XV
Leif in after days had his name of The Lucky, not for the great country which he had explored, nor for what he brought back from it, nor for the good passage home which he made, but for another reason altogether. It was the fact that the wind never failed them from the day they set out until that one on which they first saw plainly in the sea the snow mountains of Greenland. Everybody on board was in high spirits. Leif himself at the helm, and the look-out man was waiting for the first view of the great headland beyond which Ericsfrith with its two rocks would open up, and a straight course for the haven. And then, suddenly, Leif put down the helm, hard, and the ship veered several points off the land.
"What will you do, master?" one asked him, and Leif replied, "Look out and see what I will do. Do you see nothing on the water?"
The man said that he saw nothing out of the common. "Well," said Leif, "look again. I see a rock, or else a ship—and if a ship, then a ship on a rock."
They all saw the rock now. "Yes," said Leif, "and there's a ship too, or a piece of a ship; for there are men on the rock."
That was true too, but before they were near enough to count the survivors of a wreck, pieces of the wreck itself, and baulks of timber, which they supposed her cargo, came drifting by them; and then presently a drowned man with a white face turned upwards.
Leif ran on, as near to the rock as he dared, near enough at least to see the men huddled on the ridge of it, and their hands up signalling to them. There, too, were the bows of a good ship rising high into the air like a seal. The rock was a sort of shelf in the sea, and stood out some ten furlongs from the great headland.
Leif brought up his ship and cast anchor. He had the boat out, and himself rowed out to the wreck. "They can do us no harm, whoever they are," he said; "but I think they are friends of ours." Some fifteen men were huddled together, and apart from them was a woman in a blue cloak, with a man lying beside her, his head on her lap, and a cloth over his face. She did not move as the boat drew in, but all the others came scrambling down the shelf to the water's edge.
Leif shouted. "Who are ye? And of what country?"
"Thore's people—from Ramfirth."
"Where is Thore?" They pointed to the woman.
"Yonder he lies hurt. That is his wife."
"And you are for Ericshaven?"
They said that they were. "Then you are well met," said Leif, and stepped on to the rock.
Gudrid's eyes were great and serious. Leif came to her and took her hands. "I little thought we should meet again like this."
"We must have died without you," she said.
Then he asked to look at poor Thore. He was unconscious, and had a great wound in his temple, cut open almost to the bone. Gudrid told him that when they struck, Thore, who had been at the helm, was thrown out upon the edge of the rock. One of his men, thrown out also, had pulled him up out of the sea. Gudrid herself had been below, sleeping. She did not know how she had been saved. She awoke at the shock to find herself in water. Then Leif saw that she was wet through and almost rigid with cold. He did not believe Thore was dead, nor did she. "No, no, he won't die so. He will die in my arms." So Gudrid said.
They took off the sick man first, and Gudrid with him. Both of them were put to bed, where Gudrid, who was now in a fever, soon became light-headed. Leif attended to her like a woman. It was wonderful to see so big a man so gentle and light in the hand.
He brought them all in safely, and Thore and Gudrid were taken up to Brattalithe, to lodge with Eric until one at least of them was well again. Gudrid very soon recovered, and seemed none the worse, but in all her glow of beauty and health. Thore was much slower. His wound pained him a great deal. Cold had got into it and inflamed it. The pain made him fretful; he seemed much older than a year and a half's absence could account for, and was anxious to get home.
Gudrid wished to go also. Everybody was very kind to her at Brattalithe. She was a great favourite with Eric Red, who used to tell her that she ought to have married one of his sons. "Then I should have been sure that things would go right here when I am out of the way." Gudrid once replied to that that none had asked her, whereupon the old man looked slyly about him, and then said: "There was one at least was thinking of you—and so he is now."
She knew that too well. Thorstan was consumed by love, and must always be with her if he could. She was gentle with him, as she was with everybody, and had to own to herself that it was Thorstan who now possessed her thoughts. That may have been going by contraries, for if Leif paid her nothing but the good-humoured civility he had ready for everybody, Thorstan, on his part, seemed afraid of her, and was speechless in her company. But there's all the difference in the world between a man completely easy in your company and one completely uneasy. Leif was a young giant, the best-tempered giant in the world; but it was clear to Gudrid that he had other things to think about besides love. He was full of the exploration he had made, determined to get more of the good timber over, and with more than half a mind to go out and settle in Wineland. Dirk made wine of the grapes which they had brought back. There was a great feast, and everybody got very drunk. If Eric Red had not died and left the Greenland settlement on his hands there is little doubt but Leif would have colonised Wineland.
Meantime, Thorwald, the third of the brothers, was on fire with the thought of going. He said that he should go out next spring if Leif would let him have his boat. Thore—to the surprise of all—said that he would go too, but nobody seemed to want him. Leif said: "I don't think you a lucky man, Thore. And I don't think your wife will care about so long and rough a voyage, seeing what you made of her last." The laugh went against Thore.
"Gudrid shall stay with her father," said he; but Gudrid said, "I shall go if you do." Thorstan's face fell, and Eric Red burst into a great shout of laughter. "Oh, sour face," he cried out, "let us hear what you have to say about all this."
Thorstan was very hot, but he answered his father. "I think that
Gudrid should not go, nor Thore either"—which made Eric chuckle.
When he was with her the next day, after a long time of brooding,
Thorstan said that he hoped she would not go to Wineland.
"I must go if Thore goes," she said over her needlework.
"If Thore goes, I shall go myself," Thorstan said after a pause.
Gudrid looked up, but said nothing.
"He is not a lucky man—that is to be seen," Thorstan said then. "And he has no great knowledge of the sea, and is moreover infirm. It would come to this, that he would hurt himself, and you would have the care of him as you did upon the rock out beyond the head."
She answered him gravely. "It may be as you say, that he is not lucky. Indeed, I know it too well. For it was told me before ever I saw or heard of him, that he would die before me."
Thorstan was now strongly moved. He wrung his hands together. "I beg you to tell me just what was said about that."
She coloured deeply. "No, I cannot tell you."
But Thorstan said: "I know what it was. It was said that you would have two husbands. Was it not so?"
She could not tell him the truth; so she said, "Yes." Then Thorstan said in a voice which did not sound like his, "That is another reason why I must go." And then they looked at each other for a measurable space of time—and then Thorstan got up and left her.
When they met again he was as he had always been before; but Gudrid was frightened, and insisted on going home to Stockness. It was hard to persuade Eric Red to let her leave him. He had grown very fond of her, and the more so because he hated his own daughter Freydis. But Gudrid held to her determination, and won her own way. At parting old Eric took her in his arms. "I am loth to let thee go, dear child," he said, "and afraid lest I lose thee altogether. But thou art between two old men who love thee, and Thore has the first claim. Promise me this, that if he die before me thou wilt come back to Brattalithe and be a daughter to me."
"Yes," Gudrid said, "I promise you that."
"Right," said old Eric. "Then I shall live to see thee again." With that he kissed her and let her go.
XVI
Thorwald told Leif that he had been too faint-hearted in his explorations of Wineland. "You were bolder than Biorn, I grant you," he said; "but you only nibbled at the rind after all. I promise you I will dig down deeper into the meat."
"Dig," said Leif, "dig by all means. But look that you don't dig your grave. I saw no men the length and breadth of the land; and yet it is unreasonable to think that no men have been engendered to live in such a fine and fruitful country. If our father were not so old and hard to move, I tell you I should be for cutting adrift from Greenland and settling out there. But then I would go in a larger way than you intend. I would take a wife first of all——"
"So would Thorstan, our brother, if he could get her," said Thorwald.
"But he cannot get her," Leif said, and then Thorwald, "He won't move from her until he does get her."
Leif said: "He will go if Thore takes her out with you. But never mind all that. You will need a stock of cattle if you are for settling, and a strong body of men. It is not the way of our people to live in tents and eat only of the beasts that we chance to take. We are too fond of the earth to care to live without what she can give us. And if by incessant toil you win a sustenance out of this frozen land, consider what you could do in Wineland, where there is no frost, and but a sprinkling of snow, and where the soil is four feet deep, or double that for all I know."
"You are talking of one thing, and I thinking of another," Thorwald said. "Time enough to settle when I have discovered the country for you. That's what I mean to do."
Leif helped his brother with a ship and good advice; and Thorwald sailed west in the spring with a sufficient crew. Thore did not go; for that winter there had been a great deal of sickness, and old Thorbeorn took it badly, and died of it. Thore himself had the sickness, and Gudrid nursed him through it; but he was not fit for a long voyage. And Thorstan would not go either, though he kept away from Stockness, and saw nothing of Gudrid. Thorwald would have been glad of his help, for Thorstan was very strong and a man who could be depended upon; but he saw the trouble in his eyes and forbore to urge him. It came to this, then, that Thorwald was in sole command. He was young and full of spirit; he did not doubt himself the least in the world: but Leif doubted him, and threw away much sound advice upon him.
They sailed out of the frith one fine afternoon, and were lost to sight. They had a prosperous voyage throughout, and no trouble in picking up the Island of Sweet Dew, the river and the lake. There, in a glade of the forest and in full view of the lake, they saw the booths still standing, which Lief and his men had set up. They were intact, the bolts seemingly not drawn, and not much the matter with the goods within, but what fresh air and sunlight could amend it. They spent the better part of six weeks in and about those shores, but then, leaving a garrison at the booths, Thorwald and the rest of the crew went far and wide over the land, travelling mainly by boat up the great river which fed the lake on the west. They did not return till late in the autumn.
They reported to their friends that so far as they had been the forest land extended, with timber in it of incredible size and height. It increased in density the further they went, and the country all level, with no mountains to be seen. In the river were many shallows, and islands too; the shores were white sand and firm to walk upon. They had met with few animals, and no signs of men at all. Thorwald, who was unaccustomed to a forest country, said that he should never settle there, and that he should go further north, where a man might perhaps see where he was going. But they stayed out the winter where they were.
In the spring they made their preparations to depart. They sailed east in the first place, but always north of the land, but encountered rough weather off a great headland which drove them on to the beach and broke the ship's back. That gave them a great deal of work, and involved a long stay while they mended her. There was abundance of timber, and of good quality, and they were well stocked with tools; but there was much building to be done before they could get at their work, and it took them the best part of the summer. But they were away about the time of harvest, and still sailing north, and being east of the mainland, the country appeared to grow more open, the trees were sparse, and they could see hills to the far west of them. So presently, when there opened out to them the mouth of a great frith, Thorwald sailed up it some distance till he came to a place where there were bluffs standing up sheer in the water, and beyond a headland a broad bay. Thereabouts, standing close inshore he berthed his ship, and was able to run out gangways and walk from ship to land. He himself with a party went into the country to look about them. It was fine open land, with a good deal of wood growing on it, but well-watered and with pasture of fine quality. "This country suits me," Thorwald said. "I shall stay here and make a homestead in it." As it turned out he spoke more truly than he thought for.
On their way back to the ship they struck the frith nearer to the mouth than where the anchorage was. They jumped down the cliffs to the beach, and in the very act to jump Thorwald saw something move between two hummocks of sand. He collected his men together and advanced quietly. There behind the hummocks they saw men. Three hide-boats lay at the water's edge. There were three men to each.
Thorwald said, "We must rush upon them suddenly. Let each of us make sure of one man." There were twelve men with Thorwald, counting himself.
The men, who were short and very dark, with black hair, in which were feathers, had bows with them; but Thorwald gave them no chance of using them. At a signal his party sprang with cries from behind the hummocks, and fell upon them. Three fell at once; the others took to the water and were slain there, all but one. He, as he went, slid out a boat, and scrambling in, made off at a great pace, and was soon out of sight behind the cliffs. Thorwald took the hide-boats and the weapons, but left the dead men where they lay. Then he went back to the ship, uneasy, thinking what he had better do.
It was everybody's advice that they should seek an anchorage further from the shore—and that they did. Setting a watch, they went to bed. Nothing disturbed them until the grey hour of the morning; but then the watchman called loudly to Thorwald: "Thorwald, Thorwald, arm yourself, and come up!" Thorwald leapt to his feet and ran out to look. The water was very smooth and still, but listening intently, he could hear countless paddle-strokes; and by and by in the mist the water appeared to be moving, so many and close together were the boats, and so shadowy-grey the men in them.
"Out with your war-wall," Thorwald cried, and all the crew, now wide awake, obeyed him. The war-wall was run up and made fast. Every man took spear and shield and stood behind it, ready for the worst.
The natives came within easy shooting range and rained showers of arrows at the ship. They did not venture to get at closer quarters, but held on until they had shot all their arrows; then made off with cries. The Icelanders looked at each other, and Thorwald, who was very pale, said, "Is any man here wounded?" They told him No. Then Thorwald, smiling rather queerly, said: "There slipped in an arrow between the rails of the board and my shield and struck me under the arm. You shall take it out, one of you, but I declare it my death-wound. I feel the venom working in me; and now I see how wisely I spoke when I said that my homestead should be out yonder. So it will be, but a smaller one than I thought to have put up. Now," he said, lying down upon a skin which they had spread for him, "pull me out this accursed dart, and listen to what I say. You shall bury me there where my homestead is to be, and put up a Cross over me. For though I am not long christened I know that I belong to the true faith. Call that place Crossness in memory of me, and when you go home tell my people where I lie, in case any of them come out and are minded to see if I need anything."
He bore the pulling out of the dart with great cheerfulness, and composed himself for his end. The poison worked swiftly. He was soon discoloured, and rambled much in his talk. Towards the end they had to hold him, and at sunset he died.
Everything was done as he had ordered it. They dug him a grave, rather than piled a cairn about him as the custom had always been; but sat him up in it with his weapons, thinking that more honourable. There were no Christians among them to say any prayer over the grave; but they made a great Cross and carved runes upon it. Then they went back to the ship and got the anchor up, being ill-disposed to stay there another day. The night passed without attack, and by daylight they rowed out of the frith, and out to sea. They beat their way back to Eric's booths in Wineland and found them unmolested. There they remained for the autumn and winter following; and then went home to tell Eric Red and Lief the fate of young Thorwald.
XVII
Thorbeorn of Stockness died of the winter sickness the winter before Thorwald sailed for Wineland. Thore himself had been very sick too, but he recovered and was almost himself that summer. Not altogether so, for he had lost his lightness of heart, and with that his decision and blunt common sense. Gudrid, who had fought, as it seemed to her, against fate, and prevailed, was unhappy that he should care so little to be with her. She did not know that he avoided her. But it was so. He spent most of his time at Brattalithe, where he had taken a great fancy for Thorstan. He did not tell her, and Gudrid did not know, what he and Thorstan could have to say to each other—but the two were great friends. The fact of the matter was that Thore had now got it into his head that Gudrid had cast a spell upon both himself and Thorstan, and that the prediction concerning her was less prophecy than a gift of magic power. He found that Thorstan would let him talk about his hard fate by the hour together—nay, more, he found that Thorstan did not at all avoid being cast in the same lot. Thorstan, indeed, was quite open about it. "I have so much love in me for Gudrid," he said, "that you may say whatever you please about her to me, and I shall hear you gladly. Talk evil of her, sooner than not talk at all. I shall never believe you, but I shall hear her name, and name her myself. That will be enough for me." So Thore grumbled away about his troubles, and Thorstan listened to him.
He himself saw Gudrid seldom, because he believed that it made her uneasy to have him there. Nevertheless he prevailed upon Thore to bring her to Brattalithe very often; and when she was there he would take himself off cheerfully to work about the estate. Eric Red always made much of her, and even Freydis liked her well enough. She was the only woman for whom Freydis had a civil word. Freydis used to frown upon her, with her arms folded under her bosom. "You have soft ways," she said, "and can make men do as you want; but all that is nothing to me. I see that you are made of steel underneath, for all that. I see that you are no fool, and no doll. One of these days you will fall in with a man worthy of you, and then I should like to see the pair of you at work."
Another time she said, "Good for you, Gudrid, that you have no child."
Gudrid said, "That is not my opinion. I wish with all my heart I had."
"Wait," said Freydis, "until you have a man for a mate." But that made
Gudrid's eyes bright.
"You must not scorn my husband to my face," she said.
"Pooh!" said Freydis; "he's not here for long." Then Gudrid turned pale, and grew very grave.
"You know that, then?"
"Why," said Freydis, "it is common knowledge. We have all had to do with Thorberg. She has the second sight."
"That is dreadful to me," Gudrid said, but Freydis took it easily.
"You are woman enough to bear what you must bear," she said. "One of you must die before the other. I hope you don't want to share graves with such an old man as Thore? Well, then, suppose it had been you that were to die first—do you suppose that Thore would have left you for some other girl? What do you take him for? Not he. He's man enough to have his pleasure. Trust him for that."
Such was Freydis, who treated her own husband with a high hand, and sent for him when she wanted him.
Freydis spoke of the marriage of Thorstan and Gudrid as of an appointed thing. "You will suit each other," she said. "There is good mettle in Thorstan."
Gudrid could say nothing to that. The fate hung heavy upon her. She felt that she was killing Thore, and had the knife in readiness with which to kill—not Thorstan but herself. For she knew that she had given Thorstan her heart, and that his death would be more certainly her own.
Meantime, with a dreadful fascination, she watched the doom settling like a storm about her husband Thore. She only saw it; he himself, now that he was better, was unconscious of anything impending. He talked hopefully of what he should do when Thorwald came home with news of Wineland, having forgotten his dark commerce with Thorstan. But Thorstan had not forgotten, and seemed to be waiting, like a raven on a rock, until he should be dead. Gudrid, who was fanciful, saw herself and him in that guise—silent and watchful, each on a rock, made patient by certainty. All this was terrible to her, and made her old before her time. She was not more than three-and-twenty even now. Thorstan avoided her, which made matters no better, but worse, rather; for she knew why he did it, and felt spotted, and longed to see him, and felt that she was accursed.
So life drew along for that summer and autumn; and then the long Greenland winter began, with the dark and the clinging, frozen fog. Thore seemed to make no stand against it, but took to his bed, from which Gudrid knew he would never rise. She waited on him hand and foot; he lay there watching her with his aching eyes, and wounded her to the heart. He hardly ever spoke, and seldom asked for anything. Thorstan used to come up most days to ask how he did. Gudrid knew quite well when he was on the road, and would tell Thore. "Here is Thorstan Ericsson coming. Will you not see him?"
"Nay, nay, not yet," was Thore's answer.
Then there came a day when, being very ill, and nearly blind with fever, Thore asked to see Thorstan. So Gudrid opened the door to him, and her colour came back to her when she said, "Thore has asked for you. Come in, then."
Thorstan, glowing in his health and strength, came into the hall. Gudrid took his furs from him to dry them by the fire, for the fog was frozen thick upon them.
Thorstan sat on the edge of the bed, and asked Thore how he did. "I do badly," said Thore, "but before long it will be better with me." Gudrid was turning away when he said to her, "Nay, do you stop here. I shall need you." So she stood where she was, a little way from the bed, half dreading and half glorying in what was to come.
Thore shut his eyes and seemed to wander in sleep. They heard him talking very fast to himself—counting the same things over and over again, and always failing at a certain number. They thought he was counting sheep—but it was salmon in a net. Thorstan watched him attentively, while Gudrid stood in a spell; but presently Thorstan got up and fetched a stool for her to sit upon. She could not look at him to thank him. So the time passed in silence, broken only by the feverish whispering of the sick man. The thoughts of the man were deeply upon the woman, and the joy of her nearness made his heart beat. As for her thoughts, if there was no joy in them, there was great content, and a sense of peace which she had not known for a long while. She thought that a word from him might have broken down her peace. "What need of speech between us two?" she thought. "I would live with him and know all his thoughts, and tell him all mine without speech at all."
Presently Thore woke up with a start and asked what time it was. "It is late," Gudrid said. "I will bring you your broth, and maybe you will sleep a little." She turned away to the fire, but Thore said sharply, "Stay; there is no need for broth now." Then he said, "Are you there, Thorstan? I cannot see you." Thorstan said, "Here I am."
Thore spoke again. "Take the hand of Gudrid, and tell me that you have it." He faltered for a moment, but then looked at Gudrid, and called her with that look. She went over and gave him her hand.
"Is it done?" said Thore.
"Yes, it is done," he was told.
"Her father was too quick when he married her to me, and you, maybe, were over-slow," Thore said. "She would have married you at first if you had asked her. Now you must make the most of your time, for it won't be long. And I knew what the matter was between you from the first, but in those days I loved her dearly and could not let her go. Now do you two be married soon, and take it not amiss with me that I have outstayed my time."
"You do wrong to speak so," Thorstan said. "Gudrid has been faithful and loving to you; and it is no fault of hers that she knew how it would turn out."
"No, no," said Thore. "She has been good to me."
"Now I will tell you," said Thorstan, "that I have the second sight myself, and know what my fate is, and that she must take a third husband. But if it were my fate to die the day after my wedding with Gudrid, I would wed her if she would take me. You, Thore, are dying a Christian. See to it, then, that you do not die with hard judgments of Gudrid in your heart."
Thore lay still, breathing very short. They believed he was struggling with his thoughts.
Presently he called her, and she went to him, and kneeled by the bedhead, and put her cheek against his. He lay very still, and she remained patiently waiting. So then he had a great convulsion, and struggled in it; and then turned violently in his bed and sat up. He saw Gudrid kneeling, and smiled at her. It was as if he had newly awoken out of sleep, and was himself again as she had first known him. She, as if knowing his mind, leaned towards him. He kissed her forehead, and lay down again. In a few moments more he was dead.
When they had laid him out, and lighted tapers about him, Thorstan said: "Do you now go and sleep, and I will sit up with him." She asked with the eyes that she might stay, but he would not have it. So she went away and made a bed by the fire, and slept long. He did not touch her, would not look at her. They neither kissed when they parted, nor at all until Thore was buried. But after that, when she was at Brattalithe, and he found her there, he took her in his arms.
XVIII
There were many things about her marriage with Thorstan which she did not understand at the time—Thorstan's urgency for it was one, a kind of feverish haste about getting through with preliminaries; and another was his opposition to living anywhere but at Brattalithe. He would not go to her father's house, nor to that which had been Thore's, and which was now hers for life. He put a reeve in each of them and took her to Brattalithe. Afterwards she understood everything, and was confounded by her former blindness; but it is the truth that Thorstan's love for her was of a sort to forbid thinking. She was carried off her feet and out of her common sense by his passion. He, so dumb and still a man, was by the touch of passion set on fire. And fire caught fire. The pair of them lived in each other, and the world seemed empty of all other men and women.
As for Thorstan himself, knowing what he knew, it is not wonderful that his love burned at white heat. Passion with him was in a trap and fighting for an hour of life. What is wonderful is, that he never betrayed in any other way that he had the end in sight from the beginning. It was "Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die" with him. But Gudrid did not see it. She was too happy to see it. Her doom was flooded out by sunlight, as it were.
He made songs for her from the time of Thore's death onwards, and in these his secret might have been revealed if she had been able to read below the surface. He sang her one night as she lay in his arms the terrible Song of Helgi and Sigrun. Certainly Death and Love embrace in that.
Helgi was a Wolfing, the son of Sigmund and Borghild. He was forecast a hero by the Norns, and at fifteen slew Hunding, who had slain his father. The sons of Hunding gathered themselves—Alf and Eywolf, Hiorward and Haward—and the hosts met in the plain under Lowfell. There was war in heaven while those armies made it on earth. Out of the lightning flare came the Valkyrs, daughters of Odin, choosers of the slain. They rode grey horses; they wore helms and coats of mail; their spear-heads gleamed like fire. Helgi sat by the Eagle Rock and cried out to them to stay. And one—it was Hogni's daughter, Sigrun—turned him her fire-hued face and answered: "Other business have we in hand than to pledge you in horns. My father has plight me to King Hodbrord, whom I hold no better than the son of a cat. Yet he will come for me soon unless you deliver me." Then love grew between them as they looked at each other; and Helgi said: "Fear not Hodbrord, for I will meet him unless I am dead."
King Hodbrord called up his levies and mustered a host. The ships flocked about Brandey, but still he waited, and warriors came to him, hundreds of them, from Hedinsey and other islands. Then said Helgi to Hiorleif, "Is the host called?" And Hiorleif nodded his head and pointed them out over sea, high-beaked ships, hemmed with shields, thick on the water like wild swans. They fought in a storm, and the waves played their part in the battle. The waters drank as much blood as the swords; from on high Sigrun the Valkyr guided the warriors of Helgi.
Now King Hodbrord stood in the gate of his house, hooded and helmed, his spear in his hands. He saw far off in the valley horsemen riding with speed, whose cloaks flew out in the wind they made. Who come here? Whose is the host? And Godmund, his housewife, told him of the sea-fight, and that the Wolfings were coming against his house. Then looking, he saw the helm-bright Valkyrs coursing the air, keeping pace with the horsemen below. They met in a crash by the Wolf rock; the swords flamed, the spears were like flying stars. Over the dead Hodbrord Sigrun the Valkyr cried in triumph, "Never for your arms is Sigrun of Sevafell," and as she spoke the arm of Helgi the hero held her fast.
Their love was fierce, but it was short. Helgi is dead of countless wounds, and laid in his barrow with his weapons beside him. Sigrun of Sevafell keeps the house; she sits by the fire; her eyes are hard. She says to herself—
"Now had been here
Had he been minded
Sigmund's son,
The hero Helgi,
Out of the halls of Odin;
But the eagles roost
On the high ash-boughs,
All the household
Falleth to dreams—
Faint is my hope of him now."
But her handmaid at the window sees a man riding in armour. He rides a grey horse, his face is pale and streaked with blood. She speaks to herself, and then to the dead—
"What wraith rideth?
Is Doomsday come?
Shall dead men ride,
Shall they drive spurs in?
Ho, pale rider,
Hast thou leave homeward to fare?"
It is Helgi who answers her as he rides by upon a noiseless horse—
"This is no wraith,
This is not World's Doom
Though a dead man rides,
Though he pricks with spurs,
Leave I have homeward to fare."
And then he cries aloud, so that Sigrun hears him, and looks up, listening—
"Ha, come thou forth, Sigrun of Sevafell!
Here is thy lord
If thou wouldst see him;
The cairn is open,
Helgi is here
With the sword-wounds bleeding—staunch thou the blood!
For I must ride soon
The reddening roads,
My good horse climb
The ways of the air;
West of the sky-bridge
Needs I must be
Before the grey cock cry to the sun."
Sigrun is up now, and at the door. She pants as she pulls at the bobbin of the latch. Her eyes are on fire with eagerness. But the maid cries to her—
"Go not, go not,
Sigrun of Sevafell,
Sister of kings,
Seek not the house of the dead!
For the night is abroad
When the dead are mighty;
Await bright dawn, thou shalt be stronger."
But Sigrun is out in the moonlight, and Helgi is upon his feet. Now she has him in her arms; now she holds his pale face between her hands and speaks to him close—
"The hawks of Odin
Greet not the Storm-lord,
Scenting the slain, their smoking quarry,
Not more eagerly
Cry they the dawn dew
Than I cry thee, dead King Helgi.
Now I kiss thee, dead King Helgi,
Ere thou castest
Thy blood-clutter'd mail-shirt.
Bloody the dew
On thy dauntless body,
Heavy the rime
On thy raven love-locks;
Cold are thy hands, Helgi, my king's son,
How shall I loose thee, lover and lord?"
But Helgi puts her hands away from his face and holds her apart—
"The death-dew is dank on me,
Sigrun of Sevafell,
This is thy doing, O sun-fraught lady,
Golden woman, the tears thou sheddest
Upon thy bed stay not beside thee;
Like blood they fall, cold and deathly,
Like sobs they stab me
Through the breast!"
Then, seeing her despair, he throws up his white face towards the moon and laughs without joy—
"Ho, let us drink
Deep draughts of joy,
We that have lost
Land and life!
Let no man keen us,
Let no man pity
The wounds shining upon my body."
He clasps her close in his arms, and speaks as it were between his teeth.
"Now is a queen,
Sigrun of Sevafell,
Now is a queen
Shut in the cairn,
Living and warm with the cold dead."
But she strains him to her and cries aloud—
"Helgi, Helgi, here is thy bed made,
Thou son of Wolfings, a warm bed, a gentle—
Fast in arms, Helgi, enfold me;
As when thou livedst
Clip me in death sleep."
And then the maid sees the cairn open, and Sigrun lying in it in the dead man's arms. Helgi lifts up his face to the moonlight, and sings—
"Never on Sevafell
A great marvel—
No more wondrous
That hill of magic—
For Hogni's white daughter
Lies with a dead man;
A king's daughter
Alive in the arms of the dead."
There is no more terrible song than that, nor one in which love is brought so close to death. When she remembered it after-wards Gudrid saw well that she had indeed been lying with a dead man when that song was sung to her. For if she could have had the wits she would have felt at the time the death-dew on his face. But love had then bereft her of all wits.
She called that year afterwards the Little Summer, as well because of the glory and promise of it as for the few days it held. By the end of June she knew herself with child. Thorstan gave a sort of sobbing gasp when she told him and pressed her to his heart. She felt the wet from his eyes upon her cheek, looked at him and saw tears. "You weep at my news?" "It is because I am happy, my love." She herself was softly elated by the gift she was to be enabled to make him, but not otherwise. All her love was centred in him just then.
But in July the ship came home from Wineland the Good without Thorwald, and with the heavy news. Eric, who had been ageing, was very much cast down by it. He wished Lief to go out and fetch back the body; but Lief did not seem inclined to move. He told Thorstan his reason. "If we can move out, house and homestead, gear and cattle, man, woman and child, well and good. It is a finer country than this. I will settle there gladly. But you see how it is with our father. He won't last long, and you will see he will refuse to move. This is his Settlement; he has made it for himself. He is king of all this country, and he feels it. Now if we go and leave him here, he will die—and what then? The end of Eric's kingdom. No, I shall stay here and take up the government after him. But I think that you should go—you and Gudrid."
Thorstan said: "I think so too. I will speak to Gudrid. But I shall wait till after harvest."
He told Gudrid what he thought. "They have buried him heathenwise, sitting with his weapons, looking out to sea, and heaped the stones over him. True, they have set up a cross atop. But he should have the rites. I must see to that. We will go, my love, if you are willing—but maybe we shall not come back."
She looked at him fondly. "I will go wherever you bid me. But we shall come back." It is wonderful that she did not remember what had been predicted of her; but she did not.
Thorstan did not meet her eyes. "We will go, then. But not till after harvest."
"Harvest!" said she. "You will not go in the winter?"
"No, no," he said. "The harvest will not be done." Then she knew that he did not speak of the corn-harvest, but of their own.
The year sped quickly, as happy years will do; the harvest of the earth was gathered, the winter fell, the clinging mists, the still and deadly cold. But they were a happy household at Brattalithe, for Gudrid was found to be a solvent of much domestic ferment. Her sweet manners drew even Theodhild to come in and out of the house, and hushed the storms which periodically swept over Freydis the Wild. At Yule there was a feast of many days, singing, eating and drinking, and games in the snow for the young men. Gudrid sat apart and watched it, Thorstan never far away from her. Still she didn't guess what lent such fervour to their loves. Foolish with happiness, she thought it was the first of many Yules—whether here in this frost-locked country or in the forests of Wineland mattered little to her. She saw them all in years to come as they were now and felt her heart high in her breast.
And then at the end of March, when men began to talk again of the ice breaking up, and the thawing of the passages, her child was born. It was a girl, and christened Walgerd. And now Thorstan looked about him at the still sheeted lands and knew that his hour was at hand. He told nobody, he never betrayed himself; but went to work silently and methodically.
XIX
It was the end of summer again before they were ready to sail. The ship which brought home Thorwald's crew had gone a voyage to Iceland and not come back. It was necessary to find and furnish another; no crew would ship until the harvest was over; and though Gudrid was willing to follow Thorstan at a word, Eric had not wanted her to leave him yet; so she saw one more high summer.
They fared badly from the start, with heavy weather as soon as they were off the land. After a week of blustering south-west gales and rain the wind went round to the north. Then from the N.N.W. there began a storm the like of which none of them had ever known, and for week after week they were buried in it, not knowing where they were. They lost men, tackle, stores; there was not a dry rag on the ship; every day Thorstan expected the snow. Instead of that, after a few days of sunny weather, the wind dropped in a clear sky; it began to freeze, and then came the white blanket to cling about sheets and spars, and hold them close, a blur drifting upon a sea like oil. Gudrid sat like a ghost in the after deckhouse, nursing her baby and trying to keep it warm. It did not thrive and could not be expected to thrive. She was sure it would die. And so it did—died in its sleep while she was suckling it. She felt the cold upon its legs; and then it grew heavy. She looked down—its eyelids were blue. But she did not move.
Thorstan came down to see her. He knew at once. He went to her and covered her breast in the blanket. He said nothing, but was very gentle.
"Oh, husband, speak to me! Our little baby——"
"Hush, my dear one—it is better. She is not cold now." He made her lie down, with a hot stone for her feet and another for her arms to hold instead of her Walgerd. When she was asleep he said a prayer over the child and sank it in the sea. Then he comforted her as only he could have done it.
There was a good deal of sickness on board and plenty for Gudrid to do. The wind blew gaps in the fog, and as it stiffened tore it into flying shreds and rags. The ship heaved and lurched in water now inky-black. They got steerage way, and ran before a gale which they judged came from the south-west; they held this course for many days, hoping to get a sight of land. And land was nearer than they thought, for one morning Thorstan saw a darkening in the fog, a kind of shape, and then, quick as the thought, he put the ship about. She came round slowly, and at that moment the spars and rigging seemed alive with sea-birds. As the ship went round a huge black wall reared itself a-starboard, and he heard the waves at its foot. As nearly as might be he had broken up his ship on the rocks.
Thorstan ran out to sea for half a mile or more and stood off until the weather cleared a little. When it did they all saw the crags and headlands of an iron coast. The only thing to do was to keep within hail of it until they found some sort of haven. Thorstan said he would spend the winter there, whatever country it might be. Already it was cold, and wherever the land stooped low enough there was snow to be seen lying.
An opening in the land was reported next day, and as they drew near they could make out a firth and a muffled ship lying at anchor within it. The tide serving, Thorstan ran in between low hills all smothered in snow. A settlement of white, muffled houses lay on the shore of a bay, a deserted quay, a few boats drawn up on the beach: not a soul was to be seen; the winter swoon was over all.
He drew up within hail of the silent ship and anchored in that black water. The rattling of the chain and splash of the anchor echoed among the hills, but awoke no man. "Are we, dying, come to a city of the dead?" he thought. The chill lay on his heart like lead; the thought of Gudrid gave him a dull ache; even the passion of desire to save her was dead within him. He did what came up before him to be done, but could not provide nor foresee.
"Here we must see the winter out," he said, and had the boat out so that he might go ashore and seek quarters. First he went below to see Gudrid.
He found her in the bed, rigid with cold, almost too cold to shiver. He leaned over her in an agony of pity. "Oh my heart! Oh my poor heart!" She looked up at him and smiled in his face. She was not able to speak.
"I shall see the winter out here," he told her. "I must find out where we are—I believe that we have beaten back to Greenland. If that be so, then we may be able to reach home; but if that is not possible, then we stay here. I will get quarters for the men, and for ourselves, please God. My love, trust me to do for the best—and wait for me here."
She nodded her head two or three times, but her eyes were shut and she did not look at him again. He dared not kiss her for fear of finding out how cold she was. How could it be that men were allowed to suffer so? He found some more covering for her bed before he left her.
The boat took him ashore; he went to the nearest house he saw and thumped on the door. There was no light to be seen, and for long there was no sound to be heard inside; but at last he heard the bolts drawn back. A white-faced woman peered at him through a crack.
"Let me in, for the love of God," said Thorstan. Then she beckoned him in.
A sick man lay muttering in a bed; children huddled about a turf fire. The place was very nearly dark, but he made out some six souls to be there. He found out that he was come to Lucefrith in West Greenland; the winter sickness was heavy on the place. The woman did not refuse to take one of his men, and did not agree. She seemed stupid with misery. He told her that he should send her a man, and went out. In every house in the Settlement was much the same story. Sickness and death on all hands, but no refusals. At the end of his rounds he had managed to place out all hands. There remained himself and Gudrid. There was no place for them—not room enough to die in. He had asked if there were no headman in Lucefrith, and was told of one Thorstan Black; but he, it seemed, lived far off—over the hills, they said—and no way of getting at him through the snow.
Then he went back to the ship and told his men to get ready to go ashore. He took them off by companies in the boat, and saw them all indoors before he left them. The last man under cover, he rowed back alone to the ship. At this extremity, with frozen death and silence all about him, he felt a strange uplifting of the heart in the thought that he and Gudrid were now alone indeed—they two and Love. And what if Death were a fourth in the party? Ah, he was welcome too. But before Death came Love should be there. He rowed gaily, fiercely, that he might be with her the sooner.
He was warmed by his exercise when he was on deck again, and wildly happy in the thought which possessed him.
He went below and saw his love watching for him. "My heart, I am coming to you," he said. He took off his furs and most of his clothes and got into the bed with her. He held her close to him, with a passion which despair may have quickened into flame. Wildly as he had loved her since she had given him herself, he never loved her as he did now, when the end seemed close upon them.
For a week they lived so, the supreme week of Thorstan's and Gudrid's lives. They were utterly alone, and they never left each other's arms, but when Thorstan was busy mending the brasier fire, or getting food. They cherished each other, the fire in them at least never went out; they loved and slept, they loved again and slept. It was the last leap of their fire, it was the swan-song of their love maybe; but it was beautiful, and as strong as if they were breasting a great flight through space. Thorstan sang to Gudrid, he told her tales of lovers, he put their joint lives into verses; but he had not a word to say of the future. Here fate was too heavy for either love or religion. Fate stood with stretched-out arms holding a black curtain over what was to come. Thorstan had seen behind it. He knew. But Gudrid had forgotten, and he would not tell her. As for Gudrid herself, the glory was to have Thorstan find her so lovely, and her love so full, was enough for her. She lived on his needs. To fill them was her utmost desire, and to be to him a never-failing well was a crown of stars. She seldom spoke; she was as silent as the earth below the rains and heats of heaven, and as receptive. She neither asked nor pondered what was to be the end of this rapturous dream. If she had, her utmost desire would have been that they should die together in some nuptial sleep, and lie still, folded under the snow.
But Fate ordered it otherwise. The day came when they heard the knocking of oars, and then while they lay clasped, listening, a great voice hailing the ship. They looked at each other. "The dream is over," Thorstan said. "My love, the world is about us again." She clung to him. "Let us stay here—let nobody forbid us that." "Nay, but I must go out and see who is coming."
He dressed and went on deck. A large man muffled to the eyes in a bearskin was below him in a boat, standing up in it holding on to the side. He pulled open his hood and showed a red face, black beard and a pair of merry eyes.
The two hailed each other, and then the new-comer said, "They told me in the Settlement that you were under the weather here. It will have gone hard with you, I doubt. And your lady with you! Now I make known to you that I am Thorstan of this place, called commonly Thorstan Black, and at your service."
Thorstan said: "Then I must be Thorstan Red, for Thorstan is my name, and the red is of Nature's doing, and my father's. I am Eric's son of Ericsfrith. I was making the western voyage, but was driven out of my course in a gale, and forced to beat up here against my will. My men are in the Settlement, but I and the good wife could find no better quarters than these."
"I will show you better," said Thorstan Black. "I knew nothing of your coming till last night when a man came up asking for fuel. You shall come off with me now if you will. In a week's time you will be able to walk ashore. My mistress will be glad of your company, and so shall I be."
"Thank you for that," said Thorstan. "We take your offer gladly." He asked him up, but Thorstan Black said he was very well where he was.
Gudrid was dressed when he came down for her. The dream was broken, and neither of them spoke of it. Their preparations were soon made, and then they left the ship.
Thorstan Black rowed them ashore with strong and leisurely strokes. He told them that he lived over the ridge beyond the Settlement. He had a sleigh of dogs waiting for him, packed up Gudrid, put Thorstan one side of her and himself the other, cracked a great whip, uttered a harsh cry; and they were off. The dogs panted and strained at the ropes; sometimes one yelped in his excitement. And so they came to a broad-eaved house, and were welcomed by the good wife, whose name was Grimhild.
XX
The winter fell upon them in bitter earnest within the next fortnight. The snow was up to the top of the windows, and being there, froze hard, and had to be cut away with an axe. That was how they made a road to the byres where the stock were, and where they must be fed. The two Thorstans worked hard at this and at fuel-getting, and hewing of wood. Gurth the reeve helped them, but he was ailing already with the sickness, and not much use.
Grimhild, a strong-faced, huge woman, managed all the house, but Gudrid helped her now willingly. There were no maids there. In the evenings they sat by the fire and told tales. It was as merry as might be, and with Thorstan Black there was always some fun to be had. He was the lightest-hearted man and the happiest whom Gudrid had seen in Greenland, where mostly, it seemed, men had to fight with life at too long odds to have any heart left over for pastime. Thorstan Black owned to it. "There is no people but ours of Iceland, I do believe, who would hold out against this white death," he said. "So fast as we come we die of it. Then come others, and so the game goes on. It is the fighting we love; we were always fighters—what with horses, or our young men. But here we fight with the earth, sea and sky, and do little slaughter of our own kind."
"It is the fog that kills us," said Grimhild; and Gurth smothered his cough and hugged himself over the fire.
Gudrid said: "Why should you stay here? I think it is a terrible country. We shall go to Wineland as soon as the spring comes." Then she told them of that good country—of the tall trees, and the clear sky, of the dew which was sweet to the taste, of the vines tumbling over the hot rocks, the birds' voices in the forest, and the strange stars at night. Grimhild was moved by the recital.
"Ay," she said, "I have heard tell of such lands, and you may see them, being young. But this place has made me old, and almost broken my heart. In a little while I shall ask no better than to be laid in the snow."
Thorstan Black patted her on the back.
"Courage, old lass," he said. "You and I have seen the worst of it. I think it may be better hereafter. As for your land of summer all round the year, I know not that it would suit Icelanders. If you take our hardihood from us, what have we left? That which swills and eats heavily, and plays the mischief. Nay, give me a dark ghyll in Iceland, with a river racing down its length, and the sea never far off. That means more to me than your vines and soft winters. As for this stricken land, we shall beat the sickness yet. A man tempers himself. There should be a fine race here one day, of them who have got through."
Gurth turned up the whites of his eyes. He was very sick.
By and by they had news from the Settlement, where things were going badly. The sickness was very rife. Many of Thorstan's men from Ericsfrith were dead of it. They took down stores in the sleigh, and were much concerned at what they saw and heard. The strangers from the east were all sick; six were dead, and could only be buried in the snow. Thorstan promised that he would take all the bodies back to Ericsfrith if he had to heap the ship with dead men. When they returned to the homestead the first thing they heard was that Gurth was dead.
Gradually, as the winter thickened, gloom began to fall upon the housemates. The hall grew cold; it was as if there were no heat in the burning coals; as if the cold was become master of the fire. Grimhild grew strange in her ways. She was always listening, waiting for something. She said she expected a visitor, but would never say who it was. She became very silent, and tried to avoid the others. Thorstan Black told Thorstan Red that he feared the worst. "The trustiest woman!" he said. "She has stood by me in sickness and health for twenty years—and now she turns her back on me—hunches her poor shoulders and will take no comfort from me. That's a sure sign of the sickness. You distrust your old friends first." "Is that the way of it?" said our Thorstan, with fear in his heart.
Grimhild grew more and more remote, but remained on terms with Thorstan Red, in whom she confided some of her growing fancies. "The dead are unquiet," she told him when she had him out of range of the others, "and how should I be quiet? They are all about us. So soon as it grows dusk they come out of the snow. I hear them quarrelling, murmuring, and some of them grieve. I shall be with them soon—and perhaps you will see me there. It has been bad enough other winters, but none so bad as this. There are strangers here—that's how it is. We shall never quiet them till we have burned the bodies. That's the only way."
"They shall be burned, mistress," said Thorstan. "I will see to it."
She looked at him queerly, with one eyebrow arching into her hair. "You?" she said, then turned away her face. "Well, well—Christ have mercy on us."
When the fever took her and seemed to stretch her skin to cracking-point, she would not go to bed, and nobody could persuade her. She huddled by the fire, rocking herself, until the evening; but directly it was dusk she was restless. The wind used to moan about the house, and she heard in it the voices of the dead. She thought she could distinguish one from the other. "Gurth is railing—hark to him. . . . That was Wigfus answering, and that deep one is Kettleneb. Oh, let me rest—have done!" She wandered forth and back, but was mostly in the kitchen, listening at the door. Thorstan Black grieved for her and used to try to coax her back to the fire. She scowled at him as if he were a stranger, and would not let him touch her. Gudrid was afraid to go near her.
Once when she was out there on a wild moon-lit night, the others by the fire heard her cry aloud; and then she called on Thorstan. The two Thorstans looked at each other. Thorstan Black said, "It's you she wants. Go and talk to her." Thorstan Red went out.
Grimhild had the kitchen door open; dry snow was sweeping in upon her; the front of her gown was white with it. "Look at them there," she said; "look at them. Gurth is whipping them round the garth. See how they huddle—heed their crying. There, there—and there go I among them, wringing my hands." She clutched his arm. "Hush—and there go you."
Thorstan's heart jumped, and then fell quiet. "Do you see me there, mistress?"
"You are standing there in the shadow of the byre. He will not touch you. Round and round. No rest in the snow." Then she turned to him and screamed: "Don't let him touch me!" She caught at him and he tried to draw her into the house; but she struggled fiercely, and before he could stop her she was outdoors racing through the snow. Thorstan shouted to his host, who came to him in a hurry. "She's gone," said Thorstan Red. Thorstan Black and he went out together, but by now she had passed through the garth and was deep in the snow beyond. They got her home at last, but she was quite mad and fought against them all the way.
They put her to bed and kept her there by main force until she was exhausted. They were up with her all night, and she died in the small hours of the morning. There was nothing for it but to bury her in the snow.
Gudrid laid her out while Thorstan and his host were making the coffin. She put candles at her head and feet in the Christian fashion, with a cross of wood between her hands. Then she knelt by the bed to watch the corpse. It was piercingly cold, and she grew numb with it, and then drowsy. It is likely that she dropped off to sleep as she lay, for she came to herself with a start and saw the corpse sitting up, staring with open and glassy eyes. Her heart stood still, she neither felt nor thought. How long they were, the living and the dead, staring at each other, Gudrid could never have told—she was incapable of moving, being frozen with terror and cold. Presently the dead woman's mouth opened, as if she were going to speak; and then her head fell forward and she dropped. Gudrid staggered to her feet and ran out of the house. She found the men in the outhouse, and caught Thorstan Black by the wrist. Her face told her story; it was no longer that of a sane woman. Thorstan went back with her.
That night they buried Grimhild in the snow; and Thorstan Red took the sickness. He told Gudrid of it when they were in bed. He held her closely in his arms and spoke with passion: "My love, I am sick, and it may go hard with me. Remember now what I say—that the thing which I may be is not I. Be not afraid of it. You have had the best I could be—and it was you who made me. Remember what we have been, and think of me as dead already. And when I am dead, take my body back to Ericsfrith."
She clung to him, but not with tears. Tears were denied her now. The cold had mastered even them. For now she knew what must come.
XXI
The Greenland sickness took mainly the same course, varying with the patient's personal quality. It began with a high fever, intense surface irritation; there ensued violent rheumatic pains, mental alienation, delirium, madness and death. It was characteristic, as has been said, that the sufferer turned from his kind, and turned markedly from whom he knew best.
Thorstan made his preparations carefully, and instructed Gudrid. As a wife who may be allowed a last word with her husband condemned to die, she took and gave her kisses. The time was too great for tears, the heart too faint for strong embraces. All she could do she did. She would obey him, she would not show herself; but she would be always at hand. She sat mostly at the head of his bed in the wall, hidden by a curtain, but ready to fetch and carry; to bring him food which Thorstan Black could give him; hot stones for his feet, hot rags to ease the pain in his limbs. He hardly opened his eyes, hardly ever groaned; but when the fever ran high he talked incessantly, in fierce and rapid whispers—and she heard told over again the week of rapture and dream under the snow in the empty ship. She suffered greatly under this affliction, both by the memories it evoked and the knowledge that such things could never be again. Her modesty might have been offended; but Thorstan Black was very kind to her. He used to go gently away when the sufferer began to speak, and would contrive his returns so as not to intrude on any privacy. Her heart was full of gratitude to the black-bearded giant, so huge and so gentle.
The fever seemed to eat Thorstan up; he became so thin that his cheeks sank away into hollows, and his bones stuck out so sharply that the skin cracked. Gudrid began to have horror of him. She thought that her lover was dead, and that this was some terrible mock-image of him sent there to haunt her. She seemed to become younger as he grew more like an old man. She was afraid to be left alone with him. Love had been frightened out of her, and even pity scarce dared to be there. She could not believe that this was the man who had so keenly loved and worshipped her body, and by his music had uplifted her soul. She had seen Thore die and had been compassionate to the end. She remembered how she had kissed him in the very article of death, and shuddered as she thought of kissing this living corpse. Her eyes besought Thorstan Black not to leave her, and he rarely did—for by this time her husband's weakness was such that, whatever he may have said in his fever, he could hardly be heard.
Towards the end—as Thorstan Black knew it must be—he persuaded Gudrid to lie down at night while he kept watch by the bed. And so she did. The poor girl was worn out, and went to sleep almost at once.
About midnight she was awakened. Thorstan Black stood by the bed with a taper. She gaped at him, cold to the bones.
"Come, my dear," he said. "He is asking for you." She said nothing. Then in the silence she heard her husband's voice, calling "Gudrid, Gudrid, Gudrid." She fell trembling, and knew not what she said. Thorstan Black put his cloak over her, and helped her out of bed. Her knees shook. "Is he dead? Is he dead? Oh, don't leave me. I'm frightened—he looks so strange—don't leave me, Thorstan."
"No, my dear, I won't leave you," he said, and put his arm round her, for she seemed about to fall. "Come," he said, "I'll take you, and stay by you."
She mastered her fear. "Yes," she said, "I must go. Oh, but you are so good to me."
"Don't go if you are afraid," said Thorstan. "He may be dead by now."
"No, no," she said, "not yet. I must hear what he says, for it may be he knows what the course of my life must be. If God will help me, I will go. But you will come too—you promised."
Thorstan thereupon lifted her up in his arms, and carried her into the room where Thorstan Ericsson lay. He went to the side of the bed and sat down, holding Gudrid on his knee. So they waited fearfully for the dead man to speak.
Thorstan Ericsson sat up in his bed; his eyes were so deep in his head that nothing showed of them but dark caves. His mouth was open, as if his jaw had dropped. But no sound came from him.
Then Thorstan Black said: "My namesake, you called to Gudrid, and I have her here beside you. What do you desire of her?"
The dead man spoke. "Gudrid, are you there?"
"Yes, Thorstan," she said quaking.
"I will tell you, my wife, that you need not grieve for me, nor fear me, for I shall never hurt you now—nor could I have the heart. I am come to a good place, and am at peace. Now you are to know that you will be married to an Icelander who will be kind to you, and give you what your heart desires. But your life will be longer than his, and your end will be pious—and that, too, you will desire before you reach it. And I pray you to take my body back to Ericsfrith and give me holy burial. Farewell, Gudrid, and have no fear for me."
Gudrid, cold as a stone, sat on Thorstan Black's knee as if she had been a child, and stared at the figure of her love. She could not say anything to him, she dared not touch him. His head sank forward, and he fell back in the bed and lay still. Thorstan Black touched him. He was stone cold.
The good giant thought now of Gudrid only, and talked to her gently for a long while, comforting her. He promised that he would never forsake her until he had brought her safely home to Ericsfrith. He would take Thorstan Ericsson to his own ship, and all the bodies of the crew who were dead should be put with him there until such time as they could sail. "And as for you, dear child," he said, "remember that you and that true man have had the best that life can give you—for than wedded love there is no more blessed thing. Think of me, my child, who lived happily with my good wife a twenty years, and think that you are better off maybe than I. For love such as yours is not a thing that can live—no, but it must needs change as it grows older. You change, and the world comes in between; and so it changes too. Now you have had love at the full—and it is ended at the full. You should be thankful for that. And be thankful too that he is at peace, and his fate rounded—and nothing for him now but folded hands and quiet sleep. Why, look at him now, Gudrid. Even now he smiles quietly, as who should say, I have done with it all. Look at him, and have no more fear of so gentle a thing."
Gudrid turned her haunted eyes towards the dead man. It was true. Thorstan smiled to himself wisely. And now she could see that his eyes were shut. She slipped off Thorstan Black's knee and knelt beside the bed. She looked at her dead lover, and without remembering her fear or thinking what she did, she put his hair off his forehead and tidied it. Then she leaned over him, looking tenderly down at him, and stooped and put her lips to his forehead.
Thorstan Black left her, and returned presently with candles and a cross which he had made. So they laid out Thorstan Ericsson, and Thorstan Black watched him all the rest of the night.