':Jl;HCJKiC]r:l;::L^^ „ 
 
 :iiiii ii 1 1 111 r : - - ^ m ii ' ' 
 
 . • • . . ' * ' .. ■ • " Jj 1 
 
 MMJRICE = HEWLETT 
 
 i H 
 
 
/ 
 
THORGILS 
 
THORGILS 
 
 BY 
 
 MAURICE HEWLETT 
 
 Author of ** The Forest Lovers," ** The Life and Death 
 of Richard Yea and Nay," *' Love and Lucy," etc. 
 
 NEW YORK 
 
 DODD, MEAD AND COMPANY 
 
 1917 
 
CoPTnisHT, 1917 
 Bt DODD, mead and company, Inc. 
 

 CONTENTS 
 
 
 CHAPTEB 
 
 
 PAOS 
 
 I 
 
 The Killing of the Horse . 
 
 1 
 
 II 
 
 The Driving op the Thralls . 
 
 13 
 
 III 
 
 The Sword Called Blade . 
 
 22 
 
 IV 
 
 Earth-house-prey 
 
 32 
 
 V 
 
 Thorey and Gudrun . . . . 
 
 39 
 
 VI 
 
 Gudrun's Affair .... 
 
 48 
 
 VII 
 
 Thorsdoom 
 
 59 
 
 VIII 
 
 The Call from Eric the Red . 
 
 67 
 
 IX 
 
 Trouble at Sea .... 
 
 74 
 
 X 
 
 The First Winter 
 
 83 
 
 XI 
 
 The Heaviest Stroke . 
 
 93 
 
 XII 
 
 The Islands 
 
 . 104 
 
 XIII 
 
 The Boat Comes Back . 
 
 . 115 
 
 XIV 
 
 A Welcome from the Mainland 
 
 . 122 
 
 XV 
 
 They Find Eric the Red . 
 
 . 129 
 
 XVI 
 
 Col Involved Again 
 
 . 139 
 
 XVII 
 
 The End of the Thralls . 
 
 145 
 
 XVIII 
 
 Harrowing of the Sea 
 
 . 151 
 
 XIX 
 
 Treadholt Again .... 
 
 158 
 
 XX 
 
 Helga, Thorord's Daughter 
 
 168 
 
 XXI 
 
 Reckonings with Asgrim . 
 
 . 179 
 
 XXII 
 
 AsGRiM^s Money .... 
 
 189 
 
 XXIII 
 
 The Last Battle .... 
 
 195 
 
 XXIV 
 
 The Last Thorgilism . 
 
 . 202 
 
 *y r:(\*} , .. 
 
THORGILS 
 
THORGILS 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 THE KILLING OF THE HORSE 
 
 TREADHOLT lies in the South-west coun- 
 try between Markfleet and Cogsound. It 
 is all pasture thereabouts, deep and good 
 land ; but behind that, the tumble of rock begins, 
 great rocks brought down from Eyjafell in old 
 days ; and after them the heather and peat hags 
 mount upwards to the fells; and over the top 
 of the fells are waste and desolate places, rent 
 apart by crevasses and deep ghylls ; and if you 
 have heart enough to carry you on, beyond this 
 region lie the snowslopes which will take you 
 to the top of Eyjafell itself. 
 
 But all that was a long way from Treadholt 
 where Thord Domne, or Timber Thord, as we 
 should say, lived, and where Thorgils and his 
 brother were born. 
 
 1 
 
2 TIIOEGILS 
 
 Timber Thord had been a strong and bold 
 man, who became a famous man by the slaying 
 of Eaven Thorwidsson. He had had an old 
 quarrel with Raven, who was reckoned a hero 
 in those parts, and laid in wait for him one day 
 as he was riding down to Einarshaven, to a ship 
 he had there. He came riding through the 
 howes in his fine blue cloak, thinking of pleasant 
 things, when he saw Timber Thord standing 
 between two howes, waiting for him. Eaven 
 hailed him, but Thord would not return the 
 greeting; but instead hurled his spear and hit 
 Raven full in the breast and transfixed him. The 
 manslaughter was written off against others 
 done by Eaven— but Thord 's name stood high 
 after such a deed, and Thord himself married 
 Thorwen, who was Osgar's daughter, Osgar's 
 the Eastmen-Smiter, and settled down at Tread- 
 holt, where his fathers had been established a 
 long time. Thorwen gave him two sons, Thor- 
 gils and Thorleik. All their names were of this 
 stamp, for this was in the days before Iceland 
 was christened, and Thor had the devotion of 
 all the South country, rather than Frey, who 
 prevailed in the North and North-west, or Odin, 
 who had his worship elsewhere. 
 
THE KILLING OF THE HORSE 3 
 
 When Thorgils was a bare-breeched young- 
 ster of two-three years old, a blue-eyed, red- 
 cheeked, tumble-haired, bare-breeched young- 
 ster more often dirty than not. Timber Thord 
 had become rich, and intended to become richer. 
 What store he had in silver money and goods 
 he buried in the earth, and then bought a ship 
 in Cogsound and prepared for a voyage to Nor- 
 way. He wanted Thorwen, his wife, to go with 
 him; but she said. No, she would stay at home. 
 There were the children, and the treasure in 
 the ground. So she looked after house and stock 
 at Treadholt, as well she might, being a notable 
 housewife ; and Thord stood out to sea in his 
 new ship. 
 
 He never came back. All the summer and 
 winter following Thorwen looked for him. She 
 got into the way of crossing the river at the 
 ford and mounting the peat moss to a ridge 
 from where you could see Cogsound, and be- 
 yond that to Portland Neb. Somehow or an- 
 other she did that every day ; and even through 
 the winter she managed to get up there. She 
 took Thorgils with her when it was possible. 
 Then the weather broke up, the rain came, and 
 the days grew longer. There was work to be 
 
4 THORGILS 
 
 done on the land ; a man called Thorgrim Scar- 
 leg came to Treadliolt as reeve, and Thorwen 
 gave up her daily walk to the ridge. 
 
 Thorgils was puzzled at that. He did not 
 see why she left off doing what she had always 
 done. He couldn^t remember when she had not 
 done it. *^ Aren't you going to look for my 
 father's shipT' 
 
 She shook her head. 
 
 ** He won't come any more," she said. He 
 thought that very odd. 
 
 ** Why won't he? " he wanted to know. 
 
 She looked out over the sea. ** He is 
 drowned, my son." 
 
 ** Drowned? " said Thorgils. ** Do you 
 mean he is dead? " 
 
 She nodded her head sharply, and that set 
 the tears running down. 
 
 ** Then," said Thorgils, ** I am master 
 here." He was nearly four years old, but 
 Thorwen turned away to her affairs, and left 
 him alone. Thorgils marched off to the ridge 
 to look for his father, but the river was swollen 
 with the rain, and in high flood. The stones 
 were hidden, and he did not like the look of it. 
 He remained by the river side till dinner-time, 
 
THE KILLING OF THE HORSE 5 
 
 and kept to himself. He saw Thorgrim the 
 new reeve dunging the meadows, but did not 
 choose to go to him. Thorgrim was a red- 
 faced, silent man, good-tempered enough; but 
 Thorgils never took to him. 
 
 That summer Thorwen and Thorgrim came 
 to an understanding, and made up their minds 
 to keep house together. Great trouble came of 
 it in after days with which this tale has nothing 
 to do ; but meantime there was trouble enough 
 in the mind of Thorgils when he understood 
 what was in the wind. From the very first he 
 and Thorgrim did not get on together. Thor- 
 gils was only a little boy, but he remembered 
 his father and did not believe that so fine and 
 decisive a man could have allowed himself to be 
 lost at sea. Without knowing how to put it he 
 had a grudge against his mother — not on his 
 own account, but on his father's. Much more 
 allowance ought to have been made for him — 
 for such a man as that. 
 
 He said nothing more about being master at 
 Treadholt. Indeed he was rather ashamed of 
 himself for having said it. Had that been giv- 
 ing his father a chance? No, it had not. But 
 apart from that, a boy always knows what he 
 
6 THORGILS 
 
 can do and what he can't. Thorgrim took his 
 father's place at board, by the fire, and abed. 
 The steading, the stock, the thralls, the maids, 
 the fields, all fell under his charge. There was 
 no use in fighting against it ; and, of course, as 
 time went on, he grew used to the state of 
 things, and forgot all about his father. The 
 first time he heard himself called Scarleg's 
 stepson he had flamed all over his face; the 
 second time he had lost his temper and pushed 
 in among the girls at their washing-tubs. ** I am 
 Thordsson, I tell you. I am — I am.'' Some of 
 them had laughed at him, but one had taken 
 him in her arms and kissed him. * * Well spoken, 
 Thorgils," she had said. He had fought 
 to get away from her; but he had liked her 
 for it nevertheless. Afterwards the new name 
 became so common that he took no notice 
 of it, and once he found himself calling him- 
 self so. 
 
 But he did not get on well at home after 
 Thorgrim came, and wasn't there very long. 
 The end of all things at Treadholt happened 
 in the summer when he was five years old. 
 
 It was after the hay harvest, when there is 
 always a time to stretch yourself and take your 
 
THE KILLING OF THE HOESE 7 
 
 ease — ^before the corn harvest begins. One day 
 they held games in the Templegarth at Tread- 
 holt; men and boys from all the countryside 
 were there. Trestle tables were set out and 
 roofed over with green boughs. The women 
 made a feast and served the tables ; and after 
 the feast they had the games. The men had 
 their horse-fighting, swimming-matches and 
 football. The boys must have their football 
 too. 
 
 Now Thorgils, who was very strong and 
 active, as well as tall for his years, was left out 
 of the picking-up, and clamoured for a place. 
 The bigger boys scoffed at him and took no 
 more notice; but one of them who had a kind 
 face put a hand on his shoulder, and drew him 
 aside. '* You see, Thorgils,'' he said, ** it 
 would be impossible to have you in the game. 
 It would be against the rules." 
 
 ** What rules would it be against! " Thor- 
 gils always went to the point of a thing. 
 
 ** Well,'' said the other, ** the rule is that 
 you have to be reckoned good of your hands. 
 Now each of us has killed something or others — ■ 
 some very large things. But I'm sure that you 
 never did." 
 
8 THORGILS 
 
 Thorgils was mortified. It was true, lie had 
 never killed anything bigger than a fish — and 
 that hadn't been a big one. *^ Once I helped 
 hold a pig/^ he said. ** And I did hold, and 
 wouldn't let go.'' 
 
 The boy said, that wouldn't do, and then, be- 
 ing called, ran off to the field. Thorgils moped 
 by himself, and thought of his father. He 
 wouldn't go into the company again for the rest 
 of the day, nor near the house until they had all 
 gone home. 
 
 That night he made up his mind that some- 
 thing must die, and that he must kill it. He 
 knew that it must be so directly he woke. He 
 lay broad awake in his bed and looked out of 
 the window at the moon. It was a three-quarter 
 moon, very white and clear. He saw the face 
 in it plainly, and read it as a sorrowful face 
 which yet saw that the thing must be done. He 
 waited a little while longer, clasping his shins, 
 and wondering what it was that he was going 
 to kill. He was very excited about it, and 
 rather sorry for the victim, already doomed, out 
 there in the moonlight with all the other beasts. 
 He thought it would be a bullock. Not a sheep 
 certainly. Nor one of the dogs. Then, all of a 
 
THE KILLING OF THE HORSE 9 
 
 sudden, he thought that he ought to kill some- 
 thing of his own; and then he thought of old 
 Illing. Illing was a grey pack-horse which he 
 was allowed to ride. 
 
 That being settled, he slipped out of bed and 
 got down tiptoe into the hall. At the door he 
 took down a spear from the rack, then shot back 
 the bolt and went out. Two of the dogs got up 
 and jumped about him, but he made them go 
 back and lie down. 
 
 He went into the straw-yard, and saw the 
 horses huddled together, asleep, but all stand- 
 ing. He saw Illing at once, looking white in 
 the moonlight, like a silver horse. He went 
 first into the byre and took down a halter. 
 Then he went up to Illing and caught him by 
 the forelock. He had some difficulty with the 
 halter, as he was too short by a head for his 
 business; but by standing on the edge of a 
 water-trough he managed the job, and led Ill- 
 ing quietly away. 
 
 He took him into an outhouse, and made him 
 stand. He hated the whole thing by this time, 
 but knew that it must be done. So he lifted his 
 Bpear and drove it in with all his might. Illing 
 
10 THOEGILS 
 
 threw his head up and plunged wildly; but 
 even so, he slipped back on his haunches and 
 couldn't get up. He sawed with his head two 
 or three times, and then fell sideways and lay 
 still, breathing deeply. Thorgils stood leaning 
 on his spear until Illing was perfectly still — ■ 
 then he went back to the house. He had no 
 pride in what he had done. It seemed to be a 
 hateful business got over. He went to bed 
 again, and set himself the task of going to 
 sleep — in which he succeeded. 
 
 In the morning there was a great to-do. The 
 horses were turned out to grass, and Illing was 
 not to be found. Thorgrim said that he had 
 seen him in the straw-yard overnight, and that 
 he 7nust be found. The men went out again to 
 look, and Thorgils, who could not bear the sus- 
 pense, went with them, and took them into the 
 outhouse. There lay old Illing stiff in his blood. 
 Nothing was said to any purpose until they 
 came back to Thorgrim again. Then Thorgrim 
 said, * * Who can have done this ? ' ' 
 
 ** I killed him," Thorgils said, ^^ last night.'' 
 Thorgrim grew very red. ** You killed 
 him? You? What did you do that for, my 
 lad? '' 
 
THE KILLING OF THE HORSE 11 
 
 Thorgils told him the reason, and added that 
 the horse was his own. 
 
 ** You are wrong there/' said Thorgrim. 
 ^' The horse was mine, as everything is here 
 while your mother is alive. Your reason is a 
 foolish one — ^but it 's all of a piece with the rest 
 of your days here. Now there shall be an end 
 of it. Out you go.'' 
 
 Thorwen was in the women's room where 
 the girls were making the beds. She looked 
 through the door, and then came into the hall. 
 ** What has he done now, that you tell him he 
 shall go out? " Thorgrim told her the whole 
 story. He was very angry, though he didn't 
 offer to beat Thorgils for it. 
 
 *^He has never settled down with me since I 
 came here. I don't like it and won't have it. 
 But this is too much, and there shall be no 
 more. I'll take him over to Loft at Mirehouses 
 and have him fostered there. He'll be within 
 reach of you if you want to see him, and Loft 
 will do anything for Thord's son." Thorwen 
 did not gainsay him ; and the end of it was that 
 Thorgils was taken over to Mirehouses that 
 same evening. Mirehouses lies East of Tread- 
 holt, some seven miles nearer to Cogsound. 
 
12 THORGILS 
 
 Loft had been a great friend of Thord and was 
 pleased to have Thorgils. 
 
 There he stayed until he was old enough to 
 go abroad. 
 
CHAPTER II 
 
 THE DRIVING OF THE THRALLS 
 
 THORGILS grew fast and far at Mire- 
 houses, where no check was put upon 
 him, and he was allowed to go very much 
 as he liked. It is a great thing for a boy to be 
 where he is understood. Loft was amused by 
 him, and used to talk to him as if they were 
 both of an age. He called him ^* kinsman'*: 
 << Why, yes, kinsman,'' he used to say, and, *^ I 
 daresay you are right, kinsman." Loft's wife 
 was called Reginn, a good woman, who had 
 had misfortunes with her children. None of 
 them were living at this time; so you can 
 understand that Thorgils fared none the worse 
 for that. 
 
 Loft always said that his foster son would 
 turn out a paragon. He had a large and free 
 way with him, he said, by which you could tell 
 one who would take on him the handling of 
 
 13 
 
14 THORGILS 
 
 men. For another thing, Thorgils was never 
 two-minded about any job in hand. He always 
 knew what he wanted to do, and what he in- 
 tended. You can tell by that. 
 
 Thorgils himself was aware of it. He told 
 Loft how it was. He said, ** You see, Loft, it 
 isn't that I wmit to do a thing; but I know be- 
 forehand that it is going to he done/' ** That's 
 it, kinsman,'' said Loft. ** That's the man of 
 action. And you'd do it, I daresay, although 
 you might die for it — and know beforehand 
 that you were going to die for it." But Thor- 
 gils had nothing to say to that, because it had 
 never come into his head that he might die one 
 day. Other people died — like his father at 
 sea, or like Illing, his old grey horse — ^but 
 he couldn't conceive of his own death some- 
 how. 
 
 But he was fully nine years old before he 
 could make his friend Loft happy in the cer- 
 tainty of his fame to come. He was then a big 
 and strong boy, good to look at if only because 
 he was so healthy. They had a boat ready for 
 sea. Loft and half a dozen of his people. They 
 were going out beyond the Islands to fish, and 
 it would be a day and night affair before they 
 
THE DRIVING OF THE THRALLS 15 
 
 had done with it. At the last minute Loft could 
 not go. A great stone of the ballast fell on his 
 foot and broke his ankle. Thorgils begged that 
 he might take his place. He said that he 
 could row as well as any of them. Loft let 
 him go. 
 
 It was late in the season, and the weather, 
 none too good at starting, turned squally and 
 cold almost as soon as they were outside the 
 land. But they cast anchor on the good ground 
 and set to work at their fishing. Thorgils let 
 down his line, and had hardly found bottom be- 
 fore he was into a great fish. It was all he 
 could do to hold it, but hold it he did, and 
 brought it up to the side, where one of the men 
 got a hook into it and hauled it inboard. It 
 was a huge flat fish, like a flounder, only much 
 bigger — pinky-white on one side, and brown on 
 the other, with a tail as long as a cow's when 
 the skin is off it. It curled and flacked about 
 all over the place until its head was beaten; 
 and then it died. Nobody caught anything else 
 though they stuck it out through the night; 
 then, when the morning broke stormily, with a 
 choppy sea and heavy sleet showers, they put 
 up anchor and turned for home. Now it was 
 
16 THORGILS 
 
 that Thorgils proved his mettle, for he took an 
 oar and pulled like a man. 
 
 Once in harbour, nobody must carry his fish 
 but himself. * ' Have it your own way, master, ' ' 
 said the thralls. There was only one way of 
 doing it, and that was to haul it up the path 
 with a cord passed through the gill; and thus 
 attached Thorgils tugged at his fish with a 
 will. By-and-by the string gets frayed, and 
 presently parts, and pitches Thorgils on to 
 his nose. Then, busying himself with a new 
 attachment, he sees something shinng in the 
 fish's gill. ** What's that bright thing inside 
 my fish's head? " They come round him and 
 look. They dig with a knife — a silver ring! 
 ** You are to be the lucky man, master,'' they 
 tell him; and Thorgils takes it quietly. Loft 
 said just the same when the ring was given him 
 to keep for his foster son. He was proud of 
 the lad, knowing what a wind and tide he had 
 had to pull against. 
 
 Thorgils was considered as a man after this, 
 and given man's work to do; but it was the 
 driving of the thralls that made him famous 
 all over the country; and that happened before 
 he was twelve years old. There's a track be- 
 
THE DRIVING OF THE THRALLS 17 
 
 hind Mirehouses which crosses the first ridge 
 of hills and takes you down into a river bottom. 
 Good fishing is to be had in the river, and Thor- 
 gils was often there by himself. On the fur- 
 ther side of the ridge from Mirehouses, half- 
 way down the hill towards the river, are 
 barrows, where good men have been buried ac- 
 cording to custom. It is a lonely place where 
 you rarely meet a soul ; but in the valley, about 
 the river on either side, there are pasture fields 
 and certain tilth also where men work in the 
 summertime. 
 
 Now Thorgils was coming home late one 
 night from his fishing. It was dusk, but not 
 dark; and as he came up the ridge from the 
 river he thought he saw men standing about 
 one of the barrows. After a time he was sure 
 of it. It was curious, because it had never hap- 
 pened before. Nobody went near the barrows 
 after dark, because you never knew what the 
 dead might do. Sometimes they were not put in 
 right, and grumbled about it; sometimes they 
 were merry and used to sing, sitting up inside 
 the cairn. Sometimes they used to rattle their 
 weapons and call out strange old cries to each 
 other, using names which had been forgotten. 
 
18 THORGILS 
 
 Nobody cared for such things in the dark. But 
 now there were several men about one of the 
 barrows, and very busy with something. Thor- 
 gils knew that he must go and see what they 
 were doing there — so he left the path and went. 
 He took care that they should not see him 
 coming. 
 
 By using the cover of other barrows he came 
 within easy sight of them. They were thralls, 
 and there were ^ve of them. One had a pick, 
 one a spade. One stood and looked about ; and 
 two others were kneeling beside the barrow 
 where two were at work. 
 
 Thorgils watched them for a long time, very 
 excited. He guessed now that they were going 
 to rob the dead man inside, and knew that he 
 must stop them. But he thought it better to 
 wait until he could take them red-handed. 
 They had nothing as yet, though they were a 
 long way in. He thought also, that if they did 
 get anything he would take it from them and 
 give it to Loft. Loft could do what he pleased 
 with it afterwards. 
 
 By this time it was almost dark, and Thor- 
 gils was able to stand up within stone-throwing 
 distance of the thralls. In any case they were 
 
THE DRIVING OF THE THRALLS 19 
 
 at the climax of their job, and much too intent 
 on what they were about to have any regard 
 for him. The man with the shovel withdrew 
 himself from the tunnel he had cleared : imme- 
 diately another of them threw himself down 
 and crawled into the hole head first. He came 
 out with something in his hands, which they all 
 looked at. Then he went in again and re- 
 mained a good time. He brought back more 
 treasure. They all huddled together and bick- 
 ered over it. That was the time for Thorgils. 
 He came down on them like a squall, and 
 they scattered and fell all ways. '' On your 
 knees, on your knees! " They took to their 
 knees. '' Now hand over," said Thorgils. 
 "Without a word to say, the silver was handed 
 up to him — for it was all silver— arm-rings and 
 a chain, and a large cup without handles. Thor- 
 gils, who was unknown to them, — for they were 
 not thralls of Mirehouses— cut up his line into 
 lengths and bound their hands behind them. 
 Not a man of them stirred, and not one had 
 anything to say. '' Up, now, all of you,'' said 
 Thorgils ; and they stood up. So then he drove 
 them over the moor and on to the track, like a 
 flock of sheep, guiding them with his fishing- 
 
20 THORGILS 
 
 pole, and brought them down to Mirehouses. 
 He had trouble with them once ; for when they 
 found out whither he was driving them, one 
 of them guessed w^ho he was, and tried to run 
 for it. But Thorgils was too quick for him, 
 and cut him over the head with his pole. The 
 others stopped meekly while their mate fell 
 into his place again. So he brought them into 
 the garth and had them all heaped together at 
 the door when Loft came to open it. They were 
 roped to each other and tied up for the night, 
 and driven home next day to the place they 
 came from. There was nearly three pounds- 
 weight of silver altogether, which Loft kept. 
 But the report of Thorgils' deed went all over 
 the country, and he was considered a champion. 
 Scarleg, his stepfather, now wanted him home 
 again, for his wife said to him, * * You see what 
 has come of it. If Thorgils had stopped here 
 you would have had that treasure for yourself. 
 Now Loft has it, as is right enough.'' 
 
 So Scarleg made up to Thorgils and asked 
 him to come back; but Thorgils said that he 
 was well off where he was, and should cer- 
 tainly stay with Loft. He used to go over to 
 see his mother now and then, and took an in- 
 
THE DRIVING OF THE THRALLS 21 
 
 terest in her child by Scarleg, his half-brother, 
 who was called Haering ; but he was never the 
 same to her since she had allowed him to be 
 fostered at Mirehouses. 
 
CHAPTER in 
 
 THE SWORD CALLED BLADE 
 
 WHEN the time was come, which was 
 when Thorgils was full-grown, he 
 told Loft that he should like to go 
 abroad. Loft said he had expected as much — 
 ** and I think you will give a good account of 
 yourself wherever you go." There was cer- 
 tainly every sign of it about him. He was tall 
 and broad-chested ; a very fair young man, yel- 
 low-haired, with a high colour and blue eyes. 
 Loose in the limbs, as if the ligatures were not 
 set, for all that he was active and most supple, 
 a good swimmer and a great-hearted young 
 man. He was by no means quarrelsome, and 
 had never yet come to grips with anybody with 
 any notion but sport in his head. Yet men 
 obeyed him readily when he spoke sharply and 
 as if he meant it, and to be sure he had not 
 matched himself with adventurers outside his 
 little world. Now, however, he was to go. 
 
 22 
 
THE SWOED CALLED BLADE 23 
 
 He went in a ship from Cogsonnd wMch. was 
 bound for Norway, the intention in his head 
 being to take service under Earl Haakon who 
 then ruled there; but things did not turn out 
 quite as he expected. Head winds which opened 
 out into North-easterly gales drove them out of 
 their course, and they fared too far to the 
 South for Trondjhem, which they had aimed at. 
 After much tossing and drifting about they 
 made out a coast-line some three weeks after 
 sailing, and hailed a long-ship which came 
 across their course. She waited for them — a 
 black ship with shields hung along her gun- 
 wale, a large company of fighting men on board, 
 and an Earl sitting on the after-deck, a fine 
 figure of a man. 
 
 This was Earl Eric Thorwaldsson, called, 
 and very properly called, Eric the Red — for 
 he was as red as a red boar, and not unlike one 
 — with his little angry eyes, shining tusks, and 
 great chops covered with coarse hair. Yet a 
 conversable man, very friendly so soon as he 
 made out whom he had to deal with. He 
 agreed to let the Icelanders bear him company, 
 for he said that he was bound for Norway too, 
 and should look to them to bear a hand if he 
 
24 THORGILS 
 
 met any of his unfriends. ** Likely enough I 
 shall,*' he said, ^* and men who would make 
 their profit of me, for I am outlawed at this 
 time, and don't care who knows it." It ap- 
 peared that he had taken a man's wife from 
 him and had her still, and again that he had 
 killed a chieftain called Waltheow by starting 
 an avalanche to fall on his house. He took 
 rather a fancy to Thorgils and would have had 
 him in his service, but Thorgils said that he had 
 intended to see Earl Haakon first, and should 
 do so. *^ There's time enough," he said, and 
 Eric said that was a good answer at Thorgils' 
 age, though not so good at his own ! 
 
 After that they fell in with a Danish ship, 
 and there was a battle. They got alongside 
 and bound the ships together. Then they 
 fought on one or the other as the tide of battle 
 turned. Eric was like a man inspired; he was 
 like a bersark, singing all the time at the top 
 of his voice, laying about him with a long bill, 
 and yet foreseeing every turn in the game like 
 a goal-keeper at a football-match. Thorgils be- 
 haved with great coolness, standing high on the 
 poop with a long bow and two bundles of ar- 
 rows. He made very good shooting, and was 
 
THE SWOED CALLED BLADE 25 
 
 aimed at repeatedly by the Danes, who found 
 him dangerous. He should, by all odds, have 
 been killed half a dozen times; but nothing 
 touched him, and he did not leave his post until 
 he had shot away all his arrows. Then with a 
 youiig man of Eric's ship — a young man called 
 Eadwine — he cleared the decks of Danes, and 
 got hurt in the calf by a wounded man who 
 tried to hamstring him. 
 
 As for Earl Eric, somebody chopped at him 
 and took off his forefinger. He stooped and 
 picked it up. *^ My old finger? Take it, you 
 greedy swine;'' and he threw it at his assail- 
 ant and hit him in the eye with it. ** There's 
 for you, and here's for you." He hewed him 
 down before he could see what was coming 
 next. 
 
 They got a great booty off that ship, and 
 went on their course; but the Icelanders per- 
 sisted in making Trondjhem because Earl 
 Haakon would be there, which was precisely 
 Earl Eric's reason for not going thither. When 
 they parted company Eadwine said that he 
 should go with Thorgils. They had mixed their 
 blood and sworn everlasting friendship. Eric 
 made a long face when he heard about it — ** I'll 
 
26 THORGILS 
 
 have you both one of these days," he said, 
 *^ but I suppose I must lose you now. You 
 youngsters take these things to heart. Now, 
 Thorgils,'' he said, *' remember you are to 
 come to me when I send for you.'' Thorgils 
 promised. 
 
 I haven't much to say about Thorgils in Nor- 
 way, as he was there for a short time only. He 
 didn't care for Earl Haakon, who, being near 
 the end of his tether, had fallen into bad ways, 
 what with women and wine. So he and Ead- 
 wine, like-minded with him, spent their time 
 looking about for likelier company. They 
 found a ship which was going to Scotland, 
 made their proposals and were accepted. This 
 ship belonged to a chieftain of Caithness 
 named Anlaf, and was going home. On board 
 her was a rather notable Viking, called Swart, 
 which was his real name, and also Ironhead, 
 which was the name of his nature. Swart said 
 that he was going over to get Anlaf 's sister in 
 marriage, but that he shouldn't stay very long. 
 ** I'll take the woman and all I can get with 
 her, and then I shall go to England," he said, 
 ** where I can do better." He talked very big, 
 but nobody paid much attention to him. Ead- 
 
THE SWORD CALLED BLADE 27 
 
 wine said he was a bersark. Thorgils shrugged 
 his shoulders. ** He talks bersark/' he said, 
 ** yet I am thinking he could be dealt with by 
 a man of his hands/' 
 
 Well, the short of the matter is that they 
 made a good run of it, and were well received 
 by Earl Anlaf — all of them, that is, except 
 Swart Ironhead, who was not so welcome. 
 Eadwine admired Gudrun, the sister of Anlaf, 
 and saw as much of her as he could. Thorgils 
 was not so sure about her ; but women did not 
 stand for much with him. The difficulty was 
 with the lady, a tall and handsome girl, who 
 said that no earthly power would bring her to 
 marry Swart. She said that in full hall when 
 she was sitting on the dais. It was a great 
 insult, and Swart fumed over it. Earl Anlaf, a 
 jolly, easy-tempered sort of man, tried to laugh 
 it off; but Swart wouldn't have it and said that 
 a bargain had been made. ^* And I intend to 
 hold you to it. Earl," he said, '' and to have 
 recompense for an open insult. So now I chal- 
 lenge you to single battle on the holm, and the 
 sooner the better." 
 
 Earl Anlaf said that Gudrun, his sister, was 
 within her rights in refusing the man, and that 
 
28 THORGILS 
 
 he should be within the rights of an oldish man 
 in refusing his battle. '' And I don't doubt/' 
 he said, '' that I shall find a blade to meet 
 yours, and, as you say, the sooner the better/' 
 There the matter ended for the time ; but after- 
 wards Thorgils went to Earl Anlaf and told 
 him that he was ready to meet Swart on the 
 holm — *' and as soon as he please." 
 
 '' Why do you offer yourself? " said the 
 Earl. 
 
 Thorgils answered, *' Because I dislike Swart 
 and should be glad of a smack at him. And 
 because I think Gudrun should do as she 
 pleases with herself. And because I should like 
 to put in a word for her afterwards." 
 
 '' Would you indeed! "says the Earl. '' This 
 is news. Why, she is five years older than 
 you, and a notable match." 
 
 '' We can talk about all that afterwards," 
 said Thorgils. '* One thing at a time is the 
 best plan." Anlaf agreed to have him as his 
 champion. 
 
 Thorgils talked it over with his friend Ead- 
 wine, who said that it would be a good battle, 
 and a fine thing to put Swart out of the way. 
 *' He's a bad one," Eadwine said, *' but don't 
 
THE SWORD CALLED BLADE 29 
 
 suppose that he will shirk hard blows. That's 
 not the way of it. But I'll tell you this about 
 him. He believes that he can only be killed by 
 a certain sword, which is here in the house ; and 
 whenever he fights he asks his enemy, Has he 
 the sword called Blade? And if he maintains 
 that he has, he won't fight. Now wait for me 
 here while I go and fetch Blade." 
 
 Presently he returned with the sword. 
 ** Now," said Eadwine, ^^ here is your plan. 
 Thrust Blade into the sand when you come to 
 the holm where the ground is marked out. If 
 Swart asks you about it, say that you don't 
 know that its hilt is above the earth. That 
 will satisfy him and be no lie." 
 
 *' Good," said Thorgils. 
 
 So it fell out. Swart asked his question be- 
 fore they went to work, and Thorgils answered 
 as it had been agreed upon. They faced each 
 other; but at the moment of joining battle, 
 Thorgils dropped his own sword, stooped and 
 pulled up Blade out of the sand. He did that 
 so quickly that Swart didn't see what he was 
 about. 
 
 They fought fiercely for a while without 
 advantage either way, but presently Thorgils 
 
30 THOEGILS 
 
 saw his chance and hewed off the tail of 
 Swart 's shield. Swart gave a deep groan and 
 fell. Then they found that his left leg was off 
 too, a clean cut through the thigh. Then Thor- 
 gils cut off the man's head, and that was the 
 end of Swart. 
 
 In the flush of victory Thorgils now did what 
 he had not intended, that is, he determined to 
 have Gudrun for himself. His first thought, 
 when he undertook Anlaf 's battle for him, had 
 been to hand her over to Eadwine, who was in 
 love with her and wanted her badly. But now 
 he had changed his mind. He was not in love 
 with Gudrun, but he intended to have her. So 
 he spoke for her with her brother Anlaf, who 
 really had nothing to say against it. What- 
 ever Thorgils' fortune may have been in Ice- 
 land, he was now a rich man; for the law of 
 the holm was that the goods of the beaten fell 
 to the conqueror. Here he stood then, master 
 of three or four ships with their companies 
 and a store of goods beside. Therefore Anlaf, 
 after a word or two with Gudrun, who was 
 willing, contracted her to Thorgils, and they 
 were to be married at short notice. 
 
 But now Eadwine wanted to have Blade 
 
THE SWORD CALLED BLADE 31 
 
 back, and Thorgils was not so ready. ** That's 
 a rarely good sword,'' he said. ** I would as 
 soon give you my wife as that sword." Ead- 
 wine said that it did not belong to either of 
 them, and that he must by all means put it back 
 in the house. '' But," he said, ** I believe you 
 will find a good sword before you go." Then 
 Thorgils gave him back Blade, and made the 
 best of it. 
 
 He stayed in Caithness through the winter, 
 and next summer there was a foray into Ire- 
 land. The marriage was to be when they re- 
 turned. It was in Ireland that he found the 
 sword of which Eadwine had dreamed and told 
 him. That sword must have a chapter to itself, 
 for it lived as long as Thorgils did — and 
 longer. 
 
CHAPTER IV, 
 
 EAETH-HOUSE-PEEY 
 
 THEY pulled out from Wick, two ships, 
 and hoisted their sails, with a fair wind 
 from the N. N. E. They headed for the 
 open sea and laid a straight course for the 
 ocean. The wind held them throughout, and 
 blew on their quarter when they shifted to a 
 more southerly course. After a week at sea 
 they made the land, and ran into a deep bay of 
 black rock, with islands dotted about it like 
 sleeping whales. Flocks of sea-birds were 
 here, which flickered in the air like snow when 
 they drew in. The coast seemed to be unin- 
 habited, and they saw no men when they ran 
 ashore and beached their ships. One of these 
 was Thorgils' own; he had thirty fighting men, 
 who had been Swarfs, but were now answer- 
 able to him only. Eadwine commanded the 
 other ship. 
 
 They divided. Ead^^dne and his company 
 
 32 
 
EAETH-HOUSE-PREY 33 
 
 took the shore and went harrying; Thorgils 
 left a sufficiency of men with the ships and took 
 the remnant with him. He would go inland to 
 see what was to be seen. 
 
 It was forest country, he found out. Atop of 
 the cliffs the woods began within half a mile 
 of the sea, and had no visible ending on any 
 side. They found little to reward them for 
 their pains, and were hard put to it to get food. 
 Sometimes they were shot at from the trees, 
 but could not see who sped the bolts. Now 
 and again they came upon the remains of fire ; 
 but no houses or stockaded towns, and no herds 
 or flocks. 
 
 They wandered about without any sure 
 sense of direction for more than a week. Then 
 they came to a clearing in the forest, where 
 there was a heath, and a black pool of water 
 with reeds on all sides of it. Trees were dotted 
 about sparsely, here and there. They saw an 
 oak tree standing by itself, bare of leaves, while 
 all the other trees were in the new green of 
 summer. 
 
 They looked at this tree for a long time, and 
 walked about it. ** There is some meaning in 
 it,'' Thorgils said. '' Either it is rooted deep 
 
34 THORGILS 
 
 into something poisonous, and has died so, or it 
 has no root at all. Now I believe that the latter 
 is the true state of the case.'' 
 
 One of them climbed the tree and fastened a 
 rope round the top of it. They hauled on the 
 rope, and the tree began to rock. After some 
 time of hauling and rocking, down she came 
 with a crash. She was hollow ; and the ground 
 below her was hollow. Thorgils looked in the 
 hole, and in the dark saw bright eyes fixed upon 
 him. He counted five pair, but thought there 
 might be more. 
 
 He called his men about him. ** There are 
 earth-dwellers under our tree," he said. ^^ I 
 don't know how many — but a number. Now we 
 will make a bargain to share what they may 
 have stored down there; but we will say, and 
 take an oath upon it, that the first man down 
 shall take three portions, and the second man 
 down two portions, and after that the remain- 
 ing portions shall be put together and re- 
 divided, so that the others share equally in 
 them. Is that agreed! " They said '' Yes." 
 *' Very well," said Thorgils. '' Then here's 
 for three shares." With that he jumped into 
 the hole, and chanced it. 
 
EARTH-HOUSE-PREY 35 
 
 There was a great hollow place down there, 
 and a mighty to-do when Thorgils was in it. 
 Three men jumped on him at once, and he felt 
 claws at work on his legs — but there were 
 many who kept out of his way, for he could 
 hear whistling breath and fierce whisperings 
 in the dark. He had a short-handled axe in his 
 hand, and killed two of his assailants outright. 
 The third had him round the neck and his 
 teeth fastened into his shoulder. But Thor- 
 gils was very tough in the neck, and having his 
 left hand free, managed to get his knife out of 
 his belt. With that he drove in under his man ^s 
 ribs, and so finished him. Then he called up to 
 the daylight. ** Ho, there, come down, some 
 of you, and clear out this den with me.'' Two 
 or three men jumped down and stood with 
 Thorgils in the middle, where the light fell. 
 No other attacks were made. 
 
 Presently a man of theirs jumped down 
 with a torch made of heather which he had con- 
 trived to light with a flint-stone and his axe; 
 and with that to help them they cleared the 
 hole. Besides the three dead men they found 
 fifteen more persons — one a very old man with 
 eyebrows so long that they hid his eyes, and 
 
36 THORGILS 
 
 finger-nails like a bird's claws, other men of 
 valid age, very sullen and frightened, women 
 with children at the breast, girls and boys, and 
 two or three youths with hair as black as crows 
 and dark-blue eyes. Some of the girls were 
 handsome — all of them pale, with black hair. 
 There was some treasure, gold and silver, of 
 which Thorgils kept two rings for himself ; and 
 there was a sword of blue steel, very finely tem- 
 pered, with a strange light upon it. It was 
 wrapt up in a blue cloak, but shone in the dark 
 when he held it up. ** Here's the sword which 
 was promised me," Thorgils said. *^ This 
 shall be my third portion, and I want nothing 
 else. I shall call this sword Earth-house-prey, 
 and men shall remember it in days to come. 
 The rest we will share, except this old man who 
 is no use to anybody. Him I will leave behind 
 in his hole — and he shall have a girl to look 
 after him." 
 
 That was how they did it, and led away all 
 the rest of the earth-dwellers, dividing them 
 up among themselves. 
 
 There was little else to be got out of this 
 shaggy and desert country; so they made the 
 best of their way back, found Eadwine and his 
 
EAUTH-HOUSE-PREY 37 
 
 party waiting for them by the shore — with 
 cattle and a^ few captives — and ran the ships 
 out to sea again. 
 
 When they were home in Caithness Thorgils 
 said that he should go home to Iceland. *' I 
 have an estate out there/' he told Anlaf, '' in 
 none too good keeping. I think it time to cast 
 my eye over it.'' 
 
 *^ But you are to marry my sister, I believe," 
 Anlaf said. Thorgils said that he should not 
 go on with it. 
 
 '' We are not suited to each other," he said. 
 ** She don't care very much for me, nor I for 
 her, to be plain with you. If you are willing, I 
 will hand her over to Eadwine, who is fond of 
 her, and will treat her well. He was in love 
 with her from the first, which I was not, though 
 I felt, just after the battle, that I might have 
 made something of it." 
 
 '' Well," Anlaf said, '' I think you are treat- 
 ing me badly. You should not hand a man's 
 sister about as if she was a bale of goods." 
 
 '' Far from that," Thorgils said, ** I am 
 working to make her happy. She would never 
 be so with me. If you are willing we will ask 
 Eadwine what he thinks— and her too." 
 
38 THOEGILS 
 
 Anlaf was brought round to it, the more 
 especially as Gudrun was more than willing. 
 So that was settled. Eadwine said it was very 
 handsomely done by Thorgils; and after mid- 
 summer Thorgils went home. 
 
 A good deal had happened while he was 
 away. He found Loft in charge of Treadholt, 
 for Thorwen his mother was dead, his brother 
 Thorleik had gone abroad, and as for Scarleg 
 his stepfather and Haering his half-brother, 
 they had flitted to Stock-Eyre and were settled 
 out there. 
 
 Thorgils told Loft that he should stay at 
 home for a while, and Loft said it was a good 
 thing. ** You are a great man now, and ought 
 to hold your own. There's a new-comer from 
 the North settled in these parts, and seems 
 minded to take things with a high hand. We 
 need a man like you." 
 
 ** How is he called, your new man! '' 
 
 *' Asgrim is his name — Asgrim Ellida- 
 Grimsson. Something of a tyrant, I believe.'' 
 
 ** Well, we will see what we can make of 
 him," said Thorgils. 
 
CHAPTER y 
 
 THOKEY AND GUDKUN" 
 
 EVERYBODY in the country was glad to 
 see Thorgils again. They made feasts for 
 him and cried his name up to the skies. 
 And all said the same thing, that now he was 
 come to live at home, it was his business to en- 
 force the rights of the first settlers, and not 
 allow a rich man like Asgrim Ellida-Grimsson 
 to roughride his neighbours because he had a 
 large following. He used to ride thirty and 
 sometimes forty to the Thing and cow a man 
 down by threats and loud conversation. No- 
 body liked that, and there was much feeling in 
 the country about it. And again it was said — 
 and Loft said it often— that he ought to marry. 
 He was quite ready for that, he told Loft, if he 
 could find a woman to suit him. Loft said 
 '' Ride over to Calf holt and see what you think 
 of Thorey, Thorward's daughter." 
 
40 THORGILS 
 
 Thorgils said that he certainly would. * * But 
 what is she doing at Calf holt? '^ 
 
 ** She is fostered there. Thorward is dead 
 and Thorfinna her mother minds the house for 
 her son. So Thorey is with lostan of Calf- 
 holt and happy all day long. ' ' 
 
 ** Is she a pretty girl — or what would you 
 call her? " 
 
 ** I should call her a fine girl," Loft said, 
 ** and you might trust her to your death-day. 
 There's another girl there, Gudrun, her foster 
 sister. They are bosom-friends ; but Gudrun is 
 not for your way of living." 
 
 ** Well, I'll go over one day," said Thorgils. 
 
 So he did, crossing the fell by the path where 
 he had seen the thralls rifling the grave long ago, 
 fording the river and climbing half-way up the 
 second ridge. Calfholt lay there very snugly 
 under a shingle roof, with a grove of birches 
 on the weather side. It was afternoon when he 
 reached the first enclosures, and the men were 
 out in the meadows. No dogs greeted him. 
 He saw two girls sitting on the threshold of the 
 house, with a basin between them. They were 
 strigging berries, and made a good contrast. 
 One had hair much fairer than her skin, which 
 
THOREY AND GUDRUN 41 
 
 was flushed like a pink apple. Her hair was 
 flaxen-white, and very long, in a single plait 
 down her back. The other was of pale com- 
 plexion, with vivid red in her cheeks. She had 
 dark hair, which looked black. Thorgils won- 
 dered which was which. He saw the fair girl 
 look up at the sound of horse-hoofs. The other 
 took no notice. '^The dark one is Thorey,'' he 
 said to himself. 
 
 When he came up to them with a greeting, 
 they both rose ; the fair one first. He asked if 
 lostan was at home, or expected. He was get- 
 ting in the corn, the fair girl told him, and would 
 not be in till supper-time, which would be late. 
 
 ** My mother is in the house,'' she said then. 
 *' I'll go and fetch her to you." Thorgils 
 thanked her and sat do\vn by the other girl. He 
 had made up his mind that it was Gudrun who 
 had gone for her mother, and was sorry about 
 it, because he liked her best. When she got up 
 to go he had noticed that she was tall and deep- 
 chested, and thought that she walked well, 
 swinging one arm freely by her side. 
 
 Meantime he helped Thorey, as he supposed, 
 to strig raspberries, and talked to her. She 
 gave him good answers. He thought that she 
 
42 THORGILS 
 
 would make a pleasant sister-in-law, but judged 
 that she was used to men's company, and per- 
 haps rather more fond of it than she need. 
 
 Presently the fair girl came back and saw 
 what he was doing. Her eyes, very blue eyes, 
 laughed, but she hardly smiled with her mouth. 
 *' My mother begs you in,'' she said. *^ She 
 says that you are very welcome to her. ' ' 
 
 Thorgils stared. ** But if she hasn't seen me 
 come," he said, ** how can she know whether I 
 am welcome or not! " 
 
 ** I told her your name," the girl said. 
 
 ** And how did you know my name, pray?" 
 said Thorgils. She grew rather hot, and the 
 other answered for her. 
 
 ** We both knew you as soon as you came 
 into the garth. You are Thorgils, of Tread- 
 holt." 
 
 Thorgils laughed. ** You know more of me 
 than I know of you at present," he said. ** I 
 shall be glad to see your mother." Then he 
 went into the house, and Thorgerd, who was 
 lostan's wife, and own mother of one of the 
 girls, made him welcome. 
 
 He agreed to stay until lostan came in with 
 his sons, which they did when the sun rested on 
 
THOEEY AND GUDRUN 43 
 
 the top of Eyjafell. lostan had two sons, Col 
 and Starkad, both fine young men, and both in- 
 clined to be dark-hued. That set Thorgils puz- 
 zling again, for their colouring was very much 
 that of the girl he had decided to be Thorey. 
 lostan himself, a well-to-do farmer, knew all 
 about Treadholt and the fame of its new master, 
 and it may well be that he knew what Thorgils 
 was come after. However, he said nothing; and 
 when he had washed himself the girls brought 
 the meat in, and served the table as the custom 
 was. 
 
 Thorgils watched them both carefully and felt 
 himself falling in love with the flaxen-haired 
 girl. But if she were Gudrun and daughter of 
 the house, it would not be a good match for him. 
 No matter for that; she was the better of the 
 two, for quite apart from her beauty and car- 
 riage, which were beyond cavil the finer, she 
 held herself with more gravity, and never for- 
 got what she was about, whereas the little one's 
 eyes were all over the place, and she was a great 
 talker, that was evident. She had a sleek way 
 of smiling, as if to herself, at her own thoughts 
 — but really, he judged, for the puzzlement of 
 the world about her. '^ She's what you call a 
 
44 THORGILS 
 
 rogue," lie thought, *^ or a rascal if you are 
 angry. She would be a handful rather than an 
 armful. Give me a grave girl for a wife.'' 
 
 After supper they sat on the benches beside 
 the house, the evening being fine and warm. 
 Thorgils told the franklin what his errand was. 
 lostan said that he had thought as much. * * You 
 will be wanting a wife, as is reasonable,'' he 
 said, ** and if I say that you may find one here, 
 you'll not take it amiss. Those are fine girls, 
 the pair of them, and as fond of one another as 
 two beans in a pod." 
 
 Thorgils said, not a doubt of it ; and then lo- 
 stan asked him which of them he had thought 
 about. ^ * I own that Thorey is the better match 
 for you," he went on. '* She's of a greater 
 family than mine, and has more gear to her 
 name, though I will do as much for my Gudrun 
 as any man may for his daughter." 
 
 Thorgils now said that he had made up his 
 mind. He went straight to the goal, as his habit 
 was. 
 
 '* I don't know which is your Gudrun and 
 which is your fosterling," he said, *^ but that 
 makes no odds to me. A man ought to know 
 what woman he wants to marry, and so I do, I 
 
THOREY AND GUDRUN 45 
 
 choose for the fair one of those two girls of 
 yours — and now you shall tell me whose daugh- 
 ter she is.'* 
 
 lostan slapped his knee. '' Like to like," he 
 said. '* You have chosen for Thorey.'' 
 
 '' Why, I thought I had picked out your Gud- 
 run,'' said Thorgils, colouring up. 
 
 '' Not at all, master, '^ said lostan. '' We 
 don't breed that colour in my family. No, no. 
 That is Thorward's daughter, and her mother 
 is Thorfinna of Ord, who will have to be asked 
 about it— though it's all one about that. Now 
 I will fetch the girl presently and you shall ask 
 her yourself, but all being settled so far as you 
 are concerned, I don't mind telling you now 
 that you've chosen the better of the two. That 
 is a great-hearted girl who will never fail you. 
 Now mine is a good girl enough, and a sweet- 
 natured, wholesome girl— but she's fond of fun, 
 and that's a fact. We have had a little trouble 
 now and then, and there might be a little more 
 on the way. Nothing wrong, you understand- 
 but there, she's young and fond of attention. 
 And as sharp as a needle, too. It is an odd thing, 
 though, that you should have chosen Thorey and 
 thought you had Gudrun." Then he went ofE 
 
46 THORGILS 
 
 to find the girls and left Thorgils alone. He 
 himself did not think it at all odd. 
 
 Presently lostan came back. Thorey was 
 with him, walking gravely by his side. 
 
 ** Thorey, '^ said lostan, *^ Thorgils here has 
 asked for you, and there 's no better man in the 
 country. He has approved himself abroad, and 
 will be a great champion, as we all know. Now 
 what will you say to himf " 
 
 She turned her eyes upon Thorgils, and they 
 were very steady. Then she gave him her hand 
 without a word, and he took it, and kissed her. 
 ** You knew me before I knew you," he said. 
 
 Thorey said, ** I knew you before you came 
 into the home-field." 
 
 ** Was it Gudrun saw me first, or you? " 
 
 ** It was Gudrun," she said, *^ who saw you 
 first, but it was I who knew you first." 
 
 '' How was that? " said Thorgils. '' How 
 could you know a man you had never seen? " 
 
 She blushed. *' I had heard of you often," 
 she said, **and it seemed to me that you were 
 like your doings." Thorgils laughed. 
 
 The upshot of it was a plighting, and a mar- 
 riage. They set up house at Treadholt and 
 were happy in each other: as the book says, 
 
THOREY AND GUDRUN 47 
 
 *^ they fared together very well." There was 
 no meeting so far with Asgrim Ellida-Grims- 
 son, who was heard of in the country as keep- 
 ing a great train and carrying things with a 
 high hand at assemblies. Thorgils also had a 
 good company about him; and it was believed 
 that he would uphold any one who was put upon 
 by Asgrim. But Thorgils was one who never 
 made trouble. 
 
CHAPTER VI 
 
 gudrun's apfair 
 
 BUT nevertheless there was trouble next 
 summer, and Thorgils was not surprised 
 to hear that Gudrun was mixed up in it. 
 It seems that a man named Sorle, who lived not 
 far from Calfholt, was much taken with Gud- 
 run. He was a rough-and-tumble, strong man, 
 with not a great quantity of brains. He could 
 have done the thing properly if he had chosen — 
 I mean he could have seen lostan, he could have 
 spoken for the girl according to the customs of 
 his country and people ; but he did not. Instead 
 he used to come up to Calfholt at all hours of 
 the day, sit on the turf wall of the garth, kick 
 his heels there, and whistle between his teeth. 
 If Gudrun came out of the house on her affairs 
 he looked hard at her. If she spoke to him, he 
 answered shortly ; if she said nothing, he went 
 on whistling between his teeth. 
 
 Now this may or may not have been agree- 
 able to the girl herself, and, custom of country 
 
GUDRUN'S AFFAIR 49 
 
 or no-custom of country, girls have nothing to 
 say against admiration; but a girl is consid- 
 ered to be disgraced by behaviour of the sort. 
 Gudrun's parents were much offended, and her 
 two brothers angry. So one evening when Col, 
 the younger of the brothers, but the most met- 
 tlesome, came home and saw the two together, 
 he sent Gudrun into the house and had a word 
 or two with Sorle. *' You are doing wrong to 
 our family, Sorle, and I wish you would stop 
 it,'' he said. 
 
 Sorle asked him what he meant, and put Col 
 in a heat. ^' You know very well what I mean. 
 You know that a man doesn't come and hang 
 about a house all day, and talk to a girl alone. 
 You will get her made a by-word, and it's a 
 great scandal. So will you stop it or not? " 
 
 Sorle looked very doggedly at the hillside 
 over Col's head and went on whistling. 
 
 '' Do you hear what I say? " Col asked him 
 in a fume. And then Sorle stopped whistling 
 and looked at him. 
 
 *' I hear you. I shall do what seems good to 
 me," he said. '' Your high words or by-words 
 make no difference to me. So there's for you.'' 
 
 Col seemed to hover over him, as if he 
 
50 THOEGILS 
 
 might do something besides talk. Then he 
 thought better of it. '' Have it as you please," 
 he said, and turned on his heel. 
 
 Next day, there was Sorle again on the wall, 
 but Gudrun was not to be seen. Col would not 
 go into supper, but stayed in the porch watch- 
 ing his enemy. When it grew as near dark as it 
 would be, Sorle got off the wall, stretched him- 
 self and turned to go down the f ellside. Col fol- 
 lowed him at a good pace. He had a bill in his 
 hand. 
 
 Sorle did not look back or hurry himself even 
 when he heard rapid steps behind him. Pres- 
 ently Col drew level with him, and Sorle glanced 
 sideways to see who it was. He was still whis- 
 tling between his teeth. Not a word was said 
 between them, but by-and-by Col lifted his bill 
 and hit Sorle in the neck a great blow. He fell 
 like a stone and never moved again. Col laid 
 him out in the pathway and the bill upon him, 
 and went home. 
 
 Gudrun was waiting for him though she did 
 not say so, or indeed say anything until he did. 
 Col said, ** I have settled an old affair this 
 evening. You won't be troubled with Sorle 's 
 company from this night onwards." 
 
GUDRUN'S AFFAIR 51 
 
 Gudrun said, *^ His coming was nothing to 
 me, so his going will be nothing; but per- 
 haps you know that he was a thing-man of 
 Asgrim Ellida-Grimsson's and a close friend of 
 his.'' 
 
 If Col had known it, he hadn't thought of it. 
 He shrugged his shoulders, but said nothing. 
 Gudrun took the conversation in hand and told 
 him what to do. ^* I advise you to go to Tread- 
 holt as soon as you can, and get help from Thor- 
 gils. He can hardly refuse you, I think, and 
 will be a great strength to us if there is a law- 
 suit about this or any reprisal. You don't want 
 the house burned, I suppose, or to be made an 
 outlaw for a block of wood like Sorle." Col 
 said nothing, but intended to go. 
 
 Shortly afterwards, in the evening, somebody 
 knocked at the door of Treadholt. Thorey 
 opened it and was pleased to see her foster 
 brother. '' Come in, Col," she said. '' The 
 men are at table and I am going to serve them 
 this moment." 
 
 Col was out of breath and said that he 
 couldn't come in. Thorey looked quickly at 
 him. " What is it I What have you done? " 
 
 ** I can't come in until I have told you what 
 
52 THORGILS 
 
 brings me/' he said; and then he told her the 
 truth. 
 
 Thorey listened, and looked serious ; but she 
 did not seem angry. ** I'll do what I can," she 
 said, ** and when I can; but it won't be easy 
 with Thorgils. He'll make up his mind for 
 himself, and as soon as he knows what the 
 matter is. You had better go behind the hall 
 curtains and wait there. I cannot speak to him 
 about it until bedtime." Col took her advice. 
 
 Thorey went back into the hall and Thorgils 
 leaned out of the high seat and took her by the 
 arm. ** What have you done with the meat, my 
 child ? What is it all about ? ' ' She laughed and 
 said that it was all ready. 
 
 But still Thorgils was looking at her. ** I 
 never saw you with such red cheeks — or not 
 since I saw you first," he said. ** Now there's 
 something in this." 
 
 * ^ A wise man knows his own wife, ' ' she said ; 
 '* but the wife knows more of the fire than the 
 wisest man. Let me go, and you shall have 
 your supper." 
 
 That was all until bedtime ; but then she came 
 and sat by him and told him the truth. Thorgils 
 heard her without interrupting. ** That is how 
 
GUDRUN'S AFFAIE 53 
 
 it stands now at Calf holt/' she said. ** Will 
 you please to help them! Will you do it for 
 my sake? " 
 
 Thorgils gave her a kiss. ** I will do it for 
 your sake, and for Col's sake too. He is a fine 
 fellow, and everybody speaks well of him. Let 
 him go to bed now, and come to bed yourself — • 
 and to-morrow I'll go to Calf holt." 
 
 And this was what he did. He rode up to 
 Calfholt early in the morning, and found them 
 very much perturbed. They hailed him gladly ; 
 but he took it all as a matter of course. He took 
 lostan apart and told him what he proposed. 
 
 ** You shall all flit over to Treadholt, where 
 there is plenty of room for you. You had better 
 begin at once. Set the women to work indoors, 
 and do you and the thralls round up the live 
 stock. You will have Asgrim here before the 
 day is over. Bum what you can't take away, or 
 he'll have it. He will sue Col's outlawry at the 
 Thing, I don't doubt — ^but that is some way off 
 yet. Now do you as I advise, and don't be long 
 about it either." lostan thanked him heartily. 
 ** I don't suppose you understand what a help 
 you are being to me and mine," he said; but 
 Thorgils answered him, ** Few words are best." 
 
54 THOEGILS 
 
 Gudrun, who had always been rather afraid 
 of Thorgils, kept out of his way, making herself 
 very busy in the house ; but his eye caught hers 
 in the course of the morning, and she came up 
 to receive punishment. He did not say very 
 much to her. * * You had a good deal to do with 
 this, I fancy, but you didn't know what you 
 were bringing about. I daresay you think it 
 rather fine to have men shedding blood for your 
 sake — but it's a bad way of getting a husband 
 and a household of your own. Now you are 
 coming to live with Thorey there must be no 
 more sheeps-eyeing with the likes of Sorle." 
 Gudrun said that she hadn't done anything. 
 ** No," said Thorgils, ** you did nothing; but 
 you allowed things to be done which were not 
 convenient. ' ' 
 
 The stock was oif the homestead before din- 
 ner-time, and the household gear was brought 
 over on horseback before they took anything to 
 eat. After dinner they fired the stacks. Thor- 
 gils with some of his people remained to see that 
 done, and while they were in the midst of the 
 sm_other they heard horses come into the croft, 
 and then saw weapons shining. There seemed 
 to be a good many men there ; but Thorgils took 
 
GUDRUN'S AFFAIR 55 
 
 no notice. He had Earth-house-prey with him, 
 and his men all had weapons. 
 
 One or two faces looked through the smoke, 
 but it was some time before anybody came up. 
 
 By-and-by a man walked his horse through, 
 heading a troop of some half a dozen more. He 
 was a broad-shouldered, round-faced, brown- 
 bearded man, with a scarlet cloak over his 
 shoulders, thrown back to leave his arm free. 
 He wore a metal helm with wings to it, and 
 looked to be a man of forty or thereabouts. He 
 and Thorgils just looked at each other, but not 
 for very long. 
 
 Then the stranger said, '* There has been a 
 flitting here." 
 
 '' Yes," said Thorgils, '^ it looks very much 
 like that." 
 
 ** And reason good," said the other, ** by 
 what I hear." 
 
 * ^ Nobody leaves home without a cause, ' ' said 
 Thorgils. 
 
 After a little the stranger asked him, ** Might 
 you know where the folk have gone? " Thorgils 
 said that he couldn't say. 
 
 *' You mean that you won't say? " 
 
 '* I mean what I do say," said Thorgils. 
 
56 THORGILS 
 
 *' Well," said the stranger, *^ we shall know 
 soon enough whether Master Col is lucky in his 
 friends." Thorgils made no answer to that. 
 
 The stranger did not know what to do next; 
 but felt that he must do something. His men 
 behind him, no doubt, expected it of him. 
 
 '^ You are Thorgils, Scarleg's stepson, are 
 you not? " 
 
 ** They call me Thorgils of Treadholt in 
 these days," said Thorgils. 
 
 ** And lostan here was a friend of yours? " 
 
 *' He is a friend of mine." 
 
 .*' And you stay here? " 
 
 *^ I stay here." 
 
 The stranger stared at him for a little while 
 longer, then dug his horse in the flank and 
 turned him sharply. His men made way for 
 him, and he said something to them as he went 
 through ; but Thorgils did not hear what it was. 
 They all rode off. 
 
 Afterwards he was told that the man in the 
 red cloak was Asgrim Ellida-Grimsson. He 
 said that he had thought as much. 
 
 The next time he met that fine man was at the 
 Thing. He himself rode thither with a great 
 following; he had forty-five men with him, all 
 
GUDRUN'S AFFAIR 57 
 
 armed. Asgrim came with forty men, and there 
 was a great suit set in motion for the outlawry 
 of Col. Thorgils took no part in it, but acted as 
 if he knew nothing at all about it. So Asgrim 
 carried his suit, and Col was outlawed for man- 
 slaughter. Thorgils rode home again and told 
 them the news. By his advice, and under his 
 protection. Col did not leave the country, but 
 behaved as if there was nothing against him. 
 He went about with Thorgils to all the meetings 
 of that spring and summer, but with such force 
 at hand that Asgrim did not care to do any- 
 thing. The whole of the country took sides, 
 and there were affrays here and there, which 
 made some of them timid, who lived in lonely 
 places. lostan himself didn't much like it, and 
 told Thorgils that he would pay for the 
 slaughter sooner than strifes and divisions 
 should go on. Thorgils said that he couldn't 
 prevent him, but that no money need be paid on 
 his account. 
 
 However, money was finally paid by the 
 people of the country both for the slaughter of 
 Sorle and the inlawing of Col. It was paid, and 
 Asgrim took it. He asked, Had Thorgils paid 
 anything! No, they said, Thorgils had refused 
 
58 THORGILS 
 
 to pay. *' He will pay one of these days," said 
 Asgrim, ** and will have to pay dear." This 
 was told to Thorgils, as such things always are 
 told. Thorgils was angry that any money had 
 been paid at all. ** The man terrifies you by 
 his broad shoulders and great words. He is like 
 a young cuckoo, and you are the wagtails who 
 quest all over the garths to find stuff for his 
 maw and stop his squawking. Like enough you 
 will pay dear — but you will get no money out of 
 me to fill him up. ' ' 
 
 So Col was inlawed, lostan went home to 
 Calf holt, and there was peace in the country; 
 but Asgrim was always girding against Thor- 
 gils and saying what would be done to him if 
 he didn't mind what he was about. 
 
CHAPTER VII 
 
 THOKSDOOM 
 
 THEY say that when Christendom was 
 carried into Iceland, Thorgils heard of it 
 and was one of the first to accept of it. 
 I don't know how that may be, for the books 
 make out that Thorwald Codransson and a 
 Bishop called Frederick brought it into the 
 Northmen's Quarter first of all, and that it did 
 not come South for a year or more after that. 
 Let that be as it may, it was preached to the 
 Southland men in due season, and Thorgils 
 went to hear what was said. He had always 
 been a religious man; Thor's priest and Thor's 
 temple knew that, for he gave liberally every 
 year when he was at home, and they had come 
 to count on him for a good portion of their live- 
 lihood. But now, being at the Thing, where the 
 preaching was to be, he went to hear it and to 
 see what was done. Most of the great men were 
 there, and Asgrim Ellida-Grimsson among 
 
 59 
 
60 THORGILS 
 
 them. He and Thorgils spoke to each other 
 when they met now, but never had much to say. 
 
 The preaching was on a hill-top near the 
 Thing-stead, and they had made an altar up 
 there, where the Bishop burned incense, and 
 said mass in his robes. They sang the canticles 
 in Latin too, and praised God thereby. After 
 that a chieftain preached, not the Bishop, be- 
 cause he had not the language of the people. 
 Thorgils gave him great attention, and was 
 thoughtful when he had said what he had to 
 say. 
 
 There was much conversation afterwards. 
 Thorgils said that it seemed to him a good re- 
 ligion, and much more reasonable than the old 
 one. ** You have to pay for what you get,'' he 
 said. ** That is a law of the world. But it 
 costs me nothing to give a bullock here and there 
 to Thor, whereas it might cost me an inordi- 
 nate deal to have to take thought what I did, or 
 what I said, or what I imagined. But if the 
 thing you gain is worth the price — ^how then? 
 A man is a fool not to pay it." 
 
 Asgrim said it was all a parcel of lies ; but 
 Thorgils replied that you could only tell that 
 by finding out. ** You know no more about it 
 
THORSDOOM 61 
 
 than I do," he said. '' And how can you say 
 that it is made up of lies, or I that it is sooth, 
 until we try it? It sounds likely to me.'' 
 
 After that he went to see the Bishop and his 
 friends to find out just what he had to do if he 
 became a Christian. They told him that he 
 must love his neighbour. ** Well,'' he said, '' I 
 bear no ill-will to anybody, but I like some men 
 better than others." '' No harm in that," he 
 was told, '' but you must love nobody worse 
 than you do yourself." *' Ah," says Thorgils, 
 ** you mean that I must give them equal meas- 
 ure? " '' That's it." Thorgils said that he 
 could do that. *' And what else do you expect 
 of me? " Then they expounded the Christian 
 doctrine as they understood it themselves, and 
 Thorgils listened attentively. He said that he 
 would think about it, but wished to know what 
 became of Thor and the rest of the old gods. 
 '' You don't kill the gods by setting up another 
 one," he said. ** No," he was answered, ** that 
 may be. But you find out that they are not what 
 you thought them, no friends of yours. Now we 
 say that they are malignant, and think them 
 probably fiends." Thorgils said, '' A bad 
 nam,e will hang a dog, and may do a man harm; 
 
62 THORGILS 
 
 but I should like to know what Thor would think 
 of being called a fiend/' ** No matter what he 
 thinks/' they said. ** But if you become a 
 Christian you cease to serve Thor or to pay any 
 attention to him — and he won't like it." ^' I'm 
 sure he will not," said Thorgils. 
 
 He talked it over with his friends, saying that 
 he was inclined towards it. It seemed reason- 
 able, he thought. The old faith had grown up 
 by degrees, nobody knew how; one thing had 
 brought about another until now there was a 
 great stack of doctrine in front of your door, 
 so high that you couldn't see the weather. But 
 here was a new thing all compact and sizeable. 
 You can handle it and estimate it. It seemed to 
 fit in with experience — which the old doctrine 
 did not. 
 
 The end of it was that he chose to be chris- 
 tened, and was followed into the water by four 
 or five chieftains. Asgrim Ellida-Grimsson 
 was not one of them at this time. After them 
 a number of their friends and dependents went. 
 Loft was one, and lostan another. Then they 
 rode home, and when the Bishop was handy to 
 Treadholt, Thorey was christened, and Gudrun 
 her foster sister with her. Thorey had given 
 
THORSDOOM 63 
 
 birth to her first child by this time, a girl; and 
 she was christened Thorny. 
 
 These were great things, and greatly resented 
 by Thor's priest and, as it seems, by Thor him- 
 self. Thorgils had dreams about Thor. One 
 night he seemed to wake out of his good sleep ; 
 there stood a big man by the bedside, twinkling 
 his heavy eyes at him. Thorgils thought that 
 he lay looking at the apparition, not saying any- 
 thing, but guessing in his heart that this was 
 Thor. 
 
 Thor spoke to him in a heavy and grumbling 
 voice: ^* What have you done, and by what ad- 
 vice, to leave me in the lurch and treat me with 
 indignity? When I trusted in you, then you 
 failed me. But you will have the worst of the 
 battle, for I have a long memory; and it will 
 go hard with you before I have done." 
 
 '' God will help me," Thorgils said— or so 
 he thought. Then he turned over and went to 
 sleep again, and when he awoke in the morning, 
 though he tried, he could not remember what 
 had been said. 
 
 The first thing he was told when he went out 
 of doors was that his boar was dead— found so 
 in the yard. He could see no marks on him, no 
 
64 THORGILS 
 
 sign of disease; but he had the animal buried, 
 would not allow him to be cut up, or have any 
 use made of him. 
 
 He told nobody about his dream, and passed 
 over the matter of the boar's death. But he 
 dreamed again before many days, and again 
 of Thor. This time Thor looked like Eric the 
 Red, with the same snarling mouth showing 
 red under his beard, and the same little blinking, 
 angry eyes. ** You know me,*' the dream said, 
 ** and you know that I could as easily choke you 
 as your old hog. Look to yourself, then; for 
 you and I have long accounts to settle. '' 
 
 ** God will settle our accounts, Thor,'' was 
 the answer of Thorgils, and Thor said, ** See 
 to your beasts," before he disappeared. 
 
 Sure enough, he lost a bullock, which all of a 
 sudden began to stand and stare, and tremble 
 all over, with the sweat shining on his coat. 
 Then he pitched head forward on to his head, 
 and there was an end of him. They buried him 
 beside the boar. Thorgils said that some enemy 
 was abroad with a grudge against him, and that 
 he should sit up with the cattle for a night or 
 two. And so he did. What happened nobody 
 knew, for he wouldn't tell; but Thorey, who 
 
THORSDOOM 65 
 
 lay awake for a long time listening, heard him 
 singing out there, and then heard him stop sing- 
 ing. Then she thought that she heard voices in 
 debate; and presently Thorgils began to sing 
 again — but not quite the same tune. She fell 
 asleep, woke again and listened, heard nothing, 
 and looked out of the window. She saw Thor- 
 gils sitting on the turf wall, very upright, star- 
 ing up into the sky. His face looked white in the 
 moonlight, and she saw Earth-house-prey 
 gleaming on his knees, like a stream of water. 
 She went back to bed, telling herself that no- 
 body would best a man like Thorgils. 
 
 In the morning he came into her bed, very 
 cold and with nothing to say. His answer was 
 always, Nothing. *^ Did you see anything? '' 
 Nothing. *< Did the cattle take any harm? " 
 Nothing. '^ Did you hear anything! " Noth- 
 ing. He shivered a little, and looked blue about 
 the hands, cheek-bones and shoulder-blades. 
 His knees were quite blue, and his feet white. 
 But no more cattle died, and Thorgils thought 
 that the battle was over. Thorey told Gudrun 
 that her husband was the bravest of men as he 
 was one of the strongest. If he said that he 
 saw or heard nothing he did not mean that she 
 
66 THOKGILS 
 
 was to believe it — and she did not believe it; 
 he meant that he had nothing to tell her about it. 
 *^ He might tell it yon, I think,'' said Gudrnn, 
 * * or yon might have it out of him if you chose. ' ' 
 ** I don't choose," Thorey replied. ** He 
 knows best." 
 
CHAPTER VIII 
 
 THE CALL FROM ERIC THE RED 
 
 SOME years now passed over Treadholt, 
 prosperous years with no ill-fortune 
 threatening. Thorny, the eldest child of 
 Thorgils and Thorey, was seven years old; 
 there had been a boy, Thorlaf , too, who had not 
 lived to be five ; and Thorey had hopes of an- 
 other. Just then there came a messenger from 
 the sea, a man who brought news of Eric 
 the Red. That great adventurer had been in 
 many lands since Thorgils had been in his com- 
 pany long ago ; he had been in Russia, and since 
 that to Greenland. Now he was gone to Green- 
 land again, with a large convoy, and asked 
 Thorgils to join him. ** Eric bid me remind 
 you, Thorgils, of your promise made to him 
 when you parted on the Norway seas,'' the 
 messenger said. * * He did not think, and I don't 
 think, that you would deny it. He is bound for 
 a fine country where he thinks of making a 
 
 67 
 
68 THORGILS 
 
 settlement ; and he says that if he can be sure 
 of you he will be in a fair way to found a king- 
 dom. Do you come out, with what company you 
 can form, and you shall choose land where you 
 will. ' ' Thorgils said that Eric was building on 
 a light foundation. *^ He has the promise of a 
 lad, and he wants to risk upon it the welfare of 
 a man and his family. If his building falls he 
 is very little the worse — but what about me? " 
 He would not give an answer one way or the 
 other, and saw the messenger off the place with 
 no word more. 
 
 But it stayed in his mind for all that, and next 
 spring, when Eadwine his friend came to see 
 him, with a shipload of Greenland stuff for him 
 — ^not only furs, but gold as well, and amber and 
 iron — Thorgils began to be serious about the 
 message he had had, and talked to Thorey 
 about it. 
 
 She was with child and unwilling ; but she did 
 not refuse. ** It is a great risk to flit so far," 
 was all she said. 
 
 Thorg-ils said that certainly it was a risk. 
 *^ Eric has asked for me,'' he said, *' and I 
 think that I ought to go. You and I have never 
 been parted, and never had a bad word between 
 
CALL FROM ERIC THE RED 69 
 
 us from the beginning, nor shall we have one 
 now. You shall stay here and mind the house, 
 with friends to help you — and we have many 
 friends. But for my part, I shall go.'' 
 
 Thorey was troubled. She thought he was 
 for once making a mistake ; she told him so — ^but 
 then she put her hand on his knee. * * I shall go 
 with you, if go you must," she said. '' I thought 
 you would,'' he told her, and was evidently 
 pleased. Then he began with his preparations 
 and sought about to make up a good party 
 among his friends. Thorlaf, who was a son of 
 Eadwine and had been left in his charge by his 
 father, was to come; Col and Starkad, the two 
 foster brothers of Thorey, now settled in home- 
 steads of their own, chose to join with Thorgils 
 rather than with their father. Gudrun, who 
 was fond of Thorgils and anxious for his good 
 opinion, said that she would go. They took ten 
 thralls altogether, and Thorarin the reeve of 
 Treadholt. With all these people Thorgils 
 took a quantity of stock too. It was to be a 
 great flitting. He put Treadholt and all the 
 lands which went with it into the keeping of 
 Haering his half-brother, and his money with 
 it, feeling that he could trust him with so much. 
 
70 THORGILS 
 
 Finally, when he had made all his preparations, 
 at the last minute lostan came down from Calf- 
 holt and told him that he had made up his mind 
 to break his home up, and share fortunes. 
 ** The countryside will never be the same again 
 with you gone, ' ' he said. * ' I bring twelve souls 
 with me, good company all of us." *' We shall 
 want a big ship," Thorgils said; '' bigger than 
 I thought. But I won 't deny you in this. ' ' 
 
 He went far to get a ship to his liking, but 
 found one in Olvus which pleased him. She was 
 both roomy and strongly-built. She lay in the 
 creek there ; and as soon as the bargaining was 
 done, and all preparations concluded, he moved 
 out all his household, and stayed with a friend 
 of his called Thorodd at Hialla. It was fully 
 late in the season ; but he hoped for a good pass- 
 age. Unfortunately it happened that Thorny 
 his daughter fell ill, and it became a question 
 whether she should be taken or not. She was 
 nine years old, a very pretty child. 
 
 He waited three days, but dared not wait any 
 longer. He told Thorey that they must leave 
 her behind. She looked at him with her eyes 
 full of trouble, but raised none of it in speech. 
 *' What you think best," she said, ** must be 
 
CALL FEOM ERIC THE RED 71 
 
 so.'' So Thorny was left with Thorodd to fos- 
 ter and a good portion settled on her in case she 
 were to marry before her people came home. 
 Thorodd prophesied good fortune for her, but 
 Thorgils was heavy when the time came for 
 leaving Iceland. ** If I had not great faith in 
 Eric I wouldn't go even now. Yet a promise is 
 a thing to be kept." 
 
 ** It isn't easy to judge a great man," Thor- 
 odd said. ** You are backing your own judg- 
 ment, after all, rather than Eric the Red's." 
 
 *^ Yes," said Thorgils, ** I believe in him — 
 but I own that I would give a good deal to be 
 out of this adventure." 
 
 *' It is not too late, neighbour ..." Thorodd 
 began to say; but Thorgils frowned. 
 
 * * It is too late for me to go back on my bond," 
 he said. * * I expect I shall go through with it. ' ' 
 
 '' I don't doubt you will," Thorodd said; and 
 that was how they parted. 
 
 They all went on board, and waited for a wind 
 to take them out of the firth. lostan had all the 
 ship before the mast for his party; Thorgils 
 with his took the after-deck, but Gudrun, 
 Starkad and Col chose to lodge with him. Each 
 kept pretty much to their own part of the ship, 
 
72 THORGILS 
 
 and lostan's company, which was in high spir- 
 its, made a great chatter. Thorgils felt the re- 
 sponsibility on him, and remained sunk in de- 
 jection. He still had dreams at night, and it 
 seemed to him that Thor would never let him 
 alone. 
 
 Sometimes he stood at his bedside and loaded 
 him with reproaches; sometimes he seemed to 
 be in a strange country, and Thor beside him 
 showing him the terrors of it. One of his dreams 
 was that he and Thor stood on a wild shore, 
 where there were black cliffs, and a high sea 
 breaking against them. The cloud wrack was 
 heavy and low down, driven by a great wind off 
 the sea. It came on dense drifts of fog which, 
 when it parted, showed him wide stretches of 
 water white with foam. He saw a ship helpless 
 in the storm driving fast upon the rocks. Thor 
 said, * * In just such a strait will you be before 
 long, with a cold and lonely death before you, 
 unless you turn to me again. Look to it. ' ' And 
 Thorgils thought that his eyeballs grew hot and 
 smarted with the rage which possessed him as 
 he answered the fiend : ' ' Be off with you and 
 tempt me not. The Son of God is my friend, 
 Who spent His manhood and His blood for the 
 
CALL FROM ERIC THE RED 73 
 
 sake of us. He will be with us on our journey, 
 and if we are to perish we shall reach Him the 
 sooner." Then he awoke and saw that Thorey 
 was looking at him. '' You have been dream- 
 ing," she said. He confessed it. *' Not hap- 
 pily, ' ' she said. ' ' No, not happily, ' ' said Thor- 
 gils, and told her the dream. 
 
 She said that she did not like it, and should 
 never have dared go on in the face of such an 
 omen if it had happened to herself. Thorgils 
 said that it did not do to give way before such 
 things. '* I shall never give in to Thor or to 
 any of them. That would be a baseness not to 
 be thought of." '' You are quite right," she 
 said, ** but you will need your courage. I won't 
 answer for some of them if Thor shows himself 
 to them. They aren't all like you." Thorgils 
 said that he wasn't afraid of them. 
 
CHAPTER IX 
 
 TROUBLE AT SEA 
 
 THE wind came fair off the land as they 
 sailed out of the firth and reached the 
 open sea. Their course was now N. N. 
 W., and the wind holding, they were soon out 
 of sight of land. After a week of prosperous 
 journey, however, the wind gave out, and they 
 drifted helpless and aimless over the back of the 
 sea: and it became anxious work. They had 
 provisions for a fortnight, which should have 
 been ample; but lostan's party had little fore- 
 thought and feasted high and drank deep. 
 Thorgils saw that he would have to interfere 
 very soon, and put the whole ship on strict ra- 
 tions. But he had other and worse anxieties. 
 He had started late in the season, counting, as 
 he fairly might do, on a steady wind. But if he 
 was to be much delayed he would scarcely reach 
 Greenland before the winter, which he kne\\r 
 
 74 
 
TROUBLE AT SEA 75 
 
 began early. Meantime there was nothing to be 
 done but wait for a wind. 
 
 He gave lostan a hint that they had best be 
 careful with their stores. lostan was surprised. 
 '' We trusted to you entirely/' he said. '' There 
 should have been more than enough; and it's 
 rather hard to have such a thing sprung on us 
 when we are out at sea, and no means of help- 
 ing ourselves. You had better leave it to me," 
 he said. '* If you go and terrify my people I 
 don't say what might come of it." Thorgils 
 left it so ; but could not see that there was much 
 difference in the ways of the f oredeck. He had 
 not thought losan so weak with men as he 
 proved to be; but worse than lostan was his 
 , wife Thorgerd, a strong, big woman with the 
 ways of a man. She was lostan 's master in 
 most things, and difficult to deal with. 
 
 After a week or more of dead calm it began 
 to blow from the South-west, and raised heavy 
 seas. The ship was overfreighted, and Thorgils 
 thought that they would have to sacrifice some 
 of their stock. They had cattle on board, be- 
 tween decks, and as fast as they died Thorgils 
 had them thrown out. Thorgerd raised a great 
 bother about it, saying it was wicked to sacri- 
 
76 THORGILS 
 
 fice good food. ** If you would sacrifice an 
 ox to Thor/^ she said, *' there would be 
 some sense in it. Many of us are thinking that 
 we are paying too dear for your new God.'' 
 Thorgils sent her away ; but she grumbled very 
 freely. She ate and drank like a man at this 
 time, and used to be very noisy and insolent. 
 
 lostan was cast down by sea-sickness, with 
 many of the others. Starkad and Col were just 
 as bad. lostan 's son Thorarin, a young man 
 of twenty, was the most useful of the company. 
 Thorey, who was nearing her time, lay mostly 
 in bed. 
 
 Now they had had two months of stormy 
 weather, and were distressed for want of water. 
 The seas ran high, and seemed bare of life. 
 They met no other vessel, and saw no sign of 
 land. Thorgils hardly left the helm, night or 
 day, except for an hour at a time, when he dared 
 leave it to Thorarin. It was hard to get the 
 thralls to move about in such weather, with 
 green seas sweeping the deck. Two or three 
 were washed overboard, and nearly all the cattle 
 had perished. Thorgils had made up his mind 
 that it was all over with them unless the storm 
 should abate within three days. 
 
TROUBLE AT SEA 77 
 
 It did abate, by good fortune. They were 
 able to correct their course, and get things ship- 
 shape again ; but still there was no sight of the 
 land. Thorgils made the strictest rules for diet. 
 He divided up everything that they had, and 
 himself gave out the daily rations to everybody 
 on board. It was well that he did, for they had 
 yet another three weeks at sea. 
 
 It was cold weather now, and though the wind 
 had died away, the sea ran high in great rollers. 
 There seemed to be a great current, too, set- 
 ting to the South-west. They saw their first 
 iceberg at this time, and at first hailed it for the 
 mainland. The sea was breaking upon it. They 
 saw a bear walking about on a flat shelf ; and 
 high up on the ice-cliffs of it clouds of sea-birds. 
 Some of these they managed to shoot with their 
 bows. Then, when they did actually see land, 
 they believed for a long time that it was another 
 iceberg. It looked just the same : all snowslopes 
 and green ice. 
 
 It began to blow again when they had been 
 nearly three months at sea, but were in sight of 
 the land. They made out that they could see the 
 Western shores of Greenland. The storm grew 
 in intensity, and one night when it was at its 
 
78 THORGILS 
 
 highest the main-mast carried away, and they 
 were helpless. That night they came ashore 
 upon the rocks and had to remain in the utmost 
 peril until daylight. 
 
 It was a time of wild alarm for all hands. 
 Thorgils remained on deck all the time except 
 for a short moment when he went helow to see 
 how the women fared. Thorey was in great 
 pain, hut kept herself as still as she could, and 
 it comforted to see her steady eyes resting upon 
 him. Gudrun was beside her, and the two, he 
 could see, had faith in him. Thorgils sat beside 
 her and took her hand for a while. He told her 
 that he had little hope of saving the ship, which 
 was fast wedged in the rocks. He did not think 
 that she would break up yet. Even as he spoke 
 every breaking wave caused her to shudder 
 froxii stem to stern. Thorey told him that she 
 wasn't frightened — but he knew her better. 
 She said that she was glad Thorny was safe at 
 home, and as she said it her eyes filled with 
 tears, and she was obliged to turn her head 
 away. Gudrun sat on the floor and held Thor- 
 gils' knees. They were quiet here, but else- 
 where there was screaming and much commo- 
 .tion, Thorgerd drunk and shouting. He could 
 
TROUBLE AT SEA 79 
 
 not remain with Thorey long, as he had to visit 
 every one in turn and endure as best he could 
 the reproaches they flung at him. 
 
 He was on deck when the first twilight of 
 morning showed. Their ship was fast in a cleft 
 between two great rocks, which themselves were 
 the outworks of the cliffs— one of the horns of 
 a bay. As the light gained he was able to make 
 out the lie of the bay, and how it was almost 
 landlocked, and safe from the weather. Once in 
 there, they could choose the best landing-place 
 and get the women out of danger; but how to 
 launch the boat in the present sea he did not 
 know at all. He went forward and examined 
 the cliffs carefully in the hope of finding a way 
 of landing by them; but there was no help in 
 that quarter. As soon as it was light enough 
 he gave orders to get out the boat, and put the 
 women and children aboard her. He himself 
 took Thorey in his arms and got her into the 
 boat. She was too ill now to be terrified. Thor- 
 arin, lostan's son, was put in command, and 
 they pulled away from the rocks. It was fright- 
 ful to see them mount the seas and lurch down 
 out of sight; that was the worst half -hour of 
 Thorgils' life so far. 
 
80 THORGILS 
 
 But by the providence of God they escaped 
 the breakers and the cliffs, and he saw them 
 into smooth water. They set to work then to 
 get the stores out and all the things which they 
 must have ; and when the boat came back most 
 of this was bestowed in her, and the better part 
 of the men. Thorgils remained until the last, 
 not believing for a moment at a time that the 
 ship would last out till his turn came. But she 
 did — it was when he was close to shore that he 
 saw her part amidships and the bows dip and 
 sink. There was the end of that ship, then ; but 
 they were in Greenland. 
 
 The bay in which they were was of great ex- 
 tent, and cliffs enclosed it in two horns. The 
 mountains, which were covered with ice, came 
 sharply down to the shore. This was sandy, 
 with scarcely enough herbage at the edge to 
 feed a couple of sheep ; but on the western horn 
 there seemed to be a greater depth of ground, 
 and it was there Thorgils determined they must 
 build themselves a shelter against the winter. 
 As he judged, that could not be far off. He 
 thought it would set in cold when the storm was 
 spent. There was abundance of wreckage and 
 
TROUBLE AT SEA 81 
 
 driftwood all along the shore— more than 
 enough to build a good house. 
 
 Having chosen the site, all hands set to work 
 to build the house. It was made after the fash- 
 ion of their country, a long hall with a cross- 
 division in the middle — ^two hearths back to 
 back, and two doors, one for each part of the 
 house. Thorgils was determined to keep the 
 companies separate. He had not been at all 
 satisfied with lostan^s people on the voyage. 
 They had been thriftless and noisy; they had 
 been for ever at extremes, and at either extreme 
 unmanageable. He felt that he could deal with 
 his own, but that the others were beyond him. 
 There should be an equal division of whatever 
 was saved from the wreck, and then each party 
 must shift for itself. So far as he could see, 
 they must stay out the winter in this bay, where 
 they were sheltered from the worst of the 
 weather. He hoped that they would get fish to 
 live on — and didn't allow himself to wonder 
 how else they were to subsist. 
 
 They were two weeks or more building their 
 hall, and in the meantime the women lived in a 
 cave in the rocks, with a great fire to keep them 
 warm. Gudrun and some of the servant-girls 
 
82 THOEGILS 
 
 helped with the building. Thorey lay abed; 
 she was now very ill, and expecting her child 
 from day to day. They kept her warm and dry, 
 but that was all they could do. 
 
CHAPTER X 
 
 THE FIRST WINTER 
 
 WHEN the house was finished, they 
 moved into it what stores they had; a 
 certain amount of meal remained to 
 them, but not enough to see the winter out; 
 some stockfish ; some onions ; nothing else worth 
 talking about, except mead, and of that too 
 much remained. The cattle were dead and cast 
 overboard, and the sheep were all dead. They 
 had saved their chests from the wreck, and had 
 them in the hall. They dried seaweed to eke 
 out the bedding ; and then they moved in. Thor- 
 ey's baby was born in the cave, and called Thor- 
 finn. She had a bad confinement and could not 
 nourish him well on the food which they had 
 to do with. 
 
 All hands, by common consent, went to the 
 fishing, which was very well so long as the bay 
 remained open. Thorgils doubted it would be 
 shut to them when the heart of the winter had 
 
 83 
 
84 THOEGILS 
 
 grown round them ; but meantime they had good 
 catches. They climbed the encircling cliffs and 
 penetrated the upland country so far as they 
 could. They made out herds of deer on the 
 distant heights, and saw the tracks of bears, but 
 met with no animals within range ; and the snow 
 lay very deep up there. Whenever there was a 
 partial thaw the white fogs settled down upon 
 them like a blanket ; and then there was nothing 
 to be done. 
 
 It was a terrible winter indeed, full of dis- 
 aster and trouble, of which the worst must be 
 told. Men take trouble in different ways, some 
 as if they expected it, and intended to see it 
 through; and of that sort was Thorgils, who 
 was a religious man and able to control his 
 household because he was always able to control 
 himself. Of the other sort was lostan, a light- 
 hearted, easy-going man when the world went 
 well with him, but in times of stress unstable. 
 He had never had any other way of meeting 
 difficulty than that of high spirits and audacity. 
 To get those in sufficiency he knew no better 
 plan than to eat and drink all he could carry. 
 His wife was worse than he was, a woman with 
 a man's frame, a man's appetite, and the heart 
 
THE FIEST WINTER 85 
 
 and nerve of her own sex. She ate and drank 
 like a man, and scolded like a woman. On 
 their side of the house matters were always in 
 extremes. They revelled, and they desponded; 
 they fought, and then they loved. Half the 
 night they caroused, and then weren't ready in 
 the morning to take their share of foraging for 
 victual. The consequence was that Thorgils 
 and his men did far better at the fishing than 
 they did, so that very often at the end of the 
 day they would have had nothing to take in if 
 Thorgils had not shared his catch with them. 
 As trouble increased so did lostan's character 
 worsen. He now made a grievance of it if 
 Thorgils did not offer to share his catch ; he was 
 greatly offended when he was reproved for the 
 noise he allowed at night ; but what was worst 
 of all, he drew away from Thorgils his son 
 Thorarin, a fine young man and one of the best 
 of the whole ship's company. Thorgils felt 
 that more than he cared to say. 
 
 So things went on, badly enough, till Christ- 
 mas, and after that they went worse. There 
 was sickness on lostan's side of the house, and 
 the long bitter nights told upon their spirits. 
 They began to hear noises, and to imagine ter- 
 
86 THOEGILS 
 
 rible things. Thorgerd, lostan's wife, was one 
 of the worst. She was nearly always the worse 
 for drink, and saw and heard all sorts of things. 
 One night when they were feasting and making 
 a great noise — with the wind howling outside 
 and the snow driving — there came a loud knock 
 at the door, and then a dead silence. Somebody 
 said, ** If that should be good news ": and then 
 a man jumped up. ^^ I'm going out to them, 
 whether or no.'' He got the door open and ran 
 out — but did not come back. lostan and his son 
 went out to look for him, but couldn't find him. 
 They had torches and hunted all about the 
 shore. Presently they saw him, with his arms 
 stretched out, facing a rock, and jigging up and 
 down. They saw that he was mad, but mas- 
 tered him and took him back. He screamed all 
 the rest of the night until he died. 
 
 Next evening it was much the same. There 
 was a thump on the door, and a man of theirs 
 stood up. ** My turn," he said, and went out. 
 They followed him quickly, and saw him run- 
 ning like a wild thing among the boulders and 
 snowdrifts. He looked as if he was being 
 chased by something, and ran screaming into 
 the sea. They never saw him again. 
 
THE FIRST WINTER 87 
 
 Then sickness took them — scurvy; and one 
 after another they died. lostan took it on 
 Twelfth Night, and Thorgerd, who was now so- 
 bered, nursed him. She wouldn't allow either 
 Thorey or Gudrun to come near him. ** You 
 brought all this misery upon us ; now keep away 
 and let us alone.'' When lostan was dead, and 
 they had buried him with the others in the 
 snowdrift, Thorgerd took the disease, and died 
 of it. Thorarin was the last of them to go, and 
 he died on Thorgils' side of the house, in Gud- 
 run 's arms. They buried him apart, near the 
 wreck of the ship, and put a rock over him. 
 
 No hurt had so far come to Thorgils' com- 
 pany; but they were sadly cast down, and in 
 mortal terror of the unquiet dead. There seems 
 no doubt but that the dead walked. They 
 thought that they heard them shouting and sing- 
 ing wild foolish songs in their empty hall. They 
 heard them thump the door, and the madmen 
 screaming outside in the snow. Thorey said 
 nothing ; but she used to fix her dark-blue eyes 
 on Thorgils, and tremble, though she did all she 
 could to control herself. Gudrun had not so 
 much command. She was very much changed 
 from what she had been; she was grown hag- 
 
88 THORGILS 
 
 gard and lined in the face. There seemed no 
 spring left in her. But she was as fond of Thor- 
 gils as ever she had been, and always careful of 
 his good opinion. 
 
 Thorgils himself was troubled by the walk- 
 ing of the dead, but more because his women- 
 kind were so much affected. It kept growing 
 worse as the winter wore on. Some time in 
 February he told Starkad and Col (who had 
 been of his party from the beginning) that he 
 thought that they must make an end of it, and 
 they agreed to help him. The thralls would 
 not bear a hand at any price ; but Thorgils with 
 the two young men dug up all the bodies out 
 of the drifts, and made a wood pile, and burned 
 them all. It took them two days. All were 
 burned except Thorarin, who lay quiet under 
 his rock. 
 
 After that there was no trouble from ghosts ; 
 and about March, when the worst of the winter 
 was over, Thorgils set to work to build a new 
 ship out of the wreck of the old one, and such 
 timbers as they could collect off the shore. 
 There was any quantity of it. They set up their 
 stocks on a part of the beach which edged on to 
 the deep water, and having a fine store of tools, 
 
THE FIRST WINTER 89 
 
 there was very soon something to be seen worth 
 looking at. Their spirits rose; they began to 
 talk of voyaging again. Thorgils said little, but 
 worked like a dozen, saw to everything and kept 
 a firm hand on his thralls. He dared not look 
 far forward — still less look back. What he said 
 he did not always, in his heart, believe ; never- 
 theless he spoke hopefully to all of them about 
 the summer that was coming. 
 
 Yet the summer came, and the ship could not 
 be finished before it was half over. Their hands 
 were too few and the work too hard for that. 
 Thorgils dared not start without a great store 
 of provisions, and to get that all men must go 
 hunting or fishing, and the women must souse 
 and salt, or smoke and salt what the men 
 brought in. They were able to go far afield, for 
 the summers were hot, and most of the snow 
 melted. They got upon the track of the rein- 
 deer and did well; they trapped birds; seals, 
 too, they got, as well as quantities of fish. Thor- 
 gils made a conduit to bring water down from 
 the hills to their house. He laid it underground 
 in the hope that he might keep the frost out. 
 He had kept back some of their grain, and had 
 sowed it as soon as the weather opened. There 
 
90 THORGILS 
 
 was a good harvest from that, enough at least 
 to keep them through the next winter. He had 
 collected green-meat also, and having caught a 
 wild she-goat with two kids, kept her in milk for 
 the sake of Thorey and her baby. Thorey had 
 not been able to walk all the summer; he did 
 not believe in his heart that she would live 
 through another winter. 
 
 Now he had to break it to her, and to all of 
 them, that they must bide until next year. 
 Thorey said that she had known it, but Gudrun 
 desponded a great deal, and never picked up 
 heart after the cold weather set in. 
 
 She took ill in earnest about Christmas-time, 
 and nobody but Thorgils seemed to do her any 
 good. She lay in her bed, with her bright eyes 
 fixed upon him, listening to what he had to tell 
 her, and when he stopped, waiting for him to 
 go on again. When he talked hopefully of the 
 next summer, and said that he must find a hus- 
 band for her before it was too late, she said, 
 *^ It is too late. I shan't see another summer, 
 but if I had seen ten more I should never have 
 married.'' Thorgils said, ** You will fall in 
 love, my dear, and then you will sing another 
 song altogether." She said quietly, ** I fell in 
 
THE FIRST WINTER 91 
 
 love long ago, and have never fallen out of it.*' 
 Thorgils, who had no thought of what was in her 
 mind, asked her what had become of her choice : 
 ** And how did you come to leave him behind 
 you ? ' ' Gudrun said, ' ' I did not. He is here. ' ' 
 By the look she gave him then, he knew what 
 she meant, and turned the talk to other things — 
 but he felt very badly about it, and did not care 
 to tell Thorey, who was lying nearby, but had 
 been asleep at the time. 
 
 Gudrun died a few days later, and they buried 
 her just below the house, and put a cross over 
 her grave. Then Thorgils told Thorey what 
 she had said to him. She smiled rather sadly. 
 ** That was never hidden from me," she said. 
 ** Gudrun loved you ever since you took her in 
 at Treadholt after Sorle's slaughter. I saw it 
 as plainly as I see you now." ** She had no 
 reason," Thorgils said, and Thorey still smiled. 
 ** There is no reason in love ; but much pain very 
 often; and sometimes there is joy too. But 
 those who have the most pain love the better, 
 I believe." Then said Thorgils, '' T\niy, then, 
 Gudrun loved me better than you have done, 
 since she has had the most pain." Thorey had 
 tears in her eyes. ** Nay, my beloved, but I 
 
92 THORGILS 
 
 have had pain too — and now my grief is very 
 heavy. ' ' He asked her why, but she would not 
 tell him; and he had not the heart to press her, 
 because he knew. 
 
CHAPTER XI 
 
 THE HEAVIEST STROKE 
 
 HOWEVER, with the opening of the 
 spring weather Thorey seemed to get 
 better. She had given up nursing her 
 baby since they had plenty of goat's milk. Now 
 she was able to rise from her bed and be useful 
 about the house for short spells of time ; but her 
 weakness used to come over her like a flood of 
 water; she fainted often, and Thorgils urged 
 her to keep her bed yet awhile. 
 
 She went back to bed, and lay there patiently, 
 sleeping a good deal, but dreaming constantly. 
 She told Thorgils sometimes what she had been 
 dreaming about, and seemed to expect him to 
 interpret for her. One morning when he came 
 in to see how she was, he saw a great light in her 
 eyes. ** Sit down by me," she said, *^ and 111 
 tell you my dream. I thought that I stood at the 
 door of a white house, looking down a valley. 
 There was blue sky above me, and dew on the 
 
 93 
 
94 THOEGILS 
 
 grass. And I saw sheep feeding on the slopes 
 of the hills, and a shepherd lying on his cloak 
 spread out, watching them. And in the valley- 
 bottom where the river ran there were people — 
 men and maids, too ; and a game of ball was go- 
 ing on. They were kicking the ball backwards 
 and forwards across the river. Once it fell in ; 
 and there was shouting and laughing. Then a 
 young man plunged in and swam to get it. I 
 saw him shake the water out of his eyes as he 
 settled to his breaststroke. It was all so soft 
 and fair and happy — being still weather with a 
 promise of heat to come — that I tried to go to 
 sleep again, that I might dream it again. But 
 I couldn't do that, so waited for you to come 
 that you might tell me what it all meant.'' She 
 spoke eagerly, with colour high in her cheeks, 
 and made Thorgils unhappy; for he was sure 
 that she would not get better, or ever see such 
 pleasant valleys again. 
 
 But he said, ** That was a rare dream of 
 yours, and soon I hope we shall be ready to try 
 after a place of the sort. There are people of 
 our own country somewhere in this desert, and 
 they are waiting for us as the seasons pass over. 
 We had bad hap in driving on to this wilderness 
 
THE HEAVIEST STROKE 95 
 
 of rock and ice, and have never been able to 
 mend our fortunes yet.'' 
 
 ** To be sure/' said Thorey. '' We are not to 
 blame for our troubles, nor is anybody to blame. 
 But you don't tell me what you think about 
 my dream. Does it not foretell good for- 
 tune? " 
 
 Thorgils said, ** It looks like that. But you 
 and I would do wiselier to look upon it as a 
 vision of another world, such as we have been 
 taught to hold to, and your dream may be a fig- 
 ure of what reward you and holy women like 
 you are to receive from God and the Saviour of 
 men. There will be a house in a sweet valley 
 kept for you, and good friends to help you 
 there after your brave life and your troubles, 
 none of your deserving." 
 
 ** Ah," said Thorey, who was now crying 
 softly, '' get us all out of this horrible place if 
 you can. I am sore to be home again." 
 
 It was not the nature of the man to promise 
 more than he saw his way to winning. All he 
 had to say was that he did not know how that 
 was to be just yet. But he told her presently 
 that he hoped to launch the ship in a week or 
 little more, and that she would surely be fin- 
 
96 THOEGILS 
 
 ished before the bay was clear of ice. This was 
 in the early days of the spring. 
 
 He was as good as his word. The ship was 
 launched and rode in the deep water. They 
 made good speed with the rigging of her, and 
 expected to get the stores on board within a 
 month. Meantime Thorgils was much exercised 
 to know what sort of a course he ought to take 
 when he left the bay, and was always climbing 
 the hills about to spy out the bearing of the 
 land. He had discovered that islands — a clus- 
 ter of them — lay about half a day's sailing to 
 the S. S. W. There was one of these which ran 
 up into a cove, and he rather thought he should 
 try for an anchorage out there, and climb up 
 that hill for further discovery. He hadn't yet 
 been able to get a fair view Eastward, whither 
 he rather suspected Eric and his settlers were 
 gone. There was a way — or what looked like 
 a way — up a glacier to some high crags, north 
 of their settlement, which tempted him. He 
 made up his mind that he would try that before 
 he set sail. 
 
 Their way of life had for a long time run a 
 regular course. Every day the thralls, with 
 Thorarin the reeve, used to go out fishing in the 
 
THE HEAVIEST STROKE 97 
 
 boat. That was necessary for their daily liveli- 
 hood. Thorgils himself, with Thorlaf, Ead- 
 wine's son, and the brothers Starkad and Col, 
 when they were not hunting, were busy about 
 the house or the fields which they had made 
 round it. But just now all their time was taken 
 up with the ship. One of them always remained 
 near the house in case Thorey should want any- 
 thing. 
 
 Now there came a fine day, clear and still, 
 and Thorgils determined upon his exploration. 
 He told Thorey that he should not be long away. 
 She said that she was never happy without him, 
 but that he must do what he thought right. 
 ** You have never failed me ever since I have 
 known you,'' she told him — and he remembered 
 that afterwards. 
 
 The young men were wild to go with him, as 
 was natural enough, seeing the winter behind 
 them and a spell of hard work. Thorgils 
 thought that one at least of them should stay at 
 home ; but they clamoured and begged it of him, 
 and he gave way. The reeve should see the 
 thralls out to their fishing-ground, and himself 
 stay behind in the house. 
 
 That was settled, and they started early in 
 
98 THORGILS 
 
 the morning for the glacier. They had axes 
 with them as well as their weapons. Earth- 
 house-prey never left Thorgils' belt. 
 
 The climbing was slow work, and took longer 
 than they expected. It was fairly three in the 
 afternoon before they reached the crags and 
 got the look-out they had hoped for. Certainly, 
 a fine prospect; a spacious land of mountain 
 and valley, breaking into innumerable capes and 
 creeks, with the sea beyond sparkling and trem- 
 bling in the light. Looking South and South- 
 east, Thorgils was now sure that it would be 
 thereabouts he must expect to find Eric and the 
 Icelanders with him. There showed to be fair 
 shores there ; and one great firth he saw which 
 he thought must be Eric's creek. There was 
 enough pasture there, he judged, to feed half a 
 million sheep. The mountains sloped gently to- 
 wards the estuary, and were covered with 
 woods. That was a great country, and thither 
 he promised himself he should be sailing before 
 the weeks were many behind him. Out at sea it 
 was plain the ice-packs were breaking up. Come 
 a warm wind from the "West and there would be 
 a fair way. He felt very much cheered by all 
 that he saw, thinking to himself, he would have 
 
THE HEAVIEST STROKE 99 
 
 a good tale for Thorey when he was at home 
 again. She might be spared to find in that gra- 
 cious country the happy valley of her dream! 
 So he fondly promised himself. 
 
 But he found it was getting late in the day, 
 so gave the word for home. The weather also 
 had thickened ; he was afraid of being caught in 
 a snowstorm. Surely enough, before they were 
 half-way down, or a little more than that, the 
 wind got up and large flakes of snow began to 
 flit past them, tokens of what was to come. 
 
 Thorgils himself led, and was able to find the 
 path they had cut for themselves. They had to 
 step very carefully, and had roped themselves. 
 Slowly and painfully they descended the first 
 glacier, and made better way climbing the ridge 
 which took them to the second. When they were 
 atop of that they should have been able to find 
 Thorgils' Bay, for so they had called it, and 
 all the scene of their weary years. And so they 
 did, although the snow was coming thickly, and 
 the whole prospect was mufiled in it. One thing 
 Thorgils could not see, and that was the ship. 
 He strained his eyes through the dirty weather, 
 but in vain. He had no suspicion of anything 
 amiss, however, supposing that the reeve had 
 
100 THOEGILS 
 
 warped her into snugger quarters out of the 
 storm ; nevertheless he quickened his pace, while 
 at the bottom of his mind lay a grain of dis- 
 comfort which he could neither explain nor get 
 rid of. 
 
 It was drawing in towards night when they 
 came down to the level ground, and had the hall 
 in front of them. Most certainly the ship was 
 not there, and nobody could say where it was. 
 Thorlaf, who had noticed her absence some 
 time ago, ran on in front and went into the hall. 
 He did not come back. Thorgils walked quickly 
 to the door ; and as he reached it Thorlaf came 
 out to meet him. He said nothing, but his face 
 showed immediately that something was wrong. 
 He seemed unable to speak, and unwilling to 
 meet : it was as if he was afraid of Thorgils. 
 
 He for his part did not speak either. He 
 heard the child wailing, and pushed in. The 
 moment he was in the door he saw that some- 
 thing was very wrong. The chests had gone; 
 lockers were open and the blankets and other 
 things in them tumbled about. Starkad, who was 
 just behind him, said over his shoulder to Col, 
 ** A bad business here;" but Thorgils was now 
 in the hall and across the room to Thorey's bed. 
 
THE HEAVIEST STROKE .101 
 
 The child was crying, and he could see where 
 she lay. He looked at her. She was dead, with 
 her eyes and mouth open. The child was grop- 
 ing about to find her breast. Thorgils looked 
 long at her, and a great pain seemed to burn 
 inside him. 
 
 ^' Oh, Thorey," he said, *'oh, wife, anything 
 but this." Then he broke up, and fell on his 
 knees beside her and sobbed, that it was pity 
 to hear him. 
 
 But Thorlaf had seen something else, and 
 showed it to the two brothers. There was a 
 patch of blood upon the quilt. He turned that 
 back, and followed it through all her coverings 
 until they saw the place where she had been hurt. 
 The blood had stiffened there all round about, 
 but there was a wet place in the middle of the 
 wound. She had been stabbed under the left 
 arm. 
 
 They left Thorgils alone, and went to look 
 about for what might remain to them. All the 
 provisions had been taken, the stores which they 
 had been the better part of a year collecting; 
 nearly all the ship-building tools, two of the 
 goats, the ship, the boat, and all the tackle. They 
 supposed the old she-goat had only been left 
 
102 THORGILS 
 
 because the thieves had been hurried. Thorarin 
 the reeve had disappeared with the thralls. 
 Either they had forced him to go along, or else 
 he was killed and hidden somewhere. 
 
 In the face of calamity like this, with one con- 
 sent they returned to the hall to get the counte- 
 nance of Thorgils. They found the poor man 
 with his child in his arms, trying to warm and 
 quiet it. He was now himself again and gave 
 them directions what to do. One should make a 
 good fire, and one set water to boil. Dismayed 
 to find that he did not yet know the extent of 
 their losses. Col threw up his hands at the talk 
 of boiling water; but Thorgils quietly said, 
 '' They have left the little kettle. There it is 
 on the hearth. Thieves can't think of every- 
 thing.'' Then Starkad told him that the she- 
 goat was left, and Thorgils thanked God. * ^ Go 
 and draw me a horn of milk, my friend. Thor- 
 finn is hungry." 
 
 So were they all, God knew, but there was no 
 time to think of that ; and by some happy for- 
 tune before night they found the remains of a 
 side of reindeer which the thieves had over- 
 looked. They made a great fire and lay about 
 it, as close as they could get, for there was no 
 
THE HEAVIEST STROKE 103 
 
 bedding left except that which covered Thorey. 
 But Thorgils did not disturb her, and nobody 
 else dared. As for Thorgils himself, having fed 
 Thorfinn, he put him inside his coat and lay on 
 his elbow all night, watching over him. It was 
 a bad night for all of them, but for him the 
 worst he had ever known in his life, or was ever 
 likely to know;. 
 
CHAPTER XII 
 
 THE ISLANDS 
 
 HE was much changed by that dreadful 
 stroke. The spring was out of him 
 which had made him ever the first in 
 adventure ; but in one thing he was not changed 
 at all. All the grief he felt for Thorey he kept 
 closely to himself. The graves of the two foster 
 sisters lay side by side, a cross upon each. None 
 saw Thorgils beside them ; none knew whether 
 he prayed there or not, or shed tears, or allowed 
 his thoughts to turn backward to days of past 
 and done happiness. It is likely that he did not 
 seek out the graves ; he was not a man to mourn 
 over what was done ; but each of the three com- 
 panions left him out of near thirty who had 
 started out noticed how fiercely he attached 
 himself to his child Thorfinn. It looked as if all 
 his strong heart had fastened itself about that 
 frail plant. He never let him be out of his sight, 
 
 104 
 
THE ISLANDS 105 
 
 slept with him, washed and fed him himself. 
 They thought that if the boy should die during 
 the coming winter Thorgils would himself give 
 up his wish to live — and what would become of 
 them then? 
 
 It was plain that they must look for another 
 winter in the deserted bay. It would be three 
 years since they came into it, and for the whole 
 of that time no living soul had they seen except 
 each other. They were hard put to it to feed 
 themselves, and knowing that it would be 
 harder in the wintertime, they spent all their 
 time hunting ; for now that they had no boat it 
 was difficult to fish. They made themselves 
 lines and hooks out of odd tackling which they 
 found about ; with these they used to fish off the 
 rocks. But the nets were all gone, and what 
 little they caught with the lines was hardly re- 
 ward for the time spent on it. As for their 
 hunting, that was an inordinate weariness for 
 little gain. They made traps for small animals 
 — squirrels and such-like — went far afield after 
 reindeer, and, having made themselves arrows 
 after a fashion, shot a few birds. Thorgils 
 killed a bear with a spear early in the winter, 
 and that kept them for near two months. 
 
106 THORGILS 
 
 Out of the skin of that bear came their salva- 
 tion. They dressed it in its own grease, and 
 made of it a hide-boat on a framework of drift- 
 wood. The thieves had taken nearly all their 
 tools ; but they had a few augurs, and the axes 
 they had had with them on the day of disaster. 
 They were at it all the winter, working in the 
 dark by the light of the fire. Then when the 
 third spring came round, and the ice began to 
 break up again, Thorgils said that they 
 would go. 
 
 They spent the last night in the bay, singing 
 their hymns and saying their prayers before 
 they lay down to sleep. Early in the morning 
 Starkad went out to see to his squirrel-traps 
 and sea-lines and to fetch them in for the jour- 
 ney, and on his way out he turned to the graves 
 of his sister and foster sister. He saw a writ- 
 ing there, carved on a board, and read it : 
 
 Here Thorey sleeps, and here beside 
 Gudrun her sister lies asleep ; 
 They loved and lived as one, and died: 
 Vex them not, voyager, neither weep 
 Their lot. The Shepherd knows His sheep, 
 And in His fold their hearts abide. 
 
THE ISLANDS 107 
 
 He knew then that Thorgils had been out be- 
 fore him. 
 
 They made up their packages and loaded the 
 coracle with as much as they dared put in. 
 Then they dragged her down the shore and over 
 the pack-ice. The bay was still solid ice, but 
 outside in the open sea there were lanes of 
 water where they could work the oars. It was 
 fair weather and not much wind. Starkad and 
 Col rowed the boat, while Thorgils and Thorlaf 
 stood with poles ready to ward off the ice, which 
 was dangerous. More than once they had to 
 jump for it, and haul the boat out of the water. 
 But the further out to sea they reached the bet- 
 ter it became, and by mid-day there was little 
 danger from the ice, and they were able to hoist 
 a sail which they had made out of the bed-sheet 
 which had been left under Thorey. They sailed 
 South and by West, to the islands which they 
 had made out from the crag-top. Thorgils had 
 an idea that the thieves would have gone thither 
 as the nearest land, sooner than venture round 
 the coast. It was almost certain that they would 
 have made no long stay there; yet there was 
 always a chance that bad seamanship had losjb 
 
108 THORGILS 
 
 them their vessel. In any case there was less 
 trouble to be feared from the ice out in the 
 open sea; and he reckoned on finding seals 
 there, and sea-birds also. 
 
 In all of his f orecastings he turned out to be 
 right. They came safely ashore on one of the 
 islands, and built themselves a tent, using the 
 driftwood which they found in abundance. 
 They were lucky in finding a spring of water in 
 a hill; and were soon certified that sea-birds' 
 eggs would not fail them for a time. As for 
 seals, they were there like cattle on all hands, 
 resting on the shores, or out at sea on floes of 
 ice, or furrowing in the water like porpoises at 
 play. Thorgils blessed God that they had es- 
 caped so far, and come to a place where they 
 could not starve. 
 
 But Thorfinn had now to go without milk. It 
 is true that they had taken the she-goat, but she 
 was in no case to be milked, being but dry meat. 
 They boiled sea-mews' eggs for his first meal 
 and gave him one of them. He could talk a little 
 by now — ^he was nearing his second birthday. 
 He ate half of his egg, would take no more of it. 
 ** Courage, man," Thorgils said to him; ** have 
 another bite at it." '' No, no," Thorfinn said. 
 
THE ISLANDS 109 
 
 <« Why, what's the matter with the eggl '' 
 Starkad asked him. Thorfimi said, ** Father 
 won't eat his all, and I won't either." It was 
 true that Thorgils stinted himself of food, and 
 had for a long time when they were so short on 
 the mainland. Now he said, '' Go along with 
 you. I'll have another if you will." Then 
 Thorfinn ate the rest of his egg. 
 
 They stayed where they were till about mid- 
 summer, with plenty to do to keep themselves 
 provisioned, and to explore the islands round 
 about. They were numerous, but so far as they 
 could ascertain at present, not inhabited. Yet 
 the wreckage they found showed them that men 
 had been here; whether dead or alive, who 
 knows? Among other things, useful or not, 
 they found an oar with runes cut upon it to this 
 effect : — • 
 
 At home, head- washing, harbours Slug; 
 While on the cold sea here I tug: 
 Blisters and back-ache — there's my toll 
 For Slug-at-home's soap-sudded poll. 
 
 Thorgils was very excited over this find. 
 They could not make out why. He told them 
 
110 THORGILS 
 
 presently that he believed Thorarin the reeve 
 had cut the runes. ** They are in his vein,'^ he 
 said. ** He was thinking of his brother Geir, 
 who used to make his wife wash his head for him 
 once a week. ' ' They thought that fanciful, and 
 so it may have been — yet it did happen that they 
 were to find Thorarin upon one of these 
 islands. 
 
 But before they could do that they had a ter- 
 rible hour to get through. It came about, when 
 they were exploring one of the islands, that 
 they found it a good fishing-ground and deter- 
 mined to stay the night there. The weather was 
 then warm and settled. They built themselves 
 a tent, made a fire, and broiled some fish for a 
 supper. While they were busy about it. Col, 
 who had been out to fetch in a big stone to heat, 
 came in again looking rather blank. Thorlaf 
 asked him what had hurt him, but Col put his 
 finger to his lips, frowning. That gave Thorlaf 
 a hint that Thorgils was not to be worried, and 
 also it alarmed him. He took the opportunity 
 to slip out — sure enough, their boat was gone. 
 Desperate work that. Having made sure that 
 it was nowhere in sight, he went back to the tent, 
 and kept his own counsel. Thorgils had no 
 
THE ISLANDS 111 
 
 doubts, made his meal and disposed himself to 
 sleep as calmly as he generally did. But in the 
 morning, according to his custom, he was the 
 first to wake, and the first to go out. He missed 
 the boat immediately, and stood looking over 
 the sea for a long time. If he thought, he did 
 not know it ; and yet at the back of his mind he 
 must have known what there was to be done. 
 
 Presently he walked slowly back to the tent, 
 and saw Col waiting for him. They looked at 
 each other without speaking. 
 
 Col spoke first: ** It is gone." Thorgils 
 echoed him: '' Yes, it is gone.'' 
 
 Then Col said, '' That will be the death of 
 us.'V *^Well,'' said Thorgils, ''1 think it 
 likely. ' ' Then there was silence between them. 
 
 Presently Thorgils spoke again, and his voice 
 was altered so much that one could hardly know 
 him. ** We can't keep the boy alive," he said. 
 *^ One of you must kill him, for I cannot." 
 
 ** Nay, nay," said Col, *' there's no need of 
 that yet." 
 
 '' Yes," said Thorgils, ** but there is. We 
 can't keep alive here long. There's no water. 
 To see him suffer thirst and die of it is not pos- 
 sible. You must do as I tell you, and come back 
 
112 THOEGILS 
 
 to me here when it is done. ' ' He would not look 
 at Thorfinn when they took him away. 
 
 The three young men went a little way off, 
 Starkad carrying the child on his shoulder. 
 Then they sent him to play by the sea, and 
 talked about what they should do. Thorlaf said 
 that nothing would make him do it, but the 
 other two must settle for themselves. Col and 
 Starkad argued about it, Col saying that Thor- 
 gils had been right. *^ "We must perish here for 
 want of water, '^ he said, ** and it is better to die 
 quickly of smothering than slowly of thirst and 
 torment. Besides his own there would be 
 frenzy and despair for Thorgils and for us.'' 
 
 But Starkad said that all was not at an end 
 for another day and a night. * ^ If our strength 
 held us we might swim from this island to an- 
 other, where water might be. And so indeed 
 from island to island. I say that Thorgils is 
 already repenting of this bidding of his, and I 
 tell you that if we were to do it — and which of 
 us will do it? — Thorgils will feel it so badly that 
 he may never get over it. He has had more 
 troubles than most men can bear, but they were 
 in a manner not of his own doing. No man can 
 fight with such fate as his. But this would be 
 
THE ISLANDS 113 
 
 his work — and suppose, when it was done, we 
 found some means of escape! " 
 
 Col had no answer ready, but looked over at 
 his brother. ** Then you won^t do it? " 
 
 ^^ No," said Starkad, ** I'll never do such a 
 thing as that.'' 
 
 << Why, then," said Col, *' we are all of one 
 mind, for whoever does it, it won't be me." 
 
 They went back to the hut, but left Thorfinn 
 outside. Thorgils was sitting in there. He 
 looked at them terribly. * * Is it done ? ' ' 
 
 They told him. No. He frowned, and stared 
 about, and then broke into tears. In the midst 
 of his tears he came to them and thanked them. 
 ** This it is to have good men to deal with, that 
 they will save a man from his own wickedness. 
 I am ashamed of my despair, for I ought to 
 have had faith in God, and lost it. If you had 
 done my bidding and after that we had found a 
 way to escape alive, I should never have been 
 able to hold up my head. But my troubles 
 are too much for me just now, and I suffer 
 greatly. ' ' 
 
 It seemed like an answer to honesty that there 
 was heavy rain that day. It set in in the after- 
 noon and rained most of the night. They used 
 
114 THOEGILS 
 
 their tent to convoy the water into a hole in the 
 rocks, and saw their way to another twenty- 
 four hours of life. But before those were spent 
 they were to have their boat again. 
 
CHAPTER XIII 
 
 THE BOAT COMES BACK 
 
 EARLY in the morning it was, earlier than 
 Thorgils ' hour for getting out of his bed 
 — he was awoken by a shouting; he heard 
 voices of men, calling in a tongue which he had 
 never heard before. He jumped up and out of 
 the tent. There, but a little way out from the 
 shore, was his coracle, with two creatures in it, 
 men or women, he knew not which. When they 
 saw him they made signs with their arms and 
 began to pull in shore ; and now he saw that they 
 had a burden with them, a man alive or dead 
 who lay still with his head turned sideways, 
 limply hanging, as if he had no power in his 
 neck. He was rolled up in a blanket ; and Thor- 
 gils knew the blanket before he knew the man. 
 It was his own, had been upon a bed in the hall 
 at Thorgils Bay. ^* Here is one of Thorey's 
 slayers come into my hands," he said to him- 
 self, and a dreadful cheer rose up in his heart. 
 By now the boat was brought in ; the two women 
 
 115 
 
116 THORGILS 
 
 who were dressed like men and had their legs 
 swathed in skins haled it ashore; then stood 
 with beaming broad faces, waiting for Thorgils. 
 They had no fear of him at all, but talked very- 
 fast and both together, pointing to one of the 
 distant islands, and enacting by gesture their 
 discovery of the boat, the sick man at home, the 
 theft of the boat, and the passaging of the sick 
 man. Thorgils had no trouble in making out the 
 whole tale. He understood that they must have 
 seen the landing of his party from a distance ; 
 but how they reached him without a boat, or 
 how they intended to get back again, was at 
 present beyond his comprehension. However, 
 that only puzzled him afterwards ; just now he 
 was taken up with the passenger. That was 
 Thorarin the reeve, with a lead-coloured face 
 and the heavy solemn eyes of a man in the pres- 
 ence of death. There, he thought, helpless be- 
 fore him and entirely in his power lay one of his 
 wife's murderers, one of the wretches who, for 
 all they knew, had left their master and his 
 family to a certain and miserable death. Even 
 as he thought it, he felt pity for the stricken 
 man. Whatever he was, had done or had been 
 enforced to do, he must be tended now. He 
 
THE BOAT COMES BACK 117 
 
 shouted for Thorlaf, who with Col came push- 
 ing out of the tent. They lifted the reeve and 
 carried him in. 
 
 Thorarin became conscious after an anxious 
 time of watching, and made signs that he was 
 thirsty. They brought him water in the kettle 
 and wet his lips and tongue. After that he 
 drank from the spout, and drank eagerly as if 
 he had been parched with drouth. He showed 
 them grateful eyes; but Thorgils, seeing him 
 now somewhat revived, would have none of his 
 gratitude, and bent his brows upon him. The 
 others all sat or stood about him, and he seemed 
 to know what was expected of him, for he made 
 more than one effort to begin ; and they saw the 
 sweat beading on his temples with the exertion. 
 
 Presently he came to himself again and said a 
 few words. ** Tied up," they heard him say, 
 '' hand and foot." That told them all that they 
 wanted to know. Thorgils knew a great relief — 
 of thralls you may expect thralls' deeds ; but he 
 had used this man as his friend. 
 
 Afterwards he told them his story. He said 
 that he could not get the men off in the boat for 
 a long time after the climbing-party had 
 started. They hung about and made excuses. 
 
118 .THORGILS 
 
 Then, when he had them all down at the shore 
 and half the gear bestowed, Snae-Coll, who 
 seemed to be ringleader, folded his arms and 
 said that he did not intend to go fishing that 
 day. The rest stood round in a ring, murmur- 
 ing, all looking at him (Thorarin). There was 
 a wrangle, high words — * * and it may be that I 
 spoke more freely than I should '' — then, sud- 
 denly, Snae-Coll sprang at him and threw him 
 down. They tied him up like a bale of netting 
 and left him on the shore. They themselves all 
 went up to the house in a body. After hanging 
 about the door, all talking vehemently, he saw 
 Snae-Coll go in alone. He waited in terror for 
 what he knew must be. Then he heard a cry, 
 and then Snae-Coll must have come to the door ; 
 for all the others went in. 
 
 They were a good time inside the house, but 
 presently they began to come out. Every man 
 had a burden — they had gutted the house ; and 
 everything was piled in the boat. When she 
 was full two of them rowed off to the ship. So 
 it went on until a wind got up, and they thought 
 it time to be otf. They took Thorarin himself 
 in the last load, hauled up the anchor, hoisted 
 sail and stood out for the open sea. Not until 
 
THE BOAT COMES BACK 119 
 
 they were out of tlie bay did they cut his bonds. 
 Then Snae-Coll, who was captain of them all, 
 spoke to him freely. He said that for the better 
 part of a year — ever since the ship-building be- 
 gan — they had been talking among themselves 
 of a stroke for their freedom. * * We thought that 
 death must be the end of it, and that it was 
 better to die free than bond. ' ' The mutiny had 
 been devised suddenly, for they had not seen 
 their way before they heard that all the masters 
 were going together to the top of the crags. 
 ** Now," said Snae-Coll, ** we give you your 
 choice. Either you shall serve with us for our 
 common safety, or we presently heave you over- 
 board. "Which do you choose 1 ' ' Thorarin con- 
 fessed that he had agreed to work with them, 
 having a lingering hope in his head that if he 
 could contrive to tip Snae-Coll into the sea he 
 might cow the others, 'bout ship, and rejoin his 
 masters. Thorgils, listening with his chin in 
 his hand, nodded his head ; but said nothing. 
 
 They made the islands, Thorarin said, and 
 stayed there for the winter. They found one at 
 least of them inhabited, and got on pretty well 
 with the natives, each taking a girl for a wife. 
 They made these girls work for them, but did 
 
120 THORGILS 
 
 nothing themselves. Then, as soon as the 
 weather mended and the spring of the year set 
 in, they made np their minds to leave the is- 
 lands. He could not find out whither they in- 
 tended to go, nor did he know what suspicion 
 may have brought it about that they settled to 
 leave him behind. That was what they did, at 
 all events. He saw them weigh anchor and sail 
 away. They went South at first, but altered 
 their course afterwards, and sailed East before 
 a Westerly wind. 
 
 He lived with the natives of the island and 
 they had been good to him ; but he had long been 
 ailing, and got worse and worse. Then he un- 
 derstood from the gestures of the women who 
 looked after him that they had seen something 
 or somebody out at sea. They left him and were 
 away all day ; and when they came back it was 
 to wrap him in his blanket and carry him down 
 to the coracle. He had a thought in his head 
 that he should see something good before he 
 died, but knew he was not long for this world. 
 '' You will bury me here, I daresay," he said; 
 ** but I would ask of you, master, to believe 
 what I am telling you, and to carry a kind 
 thought of me back home with you. For you 
 
THE BOAT COMES BACK 121 
 
 will reach home again, I am very sure." That 
 was all he seemed able to say; for he shut his 
 eyes, and breathed short and sharp through his 
 nose. 
 
 Thorgils said, * * God knows how far you have 
 done right or wrong. I cannot think that you 
 would be lying just now, and you at the gateway 
 of death. However it may be, you shall die in 
 peace, and have the burial of a Christian." He 
 opened his eyes once and looked at Thorgils, 
 who knew then that he had told no lies. After 
 that he lay quite still for a longish time, and 
 presently they found that he was dead. 
 
 They buried him in a hurry, took to their 
 boat, and made haste to the island where all 
 their stores were. Thorgils said that they 
 would not stay there much longer, but would 
 risk a journey to the mainland. There was full 
 half the summer left. 
 
CHAPTER XIV 
 
 A WELCOME FEOM THE MAINLAND 
 
 WITH such stores of food and water as 
 they could compass in the coracle, 
 they rowed away from the islands on 
 the first ebb. It was hot ; a still day ; the cliffs 
 and mountains of Greenland could be seen 
 through the brown haze, rising into white peaks 
 above it, themselves looking like the clouds. 
 Thorgils kept a North-easterly course, making 
 out that he might be within hail of the land in 
 from ten to twelve hours. A little wind got up 
 about an hour before noon; they hoisted their 
 sail and made better speed. 
 
 Their hearts were now high with hope, and 
 even Thorgils began to be easier in his mind. 
 He told them a dream he had had last night. 
 '' 1 was at home at Treadholt,'' he said, '' and 
 five candles were burning on the floor by my 
 knee; and there was a thief in the biggest of 
 them. Then presently a woman came in at the 
 door and stood there looking at me; who then 
 
 123 
 
WELCOME FROM THE MAINLAND 123 
 
 came down the hall quickly, and snuffed the 
 candle that had a thief in it with her fingers. 
 * A fine dripping mess you suffer here,' she 
 said, and then, ^ Do you come into the garth 
 with me and answer for that theft shown in the 
 candle. You have taken away my eggs,' she 
 said, * and eaten them — and what I am to do I 
 can't tell.' " ** Yes," said Thorfinn, who had 
 been listening to all this; ^^ and then she said 
 that her children had taken away our boat." 
 << Why," said Thorgils, ** what's the meaning 
 of this? Did you see the woman too, my lad? " 
 Thorgils nodded. ** Yes, yes, I saw her. She 
 showed her legs like a man, and she was so big 
 round." He stretched his arms out to make a 
 hoop. ** Now," said Thorlaf, ** you shall hear 
 my dream. I was at home with you, and we 
 were sitting at board. Thorny came in with a 
 trencher on which were blocks of cheese. She 
 went along the table dealing out the cheese, and 
 when she came to me, she stayed awhile, picking 
 over what was left, and then she gave me a piece 
 with all the rind pared away. ' There's for 
 you,' she said. It was a good cheese too, for I 
 dreamed that I ate it." Thorgils said, " That's 
 a lucky dream of yours. I read from it that we 
 
124 THORGILS 
 
 shall go home again, and that you and Thorny 
 will make a match of it. ' ' * * I read it, ' ^ Starkad 
 said, * * that we have got over the worst of our 
 luck, and are now come down to the meaty part 
 of it.'' 
 
 The luck of the day held, at any rate; for 
 they were near enough now to the land to see 
 the waves breaking on the cliffs. They made 
 out Cape Farewell, thrusting out a flat green 
 neb far into the sea, and kept that upon their 
 lee. Thorgils intended to shelter in the firth 
 which he had seen from the mountain-top, which 
 lay as he thought just North of the Cape, and 
 which, as he made out, was where Eric the Red 
 had settled himself. He and his men were now 
 very tired ; but the tide served them, and though 
 the wind had dropped there was no sea to speak 
 of. Late at night they entered a great arm of 
 the ocean between shelving shores covered with 
 wood, and on the northern shore they stayed 
 them, and made a tent for the night. They were 
 lucky enough to find a spring of fresh water 
 within reach. 
 
 Next morning they re-embarked, and pulled 
 up the firth. They rowed until well into the af- 
 ternoon, and began to see signs of habitancy. 
 
WELCOME FROM THE MAINLAND 125 
 
 ^* We are come among men again, God be 
 thanked,'' Thorgils said. They saw wood, cut 
 and corded; they saw a boat on the shore; pres- 
 ently they saw a boat-house built under the 
 shelter of a spit of land, and round the point of 
 that a ship, riding at anchor; and then a home- 
 stead. 
 
 It brought the tears into Thorgils ' eyes to see 
 so fair a sight as this : a timber house of broad 
 eaves, smoke from a chimney in the midst of it, 
 fields of ripe grain, a man reaping barley with 
 a hook. In the yard of the house there was a 
 girl hanging clothes on a line. A prick-eared 
 dog came racing and barking down to the edge 
 of the water, sat up there, high on his haunches, 
 and watched them. ' ' We are saved alive from 
 the desolation," said Thorgils; and they pulled 
 into the shore. 
 
 The reaper now came down to meet them. He 
 and the voyagers stood at first looking at each 
 other ; then Thorgils said, * ' Give you hail, mas- 
 ter,'' and the man answered in his own tongue. 
 There was no need to ask whence they were 
 come, for it was evident upon them. 
 
 Heriolf was this settler 's name ; he was a Nor- 
 wegian, and a good soul. He took them all up 
 
126 THORGILS 
 
 to his little house; his wife and girls came out 
 to greet them ; very soon they were sitting at a 
 board, and a bowl of milk in front of Thorfinn, 
 not at all used to such food. There was much 
 to say on both sides ; but first of all they learned 
 that Eric's settlement was not in this firth at 
 all, but two days' sail northward of it. Heriolf 
 had belonged there, but had got into trouble, 
 and was now an outlaw. How was that? Well, 
 he had killed a man for good cause — so he said 
 — and had not been able to clear himself. He 
 was well enough here, where he had been for 
 two years now. 
 
 ** But I would go back if I could," he said. 
 i i There are very few here yet, good land though 
 it be ; and what men come are mostly here for 
 the same reason as mine. Now a man may 
 settle with himself whether or not he had cause 
 to kill another man, but for all that he may not 
 judge the case of others; nor need he desire 
 the company of manslayers for the rest of his 
 life. If I could inlaw myself again I would 
 leave this place to-morrow." Thorgils said 
 that they might see about that by-and-by; and 
 then, having told something of his adventures 
 and misfortunes, asked whether Heriolf had 
 
WELCOME FROM THE MAINLAND 127 
 
 seen anything of his ship and the robbers on 
 board her. Heriolf described a ship which had 
 come in the summer before, but had not come 
 ashore. So far as he knew there had been ten 
 on board of her, but they said that they had lost 
 some of their company in a gale. He described 
 the master of the vessel in such a way that they 
 thought it must be Snae-Coll himself. They 
 had stayed a week and provisioned their ship, 
 said Heriolf, and then had turned about and 
 gone out to sea again. He had told them where 
 the great settlement was. '* You'll find them 
 there, I expect.'* Thorgils said that there were 
 accounts to be regulated with these men; and 
 he thought that he should do his best to find 
 Eric's firth before the summer was ended. 
 
 However, what with weariness of the sea and 
 the hospitality of Heriolf and his family, and 
 the fondness there grew up to be between the 
 women and Thorfinn, they spent the winter at 
 the homestead, and indeed the following spring 
 and summer. Esteem grew between Thorgils 
 and Heriolf, and a firm friendship. But after 
 the next year's harvest Thorgils said that he 
 must certainly be off. 
 
 Heriolf offered him his ship and all the stores 
 
128 THOEGILS 
 
 he would need, and Thorgils said that he 
 couldn't refuse such a chance. ** But how shall 
 I repay you, my friend ? ' ' * * As for that, ' ' said 
 Heriolf, ** you shall send me the price of her 
 when you can ; but there is a thing dearer to me 
 than the money. If you can arrange for my re- 
 turn to the settlement with Eric the Red, you 
 will repay me the value of five such ships as 
 mine." ^* I'll do that,'' said Thorgils. '^ Eric 
 and I are long acquaintances." ^^ You won't 
 find him he man he used to be," Heriolf told 
 him. *^ He is something of a king in the set- 
 tlement, and fond of his own way. But," he 
 went on, *' I shall have good luck from you, I 
 know. You yourself, if I know anything of men, 
 have a kind of greatness in you. You bear both 
 fortunes equally well." Then, as the tale says, 
 they blessed each other, and Thorgils sailed 
 away out of the firth. 
 
CHAPTER XV 
 
 THEY FIND EKIO THE EED 
 
 THEY came to the mouth of Eric's firth in 
 October, just when winter had begun, 
 and sailed up into the land until they met 
 with signs of habitancy, which was a good 
 twelve hours' sailing. There was good land on 
 either side the firth, but not so good, Thorgils 
 judged, as that which they had left. The moun- 
 tains were higher, and the shores narrower; 
 they saw great glaciers glittering in the sun 
 which at midwinter would bring the ice hum- 
 mocks down to the water's edge. Notwith- 
 standing, it was a fine country, and the snow not 
 yet thick upon it. 
 
 They came to the shipping, and a quay, 
 berthed their ship, and prepared to go ashore. 
 But before they were ready they saw another 
 ship coming in behind them. She had the same 
 wind, and was making for the same mooring- 
 place. Thorgils knew her rig for a ship from 
 home. ** Good tidings! " he said, and sent off 
 
 129 
 
130 THORGILS 
 
 Thorlaf and Col to meet her. They boarded the 
 merchantman, on whose after-deck there sat a 
 broad-shouldered man in red. Directly he saw 
 them come on board he was up and came to meet 
 them. '' Hail! '^ he said, '' and who may you 
 heV^ They told him their names, and in whose 
 company they were. ** Why,'' said the man, 
 ** this is fine news. I am Thorstan White, and 
 am just come from your country. Is Thorgils 
 aboard your vessel? " They said. Yes. '' Then 
 let me go and see him." 
 
 There was a good greeting between them, 
 much to hear and learn. Thorstan said that he 
 had been in Norway, expecting Thorlaf to come 
 back ; but when there was no sign of him he be- 
 came uneasy and fitted out a ship with merchan- 
 dise and sailed over to Iceland. He went up to 
 Treadholt and found all well there. ^* Your 
 brother Haering has all in hand, and holds his 
 own well with Asgrim and his friends. He was 
 uneasy about you, having heard nothing for 
 four winters.'' '' Is that all it is? " Thorgils 
 said, ''I had thought it had been twenty." 
 Then he asked about Thorny. She was mar- 
 ried, it seems, to a man called Bearne of the 
 Pit, Thorstan Gode's son— this Thorstan Gode 
 
THEY FIND ERIC THE RED 131 
 
 being a new-comer. Thorgils said little about it, 
 but was not greatly pleased with the news. ** I 
 could have found her a better husband/' was 
 all that he had to say. 
 
 But nothing could have been better than this 
 meeting with Thorstan White. * * I am lucky to 
 have fallen in with you so soon/' he said. 
 ** Now you are to make what use you will of 
 me, of me and my gear. It is all at your serv- 
 ice, as much as at my own. I tell you so fairly 
 before these lads, and will never go back on my 
 word." 
 
 Thorgils was touched. *' I had forgotten, to 
 my shame, what good friends I had. But it is 
 true that we have known dark days. ' ' Thorstan 
 asked him, What was the worst of all that he 
 had felt? and for a time got no answer; but 
 presently Thorgils told him. ** To see that 
 hut upon the wild shore standing still by itself, 
 and to fear misfortune within it — that was bad. 
 But nothing was worse than this, to have taken 
 a beautiful girl from her foster mother, strong 
 and fresh in her youth, and to see her lying dead 
 in her cold bed, wasted and made old by misery 
 before her time — that, Thorstan, made an old 
 man of me ; and I doubt I shall get over that. 
 
132 THOEGILS 
 
 Never yet have I forgotten the sight of her 
 wide-open eyes, which had seen terror, and 
 should see nothing else; and that child there 
 groping upon her for the means of life/' ** It 
 was bad,'' said Thorstan Wliite, ** yet you are 
 alive, and the boy is alive." *' I have often 
 wished he was not," said Thorgils, but told 
 nothing of how near Thorfinn had been to death 
 since then. 
 
 They stayed for the night where they were, 
 and in the morning weighed anchor and rowed 
 the ships further up the firth ; for Eric did not 
 live by that haven, but in another, where he had 
 a large settlement, and lived in a fine stone 
 house, like an Earl. The two ships went up to- 
 gether, and found Eric's haven, and a town 
 built there. Then they unloaded the merchan- 
 dise, and stored it, and went into the market 
 to see the inhabitants. They found numbers of 
 acquaintances, who gave Thorgils a good greet- 
 ing. News of him soon reached Eric the Red, 
 sitting in his hall and hearing lawsuits. * * Bid 
 him come to me," said the great man, and went 
 on with his lawsuits. Thorgils, who was both 
 busy and interested, received the message, but 
 didn't answer it other than by saying, **I will 
 
THEY FIND ERIC THE RED 133 
 
 see him by-and-by.^' It is thought that Eric 
 was offended, but it may be that Thorgils him- 
 self was so. The fact is that the two men, who 
 had been four years, since the summons, in com- 
 ing together, did not hit it off with each other 
 when they met. 
 
 Outwardly there was some show of cordiality. 
 Thorgils went into the stone house when Eric 
 and some of his friends were sitting there, wait- 
 ing for supper. All men stood up to meet him, 
 except Eric himself. He called out, ** Hail to 
 you, traveller," before he drank. Thorgils, 
 whose leanness made him appear both older and 
 taller than he really was, walked up to the high 
 seat, looking neither to right nor left of him. 
 When he came to where Eric was sitting he 
 greeted him well. * ^ You have taken your time, 
 neighbour," says Eric. ** It has taken me more 
 than time," said Thorgils. ^' Meat off your 
 bones, my friend," says Eric, ** and company 
 to boot. ' ' Thorgils said nothing more, but when 
 they sat to supper Eric gave him the next seat 
 to himself ; Thorstan White sat next, then Thor- 
 laf , Col, and Starkad. They made merry, and 
 most of them talked at once ; but Thorgils, who 
 was never much of a talker, said little. No 
 
134 ' THORGILS 
 
 doubt he felt that he had come a long journey 
 for very little ; and no doubt his mind ran upon 
 the two graves side by side in the desert bay. 
 
 But he told Eric of the misfortunes which had 
 befallen him, and got some news which he 
 wanted. Eric said, *^ Those rascals of yours 
 are in this country. I have heard tell of them, 
 though they weren't so hardy as to come here. 
 Their ship came in last fall; they sent a man 
 ashore for victual and drink, chiefly drink. 
 They said that they were from Iceland, but had 
 lost their bearings in a storm, been driven on to 
 the Seal Islands, held there all the summer. 
 The master of the vessel had died out there, 
 they said, and several more of the company. 
 They sold two girls in the market, and were off 
 before I could come at them to ask for news of 
 you. They went up the firth — and took up some 
 land in settlement, I believe. It would be worth 
 your while to go up there one of these days. 
 They may be the very men. " * * They may be, ' ' 
 said Thorgils — ^but seemed to take no great in- 
 terest in them. 
 
 Thorgils built himself a house against the 
 winter, and took himself into it with Thorfinn, 
 and the three young men, who would not leave 
 
THEY FIND ERIC THE RED 135 
 
 him. Starkad married a daughter of Thorstan 
 "White called Bergthora. She kept house for the 
 five of them. They did not see much of Eric 
 the Red, who nevertheless was always urging 
 Thorgils to take up land and settle there. Thor- 
 gils said that there was no hurry about that. 
 The land would not run away; whereas he 
 might. Anyhow, he said, he would look about 
 him ; and if he saw anything which tempted him, 
 they could talk about it afterwards. ** There's 
 no man I would sooner have on my land than 
 yourself,'' Eric said, and made Thorgils raise 
 one of his eyebrows. He didn't see the use of 
 saying anything; but his thought was, that no 
 land which he took would be Eric's land. It 
 would be Thorgils' land, according to his 
 notion. 
 
 The house he had built for himself stood out- 
 side the town, towards the mountains. They 
 began to rise about six hours' journey away. 
 That winter, as it happened, much damage was 
 done to flocks by a white bear, which had come 
 down the glacier and lay about in the daytime. 
 No man could find him, and a price was set upon 
 his carcass, which was levied on all the settlers. 
 He was out there all the winter, and the damage 
 
136 THORGILS 
 
 done was serious. It was getting well on to- 
 wards the spring, though the snow was still 
 heavily on the land, when Thorstan White and 
 a number of the townspeople were up at Thor- 
 gils ' house. A ship had come in, and the chap- 
 men had stored their goods in the bower up 
 there. One morning when they were all in the 
 store-house, cheapening the merchandise, Thor- 
 finn, who had been running to and fro between 
 house and bower, peered into the place and 
 called, *^ Father, father!" 
 
 Thorgils looked up from his affair. *' What 
 now, my son? " 
 
 ** Oh, father," said Thorfinn, ** there's such 
 a great dog out here in the garth. You never 
 saw. He's as fat as fat, and yellow all over — 
 and no tail to him." 
 
 Thorgils had no suspicions. *' Never you 
 mind it, lad," he said ; *' but you had better stop 
 in here. Don 't go out, but leave the dog alone. ' ' 
 
 He went on with his reckoning ; but presently 
 he heard a cry from outside. 
 
 '* Oh, oh — ^he's taking me away! " 
 
 They all sprang round, and in a flash Thor- 
 gils knew what the dog must be. He drew 
 Earth-house-prey — which had never left him 
 
THEY FIND ERIC THE RED 137 
 
 yet — and ran out of the bower. They all made 
 way for him. Then he saw the great fiat-headed 
 beast, squatting on his hams in the snow, and 
 Thorfinn like a girPs doll in his black mouth. 
 He was wagging his fond head about, and the 
 child looked to be dead. 
 
 Thorgils turned sick with fear, and then his 
 anger rose in him like a tide of hot water. He 
 was close upon them in a moment and hewed at 
 the bear with all his might. He hit him on the 
 flat of his skull between the ears — and split it 
 open. The huge creature fell in a huddle of fur 
 and meat, and Thorfinn dropped out of his 
 mouth. He was insensible, but had no bones 
 broken, and no hurt to speak of beyond some 
 bruises. Thorgils, who hardly knew what he 
 had done, carried the child into the house and 
 stayed with him until he had recovered himself ; 
 but all the others gathered about the bear, and 
 one of them pelted off to spread the news in the 
 town. 
 
 There was high excitement over it, and Thor- 
 gils ' fame grew beyond belief. That same day 
 a number of the people about came up with their 
 share of the bear-money. They told the news to 
 Eric the Red, who showed himself true to his 
 
138 THORGILS 
 
 name over it. At first he was quite put out. 
 ** Well, well — and what is it to me? I never 
 supposed the man was in his dotage. ' ' But he 
 sent some of his people down to have the beast 
 cut up. Thorgils had the skin and the teeth, as 
 his due. Later on Eric seemed to make little of 
 the affair, saying that a woman would have 
 done as much as that in defence of her child. 
 Thorstan White then said, ** Yes, and have 
 been mauled for her pains. It takes a man and 
 a sword to split a bear's skull in two.*' Eric 
 nodded, looking as if he was thinking of some- 
 thing more important. Following his lead, 
 many of those about him made light of Thorgils 
 and his renown ; others took the other side, and 
 the talk grew high. The one who said least 
 about it was Thorgils himself ; but it is probable 
 that he knew everything that was debated, and 
 certain that he was aware of the coolness grow- 
 ing between Eric and himself. As often hap- 
 pens, a growing coolness is apt to break sud- 
 denly into a flame of heat. So it did now. 
 
CHAPTER XVI 
 
 COL INVOLVED AGAIN 
 
 ERIC the Red declared that he was sick 
 and tired of the bear and Thorgils' 
 glory; but in spite of that men talked 
 round about it, having little else to do before 
 the spring weather broke up the ice in the firth. 
 At such times of year as this, between the stern 
 winter and the grace of the warm rain, men 
 hang about the hall, drinking more than they 
 need, and talking louder than they ought. Col, 
 Thorlaf, and Starkad always kept together; 
 they had a strong following among the sons and 
 friends of Thorstan White. On the other side 
 were Eric's followers and servants. They were 
 fond of matching one champion against another 
 — all tongue-work — and weren't too particular 
 what they said. So it was that Thorgils was set 
 up against Eric and the tales climbed as high as 
 the church-steeple. A man called Hall, a serv- 
 ant of Eric's, grew very bitter over it, and 
 
 139 
 
140 THORGILS 
 
 scoffed the pretensions of Thorgils. ** Wliat 
 does it amount to, when alPs said I That he has 
 been shipwrecked, and lost his wife, lost his 
 ship, lost his thralls, and come in here with the 
 clothes he stands up in not his own. And you 
 set a man like that against Eric the Eed, who 
 has harried in England as far as Dovercourt, 
 and is feared half over Scotland and in all the 
 Isles ! What has your man done but kill a bear 
 to save a baby? That is a woman's business — 
 and to see him with that child, upon my soul, 
 you would hardly know whether he is man or 
 woman/' This he said in a blusterous voice, 
 rather thick with beer and anger. Col grew 
 very red, and showed him hot eyes. '* You lie, 
 and know that you are a liar," he said. ** Now 
 repeat your lie." Hall stared at him, and grew 
 red in turn. ** That I will," he said — and did 
 repeat that Thorgils was like an old woman. It 
 was his last word, for Col, who had been lean- 
 ing on a spear as he stood by the open door, now 
 drove it through Hall's neck and killed him on 
 the spot. 
 
 There was a great uproar, and men took to 
 their weapons, and parted off into sides. In 
 
COL INVOLVED AGAIN 141 
 
 the middle of it Eric the Red came in, saw the 
 body of Hall lying in a pool of blood, and asked 
 who had dared to do this. Col avowed his deed. 
 Then Eric was in a great rage. *' Take that 
 fellow,'* he said to his people, '^ and bind him." 
 The Thorgils party all stood about Col, pro- 
 tecting him. In the midst of the bustle and 
 preparation for battle Thorgils walked into the 
 hall. He was very quiet ; as he always was in 
 these days. ** You seem to be busy," he said. 
 '' What's the matter here? " 
 
 All gave place to him, as if he had been 
 directly concerned in the affair; then, lying in 
 their midst he saw the dead man. * ^ There has 
 been some mischief here," he said. ** Who has 
 done this? " They cried CoPs name to him, 
 and by degrees he came to understand what had 
 caused HalPs death. Then Eric, having seated 
 himself in his high seat, shouted for silence, and 
 said, ^' I have given orders that your man 
 Col be taken and bound, that right may be 
 done." He looked at Thorgils sternly as he 
 said it. 
 
 Thorgils said, ** It is not for me to deny your 
 right to weregeld ; but this much I will say, that 
 if anybody is to avenge the death of your serv- 
 
142 THORGILS 
 
 ant, Eric, it is yourself. You give yourself the 
 airs of a King or Earl out here ; but you are no 
 King or Earl over me and my friends, but a 
 settler in a new land. Give no orders, then, for 
 you will not be obeyed, but rather get out of 
 that seat of yours and come down and do what 
 you deem fitting. You will find me here ready 
 for you, as I always have been, whether for 
 peace or for strife." 
 
 Eric grew very red, and said something about 
 impudence which must be taught its place. 
 * * What is to prevent me from dealing with you 
 as my powers warrant, do you suppose? '' he 
 asked. Thorgils* answer was a good one. It 
 was not in words ; but he looked down upon the 
 pommel of Earth-house-prey at his thigh. He 
 did not even put his hand to the sword. It was 
 enough that he looked at it. It was, at least, 
 enough for the men crowded in the hall, who had 
 no desire to see the new settlement cloven by 
 war. They collected about Eric now, and rea- 
 soned with him, while Thorgils stood his 
 ground, and men who had been wavering hith- 
 erto came over silently to his side. What they 
 knew about Thorgils was this, that he was slow 
 to wrath, but quite without fear. What they 
 
COL INVOLVED AGAIN 143 
 
 knew about Eric was — what it may have been. 
 He had carried matters with a high hand so far 
 in Greenland, and men had acquiesced in his 
 dealings because no one of them had seen his 
 way to question them. Now there stood a man 
 out before him with flat and plain questions, and 
 the greater part of them thought that Thorgils 
 was right. It was a matter now between Eric 
 and him. Let Eric fight his own quarrel, but 
 not sit in a chair and give orders. It may be 
 that Eric did not incline to a wager of battle 
 with such a man as Thorgils, and the less so 
 seeing that he had more friends than had been 
 looked for. In the upshot the affair was settled 
 between them on reasonable terms, and peace 
 was openly declared. But Thorgils had now 
 made up his mind to go home. 
 
 Two things delayed him. One was to obtain 
 the inlawry of Heriolf , his friend of the distant 
 firth, and the other was a reckoning with Snae- 
 Coll the thrall and his gang of murderers. The 
 first matter was not hard. He argued it out 
 with Eric and his advisers, pledging himself as 
 surety for Heriolf 's peaceable behaviour. He 
 had the satisfaction of seeing a ship sail to 
 
144 THOEGILS 
 
 bring the man home, but did not stay himself 
 to welcome him. He was now impatient to see 
 Iceland again. But he had work left him to do 
 before he could think of that. 
 
 I 
 
CHAPTER XVII 
 
 THE END OF THE THKALLS 
 
 HE took counsel with Thorstan White, 
 whose advice was that he should not 
 kill the thralls when he had found them ; 
 but he would say nothing about that. Then 
 Thorstan said that he would go with him, since 
 he knew within a little just where they would 
 have settled ; and Thorgils said Yes to that, very 
 heartily. So they set out to go up the firth in a 
 longboat, and after they had passed through a 
 forest country on both sides of the water they 
 came to a belt of good land, watered by a river 
 which flowed out of a glacier, and after that to 
 a broad creek. They rowed up the creek for 
 two hours, and then saw a homestead lying in 
 meadows. There was a landing-stage and boat 
 moored alongside it. Thorgils knew it at once. 
 It was the boat which had come with him out of 
 Iceland. There were no signs of his ship, 
 however. 
 They left Thorlaf in the boat, and went on 
 
 145 
 
146 THOEGILS 
 
 shore. Some women were working in the mead 
 by the house, and a man lying on a wall watch- 
 ing them. A dog barked, and the man looked up 
 and saw them. Presently he slipped off the wall 
 on the further side of it, but Thorgils noticed 
 that he was still there ; he could see the peak of 
 his hood over the wall. The party continued its 
 way and reached the wall which bounded the 
 mead towards the water. The women ceased 
 work and stood up to watch them ; but the man 
 behind the wall stooped and ran, and presently 
 they saw him running across the garth towards 
 the house. Col saw him go — but Thorgils 
 said he had seen it already and knew who it 
 was. 
 
 Now the women came to them, with very few 
 words which could be understood. They were 
 fat women, with broad, brown faces, who looked 
 to be both good-tempered and foolish. They used 
 strange gestures, sweeping with their arms. 
 Their legs were not hidden as most women's 
 are, but swathed in sacking. Thorgils supposed 
 them to have been taken from the Seal Islands, 
 and felt sorry for them, but he went through 
 the midst of them with his party, straight for 
 the house. 
 
THE END OF THE THRALLS 147 
 
 They knocked at the door, and having no 
 answer, tried it, and found it to be bolted. All 
 the women now came about them with loud cries 
 and protestations; but Thorgils had found a 
 heavy balk of timber with which he broke down 
 the door. Then they went into the house, but 
 at first saw nobody about. It was close inside 
 and smelt very foul. They started to ransack, 
 and presently Starkad called to Thorgils that he 
 had them. There was laughter in his voice. 
 Thorgils went to where he was, and then he too 
 saw them. 
 
 They were all together — eight of them — in 
 one great bed. He saw them billowing under 
 the coverings like moles underground. Then 
 Starkad pulled back the blankets and discov- 
 ered them all huddled together. They did not 
 move. 
 
 Thorgils, whose eyes were shining cold, had 
 Earth-house-prey drawn in his hand, and lifted 
 it up. Whether he changed his purpose in the 
 very act to smite, or whether he had from the 
 first meant to do what he did, the tale does not 
 tell. He brought the sword down flatways upon 
 the buttocks of one of them, and they all jumped 
 up and knelt on the bed. Thorgils said, ** Come 
 
148 THOEGILS 
 
 out of that," and one by one they got off the bed 
 and knelt to him on the floor. 
 
 Thorgils said to Col, ** Tie them up." Snae- 
 Coll, who was the murderer, took it worse than 
 the rest, for he seemed to go mad. He howled 
 like a dog and gibbered nonsense ; but they had 
 a short way with that, and soon had him as 
 quiet as the rest of them. They were all tied 
 up and left, while Thorgils and Thorstan went 
 over the house and collected what there was of 
 value. There was money, a good deal of stock, 
 some of his own furnishings, such as bed- 
 clothes, tools, and clothing, and some fine furs. 
 When all this was stowed aboard Thorgils came 
 back to the house, where Col kept watch upon 
 the thralls. He had still his sword in his hand, 
 but he did not mean to use it. 
 
 He spoke. ^* Snae-Coll and you other thieves 
 who murder women, listen to me. I shall not 
 kill you, because that would be too good a thing 
 for you. A flash and one pang of fear, and then 
 you are at rest. No, but you shall live and be 
 wretched. Thralls you were, and thralls ' work 
 is what you have done; thralls you shall be 
 henceforward. Now get up, and down to the 
 water." 
 
THE END OF THE THRALLS 149 
 
 They rose to their feet, white and dazed with 
 fear, and he drove them before him down to 
 the water's edge. There one by one they got 
 into the boat and huddled together in the bows. 
 Then they rowed away down the firth. He had 
 left the women behind with a sufficiency of stock 
 to keep them through the winter. They would 
 fare better there, he thought, than in Eric's 
 haven. It was clear that they had done all the 
 work of the farm for their masters. Now they 
 should do it for themselves and their children. 
 So far as appeared they did not regret any- 
 thing. Some of them waved farewell, and they 
 all stood watching the boat out of sight; but 
 when they were round the bend and had another 
 view of the homestead, there they all were out 
 in the mead again. Thorgils saw smoke com- 
 ing from the chimney, too. '' They will do well 
 enough,'' he said. 
 
 The end of the thralls was that he sold them 
 all in the market the day after he had landed 
 them. Thorstan said that he had been merci- 
 ful, but Thorgils shook his head over that. 
 '' Nay," he said, '' I had been merciful to kill 
 them all outright; but it was not a case for 
 
150 THORGILS 
 
 mercy. You have not seen what I saw out in 
 the wilderness." 
 
 Now he decided to make ready for sailing; 
 and Thorstan White said that he should go 
 home with him. Starkad, who had married a 
 wife and now had a child, made up his mind to 
 stop in Greenland for a while. Thorlaf and 
 Col said that they should go home with Thor- 
 gils. 
 
CHAPTER XVIII 
 
 HAEEOWING OF THE SEA 
 
 THE winter set in early that year and 
 caught Thorgils at his preparations. 
 They had to wait for the year to turn, 
 but set out as early as they dared — and too 
 early as it turned out; for though the ice was 
 broken up and they had a fair lead, the winter 
 storms were not over. 
 
 For two days they had smooth water with 
 the wind upon their quarter, and then they had 
 sight of their own land. They were in high 
 spirits and full of hopefulness. But the wind 
 died away and they lay adrift, waiting for what 
 was to come. The wind veered round to the 
 North and gradually increased in force until it 
 blew a gale. Close-hauled as they were, they 
 could make no way. So it blew hard for twelve 
 days, and they drove before it, whither they 
 knew not. They suffered sorely from the cold ; 
 for there came much snow. 
 
 But this was not the worst of it. They were 
 
 m 
 
152 THORGILS 
 
 many days out of their course, and the child 
 Thorfinn very sick with the cold ; but when the 
 northerly gale had blown itself out, and they 
 had, with infinite labour, repaired their tackling 
 and got things ordered again, now it began to 
 blow out of the South-west, and increased to 
 the worst storm any of them had ever seen. 
 The waves rolling in from the ocean were like 
 mountains of green water. The main-mast car- 
 ried away, and the ship filled dangerously, and 
 must sink but for incessant baling. For two 
 days they baled ; and then the storm grew to a 
 height, and billow after billow broke over them. 
 Eight huge waves came over them, and still they 
 baled for mere life. Then came a ninth wave, 
 and that the biggest of them all. It struck 
 Thorgils full in the back and drove him from 
 the helm. Thorfinn had been between his knees ; 
 but when Thorgils was seen again in the volume 
 of that water, Thorfinn was not with him. His 
 father's grey face was a pity to see — ^but just 
 then the backwash of the wave threw Thorfinn 
 on board again. Thorgils clasped him with a 
 cry and held him close. Thorfinn was as brave 
 as could be. " That was a brimmer, father! " 
 he said; and his eyes laughed. But Thorgils 
 
HARROWING OF THE SEA 153 
 
 had no laughter in him. *^ Bale as you may,'' 
 he said, but he himself had no more care for 
 sea or land. 
 
 Yet they saved the ship, and by nightfall 
 were under the shelter of the land again; but 
 that was a night of sorrow. Thorfinn had high 
 fever, and began to throw up blood. He talked 
 wildly, without sense, knew nobody, and to- 
 wards morning died in his father's arms. 
 
 Thorgils sat quite still in a stare, holding the 
 dead child. He saw nobody, and said nothing 
 at all. They left him alone, thinking that the 
 best way, and busied themselves with the ship. 
 They rigged up a mast with a lug-sail and made 
 the best they could. All men worked well ; but 
 Thorlaf seemed to take direction over the 
 others. In thirty hours' sailing they made out 
 Hiarlaf's head, and rounding that dropped 
 anchor in Arnarbel's Oyce, where the white 
 water comes into the sea. There was snug lying 
 there, and it was not far from their own 
 country. 
 
 Thorgils, since his boy's death, had not 
 moved or spoken, nor had he eaten anything. 
 He just sat up stiffly, staring with blank eyes 
 into the distance, with Thorfinn 's body on his 
 
154 THORGILS 
 
 knees. But his friends were now mucli troubled 
 about him. They believed that sorrow had 
 robbed him of his wits; they expected that he 
 would resist with frenzy any attempt they 
 might make to land the dead child and bury 
 him ; and yet such an attempt must be made. 
 
 There were men on the shore now, looking 
 at the ship, and a boat was putting off with 
 people on board. Thorstan said that he would 
 pull out to meet them. Then he thought of 
 what might be done to rouse Thorgils. * * I will 
 seem to dispute with those men about the har- 
 bour-dues ; we will have a tussle. It shall look 
 as if we were come to fighting. Now when you 
 see us all struggling together, do you cry out to 
 Thorgils, * Help, rescue — Thorstan is taken.' 
 That will move him. He will come ashore in 
 one of their boats — and while he is composing 
 the quarrel, you shall pick up the child and 
 carry him to the church. He will be in a great 
 rage with you ; but that will make no matter so 
 that he recovers his senses." Thorlaf agreed 
 to that, and Thorstan rowed ashore, meeting the 
 boats half-way across and turning them back 
 with him — or some of them. After a while they 
 on the ship saw what seemed to be a fight going 
 
HARROWING OF THE SEA 155 
 
 on. Thorlaf ran to Thorgils with the alarm, 
 and the afiQicted man awoke. He gave a mo- 
 ment's flash of the eyes to the shore, then got up 
 and, still carrying Thorfinn, went down the side 
 into one of the boats. He covered the body with 
 a cloak just as if it was alive. 
 
 They came close to land, and Thorgils jumped 
 into the water and waded ashore. The same 
 moment Thorlaf turned the boat's head, and 
 they rowed across the river to the church. Be- 
 fore Thorgils could come at them again Thor- 
 finn was buried. Col and Thorlaf did it to- 
 gether, with the priest of the church, and they 
 stayed in the priest's house to see how Thorgils 
 would deal with them. They knew that they 
 had taken a great risk, and that it might go hard 
 with them. 
 
 The quarrel, of course, which had been no 
 quarrel at all, ceased when Thorgils came into 
 it. Then he was for going back to the boat, and 
 it seemed as if his fit had come on him again. He 
 had had neither food nor sleep for two days, 
 and looked an old man. He showed no pleasure 
 in being at home again, among men who wished 
 him well; he did not ask after his daughter 
 whom he had left just hereabouts five years ago. 
 
156 THORGILS 
 
 All his thoughts were centred in Thorfinn, 
 whom he considered as alive and waiting for 
 him. 
 
 They told him then what had been done. For 
 a long time he could not understand them ; but 
 when he did he grew terribly angry and vowed 
 that CoPs life should pay for it. Col had killed 
 Thorfinn, he said, and Col should die. Nothing 
 would stop him from taking boat; so he was 
 rowed across the river and stalked up to the 
 churchyard, Earth-house-prey in his hand. The 
 priest came out to meet him. ** Give me the 
 slayer of my boy," he said; and the priest re- 
 plied, ** That cannot be, Thorgils. It was God 
 who slew your son, and He is not at my dis- 
 pose." '' It was Col who killed him," said 
 Thorgils; ** I know that very well." *^ It was 
 Col who did for you that which you ought to 
 have done, ' ' said the priest. * * Come, I will take 
 you to your boy's grave." Thorgils, in a stare, 
 allowed himself to be led by the hand. He stood 
 looking at the grave quietly; and then they saw 
 that his eyes were full of tears. They let him 
 weep as he would, but presently Col and Thor- 
 laf came out of .the house behind him and stood 
 by his side, without saying anything. For some 
 
HARROWING OF THE SEA 157 
 
 time he was not aware of them, but when he 
 turned his eyes and saw them both there, he had 
 no remembrance of the rage which had brought 
 him to the grave, with the intent of filling an- 
 other grave. He looked kindly on them, with 
 his eyes all wet, and put his hand on CoPs 
 shoulder, and leaned hard on him. They took 
 him away presently, and then he ate and drank, 
 and afterwards lay down and slept. 
 
 The fit was off him, and he resumed hold upon 
 life, such of it as was left to him; but it was 
 evident to those who had known him so long 
 and seen him so intimately that he was aged by 
 ten years in the two days since Thorfinn died. 
 For one thing, he had become more peremptory, 
 more arbitrary in his dealings with men, and 
 much more irritable than he had been wont to 
 be. That showed itself as soon as he was at 
 home. 
 
CHAPTER XIX 
 
 TKEADHOLT AGAIN 
 
 THEY sailed away from Olvus soon after- 
 wards, and came into their own waters 
 about mid-May, and from the sea had a 
 sight of Treadholt among its green meads. Ey- 
 jafell was still deeply mantled in snow, there 
 were no leaves on the trees ; but the river ran 
 brimmingly, and they could see lambs in the 
 home-meadows. 
 
 For all this Thorgils had a sombre regard. 
 He saw, but did not look. It was Col who 
 pointed places out to Thorlaf , or Thorlaf to Col, 
 and both of them made the most of their land 
 for Thorstan White's advantage. They left 
 Thorgils very much to himself, and that was all 
 he asked of them. Yet when they came into 
 Cogsound, and friends on the quay hailed them, 
 or presently, when a crowd of them came aboard 
 — and Haering his brother one of them — ^his 
 heart warmed to the welcome he received, and 
 he spoke like himself again. There was much 
 
 158 
 
TREADHOLT AGAIN 159 
 
 to tell and little of it good; yet it was a relief 
 to him to speak freely of Thorey's end and of 
 Gudrun's, even to confess the bitterness of his 
 heart when, at the very last, his boy was taken 
 from him whom he had been at such desperate 
 pains to keep alive. In time he did come to 
 speak of that, not making much of his own mis- 
 ery — for that was not his way ; telling rather of 
 the lad^s high heart and pretty ways, and leav- 
 ing all the rest to be understood by them who 
 heard him. 
 
 Haering gave good reports of his husbandry 
 at Treadholt. ** You will find all in order, 
 brother, and can take it over from the moment 
 you cross the threshold." Thorgils said there 
 was no hurry about that, but there would be ac- 
 counts to settle, and the matter of Thorny 's mar- 
 riage to be gone into. He wanted to know more 
 about Bearne of the Pit, and seemed fidgety 
 over the whole affair. As soon as might be they 
 all went over to Treadholt, where Thorstan 
 White would stay through the summer while he 
 was looking about him. Loft, now a very old 
 man, came out to meet them a mile short of 
 Treadholt. He wept when he saw Thorgils 
 again, and treated him as if he were the elder 
 
160 THORGILS 
 
 of the two, being indeed almost childish himself. 
 Thorgils embraced him warmly, and walked 
 with him up the road, old Loft taking his arm to 
 help him along. Then came out Haering's wife 
 and three sons, fine lads, to join the party — 
 and that was a happy meeting because Thor- 
 gils loved children and was at his best with 
 them. After a time Thorlaf and Col went up to 
 Calf holt, to take possession of that on Col's ac- 
 count as heir of his father lostan — but that was 
 not for some days. There was a great feast at 
 Treadholt first, to which all the neighbours 
 came, and among them Bearne of the Pit, and 
 Thorny, the last alive of Thorgils' children. 
 
 For what reason is not to be known, but Thor- 
 gils took immediate dislike of Bearne, who was 
 most earnest to please his father-in-law and 
 signally failed to do it, perhaps for that very 
 reason. Bearne was a stoutish man, with a 
 round, red face, and rather small, anxious eyes 
 which watered freely. Thorgils judged him a 
 time-server, which perhaps he was. Thorny 
 was a handsome girl, after the fashion of her 
 mother, slim and very upright, with hair lighter 
 than her skin. She had not the deep-blue eyes 
 of Thorey, nor her look of truth and courage — 
 
TREADHOLT AGAIN 161 
 
 though she had plenty of both — but she was a 
 handsome girl, a great deal younger than 
 Bearne, who had been married before and had 
 a daughter at home. Thorny had a child, whom 
 she brought with her, a boy called Thorolf . 
 
 Haering was host, for Thorgils would take 
 over nothing yet awhile, and, being a munificent 
 man, offered great hospitality on all hands. 
 The whole countryside came up to Treadholt 
 and sat there for a week. Thorgils was very 
 affable and talked freely to those whom he 
 knew or knew of; but to Bearne, of whom he 
 knew next to nothing, he was measured in his 
 civility, and well on this side of cordiality. The 
 more he held off the more Bearne paid court 
 to him. He was a foolish man, who did not 
 know what he owed to himself; and so it went 
 on until one fine day Thorgils lost his temper 
 and said, ** I wish that you would leave me 
 alone. You have married my daughter, and 
 that ought to be enough for you. My agree- 
 ment was not to be looked for, placed as I was ; 
 but it seems to me that you have got so much 
 the best of the bargain that a little modesty 
 would become you very well." Bearne was 
 much dismayed and asked his wife what he had 
 
162 THOEGILS 
 
 better do. ** It occurs to me," he said, *^ that 
 I have been insulted, which is rather hard to 
 bear, and must be more trying to you than to 
 me, I should think. I think your father has left 
 his temper as well as his family in Greenland. ' ' 
 Then he wiped his eyes and blinked at Thorny. 
 She said, ** "Wliy can't you leave my father 
 alone? He knows nothing of you, and you 
 might have seen that he makes friendships 
 slowly. There is something against you I know. 
 It may be that your eyes are always on the 
 drip.'' Bearne said that it was hard that a 
 man's infirmities should be cast up against him, 
 but Thorny said, ** Well, then be careful not to 
 cast theirs up against other men." But Bearne 
 was unhappy when he was in the company of 
 people who did not love him, and took his wife 
 away as soon as he could. 
 
 After he had gone Thorgils spoke his mind 
 to Haering. *^ One thing displeases me, 
 brother, in your ruling of my business, and that 
 is your handing Thorny over to that weeper. 
 He overwept your foresight, and sluiced your 
 pockets of more than you should have kept there 
 for his washings. My meaning is that you en- 
 dowed her for more than the man was worth. 
 
TREADHOLT AGAIN 163 
 
 I think that he overreached you, and owe him 
 a grudge for that. ' ' Haering justified himself, 
 but said that he would readily pay back what- 
 ever Thorgils thought laid out in excess of rea- 
 son. Thorgils would not hear of it. ** It is not 
 your money that I am after, but my own,'' he 
 said; ** but now we will leave it. I shall have 
 time enough to reach an understanding with the 
 bleary one. Let him sop his eyes with my nap- 
 kins while he can." 
 
 Thorstan White, who was a great trader, did 
 not stay out the summer at Treadholt, but was 
 there just long enough to fit out a ship. He said 
 he should go to Norway and might be back in 
 the following summer. Thorgils sped him out- 
 ward with great good will, and they parted firm 
 friends. After that he remained quietly at 
 home throughout the winter, revolving many 
 things in his mind. He seemed to be in the 
 trough between manhood and old age ; but as it 
 turned out he was rather renewing his strength. 
 He was not yet fifty years old. 
 
 In the spring the Thing was held at Arness, 
 and all the chief men of the country rode to it. 
 It was a long journey from Treadholt, seeing 
 Arness lies across Rang-river Vales, on Thurso 
 
164 THORGILS 
 
 Water; but nevertheless Thorgils went, and a 
 goodly company with him. 
 
 He reached the place late, and went at once 
 to the booth which had been prepared for him. 
 They told him that his son-in-law and Thorny 
 were there, and he heard it grimly. ** I wish 
 them joy of it,*' was all he said; nor would he 
 go to visit them, nor did they venture to come 
 over to him. Thorny was as sharp as all women 
 are who know things otherwise than by the ears 
 or eyes. She understood that there was sore- 
 ness in her father's mind, not caused by that in 
 her husband's eyes. Bearne was very uneasy, 
 and caught sight of Thorgils more than once at 
 the assemblies. He waited upon him patiently 
 with his eyes, but Thorgils made as though he 
 was unconscious of him. However — he was not 
 at all unconscious. 
 
 One morning, after he had been there nearly 
 a week, he took his sword in his hand, and went 
 directly to Bearne 's booth. Thorny saw him 
 coming, and a bright light came into her eyes. 
 ** My father is coming here," she said to her 
 husband. ** Up now and go to meet him, and 
 behave yourself like a man. Wipe your eyes 
 first, for the love of goodness. I can see that 
 
TREADHOLT AGAIN 165 
 
 his anger has come to a head. All now depends 
 upon you." Bearne was rather flustered, but 
 took hold of himself and went to the booth door. 
 He saw Thorgils coming on like a strong wind ; 
 he went out bare-headed and weaponless to 
 meet him. ^* Hail, kinsman," he said; ** this is 
 what I have been hoping for. Now I ask you to 
 take up your lodging with us for as long as may 
 please you. I only wish to serve you, and all 
 I have is at your disposition if you will use it." 
 Thorgils stopped short and listened to him. 
 Bearne had his hand out. His anger fell off 
 him like a cloak. *^ You speak well," he said, 
 ** and I accept your offer. The fact is that I 
 was coming in a great rage, and don't know 
 what might have happened." Bearne said that 
 he was very sorry to have displeased him, and 
 that he hoped he would stay with them at the 
 Pit. ** When you are there," he said, *' you 
 shall look over all that I have, and what you 
 please to take away with you, that you shall 
 have and welcome." Thorgils laughed quietly 
 and patted Bearne on the shoulder. Then they 
 went into the booth and he gave Thorny a kiss, 
 and seemed glad to be with her. 
 When the Thing was over Thorgils rode with 
 
166 THORGILS 
 
 Bearne and Thorny to Pit, which was the name 
 of Bearne 's homestead. He saw everything 
 they had and approved of it. Thorny told him 
 that it was all his if he chose to take it : ** All 
 came from you, and shall go back again at your 
 will.'' Thorgils, without moving a muscle, said 
 that he would look over the stock and take what 
 seemed fair ; and when he went through it all 
 with Bearne he did set aside twenty cows and a 
 six-score ewes as his when he called for them. 
 To this Bearne assented, and presently Thor- 
 gils rode home to Treadholt. In due time he 
 sent men over to Pit to get in the stock he had 
 marked. It came in, and with it came Thorny 
 herself with a child at the breast. '' What is 
 this, my child? " '' Father," she said, '' it 
 seems to me that you are set against my hus- 
 band, and regret that I was given to him at all. 
 Now, if you will have me, I will separate from 
 him and stay here with you ; and you can have 
 all my dowry back again whenever you wish. 
 So says Bearne himself.'' 
 
 Thorgils was much affected by her meekness, 
 and gave her his blessing. ' ' A blessing on you, 
 and on Bearne as well," he said. *' You are 
 good souls, and I have tried you over hard. I 
 
TREADHOLT AGAIN 167 
 
 own that I thought he had overreached them 
 that had you in charge ; but that doubt of mine 
 soon left me. He met me at Arness like a man, 
 and when I went to Pit I only acted so to try 
 him. Now you shall take all this back home 
 with you, and be sure that I shall never part 
 you two. Tell Bearne that he and I shall be 
 good friends after this ; for I never forget the 
 goodness in a man, whatever I may do with his 
 badness. *' 
 
 So that trouble was all smoothed over, and 
 Thorgils lived at ease, but very lonely. 
 
CHAPTER XX 
 
 HE bore his loneliness as long as lie could, 
 but found himself getting older ; and the 
 older he grew the less he liked being 
 alone. What he remembered chiefly about 
 Thorey now was her presence about the house, 
 how good she was to look at, how pleasant the 
 sound of her voice. A man, he thought, lost the 
 savour of the good things of this life by having 
 them unseasoned by a woman's grace on them. 
 At one time he thought of taking Thorny at her 
 word and having her and Bearne to live with 
 him. But he gave that up very soon. He was 
 fond of Thorny, and fond of Bearne too, a faith- 
 ful man; but he knew himself. Small things 
 vexed him, and to see a man always wiping his 
 eyes would have led to no good. * * I should try 
 to mend his sore eyes, and fail, and hate them 
 worse than before." Then he thought of marry- 
 ing again, and the more he thought of it the 
 
 168 
 
HELGA, THORORD^S DAUGHTER 169 
 
 more he liked the thought. He would be very- 
 good to her ; he knew that. She would be like a 
 daughter to him — and yet by no means a 
 daughter. And there would be children, with- 
 out which a woman was nought, and a house 
 less than nought. Yes, he would get him a wife. 
 It was not at all too late. 
 
 He went over to Pit and talked to Bearne 
 about it. ** Bearne,'' he said, ** you have found 
 yourself a good wife. Now find one for me." 
 Bearne gazed out of his watery eyes for a little 
 while, and then told him that the girl was found. 
 '' And who is she? " '' She is Helga, Thorord's 
 daughter," said Bearne, '* a girl of a thousand. 
 A fat girl and very good-tempered." Thorgils 
 said that she sounded promising. ** You shall 
 see her," Bearne said. ** We will go to Shale in 
 the morning. Thorord lives near Shale. He is 
 priest of Olvus, and is a relative of mine by the 
 mother's side. The trouble will be, not with 
 Thorord, who is a reasonable man, but rather 
 with Shafto, the girl's brother." 
 
 '' And what is the matter with Shafto? " 
 Bearne looked serious. ** He is leagued with 
 Asgrim Ellida-Grimsson, and Asgrim rather 
 favours the girl himself. ' ' 
 
170 THORGILS 
 
 *' He is always crossing my road," said Thor- 
 gils, ** or he used to be. But I don't doubt 
 I can deal with Shafto. How old is your 
 Helga? '' 
 
 ^' She will be seventeen, I daresay,'' says 
 Bearne. 
 
 ** Well, we will see her," Thorgils said. 
 *^ There will be no harm done. And she may be 
 too fat." 
 
 * * Not a bit of it, ' ' said Bearne. ' ' They can 't 
 be that." 
 
 Whether Bearne, in his anxiety to stand well 
 with Thorgils, busied himself in the affair be- 
 forehand or not, he and Thorgils were received 
 at Shale with much more interest than a simple 
 visit would have warranted. Thorord was a 
 plain and bluff sort of man, but his son Shafto 
 had a scowling brow which was freely at work 
 just now. They saw Helga before supper, but 
 not to speak to, as she was busy. She was 
 plump rather than fat, and had a pretty, fresh- 
 coloured face, fair hair, and light-blue eyes. 
 The excitement of the moment — visitors with all 
 sorts of implication in their coming — ^was very 
 becoming to her. Thorgils in his quiet way 
 watched her and knew all about it. He thought 
 
HELGA, THORORD'S DAUGHTER 171 
 
 to himself, If a girl could always contrive to be 
 on the edge of an asking in marriage, how her 
 beauty would be enhanced! 
 
 After supper was over — at which she had 
 served the guests and her father — she came and 
 sat beside Thorord and listened to the talk. It 
 should have interested her, for Thorgils was 
 relating his adventures in the wilderness ; but it 
 did not. She was judging the speaker all the 
 while, this sad-faced, thin and very tall man 
 whom she guessed to be as old as her father. 
 All her pretty fluster died away; she didn't 
 want to marry him at all. Her other suitor, 
 whom she had never seen, Asgrim Ellida-Grims- 
 son, must be the better match. Everybody had 
 something to say of his great w^ay of life, and 
 she understood too that he wore splendid 
 clothes, and that his horse had fine trappings. 
 He was a nobleman, and looked it, or so they 
 said. This man of the quiet voice might be 
 noble also, but there was no sign of it about him. 
 He was grey, very thin ; his doublet was shabby, 
 threadbare in places. He talked to the company 
 at large, so far as she could see, never looked at 
 her at all. She could never have guessed at the 
 depths of him even if she had wished to guess at 
 
172 THOEGILS 
 
 it— which she did not. By-and-by she grew very 
 depressing, and slipping out of her father's arm 
 left the men to themselves, and went rather un- 
 happily to bed. Shafto found her pouting and 
 red-eyed next day and did his best for his 
 friend Asgrim; but in the meantime Thorgils 
 had asked for her, and her father was inclined 
 towards him on all sorts of grounds. 
 
 Thorgils rode away home thinking much of 
 Helga. ** Before I know it I shall be in love 
 with that good-temperd, comfortable girl,'' he 
 told Bearne. *' I don't believe that I shall ever 
 love a woman again as I loved Thorey, and I 
 don't believe that I shall ever again meet with 
 such a woman as she was. Your Thorny comes 
 near her, but not to reach the edge of her 
 shadow. Yet this girl pleases me, and I hope 
 that you will settle the business for me, 
 Bearne." 
 
 Bearne said, *' Leave it for a little. There's 
 much to be done. Young Shafto will be a great 
 obstacle. I can see he don't care about it, and 
 that he means to get the girl on his side. We 
 will talk it all over at the Thing, and it may be 
 useful to make Shafto more aware of you than 
 he is just now." Thorgils smiled and rather 
 
HELGA, THOEORD'S DAUGHTER 173 
 
 stretched his smile. * * I am thinking that I can 
 deal with Shafto,'' he said. 
 
 Nothing more was attempted until the Thing 
 at midsummer, and then Thorgils spoke to 
 Thorord again, and Thorord seemed to favour 
 him strongly. Shafto kept out of the way, and 
 bestowed himself in Asgrim's booth. When 
 Thorgils had come to an understanding with 
 Thorord, as he thought, he now saw Asgrim and 
 Shafto always in the booth where Thorord 
 lodged, and guessed what was going on. Next 
 time he mentioned his business to Thorord, the 
 man had cooled oif. Thorgils became angry, 
 and said that he would wring Shafto 's neck 
 for him. 
 
 A ship came in to Einar's haven that sum- 
 mer. Bearne of the Pit told Thorgils about it. 
 He had had the news from Shale, and said that 
 Shafto was going over to see what was to be 
 seen. Thorgils said, ^* Right. He shall see me, 
 at any rate. ' ' He went to the haven with Col and 
 three other men, crossed the ferry and stood 
 on the other side waiting. By-and-by Shafto 
 came riding down to the ferry with some men 
 with him. He saw the horses feeding on the 
 other side, and that they had saddles on them. 
 
174 THORGILS 
 
 '* Whose horses! '' He was told, Thorgils' of 
 Treadholt. *^ Oh/' said Shafto ; *^ and where is 
 Thorgils of Treadholt himself! '' '^ He is 
 thereabouts in the brushwood," he was told. 
 ** I think he waits for an enemy. It looks like 
 that." Shafto turned to his men and told them 
 that they had better get back home. ** I have 
 been talking to the ferryman, and hear that the 
 goods are going very dear just now. Later on 
 the prices will be better, but if we go over now 
 they will be sure to keep them up, thinking we 
 are eager." They went home then, but every- 
 body had seen the horses across the river, and 
 knew whose they were, and all about it. 
 
 Thorord said that he had known how it would 
 be. ** You and your handsome friend Asgrim 
 will get me into trouble with that Viking," he 
 told Shafto. ** Do you think we can go on like 
 this, not daring to cross our own river! He 
 shall have Helga as soon as he pleases for me. I 
 seem to know the man. He is slow to rouse, but 
 not to be turned from his purpose by anything 
 you can do. Now Asgrim 's not that kind. 
 You can pay Asgrim for an affront with a good 
 present, and he will think no more about it. But 
 Thorgils would take nothing but the one thing." 
 
HELGA, THORORD'S DAUGHTER 175 
 
 After that he sent word to Thorgils that the 
 betrothal should be when he pleased, and the 
 wedding at Shale before the winter; and so it 
 was done. Helga was in very low spirits about 
 it, and as well as that dreadfully frightened of 
 Thorgils. It was not a happy beginning. 
 
 When they came home to Treadholt there was 
 a feast, and everybody paid court to the bride, 
 except, it seemed, the bridegroom. He was in 
 one of his silent moods, and had very little to 
 say. Helga was happy enough while the guests 
 were there; but when she was alone with her 
 husband she did not seem able to say a word to 
 him. However, she was his wife now, and cer- 
 tainly he was kind to her; but it hadn't turned 
 out as he expected. He thought that she would 
 have been as happy and lighthearted bustling 
 about Treadholt as he had seen her at Shale. 
 Nothing of the kind! He was disappointed, 
 and showed that he was. That made her 
 worse. 
 
 It went on very badly all through the sum- 
 mer, and towards the winter, but before it had 
 begun to snow Helga thought that she could 
 bear herself no longer. So one day, when Thor- 
 gils was out on the fells rounding up sheep, she 
 
176 THORGILS 
 
 told one of the servants that she was going 
 over to Shale, and that he must saddle two 
 horses, as she would want him to come with her. 
 She rode accompanied as far as the house, and 
 being come to the garth gate, Helga got down, 
 and told the man to return with both the horses, 
 as she was going to stay there. And so she did, 
 though Thorord blamed her and said that she 
 must take the consequences, whatever they were. 
 Shafto said she had done right ; and Helga her- 
 self felt sure that Thorgils would never claim 
 her again. ** He looks on me as one of the serv- 
 ant-maids," she said, ** and doesn^t know one 
 of us from the other.'' Thorord told her that 
 that was nonsense. ** Thorgils is not the man 
 to take one of his servant-maids in his arms.'* 
 Helga, tossing her head, said that it might come 
 to that. ** He can do very well without me 
 there, you will see." 
 
 She was at home for several days without any 
 message from Treadholt, and then there came 
 an evening when they were sitting at board, and 
 heard a horse outside in the garth; then pres- 
 ently a single thump at the door. It was opened 
 by one of the hinds, and Thorgils came into the 
 hall. 
 
HELGA, THORORD'S DAUGHTER 177 
 
 He looked a great warrior, having a helm on 
 his head, and his sword Earth-house-prey in his 
 hand. He took no notice of anybody as he 
 walked up the hall ; neither saluted Thorord nor 
 any one else. He walked by them all to where 
 Helga was sitting and took her by the wrist. 
 She rose as he did it, and made no resistance 
 to him. He led her out of the house and into 
 the yard where his horse was standing, lifted 
 her quite easily and put her in the saddle ; then 
 mounted himself behind her and rode away. 
 There had been that about him which had held 
 every one still in his place to see what he was 
 going to do ; but when he was sure, Shaf to, very 
 red in the face, got up and asked his father that 
 some of them might go after him. Thorord, 
 angry, scoffed at him. ** A pretty sight you 
 would be, following a man like him, keeping 
 your distance, and not daring to diminish it by 
 half a yard. That is how finches follow a kite, I 
 think. Keep out of the man's way, and deem 
 yourself lucky that he don't send for you to 
 know what you want to do, meddling with his 
 affairs. And what is it that you suppose your- 
 self to be doing, I should like to know? He 
 came after his own, and he took it away with 
 
178 THORGILS 
 
 him. No man of this house shall go after him — 
 I'll see to that.'' 
 
 Thorgils said nothing to Helga all the way 
 home, but when he had her indoors he surprised 
 her very much. She was in a great fright and 
 thought she was going to be beaten ; but instead 
 of that he took her in his arms and kissed her 
 well. Then she began to cry, and said that she 
 was sorry. *^ My dear," he said, ^^ it is I who 
 am sorry. Until I had lost you I didn't know 
 how much I wanted you. Now we understand 
 each other, and things will go better between 
 us." She slept in his arms, and in the morn- 
 ing found herself happy. * * "Why am I so happy 
 to-day? " She asked Thorgils that. He pinched 
 her cheek. *^ Go and ask the hens, my dear," 
 he said. ** They will tell you." But she 
 wouldn't go. 
 
 The end of all this was that next year Helga 
 had a son. They called him Grim, and he was 
 the first of many. Yet Thorgils was sixty when 
 Grim was bom. 
 
CHAPTEE XXI 
 
 BECKONINGS WITH ASGRIM 
 
 NOW, towards the end of his life, when a 
 man might look for peace and quietness, 
 Thorgils began to find himself rubbing 
 elbows with Asgrim Ellida-Grimsson. There 
 is nothing surprising in that, since they were 
 the two men of most consideration in the coun- 
 try, and Asgrim, at least, very much aware of it. 
 There was this marked difference between them, 
 that Thorgils was a great man and not aware 
 how great he was, and Asgrim a great man who 
 thought himself greater than he was. Asgrim 
 made a show of his greatness ; he was fond of 
 ornament and trappings ; he was pleased to ride 
 about attended by many ; he held himself to be 
 above the law. He was a portly high-coloured 
 man of much greater presence than Thorgils, 
 who grew leaner as he grew older. On his broad 
 back a scarlet cloak looked very magnificent. 
 He was fond of wearing scarlet, and always had 
 his clothes of the best Italian cloth that you 
 
 179 
 
180 THOEGILS 
 
 could buy. Fur was another weakness of his; 
 broad trimmings of fur were on all his doublets, 
 and in the winter he had a sable cloak, very fine 
 indeed. Not only was he a landed man, but a 
 great trader also, with ships for Norway, Ire- 
 land, Eussia, and Germany. It was upon a 
 matter of ships that he and Thorgils began to 
 quarrel. 
 
 There was a good haven which ran into land 
 belonging to Thorgils and friends of his. It was 
 handy for Asgrim and often used by his ves- 
 sels. But he would never pay the toll, nor allow 
 his men to pay any. This had gone on for many 
 years, and at last it became notorious, and 
 Thorgils' collector complained of it. Thorgils 
 said that he would speak to Asgrim when he 
 came across him ; and so he did. 
 
 He was riding down to the sea one day upon 
 an old flea-bitten horse almost as lean as him- 
 self, alone, in his shabby leather jacket, with his 
 cloak twisted about him — for it was cold 
 weather — when he met with a company riding 
 up; six or eight men talking and laughing to- 
 gether, and Asgrim in front of them in his fa- 
 mous sables, riding alone on a great white stal- 
 lion. Thorgils, looking mean and withered in 
 
EECKONINGS WITH ASGRIM 181 
 
 the wind, reined up and nodded his head side- 
 ways to Asgrim. The great man stared, and 
 puffed out his cheeks ; but he also reined up. 
 
 ** I am glad to meet with you," says Thor- 
 gils. ** There is a little matter of harbour-dues 
 to square between us." 
 
 *' Ho, indeed," says Asgrim. ** How may 
 that be? " '' Why, it is like this," says Thor- 
 gils. ^* Your shipmen use the haven out yon- 
 der, and come and go as they please ; but they 
 don't pay the toll. When it is asked for they 
 speak of you." 
 
 '' They do well," says Asgrim; '' they do 
 well." 
 
 ** They do, I suppose, as they are told," says 
 Thorgils; ** but my people don't grow fat on 
 such words as they use. Now I ask you to re- 
 member that the land belongs to me and my 
 friends, and that everybody pays the tolls but 
 you." He fixed Asgrim with a shrewd but 
 friendly eye, and made him feel cross. 
 
 He looked about, but Thorgils' eye did not 
 leave him ; he grew rather red and felt his anger 
 rising. *' I can't speak about it now," he said. 
 
 '' Why not," said Thorgils, '' if I can speak 
 about it? " Then Asgrim was angry. 
 
182 THORGILS 
 
 '^ The sea is open to all ships/ ^ he said, ** to 
 mine as well as other people's. It is not my 
 custom to be troubled with petty customs, a 
 penny here, or a penny there. These are for 
 fishermen and little men. You must not claim 
 your pennies of me." 
 
 ** I shan't claim them any more," said Thor- 
 gils, and rode on. Asgrim thought that he had 
 got the better of him, and so did his respectful 
 following. There was much laughter among 
 them as they went their way — and Thorgils 
 heard it. 
 
 Nothing more was said or done until the 
 spring, when Asgrim gave out word that he 
 was launching a ship down at the haven. The 
 news went about the country and a number of 
 people came out to see the sight. It was low 
 water, and Asgrim was out on the sands with a 
 deal of company, meaning to warp the ship out 
 of the dock into the river. He looked very noble 
 in his scarlet, edged with black fur, and though 
 it was a foul shore, full of pools and pits of 
 water, he did not disdain to take command of 
 the rope, nor to haul at it himself. A number of 
 hands, women as well as men, laid hold ; behind 
 
RECKONINGS WITH ASGRIM 183 
 
 them all was Asgrim — and behind him was a 
 deep pool of water. 
 
 Asgrim gave the word, and they all began 
 to haul. Down the shore came a rider on a thin 
 horse, a tall man with a long-handled axe in his 
 hand. He stayed looking at the company for a 
 while. The rope was taut, all the haulers, men, 
 women, and Asgrim, were leaning backwards, 
 straining for their lives. The single rider 
 moved forward, and stood up against the rope. 
 The axe flashed in the air and came down sharp 
 —the rope parted, and all the people fell back- 
 wards, Asgrim souse into the pool, women on 
 top of him, men on their backs in the wet sand. 
 There went up a wave of laughter from the 
 lookers-on, all the way from the sands to the 
 dry land; but Thorgils sat motionless on his 
 horse and did not laugh at all. 
 
 For some time nothing could be seen of As- 
 grim but his feet in commotion. Then his red 
 back could be seen wallowing in the water, and 
 finally he dragged himself out, and men began 
 to fish for their wives and mothers. Asgrim 
 was too full of water and too empty of breath 
 to do more than splutter and wheeze— but after 
 a while he remembered his dignity and stared 
 
184 THORGILS 
 
 about to see who was laughing at him. He saw 
 that everybody was, or had just been laughing. 
 Even his son Thorhall, who stood close to him, 
 was helpless with mirth. '^ Don't be such a 
 fool," Asgrim said, but Thorhall could only 
 wag his head and cling to his own knees. 
 
 ** Who did this villainy? '' Asgrim cried out, 
 and Thorhall, rocking about, holding his knees, 
 wagged his head without speaking. Asgrim 
 flung himself round and caught a young man by 
 the ear. '* Tell me who did that, you," he said, 
 ** or you shall repent it." The young man 
 pointed to Thorgils, who still sat his horse 
 where he had been when he cut the rope. As- 
 grim stared. '* Who is that man? Where 
 does he come from! " But he knew who it 
 was. 
 
 There was nothing to be done. Everybody 
 was laughing, and the more angry he grew the 
 more they laughed. He had only to turn to a 
 man to make him twist about in an agony of 
 laughing. Men implored him not to look at 
 them lest they might rupture themselves and 
 perhaps die. The only two people not laughing 
 upon that shore were Asgrim and Thorgils. 
 From the ship itself, far out in the dock, came 
 
RECKONINGS WITH ASGRIM 185 
 
 the sound of men laughing and slapping each 
 other on the back. 
 
 Asgrim gave it up, and went away without a 
 word to Thorgils. But one of the men on the 
 shore in the space between the spasms of his 
 laughter was able to ask, ** Why did you do it? 
 Oh, why did you do iti *' and Thorgils said, 
 ** Ship's toll,*' before he turned his horse and 
 rode thoughtfully home. 
 
 In the evening when people had somewhat 
 recovered themselves Asgrim told Thorhall his 
 son that he could not overlook such an insult. 
 Thorhall struggled with himself, and managed 
 to say that he thought his father had better go 
 abroad. ** You will find,'' he said, '^ that every- 
 thing you may do will make people laugh again. 
 I suppose you don't know what you looked like ; 
 but if you will excuse me I won't attempt to tell 
 you, because it will make me ill. Nevertheless, 
 as I said, my advice is that you should go abroad 
 for a while." 
 
 Asgrim said that he should do nothing of the 
 kind. He was exceedingly angry ; but the worst 
 of it was that he was compelled to avoid Thor- 
 gils. Whenever he came across him the people 
 with him were reminded of the affair of the 
 
186 THORGILS 
 
 launch and looked at each other, and then 
 quickly looked away. 
 
 It was long before the business of the launch 
 was forgotten; but Asgrim remembered it 
 longer than anybody else, and was careful not 
 to come in Thorgils ' way ; and when it happened 
 later on that Thorhall wanted to marry a daugh- 
 ter of Bearne's and Thorny 's, and asked his 
 father to ask for her, Asgrim made it a point 
 of the bargain that Thorgils should not be asked 
 to the wedding. 
 
 Bearne rubbed his chin. '* As to that,'' he 
 said, ** things are so here that Thorgils will be 
 welcome whenever he comes, and nothing will 
 be done to keep him out of the house." Asgrim 
 had known that before, but it made him impa- 
 tient to be reminded of it. 
 
 ** I may not seem unreasonable," he said, 
 ** and I don't wish to be so; but there is a dif- 
 ference between making a man welcome and 
 bidding him to a feast. Remembering how 
 things are between us, I ask you not to summon 
 him as a guest." 
 
 Bearne agreed to that, and kept the matter 
 to himself, but of course it was spread about. 
 Thorgils, after his usual fashion, said nothing ; 
 
RECKONINGS WITH ASGRIM 187 
 
 but Helga was offended, and said it was very 
 odd if she could not see her step-granddaughter 
 married. Thorgils told her that she should go. 
 
 Accordingly one fine morning Thorny, at the 
 door of her house, looking down the hillside, 
 saw a rider come out of the wood and begin to 
 mount the rise towards her. She called back 
 to Bearne, ** Here comes somebody this way, 
 and if it isn ^t my father it 's his ghost. ' ^ Bearne 
 went out in a hurry to meet him. Thorgils 
 greeted him, and then he said, *' You have a 
 wedding before you, I hear. Now it is strange 
 that you haven't bidden us — and we think that 
 we are in the cold." 
 
 Bearne said, *' Why, how could that be? 
 We know that you and Helga can ask your- 
 selves, and proud shall we be to see you here 
 whenever you care to come." 
 
 ** So I thought," said Thorgils, and brought 
 over Helga the night before the wedding; and 
 there they were at the door when Asgrim and 
 his company came riding up. 
 
 Asgrim stopped dead on the hill. ^' There's 
 that accursed old Thorgils," he said. ^' Now 
 I go no further, since I cannot suffer his 
 insults." 
 
188 THORGILS 
 
 ** Never mind him now," says Thorhall. 
 ** Consider him beneath your notice." 
 
 '' How am I to do that if he is not so? " cried 
 Asgrim ; but he had to go on. He was sore all 
 over, and the friendly greeting of Thorgils 
 made him no better. In fact, he behaved badly, 
 and meditated worse. He determined that he 
 must get rid of Thorgils. Thorgils watched 
 him with a queer gleam in his eye — the sort of 
 look which a man shows when he has a salmon 
 lightly hooked in heavy water, and prepares 
 for anything to happen. 
 
 But it was a dull feast. Thorgils said very 
 little, and Asgrim hardly anything; for when- 
 ever he began to talk loudly he saw Thorgils 
 looking at him as if he were amused, and 
 stopped. All this maddened Asgrim. 
 
CHAPTER XXII 
 
 NOW there was bustle in and about the 
 garth, for it was the morrow of the feast 
 when men were getting ready to ride out. 
 Thorgils, who was quite at home at the Pit, was 
 in no sort of hurry, so stood about talking to 
 the others, or at his favourite sport of watching 
 them and getting quiet amusement out of their 
 tricks and ways. In particular he observed 
 Asgrim's cavalcade making preparations: fine 
 horses, fine accoutrements and thralls who 
 shone, as it were, with a reflected splendour 
 from their proud master. Asgrim himself was 
 not to be seen, but his reeve was much to be 
 observed. In his smaller way he reproduced 
 the habit of his lord; he puffed out his cheeks 
 and exploded his breath, he stared and opened 
 his mouth in the same way; he said, *' God bless 
 me ! ' ' or * * What 's the meaning of this, my 
 man? '* — just as Asgrim might. And he did 
 not know, any more than Asgrim did, how un- 
 
 189 
 
190 THORGILS 
 
 commonly like a goose in a farmyard he was, 
 with a small soaring head wagging above a 
 bulging breast. 
 
 Then, as he leaned by the house wall watching 
 all this, Thorgils' eye caught a gleam of red 
 down below the house on the edge of the wood. 
 There was Asgrim, down there, talking with 
 a man. 
 
 The man was a thrall — and more than that, 
 it was a thrall of his from Treadholt, and not 
 one of Asgrim 's own. What did this mean? 
 Thorgils kept his eye fixed upon them. He saw 
 Asgrim talking earnestly ; with one hand up he 
 made quick gestures, and then a lunge forward. 
 The thrall had his head bent, but was listening 
 closely. When Asgrim had finished, the other 
 looked all about him, into the wood, out into the 
 meadows, down into the valley where the river 
 ran boiling and foaming among the rocks. After 
 some time, and after another word or two from 
 Asgrim, he looked up and spoke a few sen- 
 tences. Then Asgrim opened his wallet and 
 took out something in his fist. Thorgils was 
 now absorbed in observation. He saw Asgrim 
 deal out his handful piece by piece into his other 
 hand. After a time he paused and showed his 
 
ASGRIM'S MONEY 191 
 
 new handful to the thrall. The thrall shifted 
 about ; they talked both at once ; then Asgrim 
 dealt out more pieces — and the thrall took the 
 handful and put it into a cloth, and stuffed the 
 whole into his breast. They parted with a 
 word or two more. Asgrim went along the 
 woodside; the thrall slipped into it. Thorgils 
 leaned motionless by the house and waited. It 
 was a long time before he saw either of them 
 again, but when he did, it was Asgrim first. 
 
 Asgrim came round the house from the back 
 of it, and found himself face to face with Thor- 
 gils. He stopped and puffed out his cheeks ; his 
 eyes flickered ; but he came on, and greeted his 
 enemy. *' So, neighbour! Much bustle this 
 morning! But to-night, I daresay, all will be 
 quiet enough." 
 
 ** Some will be quiet," said Thorgils; '' but 
 some will be unquiet. Mostly it runs like this, 
 that as men do so they sleep." 
 
 ** Yes, yes," said Asgrim; *' and so it should 
 be. Are you away early? " 
 
 ^* I might be," said Thorgils — and just then 
 he saw his thrall come in from the other side 
 and enter the house. 
 
 Asgrim and his retinue were mounted and 
 
192 THORGILS 
 
 away soon after dinner. Then Thorgils gave 
 the word for saddling, and had all ready by four 
 o'clock in the afternoon. Just at the last mo- 
 ment, when Helga was mounted, and all the 
 company waited for Thorgils, he seemed to re- 
 member something which he must see about. 
 He said to Helga, *' Do you go on with all of 
 them by the valley, I shall overtake you, going 
 over the hill. Look for me at the ferry. If I am 
 not there, wait for me half an hour — not more.'' 
 Then to the thrall who had taken Asgrim's 
 money he said, ' ' Walk my horse and your own. 
 I shall have something for you to carry." The 
 man lowered his eyes, but had nothing to say. 
 Thorgils went back into the house and stayed 
 there for an hour ; then he came out with a sack 
 full of hay or something soft, and gave that to 
 the thrall to carry. He mounted his horse with 
 difficulty, for he was now old and stiff, and 
 led the way up the hill. The thrall followed 
 him. 
 
 At the top of the hill Thorgils waited for the 
 man to come up. '* I see you have a good axe 
 on you," he said. ** Where did you get that 
 from? " The thrall said that he had found it in 
 the river-bed as they were riding to the Pit, and 
 
ASGRIM'S MONEY 193 
 
 that he had ground it up at the house. Thorgils 
 said, '' Let me look at it/' and leaned over to 
 reach it. He put out his hand for it and touched 
 the breast of the thrall with his wrist. He then 
 felt the hard lump of the money which he had 
 hidden there, tied up in a cloth. The thrall him- 
 self was as white as cloth when he handed over 
 the axe. Thorgils took it from him, looked at it 
 and hung it over his saddle-bow. Then he said, 
 *^ Now give me Asgrim's money which you have 
 in your breast.'' The man breathed sharply 
 through his nose, and fumbled for the bundle. 
 It was handed over. Thorgils took it. His 
 eyes blazed. '^ You dog," he said between his 
 teeth and struck the man in the face. The thrall 
 turned his head aside to avoid it, and Earth- 
 house-prey flashed in the air. The head rolled 
 into the heather; the body swayed and fell 
 under the horse, but the feet still held, and 
 slewed the saddle round. 
 
 Thorgils put the head in the sack of hay, freed 
 the saddle and righted it, and went his way down 
 the hill, leading the horse. Already his rage 
 had left him. He was now thinking what Asgrim 
 would look like when he had his money back 
 and the head into the bargain. ** Money well 
 
194 THORGILS 
 
 laid out/' he said to himself, ** and returned 
 with interest. ' ' 
 
 He found Helga waiting for him at the ferry. 
 She had been there half an hour. ** Why are 
 you so late? '' she said, ** and what have you 
 done with Haurd? '' 
 
 ** Haurd had money,'' he said, ** and offered 
 it for his freedom. Now he has got it. ' ' 
 
CHAPTER XXIII 
 
 THE LAST BATTLE 
 
 ASGRIM Ellida-Grimsson was not directly- 
 answerable for Thorgils ' last battle ; but 
 in a sense he was. He hoped that mis- 
 chief would ensue, and mischief did — yet he put 
 it so that nothing could be brought home to him. 
 
 Thorgils had been ill all the winter with a 
 chill which he had taken when it began, and 
 which settled on his chest and would not leave 
 him. Helga never left him either, but was de- 
 voted; and when he was able to get out of bed 
 and look at his spindle shanks he first read his 
 emaciation in her kind eyes. They were full 
 of trouble. ** My dear," she said, ** it makes 
 me sad to look at you." ** I don't wonder at 
 it," he said. ** You say to yourself, That is a 
 stony field I have been tending. What sort of a 
 crop off that, after all my pains ? ' ' 
 
 ^ ^ No, " she said, ' ' I don't say that. " * ' Then 
 what do you say? " *' I say that I shall love to 
 see you well again and out in the world; and 
 
 195 
 
196 THORGILS 
 
 lean as you are I ^d rather have you with me than 
 any man I ever saw yet. " * * That 's good news, ' ' 
 said Thorgils, ** and I shall get fatter on it.'' 
 He never did that, but he was up and about be- 
 fore the spring weather came ; and when once 
 he was on his feet again nothing could keep him 
 within doors. He had grown to be very fond of 
 Bearne of the Pit in his old age, partly for his 
 own sake, but mostly for Thorny 's. She re- 
 minded him of Thorey, whom he had never for- 
 gotten for an hour together. He liked in these 
 days to sit with his arms on the arms of a chair, 
 and see Thorny going about her affairs. 
 
 Directly he was well enough to mount his 
 horse he must needs go over to Pit, and it was 
 going over there that he met Helge and fought 
 his last battle. 
 
 Helge was a man from the East country, a 
 shipman and acquaintance of Asgrim's, who 
 brought a ship into Einar's haven with stores 
 for Asgrim. Asgrim had been waiting for him 
 down at the Haven, had gone aboard when the 
 ship was berthed, and sampled his goods. He 
 said that he wouldn't stay, and directed Helge to 
 ride up to his house as soon as he had landed 
 his freight — ** And if a crow-faced old rogue 
 
THE LAST BATTLE 197 
 
 named Thorgils should be in your road and you 
 should happen to give him a fall/' he said, 
 ** why, you will be none the less welcome for 
 that.'' There will be a man of his on to you 
 for toll, like enough," he said, *' but never you 
 pay it. That's an old quarrel between us, and 
 maybe he thinks he has bested me over it^ — but 
 I don't know who is likely to laugh last in it yet. 
 There will be a good laugh for me if you should 
 turn him into the mire. So much I will tell 
 you." Then he got down into his boat and 
 was pulled away. 
 
 By-and-by, sure enough, a boat came along- 
 side with a man in her asking for the toll. 
 Helge said that he had orders not to pay it. 
 ** You must answer to my master for that," 
 said the toll-maker ; * ' Thorgils of Treadholt is 
 his name, a man of great worship in this coun- 
 try. It is nothing to do with me." Helge said 
 that he would answer or not as it came to him 
 when he met Thorgils. 
 
 The road from the Haven crossed that to the 
 Pit, and just thereabouts the two men met. 
 It was blowing keenly from the North-west with 
 a powdery snow, and Thorgils, who felt the cold, 
 was huddled up in his cloak, and crouched over 
 
198 THORGILS 
 
 his horse's neck to escape what he could of it. 
 Helge, looking him over, said, *^ This old 
 atomy must be my man. We'll soon have him 
 on his back, I believe. ' ' 
 
 It was not at all difficult to jostle into Thor- 
 gils, who was not looking out for anything of 
 the sort. As nearly as could be, he was out of 
 the saddle. * * What are you doing, my friend 1 ' ' 
 he cried out sharply. *^ Is the road too straight 
 for you? And who may you be then who drive 
 into your betters? " He added this last ques- 
 tion because Helge was laughing at him. 
 
 Helge now set his arms akimbo, and stuck out 
 his feet. ** Betters, old master! Than whom 
 are you the better on this road ? And who might 
 you be, with your foot in the grave 1 ' ' 
 
 Thorgils told his name. *' That is what they 
 call me who know me." 
 
 Helge said, ** That was the name of a fight- 
 ing man, I understood. But some say it is the 
 name of a toll-monger who now and then gets 
 more than he asks for. Now which Thorgils of 
 these might you be? Or are you the grand- 
 father of both of them? " 
 
 Thorgils became angry. *' You shall find out 
 who I am, my fine sir," he said. *' I am one 
 
THE LAST BATTLE 199 
 
 who has never been men's laughing-stock yet, 
 and shall not be now. Swing your axe, man, 
 and face me now in battle. That is the way to 
 prove it. ' * 
 
 The wind was sharp in his face, and he was 
 still screwed up to avoid it. Helge scorned him 
 in his heart, but nevertheless he swung out his 
 axe, saying as he did so, ^' Little enough to 
 prove upon your weevilly carcass, I'm thinking. 
 And what shall be left for the worms if I carve 
 it now? " 
 
 But Thorgils was looking at his axe. ** You 
 will do little with that. It's no weapon to bite 
 into my skull — but you have brought it on your- 
 self." 
 
 His eyes narrowed down to fine lines of light, 
 and his lips were stretched to a grin. He looked 
 both wicked and happy at once, huddled up in 
 the saddle — and he was just what he looked, 
 having a zest for battle and a keen rage against 
 his adversary in his heart. 
 
 Helge had backed his horse somewhat, and 
 now came on. Thorgils waited for him; angry 
 as he was, and mettlesome, he did not mean to 
 strike the first blow. Helge spurred forward, 
 then, and aimed for the sword-arm; Thorgils 
 
200 THORGILS 
 
 avoided that by spurring his horse sharply and 
 twisting himself sideways; but the axe came 
 down upon the calf of his leg, and though it was 
 too blunt to make a bad wound, it made wound 
 enough to inflame Thorgils. He turned his 
 horse, and so had his back to the wind, and then 
 at the moment Helge was facing him again. 
 But before he had time to get the mockery out 
 of his face, suddenly, as he scorned him, the old 
 man became transformed into the likeness of a 
 striking snake. His head lifted, his body 
 straightened ; then the whole of him darted for- 
 ward. Earth-house-prey streaked the air like a 
 flash of lightning, and struck Helge on the 
 shoulder. The axe dropped, and the arm with 
 it. Helge threw back his head and groaned; 
 then toppled sideways and fell to earth. Thor- 
 gils, his rage still high in him, rode on his way 
 into the teeth of the wind. He felt his leg stif- 
 fening ; and when he reached the Pit, he had to 
 be lifted down from horseback. 
 
 But before he had reached the Pit his anger 
 had left him, and he was sorry for what he had 
 done. He told Bearne about it. ** That hot- 
 faced dumpling of a man bounced me into it. I 
 ought to have known better. I am an old fool. 
 
THE LAST BATTLE 201 
 
 But now I Ve killed him, and must take the con- 
 sequences of it. See what you can do for me, 
 son-in-law; but take notice that I will pay full 
 weregild for the slaughter. It was forced upon 
 me by insolence— and a man grows touchy as he 
 grows old— but the challenge came from me; 
 and now I am sorry for it." 
 
 That was Thorgils' last battle, and the ride 
 to the Pit was his last ride too. His leg stiff- 
 ened and remained stiff. He had to be carried 
 home to Treadholt, and could never again walk 
 without the help of a stick. Nothing followed 
 upon the battle for some time. Asgrim made no 
 claim, did nothing at all; but news travelled 
 slowly about Iceland in those days, and Thor- 
 gils always said that something more would be 
 heard of it. Bearne went to the Thing tjiat 
 summer and proclaimed the slaughter there, 
 offering weregild on Thorgils' behalf. No 
 claim was set up. It was two years, they say, 
 before the affair was moved again — and by 
 that time Thorgils was past his work, and lay 
 long abed. The tale of Helge's vindication will 
 be the last I have to tell about Thorgils. 
 
CHAPTER XXIV 
 
 THE LAST THOEGILISM 
 
 IT was in early summer, the last that Thor- 
 gils was to see, that two brothers of Helge's 
 came over to Einar's haven in a ship from 
 the East. They were Einar and Sigurd by 
 name, and their coming was a secret. Asgrim 
 had nothing to do with it. They came in late 
 one evening, moored their ship, were aland, 
 themselves and their horses, and away betimes 
 before anybody had news of them. They made 
 fast riding, and reached Treadholt by nine 
 o 'clock in the morning. 
 
 The place was very quiet, for all the men 
 were away at the hay-harvest, the women were 
 busy, and old Thorgils lying in his bed looking 
 at the sunlight dancing on the wall. The sun 
 hit the water in a bucket outside, and the flicker 
 that he saw was reflected from the water. 
 
 Einar and Sigurd had left their horses below 
 the garth, and walked up to the house. At the 
 
THE LAST THORGILISM 203 
 
 door, which was open, they stopped and whis- 
 pered together. Sigurd said, ** We shall have 
 no trouble here. They are all out and about." 
 Einar said nothing, and then Sigurd asked him, 
 '' Who shall do it, you or If " Einar looked all 
 about before he spoke. Then he said, '^ I don't 
 much care about this. It seems a bad job to me 
 for the two of us to kill an old man in his bed, 
 a man who has had a life of renown and good 
 report. He must be near his death in any case. 
 I tell you, I don't like if 
 
 Thorgils heard them muttering, but not what 
 they said. He turned out of bed directly, and 
 covered himself with his old cloak. Then he 
 picked up Earth-house-prey, which always slept 
 with him, picked up his stick and hobbled out 
 into the hall. The two men at the door saw him 
 coming, and stared open-mouthed at him. 
 Thorgils stood shaking in mid-hall; he wasn't 
 very steady on his feet the first thing in the 
 morning, as he always woke up stiff. 
 
 ** Now come in, the pair of you," he said, 
 ' * and have what you can get of me. ' ' 
 
 They hesitated at first, but then came into 
 the hall, and stood watching Thorgils. 
 
 *' Who may you be," Thorgils asked them, 
 
1204 THORGILS 
 
 ** who came up here with your weapons 
 ready? '' 
 
 Sigurd said, ** We are the brethren of Helge 
 whom you slew. ' ' Thorgils nodded his head. 
 
 * * I thought as much, ' ' he answered. * * I laid 
 an egg that day which I thought would hatch out 
 presently. Well, come and do what you can — 
 and I will do what I can." 
 
 Then Einar said, '' Thorgils, I am very un- 
 willing to go on with this, and my brother here 
 is likeminded with me. If I have anything to do 
 with it we will compose this quarrel." Then he 
 threw his sword down and waited where he was. 
 
 Thorgils' old eyes shone, and his face became 
 friendly at once. '* You speak like a man," he 
 said, * * and you may be sure I have had enough 
 fighting by this time. Now I'll tell you the 
 truth. Your brother Helge made me angry, less 
 on his own account than on that of the man 
 who egged him on. And he wasn't quick 
 enough for me, and was ill-armed — and so I told 
 him. But there it was. I killed him, and was 
 sorry for it, and ready to pay my debt at any 
 time. But now you treat me better than I de- 
 serve, and shall have my friendship if you will 
 take it. I will pay weregild for Helge here and 
 
THE LAST THORGILISM 205 
 
 now ; and to you ' ' — lie spoke to Einar — * * I will 
 give this good sword of mine. Earth-house- 
 prey I call it, for I took it out of the earth, long 
 ago in Ireland ; and I've worn it fifty years ; and 
 a good friend it has been to me. There's no 
 better sword in this, country, and it will do you 
 credit, and you it — ^f or you are a fine man. As 
 for you" — this to Sigurd — ** you shall take 
 five marks of silver from me, if you please, 
 and reckon up with your brother after- 
 wards." 
 
 Then he called Helga to come in and serve 
 them with drink; and they parted on good 
 terms. 
 
 He told Helga afterwards that he should die 
 very soon, because the better part of him was 
 gone now. He said that he wished to die at the 
 Pit, but didn't tell her the reason. So when 
 the hay was all in, he was carried over to 
 Bearne's house — and there he took to his bed, 
 and there he died. 
 
 His mind wandered very much towards the 
 end. He thought that Thorny was her mother, 
 and that they were all in the wooden house in 
 the desert bay. He used to stroke her hair, 
 and tell her to have patience and courage. 
 
206 THORGILS 
 
 *' All will go well, my dear/^ he was fond of 
 telling her, '* for you and I have been lovers 
 from the beginning, and love outlives the dark.*' 
 Helga took it bravely. 
 
 THE END 
 
UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LIBRARY 
 BERKELEY 
 
 THIS BOOK IS DUE ON THE LAST DATE 
 
 STAMPED BELOW 
 
 Books not returned on time are subject to a fine of 
 50c per volume after the third day overdue, increasing 
 to $1.00 per volume after the sixth day. Books not in 
 deniand may be renewed if application is made before 
 expiration of loan period. 
 
 ^.. iu; 
 
 im 31 1921 
 FEB 16 1921 
 
 >^^%^ 
 
 fSOe"" 
 
 ^. 4*/ W "».■ 
 
 OCT 1 4 J982 9 6 
 
 8ECCIR.HW 5 "SI 
 
 
 5aip-7,'16 
 

 1 ^ 
 
 359.34t 
 
 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LIBRARY