"Where did you put that treasure in safety?"
"It remained in the bark that brought me to this side of the river.—My companions rowed back from the shore and cast anchor beyond the reach of the arrows of your hordes."
"We also have barks moored at the other end of the camp. I shall order your companions to be pursued—I shall have the treasures!"
"You deceive yourself!—As soon as my companions see the enemy's barks approach from a distance, they will suspect foul play. Seeing that they have a long lead, they will be able to regain the opposite shore of the Rhine without any danger whatever.—Such will be the only fruit of the treachery practiced by your people upon me.—Come, woman! Have me boiled for your infernal auguries! Perhaps my bones, bleached in your caldron, may be transformed into magnificent ornaments!"
"I want the treasures!" replied Elwig struggling against her lingering suspicions. "Since you did not carry the jewels about you, when would you have given them to the kings of our hordes?"
"When I left the jewels in the bark I expected I would be received as an envoy of peace, and that as such I would be escorted back to the river bank. My companions would then have returned to the shore to receive me, and I would have taken the presents out of the bark and distributed them among the kings in the name of Victoria and her son."
The priestess looked upon me for a while with darkling eyes. She seemed to yield alternately to mistrust and to the promptings of cupidity. Finally, however, the latter sentiment evidently prevailed. She took a few steps away, and with a strong voice pronounced the bizarre name of a person who was not until then upon the scene.
Almost instantly a hideous old hag with grey hair and clad in a blood-bespattered robe issued from the cavern. She was, no doubt, the active priestess at the inhuman sacrifices. She exchanged a few words in a low voice with Elwig and forthwith vanished in the surrounding wood, in the direction that the black warriors had followed.
Again dropping on her haunches beside me, the priestess said in a low and muffled voice:
"Since you wish to speak with my brother, King Neroweg, I have sent for him.—He will soon be here—but you shall not mention a word to him concerning the jewels."