“Have the wits been stolen out of you?  There is not even so much as a devil-fish where you are pointing.”

The Icelander took off his cap, and commenced wiping the great beads from his forehead.  “You begin to listen after the song is sung,” he answered, peevishly.  “The thing ran away as soon as you approached.  It was a fox that was bloody all over.”

A yell of terror distended Kark’s throat.

“A fox!” he screeched.  “My guardian spirit follows me in that shape; a foreknowing woman told me so.  It is my death-omen!  I am death-fated!” His knees gave way under him so that he sank to the ground and cowered there, wringing his hands.

The Icelander shot a look of triumph at the sceptical stranger.  “They have no call to hold their chins high who hear of strange wonders for the first time,” he said, severely.  “It is as certain that men have guardian spirits as that they have bodies.  Yours, Robert of Normandy, goes doubtless in the shape of a wolf because of your warrior nature; and I advise you now, that when you see a bloody wolf before you it will be time for you to draw on your Hel-shoes.  The animal ran nearest the thrall—­”

Kark’s lamentations merged into a shriek of hope.  “That is untrue!  It lay at the Norman’s feet; you told him so!”

While the seer turned to look rather resentfully at him, he climbed up this slender life-line, like a man whom sharks are pursuing.

“It was not a fox that you saw, at all; it was a wolf!  So excited were you that your eyes were deceitful.  It was a wolf, and it was nearest the Norman.  A blind man could see what that means.”

The Icelander pulled off his cap again, but this time it was to scratch his head doubtfully.  “It was when the stranger approached it, that it was nearest to him,” he persisted.  “While this may signify that he will seek death, I am unable to say that it proves that he will overtake it.  Yet I will not swear that it was not a wolf.  The sun was in my eyes—­”

Robert the Fearless burst into a scornful laugh.  “Oh, call it a wolf, and let us end this talk!” he said, contemptuously.  “I shall not die until my death-day comes, though you see a pack of them.  Call it a wolf, craven serf, if that will stay your tongue.”

There was no chance for more, for at that moment Valbrand joined them.  “There is naught to be seen which is different from what we have already experienced,” he said shortly; and they began the return march.

They reached the landing-place first; but it was not long before the heads of their companions appeared above a rocky ridge.  This party, it was evident, had had better sport.  Several men carried hats filled with sea-birds’ eggs.  Another explorer had under his arm a fat little bear cub that he had picked up somewhere.  Rolf’s deftness at stone-throwing had secured him a bushy yellow fox-tail for a trophy.

The party had gone inland far enough to discover that creeping bushes grew on the hills, and rushes on the bogs; that it was an island, as Biorn had stated, and that forests equal in size to those of Greenland grew in sheltered places.  But they had seen nothing to alter their unflattering first opinion.  Vikings though they were, warriors who would have been flayed alive without flinching, relief was manifest on every face when the leader finally gave the word to embark.