As it were about a ship's length from us sailed another ship, tall and shadowy and gray, holding the same course as ourselves, and keeping place with us exactly, rising and falling over the hills of water as we rose and fell.

And we could see that she had the same high dragon stem and stern as our ship, and on her decks we could make out forms of men amidships, dim and misty as the ship herself.

Yet though we could see her thus, in no wise could we make out the sea on which she rode--so thick was the curling fog everywhere, though the sun was trying to find a way through it, changing its hue from gray to pearly white.
Now, Bertric started from the stillness which held us, and hailed the ship loudly.
"Ahoy! what ship is that ?" The hail rang, and seemed to echo strangely in the fog, but there came no answer.

Nor was there any when he hailed again and for the third time.

I thought that the outline of the strange sail grew more dim at the first cry, and again that it was plainer, for the mist across the sun drifted, though we could feel no breeze.
"It is Aegir's ship," whispered Gerda, still clinging to me.
"Thorwald is therein," and she raised her hand as if to wave a farewell, hardly knowing what she did.
At that, one of the shadowy forms on the strange deck lifted its arm with the same gesture, and at the same moment.