CHAPTER XXIV

FOR DEAR LOVE'S SAKE

He alone knows, Who wanders wide And has much experienced, By what disposition Each man is ruled Who common sense possesses.

Ha'vama'l

The first night out was a moonless night, that shut down on the world of waters and blotted out even the clouds and the waves that been company for the solitary vessel. The little ship became a speck of light in a gulf of darkness, an atom of life floating in empty s.p.a.ce. Under the tent roofs, by the light of flaring torches, the crew drank and sang and amused themselves with games; but beyond that circle, there was only blackness and emptiness and silence.

Sigurd gazed out over the vessel's side, with a yawn and a shiver combined. "It feels as though the air were full of ghosts, and we were the only living beings in the whole world," he muttered.

A tow-headed giant known as Long Lodin overheard him, and laughed noisily, jerking his thumb over his shoulder toward the deck where Leif's eagle face showed high above their heads.

"_His_ luck could carry us safe through even the world of the dead," he rea.s.sured him.

But Rolf paused in his chess game to throw his friend a keen glance.

"The Silver-Tongue has been one not apt to speak womanish words," he said, gravely. "Something there is on your mind which disturbs you, comrade."

Sigurd pulled himself together with an attempt at his usual careless laugh. "Is it your opinion that I am the only person who is thinking of ghosts to-night?" he parried. "Look yonder at Kark, how he fears to turn his back on the shadows, lest the Evil One overtake him! It is my belief that he would like it better to die than to venture into the dark of the foreroom."

Following his glance, they beheld the bowerman, leaning against the mast with a face as pale as a toadstool. When a sailor threw a piece of dried fish at him, he jumped as though he had been struck by a stone. Rolf's gentle smile expanded into a broad grin, and he let himself be turned thus easily from his object.

"Now that is true; I had not observed him before. He appears as if the G.o.ddess Ran already had hold of his feet to pull him down under the water. Let us have a little fun with him. I will send him to the foreroom on an errand."

Robert of Normandy set down his drinking-horn with a sharp motion, and Sigurd leaned forward hastily; but the Wrestler's soft voice was already speeding his command.

"Ho there, valiant Kark-with-the-white-cheeks! Get you into the foreroom and bring my bag of chess-men from the bra.s.s-bound box."

Kark heard the order without a motion except an angry scowl, and Sigurd drew back with something like a breath of relief. But Rolf made a sudden move as though to rise to his feet, and the effect was magical.

"I am going as soon as is necessary," the thrall growled. "You said nothing of being in haste." And he shuffled over to one of the torches to light a splinter in its flame, and pushed his way forward with dragging feet.

Sigurd and the Norman both sprang after him.

"I tell you, Rolf, I have something against this!" Sigurd stormed, as the Wrestler's iron hand closed upon his cloak. "My--my--my valuables are in the same chest. I will not have him pawing them over. Let me go, I say!" He managed to slide out of his cloak and dodge under Rolf's arm.

A spark of something very like anger kindled the Wrestler's usually mild eyes; he caught the Norman around the waist, as the latter tried to pa.s.s him, and swung him bodily into the air. For an instant it seemed possible that he might hurl him over the ship's side into the ocean. But he finally threw him lightly upon a pile of skin sleeping-bags, and turned and hastened after the jarl's son.

Guessing that some friendly squabble was in progress, the sailors made way for him good-humoredly, and he reached the forecastle only a moment behind Sigurd. Kark's taper was just disappearing among the shadows beneath the deck.

Before the pursuers could speak, the bowerman leaped back upon them with a shriek that cut the air.

"Ran is in there! I saw her hair hanging over a barrel. It was long and yellow. It is Ran herself! We shall drown--"

Sigurd Haraldsson dealt him a cuff that felled him like a log.

"The simpleton is not able to tell a piece of yellow fox-fur from a woman's hair," he said, contemptuously. "Since you are here, Rolf, hold the light for me, and I will get the chess-bag myself." He spoke loudly enough so that the men on the benches heard, laughed, and turned back to their amus.e.m.e.nts. Then he drew Rolf further into the room, laid a hand over his mouth, and pointed to the farthest comer, where barrels and piled-up bales made a screen half-way across the bow.

Hair long and yellow there was, as the simpleton had said; but it was not the vengeful Ran who looked out from under it. Tumbled and dishevelled, paling and flushing, short-kirtled and desperate-eyed, Helga the Fair stood before them.

"Behold how a prudent shield-maiden helps matters that are already in a snarl," the jarl's son said, dryly.

The Wrestler started back in consternation.

Helga dropped her eyes guiltily. "I cannot blame you for being angry,"

she murmured. "I have become a great hindrance to you."

"It is an unheard-of misfortune!" gasped Rolf. "In flying from Gilli you have broken the Norwegian law; and by causing Leif to aid you in your flight you have made him an accomplice. A bad result is certain."

Helga's head bent lower. Then suddenly she flung out her hands in pa.s.sionate entreaty.

"Yet I could not help it, comrades! As I live, I could not help it! How could I have the heart to remain in safety, without knowing whether Alwin lived or died? How could I spend my days decking myself in fine clothes, while my best friend fought for his life? Was it to be expected that I could help coming?" She spoke softly, half-crouching in her hiding-place, but her heart was in every word.

Her judges could not stand against her. Rolf swore that she would have been unworthy the name of shield-maiden had she acted otherwise. And Sigurd pressed her hand with brotherly tenderness.

"You should know that I am not blaming you in earnest, my foster-sister, because I grumble a little when I cannot see my way out of the tangle."

He bent over Kark to make sure that he was really as unconscious as he seemed; then he lowered his voice nervously. "What makes it a great mishap is that your presence doubles Alwin's risk, and because one can never be altogether sure to what lengths Eric's son will go,--even with one whom he loves as well as he loves you. If I could find some good way in which to break the news to him before he sees you,--"

Helga sprang out of her niche, and stood, straight and rigid, before them. "You shall not endanger yourself to shield me. You will feel it enough for what you have already done. The first burst of his anger I will bear myself, as is my right."

Before they had even guessed her intention, she slipped past them, leaped lightly over Kark's motionless body, and delivered herself into the light of the torches. In another instant, a roar of amazement and delight had gone up from the benches; and the men were dropping their games and knocking over their goblets to crowd around her.

"She has got out of her wits," Rolf said, wonderingly.

"He will kill her," Sigurd answered, between his teeth. "For half as much cause, Olaf Trygva.s.son struck a queen in the face."

They followed her aft, like men walking in a dream; but between the rings of broad shoulders they soon lost sight of her. All they could see was the Norman's dark face, as he stepped upon a bench and silently watched the approaching apparition.

"The Troll take him! If he cannot keep that look out of his eyes, why does he not shut them?" Sigurd muttered, irritably.

Perhaps it was that look which Helga encountered, as she made the last step that brought her face to face with the chief. At that moment, a great change came over her. When the guardsman pushed back to the extreme limits of his chair to regard her in a sort of incredulous horror, she did not fall at his feet as everyone expected her to, and as she herself had thought to do. Instead, she flung up her head with a spirit that sent the long locks flying. Even when anger began to distort his face,--anger headlong and terrible as Eric's,--her glance crossed his like a sword-blade.

"You need not look at me like that, kinsman," she said, fiercely. "It is your own fault for giving me into the power of a mean-minded brute,--you who brought me up to be a free Norse shield-maiden!"

If the planks of the deck had risen against them, the men could not have looked at each other more aghast. Her boldness seemed to paralyze even Leif. Or was it the grain of truth in the reproach that stayed him? He let moment after moment pa.s.s without replying. He sat plainly struggling to hold back his fury, gripping his chair-arms until the knuckles on his fists gleamed white.

After peering at him curiously for awhile, as though trying to divine his wishes, his shrewd old foster-father put aside the chess-board on which they had been playing, and hobbled over and laid a soothing hand on the girl's arm.

"Speak you of Gilli?" he inquired. "Tell to us how he has ill-treated you."

It was only very slightly that the pause had cooled Helga's valor.

"He has treated me like a horse that traders deck out in costly things, and parade up and down for men to see and offer money for," she answered hotly.

Though they knew Gilli's conduct was entirely within the law, and there was not a man there who might not have done the same thing, they all grunted contemptuously. Tyrker stroked his beard, with an-other sidelong glance at his foster-son, as he said, cautiously: