seemed, or seeing that I meant him no harm.

Then I spoke plainly to him.

"I will harm you not. But your life is in my hands in two ways. I
can slay you by water or dagger for one thing; or for another, I
think I can take this boat to shore at some place where you are not
known, and so let you live a little longer. And in any case I have
a mind to try to save my own life; thus if you will obey me so that
I may tend the boat, yours shall be saved with it, so far as I am
concerned. But if you hinder me, die you must in one way or
another!"

Now he saw well enough that his only hope lay in my power to take
the boat safely across the water, and so promised humbly to obey me
in all things if I would but spare him and get the boat to shore
quickly. So I unbound him and coiled the rope at my feet again,
bidding him lie down amidships and be still.

Many a time men have asked me why I slew him not, or cast him not
overboard, thus being troubled no more with him. Most surely I
would have slain him when we fought, in the white heat of
anger--and well would it have been if Ulfkytel had doomed him to
death, as judge. But against this helpless, cringing wretch, whose
punishment was even now falling on him, how could I lift hand? It
seemed to me, moreover, that I was, as it were, watching to see
when the stroke of doom would fall on him, as the earl said it
surely must on the guilty.

The wind freshened, and the boat began to sing through the water,