A moment afterwards the comrade boat ducked up again:  it had vanished for an instant as before.  Now, too, he saw more of the heavy man who sat in the stern there in the same place as himself.  Out of his back, just below his sou’wester (as he turned round it showed quite plainly), projected an iron spike six inches long, which Elias had no difficulty in recognising again.  And now, as he calmly thought it all over, he was quite clear about two things:  one was that it was the Draug[8] itself which was steering its half-boat close beside him, and leading him to destruction; the other was that it was written in heaven that he was to sail his last course that night.  For he who sees the Draug on the sea is a doomed man.  He said nothing to the others, lest they should lose heart, but in secret he commended his soul to God.

During the last hour or so he had been forced out of his proper course by the storm; the air also had become dense with snow; and Elias knew that he must wait till dawn before land could be sighted.  Meanwhile he sailed along much the same as before.  Now and then the boys in the stern complained that they were freezing; but, in the plight they were now in, that couldn’t be helped, and, besides, Elias had something else to think about.  A terrible longing for vengeance had come over him, and, but for the necessity of saving the lives of his three lads, he would have tried by a sudden turn to sink the accursed boat which kept alongside of him the whole time as if to mock him; he now understood its evil errand only too well.  If the Kvejtepig[9] could reach the Draug before, a knife or a gaff might surely do the same thing now, and he felt that he would gladly have given his life for one good grip of the being who had so mercilessly torn from him his dearest in this world and would fain have still more.

At three or four o’clock in the morning they saw coming upon them through the darkness a breaker of such a height that at first Elias thought they must be quite close ashore near the surf swell.  Nevertheless, he soon recognised it for what it really was—­a huge billow.  Then it seemed to him as if there was a laugh over in the other boat, and something said, “There goes thy boat, Elias!” He, foreseeing the calamity, now cried aloud:  “In Jesus’ Name!” and then bade his sons hold on with all their might to the withy-bands by the rowlocks when the boat went under, and not let go till it was above the water again.  He made the elder of them go forward to Bernt; and himself held the youngest close by his side, stroked him once or twice furtively down the cheeks, and made sure that he had a good grip.  The boat, literally buried beneath the foaming roller, was lifted gradually up by the bows and then went under.  When it rose again out of the water, with the keel in the air, Elias, Bernt, and the twelve-year-old Martin lay alongside, holding on by the withy-bands; but the third of the brothers was gone.