So suddenly did it come that I started, and I heard
Father Phelim draw in his breath with some words which I could not
catch.
"What is that?" I asked Gerda, under my breath and pointing.
She laughed gently, and her hand tightened on my arm.
"We were wont to call it Thor's hammer," she said. "We see it from
time to time, and it brings luck. Now it greets me and you--but it
is not the old sign to me any longer."
"It is strange," said Bertric. "Once you called on Asa Thor--and
here is that one to whom you called, and yonder--"
"No, no," she said, clinging to me, "it is no longer Thor's
hammer."
"It is the sign which shall be held dear here," said Phelim. "It is
the sign that all good has come to this place."
"So may it be," said Gerda softly, and I thought that the
reflection of the cross made a glimmering pathway from the hall to
the ship which bore her homeward.
But I had no time to wonder how and why that sign was there, for
now we were seen, and torches began to flicker along the wharf. Our
pilots spoke to Asbiorn, and he passed the word for men to go
forward with the shore warps, and the oar strokes slowed down. I
thought I saw the broad gleam of light as the doors of the hall
opened and closed again, and then a hail or two went back and forth
from the shore and us.
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