"
I nodded, for the reasoning seemed good. Rather would I be drowned than
fall into the hands of those who were galloping on the shore, to be
dragged back to London and a felon's doom.
So I pressed upon the tiller to bring the _Blanche_ more into
mid-channel, and headed for the sea. Wider and wider grew the estuary
and farther and farther away the shores as the _Blanche_ scudded on
beneath her small sails with the weight of the gale behind her, till at
last there was the open sea.
Within a few feet of the tiller was a deck-house, in which the crew ate,
built of solid oak and clamped with iron. Here was food in plenty, ale,
too, and with these we filled ourselves. Also, leaving Kari to hold the
tiller, I took off my armour and in place of it clothed myself in the
rough sea garments that lay about with tall greased boots, and then sent
him to do likewise.
Soon we lost sight of land and were climbing the great ocean billows,
whose foamy crests rolled and spurted wherever the eye fell. We could
set no course but must go where the gale drove us, away, away we knew
not whither.
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