“It is the exploring party, returning!  It is possible that one of them might blunder in here.  Do you think we can climb the bluff before they turn the bend and see us?”

The voices were becoming very distinct now.  Alwin shook his head.

“I think it better to remain where we are.  Sigurd knows that we are likely to be here.  He will turn them aside, if need be.  See; yonder is his blue cloak now, at the—­”

He broke off and slowly rose to his feet, a look upon his face that made Helga whirl instinctively and glance over her shoulder.  She did not turn back again, but sat as though frozen in the act; for behind the sumach bush Leif stood, watching them.

How long he had been there they had no idea, but his eyes were full upon them; and they realized that at last he knew truly for whom it was that Helga, Gilli’s daughter, had fled from home.  His lips were drawn into a straight line, and his brows into a black frown.

The voices came nearer and nearer,—­until Sigurd’s blue cloak fluttered at the very foot of the trail.  When he saw the chief’s scarlet mantle mingling with the scarlet of the sumach leaves, the jarl’s son gave a great leap forward.  It was no longer than the drawing of a breath, however, before he recovered himself.

His clear voice rose like a bugle call, “Diable! foster-father!  I have just made a very different discovery from the one I promised you,—­Tyrker has been left behind.”

The chief was down the bank in three long leaps, shooting a volley of fierce questions.  Each member of the party instantly raised his voice to defend himself and blame his neighbor.  The remainder of the camp, brought to the spot by the noise, rent the air with upbraiding and alarms.  When the shield-maiden suddenly sprang from nowhere and stood in their midst, the men did not even notice her; nor did the appearance of the Norman attract more attention.  As an accident, it was incredibly fortunate; as a diversion, it was a master-stroke.

Yet it did not take the chief long to quell the up-roar, when at last he had made up his mind what course to pursue.  Seizing a shield from a man at his side, he hammered upon it with his sword until every other sound was drowned in the clangor.

“Silence!” he shouted.  “Silence, fools!  Would you save him by deafening each other?  We must reach him before wild beasts do:  he would be as a child in their clutches.  Ten of you who are fresh-footed, get weapons and follow me.  The least crazy of you who accompanied him, shall guide us back.”

Only as he was turning away and ran bodily into him, did he appear to remember the Norman’s existence.  His eyes gave out an ominous flash.

“You also follow,” he commanded.

As the little column moved over the hills in the fading light, Helga looked after them, half dazed.

“What is the meaning of that?” she murmured to the jarl’s son at her side.  “It is certain that Leif recognized him; yet he chooses him to accompany them.  I do not understand it.”