An Old Captivity

  He wrinkled his brows. “Aunt Janet? I forget. Not since Reykjavik, I don’t think.”

  “What a shame! Would you like to write a cable to her now? I could take it up to the wireless station, and get it off to-night.”

  He roused himself. “It’s awfully good of you, Miss Alix. I’d better send her one. Could you pass me over that pad, and the pencil?”

  She sat on his bed and watched him draft the cable. It read:

  SURVEY NEARLY FINISHED STAYING FEW DAYS HERE BEFORE RETURNING. DONALD.

  The girl expostulated with him. “You can’t just send it like that, Mr. Ross. Send her your love, at any rate.”

  He smiled. “She’d never forgive me if I spent money cabling that.”

  “I’ll never forgive you if you don’t.” She took the pad from him, and added:

  ALL MY LOVE AND BEST WISHES FROM LOCKWOODS WILL SEE YOU BEFORE LONG.

  He laughed. “She’ll have a fit.”

  “Probably do her good. Here’s your Ovaltine, Mr. Ross. I’ll take this up and send it off at once.”

  She left the house and walked up to the wireless station; when she returned she found that he had drunk the Ovaltine and eaten all the bread and butter.

  At Guildford, Aunt Janet had the novel experience of being rung up on the telephone that Donald had installed, to have her telegram read out to her at ten o’clock at night. It was too late that night for her to do more than ponder the matter, and set the new cable up on the kitchen mantelpiece beside the one from Reykjavik, now growing rather dirty. But at nine o’clock next morning she was at the post office inquiring the cost of a wireless message from a place called Julianehaab.

  After a good deal of research they told her it was one and sevenpence a word.

  “Land sakes alive,” she muttered to herself. “Over a pound—a pound and sevenpence for that last sentence. Donald must be daft, or he’s in love.” But she was very pleased. It was as if he had spent that much money on a present for her. The confirmation copy had arrived when she got home; she carried it with her in her bag for weeks.

  Lockwood landed from the motor boat at about eight o’clock, relieved to see the seaplane in one piece upon the beach. He left Ajago to get some help to bring the gear up to the house, and went on himself. Alix came to meet him from the house, and told him briefly what had happened.

  They gave the pilot some more Ovaltine and a milk pudding when they had supper, and another bowl of bread and milk at half-past ten when they prepared for bed. The girl said cheerfully: “You ought to sleep now, after all this milk.”

  Ross said: “I ought to, but I shan’t.”

  As before, Alix slept in the inner room, screened from the main part of the hut by a matchboarding partition without a door. The men slept at the other end of the main room. Lockwood laid out his sleeping-bag beside the pilot, undressed, and got into it. “Give me a call if you want anything,” he said.

  At one o’clock he woke, raised himself, and looked at the other in the dim light. Ross was lying wide awake upon his back. He turned his head and looked at the don.

  Lockwood said: “Have you been to sleep at all?”

  “Not yet. Don’t worry about me, sir. I’m all right.”

  The don sat up. “You’d better have another cup of Ovaltine.”

  “I don’t want that, sir.”

  Lockwood got out of his bag and pulled on trousers over his pyjamas. “You’d better have it. I’ll have one myself. No—you stay where you are.”

  He busied himself with cups, and lit the Primus stove. Alix, behind her matchboarding partition, woke at the noise of the stove, heard the men talking, and realised what was happening. There was no need for her to get up; she lay quiet in her bag, listening to their conversation.

  Lockwood, busy with the stove, said carelessly: “Do you know anyone called Leif, Mr. Ross?”

  The pilot did not answer for a moment. Then he said quietly: “Why do you ask that?”

  The other said: “It’s not really a fair question. But you said something about Leif when you were ill, when you were waking up. I was wondering if he was somebody you knew.”

  Ross did not answer. Presently Lockwood poured the hot milk into the mugs, stirred in the Ovaltine, and carried the mugs over to the sleeping-bench. He gave one to the pilot, and got back into bed himself with the other.

  They sat waiting for the drink to cool. “I had the hell of a dream,” the pilot said presently. “A chap called Leif came into it.”

  Lockwood nodded. “Do you dream much?”

  “I don’t dream at all, in the ordinary way. I suppose it’s all that stuff that I was taking.”

  “Very likely. What sort of a man was this Leif?”

  “Oh, he was a grand chap. A great big man, with yellow hair, very kind, and very straightforward. He could do everything better than anyone else.”

  “Who was he?”

  “I don’t know who he was.”

  “Can you remember anything else about him?”

  The pilot said: “I can remember everything. If I could draw I could do you his portrait—now.”

  The don asked: “Where did he live?”

  Ross laughed shortly. “That’s the funny part about dreams. They all get mixed up with real things, that you’ve seen yourself. I thought he lived in that cove where we camped, beside the stream.”

  “Did he live in a tent, like us?”

  “No—there was a farm there, where the ruins are. A lot of little stone houses, with wooden thatched roofs. It was a pretty squalid sort of set-up, altogether.”

  The don sipped his Ovaltine. “What were the windows of the houses made of?” he asked, with apparent carelessness.

  “Some part of the guts of a cow. A sort of membrane, stretched on a wooden frame. It let the light in fairly well.”

  “Were all these houses dwelling-houses?”

  The pilot shook his head. “They were mostly outbuildings for the cattle. I suppose fifty or sixty people lived there. But they all slept about in the cowhouses or anywhere—there was only the one proper house. I had a corner in the hayloft. A lot of us slept up there.”

  Lockwood asked: “Do you remember who you were, or any other details?”

  Ross said: “I remember everything.”

  He turned to the don. “In my dreams, the ones that I can remember, silly things have always happened. Foolish things—you know. But nothing like that happened in this one. It was all so—so real.”

  “Bad dreams are like that sometimes. Was it very distressing?”

  The pilot said softly: “Not until it came to an end.”

  The older man sipped his Ovaltine again. “If you can’t sleep, tell me about it.”

  Ross said: “I can’t sleep because of it. I can’t stop thinking about it, all the time. If I tell it to you, do you think it will put it out of my mind for a bit?”

  Lockwood said gently: “It’s worth trying.”

  The pilot said: “This man Leif, who lives in the house. I thought that I was one of his slaves. My name was Haki.”

  Behind her matchboarding the girl lay listening, wide awake.

  AN OLD CAPTIVITY

  IX

  HE thought that he had not always been a slave. In his dreams he could remember the hovel that he had lived in with his parents and his brothers, a rough shelter made of stones and turf upon the edge of a sea loch in a barren land of grey skies and heather. They had a few sheep, and they had a crazy boat made of skins stretched over a light wooden frame; they used this for fishing.

  He did not know how old he was, or how long he had lived in that place before the ship came. It was an enormous double-ended ship, built like an open boat but over a hundred feet in length. It had a short mast with a square sail brailed up on a yard; it had oars to row with, and it was manned by about thirty huge men with fair hair, the biggest men that he had ever seen.

  He was out fishing in the boat alone; as he came home-wards round the point and opened up the bay in
which they lived he saw the ship upon the beach before their house, and the men swarming over everything. He stopped rowing to watch, and saw his parents and his brothers flying up the hillside, far outdistancing the blond giants in pursuit of them. And then he saw another thing. The men were driving all their sheep down to the beach, picking them up, and heaving them on board the ship.

  He dashed on shore in a blind fury, armed with a heavy stick. They must not be allowed to take the sheep. He struck at one of the men; with the greatest ease the giant twisted the stick from his grasp and pinned his hands. Then they bound his arms behind him with a leather thong, and put him on the ship with the sheep.

  There were other people on the ship in similar condition to himself, and other sheep. Presently the ship was pushed off from the beach, the grey woollen sail was dropped down from the yard, and she began to cruise along the shore before the wind. His captors undid his arms and offered food and water, but he would not take either. He could not understand a word they said to him.

  He could understand what the other captives said, but they spoke very little. He learned from them that the blond men had come in the ship from Norway. Most of them seemed to take their position philosophically; the younger they were, the more they fretted and refused food.

  Amongst them there was a girl with fair hair, about sixteen years of age; her name was Hekja. She sat crouched down among the sheep, refusing everything, silent and alert; all day she watched the land. He did not speak to to her, but he knew instinctively that she was ready for any chance to escape, however desperate.

  When night came the blond men gave them skin rugs to put over them, to keep them warm.

  He did not know how long they were in the boat—two or three days perhaps. There came a morning when the ship approached the shore, to cut grass for the sheep. Beneath the cover of the animals he stretched out his foot furtively, touched the girl’s toe, and glanced towards the shore. As the keel grated on the sand they were over the side like lightning, and running up the beach pursued by the most agile of the Norsemen.

  The girl was as nimble as he, and a better runner. They went up the cliff like a couple of monkeys and set off together in a steady lope over the hill. The Norsemen gave up the pursuit when they had covered a mile, gasping and panting in their rough grey woollen clothes. As they stood sweating they watched the fugitives far above on the hillside nearly two miles away.

  “Bad luck to lose them,” one of them remarked. “Runners like that would have been a good present for the King.”

  Some time later the fugitives stopped running, hardly out of breath. They seemed to be safe from pursuit. Haki stared about him with a growing concern. He could not yet see what lay beyond the hill, but it began to look as though they were on an island, and an uninhabited and barren place at that.

  They went on, and an hour later knew the worst. They were on an island without beasts, or people, or anything to eat except the grass. Far below them they could see the vessel on the beach and the men spread out on the hillside cutting grass; they saw the smoke of a camp fire from the beach.

  They wandered about all day at a safe distance, finding no food except a few shellfish. They were desperately hungry, having eaten practically nothing since their capture. When night fell they found a little cave and huddled together in it for warmth; in spite of that they were numb and stiff with cold when morning came. They had no means of warming themselves or making a fire, nor any hope of anything to eat barring the mussels on the rocks.

  Far below them they could see the ship still on the beach, and the smoke of the fire.

  Haki said: “This is a bad island, with no food. It is better in the ship.”

  The girl said desperately: “I will not go back.”

  He said: “If we do not go back, we shall die.”

  Presently they were walking slowly down towards the ship. The Norsemen saw them, and a man came towards them alone, carrying a lump of cooked meat still savoury and warm from the fire. They took it from him and ate it ravenously.

  Presently the ship put to sea again; they were content to go with it. The men were kind to them and gave them good food and a cup of ale to drink; their break-away had marked them out from the other captives as slaves who were of value for their spirit.

  After a voyage lasting for two days they landed in Norway. Haki and Hekja were separated from the other slaves and put to work on a farm, where they served in some manner as sheep-dogs to the herds of cattle that strayed across the moors. With this occupation their powers of running developed remarkably. From time to time high-born people carne to the farm from the town; then the runners would be brought out and put to test. They rather liked these days. It was child’s play to them to cover fifty miles in a day across a trackless countryside; they ran steadily and lightly side by side all the day through. They carried nothing, and wore a minimum of clothing for the latitude. On arrival in the country they had been given material for clothes, white woollen vadmal, white for slavery. This they had worked up into a single garment, a white trousered overall with a hood that could be thrown back on the shoulders, open down the sides beneath the arms. It was the only sort of garment they knew how to make; it interested the Norsemen very much. They wore nothing else. The long slits beneath the arm-holes made it well ventilated and cool for running; when at rest they could button up these slits.

  Their hair had been cut short as a sign that they were slaves, and they ran in bare feet. When on a journey they ate nothing and drank very little. On one occasion they covered seventy miles between dawn and dusk of a summer day.

  This went on for eight or nine months. Then they were taken into town, to the King’s Hall. The throng of people and the magnificence of everything left them frightened and confused; in this state they came before the King Olaf. He was talking to the man they later came to know as Leif.

  “Lord,” said the man who had brought them from the farm, “these are the runners.”

  The King looked them up and down with interest. “So. What country are you from?”

  They were too scared to answer him. Even if they had not been scared they could not have answered, for they did not know.

  The man said: “Lord, they are from Scotland.”

  The King said: “So—they are Scots. Can they speak our language?”

  “They understand it, Lord, but they speak it with difficulty. When they are frightened they become dumb, and they are frightened now.”

  The King said: “You have nothing to fear from us.”

  They did not believe him; he was too powerful.

  The King turned to the man Leif. “These are the runners,” he said. “I give them to you. They can run further and faster than anybody in the world. Take them with you in your ship, and use them to explore your new colony. I have forgotten the name.”

  Leif said: “Lord, we want to call it Greenland.”

  “Is it, then, so green and fertile?”

  Leif hesitated. “In summer, Lord, there are meadows in the south-west of the country where cattle may pasture. But most of the country is a field of ice.”

  The King frowned. “A bad name for such a place.”

  The man said: “Lord, Iceland was called by a true name and people are afraid to go there, because of the ice. My father Erik wants people to come to our country, and so he asks your grace to call it Greenland.”

  For a moment the King pondered this; then he burst into a great bellow of laughter, with all his court. It seemed to them to be a very subtle joke. The runners stood bewildered, and more frightened than ever. They had understood a great deal of the conversation, and saw nothing funny in it. They could not understand these people at all. They shrank a little closer together as the laughter roared about them.

  They were taken away and lodged in a stable in the town. The bustle and confusion, and the many people thronging round and looking at their clothes, upset them; they were unhappy and refused to eat. On the second day Leif came to look them over.

>   He spoke slowly to them, using simple words that they could understand. “So,” he said kindly. “You ate nothing yesterday. What is the matter? You have nothing to fear.”

  Hekja crouched down and shrank away from the great bulk of the man. Haki plucked up courage. “Lord,” he said in his uncouth dialect, “the people come and laugh at us.”

  This big man nodded with understanding; he had had much to do with animals. “This is not a good place for you. In a month we go by ship to my colony in Greenland. Would you like to go back to the farm until we sail?”

  Haki said: “Lord, we were happy on the farm.”

  Leif turned away. “You shall go back until I send for you.”

  They were taken back to the same farm and resumed their old life, herding the cattle. In a month they were taken to the ship. It was a larger ship than the one in which they had come from Scotland. It was double-ended and open like a huge ship’s lifeboat; it had a beam of fully twenty feet, with massive sweeps for rowing in a calm. It had one great mast carrying a yard and a squaresail that could be trimmed to the wind, and reefed; at the bow the stem rose high above the sheer line of the hull, carved like a dragon’s head. It drew about six feet of water. There were no decks, but amidships there was a pitched roof like a house which formed a shelter for the perishable goods. There was a leather sleeping-bag for everyone on board. The bottom of the ship was covered with flat slabs of stone carried as ballast; towards the stern these were heaped together for a fireplace.

  In this ship they sailed from Norway. They touched at several islands, and were at sea for a long time. At last they came to pack ice and pressed through it, rowing the ship and forcing through the ice. Finally they sighted land, rounded a cape and coasted on a little way until they entered a fiord and came to the farmhouse in the cove.

  Many people came down to meet them, made them welcome, and helped them to unload the ship. The ship itself was pulled up from the sea on rollers laid beneath the keel and a rough shelter was built over it.

  Haki and Hekja were put to work with the cattle as they had in Norway, running with verbal messages from time to time between the settlements. They were always sent together, in case one had an accident remote from any help.