"I love him, of course. But a woman couldn't do a thing like that," was
the way she put it to me the next morning.
I felt, however, that Olaf would master her. Will was set against will,
mind against mind. And at last she showed him the way. "A thousand years
ago you would have carried me off."
I can see him now as he caught the idea and laughed at her. "Whether you
go of your own accord or I carry you, you will be happy." He lifted her
in his strong hands as if she were a feather, held her, kissed her, and
flashed a glance at me. "You see how easy it would be, and there's a
chaplain on board."
There is not much more to tell. Nancy went down one morning to the beach
for her bath--and the fog swallowed her up. I have often wondered
whether she planned it, or whether, knowing that she would be there, he
had come in his launch and had borne her away struggling, but not, I am
sure, unwilling. However it happened, the cloak went with her, and I
like to think that she was held in his arms, wrapped in it, when they
reached the ship.
I like to think, too, of my Nancy in the glowing room with the wolfskins
and the strange old tapestry--and the storms beating helpless against
her happiness.
I like to think of her as safe in that hidden land, where most of us
fain would follow her--the mistress of that guarded mansion, the wife of
a young sea god, the mother of a new race.
But, most of all, I like to think of the children. And I have but one
wish for a long life, which might otherwise weigh upon me, that the
years may bring back to the world those prophets from a hidden land,
those young voices crying from the wilderness--the children of Olaf and
of Nancy Greer.