," said Ulric. "She was too strong for us and Odin destroyed her."
"It is well to have him on our side," said Tostig; but Knud the Bear laughed loudly, as was his wont, and said: "Odin is not a sea god. What hath he to do with sand and water? Some other god is hidden under the living sand. We shall leave him behind us when we go away – "
"Her bulwarks go under!" shouted one of the vikings. "Hark to the trumpets! They go down!"
The trumpet blast ceased and there was a great silence, for the like of this had never before been seen.
"Oars!" commanded Ulric. "We will search the coast. Such a warship as was this came not hitherward without an errand. She may have had companions."
The old vikings all agreed with him, and an eager lookout was set, but behind them as they sailed away they saw nothing but a bare bed of sand, over which the tide was returning.
CHAPTER VIII.
The Saxon Shore
"O jarl!" exclaimed Knud the Bear, in a morning watch, "we have wasted days in this coasting. The weather hath been rough and the men are