Talbot Mundy

“ Like the echo to that from away up-river came a chorus of six horns blown in unison. There began loud shouting from somewhere just beyond the trees and, presently, the unmistakable thump and rattle of oars being laid in rowlocks. A moment later Tros' ear caught the steady, short stroke of deep-sea rowing, such as men use where the waves are steep and close together. ”

“ Tros swung the bireme's head up-stream and began to consider that other smudge of brown smoke, half-a-dozen or more miles away.
"Now, if Lud of Lunden really is a good god," he remarked to Orwic, "we will catch another longship on our ugly snout without wasting a single arrow!"
"We might pray to Lud," Orwic suggested.
"No," said Tros. "The gods depise a man who prays. They help men who make use of opportunity. Get below there!"
The oarsmen were all leaning overside to watch the Northmen being cut down by Britons as they struggled through the muddy shallows close by the riverbank. ”

“ He was already whistling to himself.
"Yonder!" said Conops, nodding, his one eye staring upriver. "Too much smoke!"
"Mist!" remarked Orwic, but the wish was father to the contradiction.
He had seen that kind of smoke before; had more than one scar to show for it. One did not admit, until sure, that Northmen might be raiding British homesteads.
"Smoke!" Tros announced after a minute. He could almost smell it. "Orwic! Caswallon shall welcome us after all!"
Orwic shouted. A dozen Britons came out of the hold, to cluster on the poop and stare at the smudge on the skyline. ”

“ TROS sent Conops below to discover what the damage really amounted to, and watched the Northmen. Their longship had gone under sidewise, so that not even her mast was visible. Most of her men were drowning; some had struggled to the mud bank, where the yielding mud sucked them under. Others, trying to make the creek-mouth, were being carried upstream by the tide; not many were swimming strongly enough to have any prospect of reaching shore. And as if they had been hiding in fox-holes, Britons began appearing from between the trees gathering in excited groups to cut down the survivors. ”

“ I will drive you!" Tros retorted. "Stand out, the man who thinks I can't! Come on and let's settle the question! What? Haven't I a rival? Down off my poop then! Down you go!"
He strode toward them, point-first, and they scrambled off the poop in laughter at their own defeat. So Tros saw fit to smile too, as they crowded in the waist to hear the rest of what he had to say.
"Northmen!" he laughed, pecking at the planking with his sword-point. "I will give you such a bellyful of Northmen as you never dreamed! To your benches now! Out oars!" ”

“ Each to his own profession, born leaders in the van, born blacksmiths to the anvil, born adventurers toward the skyline—he for one!—and each man fighting to a finish with whatever enemy opposed him, that enemy on every battlefield himself, no other! ”

“ Tros was not fond of explanations; they are usually bad for discipline; but he conceded something to Orwic's prompt obedience, which was a novelty to be encouraged.
"We should have lost the wind around the next bend anyhow. I would have had to take men from the oars to man sheets and braces. The Northmen are faster; we couldn't have run, sail or no sail. Gather all the arrows into one basket, set that by the starboard arrow-engine, and listen to me! I'll kill you if you loose one flight before I give the word!" ”

“ The thought encouraged him.
"If I am to help Cæsar, and he me, then my time to die is not yet. For I will injure him with all my might and main until my whole mind changes!"
He reflected that it takes time for a man's inclination to change to that extent.
"My will is not the wind!" he muttered. "I will live long before I befriend Cæsar!"
The wind changed while he thought of it, veering to the southward, blowing all the mist toward the northern riverbank until At last the sun shone on a strip of dark-green where the forest touched the tide-mud and Conops cried "Land-ho!" from the poop. ”

“ Conops bared his teeth and Orwic, who had led an earlier mutiny to his own distress, made signals; but they deferred no more to Orwic than to Tros. Orwic was only Caswallon's nephew; they were as good as he, and equally entitled to opinions. Besides, as second-in-command, Orwic was responsible along with Tros for failure to capture Cæsar, and that, added to jealousy, was excuse enough for ignoring his signals.
"Any man can sail a ship upriver!" ”

“ He began to wonder whether his father had not been right in saying that a man's delight in action was no better than the animals', that his brain was only a mass of instincts magnified, and that the soul was the only part of him worth cultivating. ”

“ They could back away no farther; to advance meant instant death to two or three at any rate, and whether or not Orwic should take Tros' side.
"At your hands I have suffered failure!" Tros went on. "It carks in me. I went for Cæsar. I bring back dead and wounded men. Whose fault is that? Yours, you disobedient young ——! By the gods who grinned when you wasted arrows, it shall be my fault if I fail again! Now hear me! Not a man aboard this bireme shall see Lunden until we beat the Northmen first! ”

“ That might mean that the Northmen were divided, one ship's crew plundering on either bank; which was likely enough, since it would be good strategy, obliging Caswallon to divide his own forces and making it more difficult for him to gather men into one managable unit. The Britons were probably in scattered tens and dozens being beaten in detail for lack of one directing mind.
"A man does what he can," Tros reflected, glancing upward at the heavy fighting-top, that might be visible from a long way off upriver.
He called the man down from the mast-head, then turned to Orwic. ”