"Nevertheless," answered my father, smiling, "Ingild will have many
a brave show for you in town. Wait till you get to London, for the
court of Ethelred himself will very likely be there, and there will
be much to see. And maybe you will find some Danish ship in the
river, and will send her captain here to take the jarl home with
him; for we may not hold him as a prisoner with us."

Then Lodbrok added that, in any case, I might find means to send
messages to his home by some ship sailing to ports that he named;
and that I promised I would do. Thereon he gave me a broad silver
ring, rune graven, to show as a token to any of his countrymen whom
I might meet, for the ring was known.

"Do not part with it, Wulfric," he said, as I thanked him; "for it
may be of use to you some day, if not on this voyage. Jarl Lodbrok
is well known on the high seas, and he gives not rings for naught."

Now I would not take the falcon with me, but begged the jarl to use
her; and I asked him also to train for himself a greyhound that I
had bred, and of which he thought highly.

"Why," said he, "I shall have the best hawk and dog in all Thetford
town, and Beorn the falconer will have naught to say to me."

Thereat we laughed, for Beorn's jealousy was a sport to us when we
thought of it, which was seldom enough.

So these two went to Thetford, and in the last week of August I
sailed for London, with a fair breeze over the quarter, from our
haven.