"Though they have in no way hurried the matter, I believe that he is almost dead now," Rolf comforted his captive.

Even as he spoke, the last faint cry ended in a gurgling choke,--and there was silence.

Instantly the scarf was slipped from Alwin's mouth, and the living fetters unclasped themselves from his limbs.

"Thanks to me--" Rolf was beginning.

The brief interval of silence was shattered by a cry from the sentinel on the river bank, followed either by an echo or an answering whoop from the opposite sh.o.r.e. Rolf stretched himself along the branch, just in time to see the men below scatter in wildest confusion and plunge headlong into the thicket.

"In the Troll's name!" he e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed. "When dwarfs run like that, giants must be coming!"

Alwin had clambered to his feet, and stood with his head thrust up through the leafy roof.

"It is more out of the same nest!" he gasped. "They are coming from the other bank, swarms of them ....There! Some of them have landed..."

Rolf laughed his peculiar soft laugh of quiet enjoyment. "By Thor, was there ever such a game!" he exclaimed. "I can see them now; they are after the first lot like wolves after sheep--No, Kark was the sheep!

These are the hunters after the wolves. Hear them howl!"

"The last ones have climbed out of the water," Alwin bent to report. "Do they also follow?"

"As dogs follow deer. Saw I never such sport! When we can no longer hear them, it will be time for us to run a race of our own."

Alwin made no answer, and they waited in silence. Gradually distance drew soft folds over the sharp cries and m.u.f.fled them, as women throw their cloaks over the sharp swords of brawlers in the hall. Once again the drone and the chirping became audible about them, and the smile of the sunshine became visible in the air. It occurred to Alwin that the peacefulness of nature was like the gentleness of the Wrestler; and there floated through his head the saying of a wrinkled old nurse of his childhood, "The English can die without flinching; the French can die with laughs on their lips; but only the Northmen can smile as they kill." When the last smothered shout was unmistakably dead, Rolf swung himself down from the bough; hung there for an instant, stretching himself comfortably and shaking the cramps out of his limbs, then let himself down to the ground; and Alwin followed.

The soft sod lay trampled and gashed by the grinding heels; and the lengthening shadows pointed dark fingers at the middle of the nook, where a shapeless thing of white and red was lying.

Rolf bent over it curiously.

"It must be that these people love killing for its own sake, to go to so much trouble over it," he commented. "Evidently it is not the excitement of fighting which they enjoy, but the pleasure of torturing. I will not be sure but what they are trolls after all."

"It was a devils' deed," Alwin said hoa.r.s.ely. He looked down at the ghastly heap with a shudder of loathing. "And we are not without guilt who have permitted it. It is of no consequence what sort of a man he was; he was a human being and of our kind,--and they were fiends. You need not tell me that we could not help it," he added in fierce forestalling. "Had he been Sigurd, we would have helped it or we would both have lain like that."

Rolf shrugged his shoulders resignedly as they turned away. "Have it as you choose," he a.s.sented. "At least you cannot deny that you were helpless; let that console you. May the gallows take my body if you are not the most thankless man ever I met! Here are you rid of your enemy, and at the moment when he was most a hindrance to you, and not only do you reap the reward of the deed, but you bear no dangerous responsibility--"

He was checked by a glimpse of the face Alwin turned toward him. Pride and loathing, pa.s.sion and sternness, were all mingled in its expression.

The Saxon said slowly, "Heaven's mercy on the soul that reaps the reward of this deed! Easier would it be to suffer these tortures a hundredfold increased. Profit by such a deed, Rolf Erlingsson! Do you think that I would live a life that sprang from such a death? To cleanse my hand from the stain of such a murder, though the blood had but spattered on it, I would hew it off at the wrist."

CHAPTER XXIX

THE BATTLE TO THE STRONG

He is happy Who gets for himself Praise and good-will.

Ha'vama'l

It was a picture of sylvan revelry that the sunset light reddened, as it bade farewell to the Norse camp on the river bluff. On the green before the huts, two of the fair-haired were striving against other in a rousing tug-of-war. Now the hide was stretched motionless between them; now it was drawn a foot to the right, amid a volley of jeers; and now it was jerked back a foot to the left, with an answering chorus of cheers.

The chief sat under the spreading maple-tree, watching the sport critically, with an occasional gesture of applause. Over the head of the bear-cub she was fondling, Helga watched it also, with unseeing eyes.

Those who had come in from hunting and fishing sprawled at their ease on the turf, and shouted jovial comments over their wine-cups.

They welcomed Rolf and the Norman with a shout, when the pair appeared on the edge of the grove.

"Hail, comrades!"--"It was in our minds to give you up for lost!" "Your coming we will take as an omen that Kark will also return some time."--"Yes, return and cook us some food."--"We are becoming hollow as bubbles."

Rolf accepted their greetings with an easy flourish.

"You will become also as thin as bubbles if you wait for Kark to cook your food," he answered, lightly. "I bring the chief the bad tidings that he has lost his thrall." Pushing his companion gently aside, he walked over to where the Lucky One sat. "It will sound like an old woman's tale to you, chief," he warned him; "yet this is nothing but the truth."

While the skin-pullers abandoned their contest and dropped cross-legged upon the hide to listen, and the outlying circle picked up its drinking horns and crept closer, he related the whole experience, simply and quite truthfully, from beginning to end.

From all sides, exclamations of amazement and horror broke out when he had finished. Only the chief sat regarding him in silence, a skeptical pucker lifting the corner of his mouth.

Leif said finally, "Truth came from your mouth when you foretold that this would appear to me as strange as the tales old women tell. Until within the last month we have pa.s.sed through that district almost daily; and never yet have we found aught betokening the presence of human beings. That they should thus appear to you--"

"They came like the monsters in a dream, and vanished like them," Rolf declared.

"Saving in the fact that dream monsters do not leave mangled bodies behind them," Leif reminded him; and his eyes narrowed with an unpleasant shrewdness. "Rolf Erlingsson," he advised, "confess that they are the dreams you liken them to. That Kark was no favorite with you or your friend"--he nodded toward the Norman--"was seen by everybody.

Confess that it was by the sword of one of you that the thrall met his death."

For once the Wrestler's face lost its gentleness. His huge frame stiffened haughtily, as he drew himself up.

"Leif Ericsson," he returned, fiercely, "when--for love of good or fear of ill--have you ever known me to lie?"

The chief looked at him incredulously.

"You will swear to the truth of the tale?"

"I will swear to its truth by my knife, by my soul, by the crucifix you wear on your breast."

After a moment, Leif arose and extended his hand. "In that case, I would believe a statement that was twice as unlikely," he said, with honorable frankness. And a sound of applause went around as their hands clasped.

From the spot where the Norman had halted when his companion pushed forward, there came the rustle of a slight disturbance. Sigurd had caught his friend by his cloak and was pleading with him in a pa.s.sionate undertone, growing more and more desperate at each resolute shake of the black head. The instant Leif resumed his seat, the Fearless One wrenched himself free and strode forward. Rolf strove to bar his way, but Robert Sans-Peur evaded him also, and took up his stand before the bench under the maple-tree.

"The Fates appear to be balancing their scales to-night, chief," he said, grimly. "For the dead man whom you believed to be alive, you see here a living man whom you thought to be dead. For the thrall that you have lost, I present to you another."

Winding his hand in his long black locks, he tore them from his head and revealed the crisp waves of his own fair hair.

From either hand there arose a buzz of amazement and incredulity mingled with grunts of approval and blunt compliments and half-muttered pleas for leniency. Only two persons neither exclaimed nor moved. Helga stood in the rigid tearless silence she had promised, her eyes pouring into her lover's eyes all the courage and loyalty and love of her brave soul.

And the chief sat gazing at the rebel brought back to life, without so much as a wink of surprise, without any expression whatever upon his inscrutable face.

After a moment Alwin went on steadily, "I hid myself under this disguise because I believed that luck might grant me the chance to render you some service which should outweigh my offence. Because I was a short-sighted fool, I did not see that the better the Norman succeeded, the worse became the Saxon's deceit. My mind changed when your own lips told me what would be the fate of the man who should deceive you."

The chief's face was as impa.s.sive as stone, but he nodded slightly.

"A man of my age does not take it well to be fooled by boys," he said.

"It is a poor compliment to his intelligence, when they have the opinion that they can mould him between their fingers. Though he had rendered me the greatest service in the world, the man who should deceive me should die."