"Princess," he said, "the heathen shoot far with bow and sling. It is time you sought shelter below. For a while you can there lie in safety."
"But you, cousin? The Dane ships swarm with warriors. You and your men will all be slain! Do not fight them, Roland! Let there be no bloodshed."
"A wise maiden!" cried the shipmaster. "Mark the odds,--one stroke brings death to us all. Yield, lord Frank! What if they give two or three to Odin? The rest they 'll spare for thralls or set free for wergild."
"Ah, Roland, yield, then! Do not anger the terrible heathen. My father will soon ransom us."
"And what will he say to his daughter's faithless warder,--to the coward who, without a blow, yielded a king's child into heathen thraldom?--By my sword, the Danes take you only over the corpse of the last Frank in this ship!"
But proudly as he spoke, when he swung the girl down from the deck, the count's heart sickened at thought of her helplessness. How would the little cloister-maiden fare in the hands of the fierce sea-thieves? The anguish of the thought filled him with renewed rage. He gripped his sword-hilt.
"Now to die, with a score of Danes for death-bed," he muttered.
Then a sudden hope flashed from his blue eyes. He seized the steersman by the shoulder, and shouted joyfully: "Ho, Frisian; we may yet go free! Cast over the cargo! The breeze freshens; we 'll outsail the thieves!"
"Only another viking could do that--yet the cloth bales will float--the Danes may linger to pick them up. A good trick, if old-- But what-- Curse of the foul fiend! Look to seaward--three more longships--across our course!"
"The race is run! Strike sail, man, and go forward to your sailors. You and they may so save your skins. I and my men die here."