CHAPTER XVII.

THE END OF THE STORY.

"A boon! a boon!" exclaimed Helgi. "Kari seeks a boon. A wife, or a farm, or a pair of pigskin trousers; which is it, Kari? Before you win it you must sing us a stave. Strike up, man!"

"No boon I seek," replied Kari. "A maiden stands without who seeks King Estein, and will not come inside."

"Aha!" laughed Helgi. "Blows the wind that way?"

"What does she want?" asked Estein.

"I know not; she would not tell."

"Tell her to come in," said Earl Sigvald. "Do you think it is fitting that the king should go out at every woman's pleasure?"

"That is what I told her, but she said she would see the king outside or go away."

"Bid her come in or go away!" cried the earl.

"Nay, rather ask her what her errand is about," said Estein.

"And tell her," added Helgi as the bird-man turned away, "that here sits the king's foster-brother, a most proper person at all times to hear a maiden's tale, and now most persuasively charged with ale."

The man went down the hall again, and Earl Sigvald exclaimed testily,--

"Some thrall's sweetheart doubtless, come to babble her complaints."

"Or perhaps the bride come to claim King Estein's hand," suggested his son. In a minute Kari returned.

"She will not tell her business," he said, "but begs earnestly to see the king."

"Bid her begone!" cried the earl. "The king is feasting with his guests."

"Did not her eyes sparkle and her trouble seem to leave her when she heard the king's foster-brother was here?" asked Helgi.

"I shall press his claims myself," said Estein, rising from his seat.

"Will you see her then?" asked the earl.

"Why not?" replied Estein. "Perchance she brings tidings of importance."

"If you rise at every strange woman's bidding you will have many suitors," said the earl.

"That is the lot of a king," replied Estein, with a smile.

The smile died quickly from his face as he walked down the hall, and men noticed that he looked grave and preoccupied again. It was not that his thoughts were running on this unusual summons; as he pa.s.sed through the dark vestibule he felt only a little curiosity, and at the door he paused and looked out idly enough.

It was a fine starlight night, and down below he could see the glimmer of the sea, and across the fiord the black outline of the hills, and nearer at hand he heard the sough of the night breeze in the pines. Close outside, the tall, hooded figure of a woman stood clearly outlined, while he himself was obscured in shadow.

At the second glance, something in the pose of his strange visitor struck his memory sharply. She seemed at first afraid to speak, and, with rising interest, he said courteously,--

"You wish to see me?"

The girl seemed to start a little, and then she said in a low voice,--

"Are you King Estein?"

The words were almost lost in the hood that shrouded her head.

They died away to a low whisper; but ere they were gone Estein had caught the slight flavour of a foreign accent, and for an instant he was on the Holy Isle again. With a sharp effort he controlled the sudden rush of emotion they called up, and even altered his voice to a low, guarded pitch as he answered,--

"I am the king." The girl paused for a moment as if to collect her thoughts, and then she said,--

"You had a brother, King Estein--Olaf Hakonson--"

She stopped again, and seemed to look hesitatingly at him.

"What of him?" said Estein.

"He fell, alas, long since. Forgive me for calling him to mind now, but he is in my story."

"Well?"

"Three men were at his death," said the girl, gaining confidence a little. "Thord the Tall, Snaekol Gunnarson, and Thorfin of Skapstead. Snaekol and Thorfin are dead long since--may G.o.d forgive them! but Thord the Tall lived to repent of the burning."

"It was an ill deed," said Estein.

"He was a heathen man then, King Estein--but I forget, you know not of Christians."

"I have heard of them," said Estein, half to himself.

"As the years drew on he became a Christian, and followed another G.o.d and another creed, and left the world and Viking forays, and came to a little island of the Orkneys with me, his only child.

For both my brothers fell in battle, King Estein, and now there are none others left in the feud."

"How do men call you?" said Estein, asking only that he might hear her name again.

"I am Osla, the daughter of Thord the Tall," she answered, drawing herself up with a touch of half defiant pride. "He was the enemy of your family, but a lender-man [Footnote: n.o.bleman.] of high birth, and a good and n.o.ble man."

"Ay?"

"He lived in the island," she went on, "for many years, all alone save for me."

Estein could not keep himself from asking,--

"Alone all the time?"

"All--save once indeed, when a Viking came by chance, but he left shortly," and then she continued hastily: "My father thought often of the burning. Many deeds he had done which he repented of there in the solitude of the Holy Isle. Yet was he not worse than others, only he became a Christian, and so they seemed ill deeds to him."

"Even this burning?" said Estein, a little dryly.