Never had Ingolf been so frightened as when he stood there and saw Leif in the water—never so helplessly anxious and despairing. He stood, and could neither move hand nor foot. He felt paralysing terror like a dead weight in his whole body. Then he suddenly began to shiver. At the same moment all power of cool reflection deserted him and he forgot that he was no better a swimmer than Leif. He must get out and help him. And he was on the point of plunging from the rock with his clothes on when he saw Leif come crawling up through the water.
Leif crawled up and got his head above the surface. He spat and snorted and made grimaces. It did Ingolf good to see him. And he did not go to the bottom again. Leif, the incredible, swam! Not with arms and legs working on both sides as he had practised the motions. No, he simply crawled through the water with a long stroke and did not sink. It looked so ridiculous that Ingolf had to laugh aloud. No, Leif of course could not be so easily drowned as others die naturally. Now he felt the ground under his feet. He stood still, coughed, and spat up water and shook himself so that the red locks flew about his head. He laughed suddenly when he set eyes on Ingolf. "What, not yet out of your clothes?" Quite calmly he waded to shore. And when he stood opposite Ingolf, he said simply and unaffectedly, although he shivered over his whole body: "I was nearly drowned that time! Who could guess that it was so difficult? If I hadn't just happened to think, while I was down there, how dogs swim, I should be lying there still!"
When at last he had finished spitting and shaking the water out of his ears, he took the same header again as a matter of course.
Such was Leif. He could not break his neck, he could not drown, and bears sneaked off when they met him. Could he, then, be lost in a wood and frozen to death? Or would he extricate himself again as he alone could? Ingolf thought it not quite impossible, and that was his only hope and comfort.
It would be just like Leif to crash his way through a wood in which anyone else would be lost, and to be first home. If only he were already there, in bed and asleep!
Ingolf was aroused from his reveries by his horse suddenly coming to a dead stop. He looked round him, and was not long in discovering that he had reached home. The horse had stopped exactly opposite the door of the stable. Stiff in all his limbs from the cold, he crawled down and opened the door. His only thought was whether Leif's horse might already be inside. He went from horse to horse, felt them, and noted their distinguishing marks. He knocked against his own horse, which had followed after him into the warmth with its saddle and bridle on. He freed it from the bridle, but forgot the saddle, and went on. No, Leif's horse was not in the stable.
That was only what he had expected. Nevertheless, he felt suddenly paralysed with disappointment. Leif, then, had not reached home. Leif was still somewhere without. At that very moment he was roaming about lost either on the heath or in the wood. Leif's horse was not one of those which could find its way home by itself.
Ah, Leif! Leif! He hoped that it was not already all over with him. Ingolf seemed to see him in front of him lying on his back in a snowdrift with arms and legs stretched out. The snow was drifting over him and already nearly covering him. By the side of him stood his horse, with its head hanging down. Ah, Leif! Leif!
Ingolf collected himself. He did not feel the cold any more, nor did he notice how hunger was gnawing him. He shut the stable and went to the courtyard. There was something feverish and yet resolute about all his proceedings. He entered the outhouse where the ski were kept, and found his own and Leif's. He opened the house-door a little and whistled softly to his dog. The dog was wild with delight at seeing him again, jumped about him, and licked his cold hands with his warm tongue, while Ingolf, his fingers stiff with the frost, was buckling on his ski. He had no time to take notice of it. As soon as he had buckled his snow-shoes firmly on, he sped away from the house, the same way he had come. Now he again paid attention to the direction of the wind and the light of the moon.
Leif must be found—there was no question about that. He could not return home alive without him.