"Ho, there! put me across, will you?" shouted the stranger.
"Aye, aye; but we must know thy business first," bawled Ceolwulf in return, resting on his oar.
"I want to go to Cymenesora. Thy crew seems weak. I might lend thee a hand at an oar if thou art bound for the same place."
"Maybe we are, and maybe we aren't," said the cautious Ceolwulf; "but I don't see how we're going to get thee in. See how the tide is setting us up?"
"Yes; but, Biggun, if I back water and thou pullest we shall swing round, and not many strokes will bring us ashore, thou knowest well," said Wulfstan.
"That's all very fine, Wulf; but how am I to know if it's safe to take him on board? We're strangers in a strange land, seest thou, and it's better to keep to ourselves until we know who's who. That young man there is too fine a bird not to be somebody, and he may not be friends with them who have the rule in these parts, dost understand? or he might take a fancy to our boat perhaps. There's no knowing."
"Now, old man, art going to put me across or not?"
"Do, Biggun, row ashore. If he is somebody important, we shall be all the better for having done him a good turn; and, besides, he can get us to Boseham, or wherever we are going, all the quicker, and then poor Eddie can be attended to. And I am dying of hunger, too."
"Well, I don't much like it, but I don't see that we can come to much harm anyway. Let me paddle a bit, Wulf; she will come round into the slack water under that point. There—that's it."
The tide had already carried them close to the point, and a few strokes brought the bow of the boat grating against the steep shingle, but not sufficiently near for the stranger to get in without wetting his feet. However, taking a run, and using his spear as a leaping pole, he sprang lightly on board without touching the water at all.