Wulfric the Weapon Thane: A Story of the Danish Conquest of East Anglia

by Charles W. Whistler

I said that it was so, and that I would at once go back to Reedham when my business was done, there to prepare for his coming.

"That is well; and we will sail to Thames mouth together. And you shall sail in my ship to tell me more of my father, and because I think we shall be good friends, so that I would rather have you come and raid a town or two with me than part with you. But as you have your ship to mind, we will meet again at Reedham, and I will winter there with you, and we will hunt together, and so take you home with us in the spring."

Now this seemed good to me, and pleased me well enough, as I told him. Where Halfden and his crew went, south of Thames mouth, was no concern of mine--nor, indeed, of any other man in East Anglia in those days. That was the business of Ethelred, our overlord, if he cared to mind the doings of one ship. Most of all it was the concern of the sheriff in whose district a landing was made.

So messages were sent to old Kenulf, and glad was he to know that we should not have to give up our passage to London, and maybe still more to feel safe in this powerful company from any other such meetings. And before the tide served us, Halfden had said that he also would come to London, so that our ship should lead the way up the river.

When we weighed anchor Thormod must needs, therefore, reef and double reef his sail, else our ship had been hull down astern before many hours had passed, so swift was the longship.

Now I have said that old Kenulf had misliked the look of the weather, and now Thormod seemed uneasy. Yet the breeze came fresh from the southeast; and though it had shifted a good deal, I, for my part, thought little ill of that, for it held in that quarter till we were fairly among the sands of the Thames mouth at nightfall, and Kenulf lit lanterns by which we might follow him. No man knew the Thames-mouth channels better than our pilot, Kenulf the sea crafty, as we called him.

Then it fell dead calm, quite suddenly, and we drifted, with the sail flapping against the mast idly, for half an hour or so. Then fell on us, without warning, such a fierce gale as I had never before seen, blowing from north and west, with rain and bright lightning, and it raised in five minutes a sea that broke over us again and again as Thormod brought the ship head to wind.

Then I lost sight of Kenulf's lights, and as I clung to the rail, my mind was torn with longing to be back in my own ship in this danger, though I knew that Kenulf needed me not, and that, had I been there, it would but have been to obey him with the rest of our crew; yet I think that any man who loves his ship will know what I felt.

And of the fury and darkness of that night I will say little. This is what comes into my mind of all that happened--aye, and at night, when the wind roars round the house, I see it all again, waking in my dreams as I call to Kenulf. One flash of lightning showed me my ship dismasted and helpless, drifting broadside on to a sand over which the waves broke white and angry, and when the next flash came--she was gone!

Then I cried out on my folly in leaving her, and out of the blackness beside me as I clung to the gunwale, straining my eyes against the spray, Halfden's voice came, crying, as he gripped my arm: