Erling and Hilda regarded the strange characters with much interest. Indeed, the young man’s look almost amounted to one of awe, for he had never seen the scroll before, although Hilda, to whom it had several times been shown and explained, had told him about it.
“These marks convey thoughts,” said Christian, laying his forefinger on the characters.
“Can they convey intricate thoughts,” asked Erling, “such as are difficult to express?”
“Aye; there is no thought which can quit the tongue of one man and enter the understanding of another which may not be expressed by these letters in different combinations.”
“Dim ideas of this have been in my mind,” said Erling, “since I went on viking cruise to the south, when first I heard of such a power being known to and used by many, but I believed it not. If this be as thou sayest, and these letters convey thy thoughts, then, though absent, thy thoughts might be known to me—if I did but understand the tracing of them.”
“Most true,” returned the hermit; “and more than that, there be some who, though dead, yet speak to their fellows, and will continue to do so as long as the records are preserved and the power to comprehend them be maintained.”
“Mysterious power,” said Erling; “I should like much to possess it.”
“If thou wilt come to my poor abode on the cliff I will teach it thee. A few months, or less, will suffice. Even Hilda knows the names of the separate signs, and she has applied herself to it for little more than a few days.”
Hilda’s face became scarlet when Erling looked at her in surprise, but the unobservant hermit went on to descant upon the immense value of written language, until Hilda reminded him that he had consented to sit in judgment on a knotty point.
“True, I had forgotten.—Come now, Erling, let me hear it.”
The youth at once began, and in a few minutes had so interested his hearers that they gazed in his face and hung upon his words with rapt attention, while he detailed the incidents of the combats with a degree of fluency and fervour that would have thrown the oratory of Glumm and Kettle quite into the shade had it been told in the hall.
While Erling was thus engaged, his friend Glumm, having finished the recital of his adventures for the twentieth time, and at the same time eaten a good supper, was advised by his companions to have the wound in his head looked to.
“What! hast thou not had it dressed yet?” asked Ulf; “why, that is very foolish. Knowest thou not that a neglected wound may compass thy death? Come hither, Ada; thy fingers are skilled in such offices. Take Glumm to an inner chamber, and see if thou canst put his head to rights.”
“Methinks,” cried Guttorm Stoutheart, with a laugh, “that she is more likely to put his heart wrong than his head right with these wicked black eyes of hers. Have a care, Glumm: they pierce deeper than the sword of the berserk.”
Ada pretended not to hear this, but she appeared by no means displeased, as she led Glumm to an inner chamber, whither they were followed by Alric, whose pugnacious soul had been quite fascinated by the story of the recent fight, and who was never tired of putting questions as to minute points.
As Glumm sat down on a low stool to enable Ada to get at his head, she said (for she was very proud of her lover’s prowess, and her heart chanced to be in a melting mood that night), “Thou hast done well to-day, it would seem?”
“It is well thou thinkest so,” replied Glumm curtly, remembering Erling’s advice.—“No, boy,” he added, in reply to Alric, “I did not kill the one with the black helmet; it was Erling who gave him his deathblow.”
“Did Hake the berserk look dreadfully fierce?” asked Alric.
“He made a few strange faces,” replied Glumm.
“The wound is but slight,” observed Ada, in a tone that indicated a little displeasure at the apparent indifference of her lover.
“It might have been worse,” replied Glumm.
“Do tell me all about it again,” entreated Alric.
“Not now,” said Glumm; “I’ll repeat it when Hilda is by; she has not heard it yet—methinks she would like to hear it.”
“Hilda like to hear it!” cried the lad, with a shout of laughter; “why, she detests fighting almost as much as the hermit does, though, I must say, for a man who hates it, he can do it wonderfully well himself! But do tell me, Glumm, what was the cut that Erling gave when he brought down that second man, you know—the big one—”
“Which? the man whose head he chopped off, with half of the left shoulder?”
“No; that was the fourth. I mean the other one, with—”
“Oh, the one he split the nose of by accident before battering down with—”
“No, no,” cried Alric, “I mean the one with the black beard.”
“Ha!” exclaimed Glumm, “that wasn’t the second man; his fall was much further on in the fight, just after Erling had got hold of the battle-axe. He whirled the axe round his head, brought it from over the left down on Blackbeard’s right shoulder, and split him to the waist.”
“Now, that is finished,” said Ada sharply, as she put away the things that she had used in the dressing of the wound. “I hope that every foe thou hast to deal with in future may let thee off as well.”
“I thank thee, Ada, both for the dressing and the good wish,” said Glumm gravely, as he rose and walked into the hall, followed by his persevering and insatiable little friend.
Ada retired hastily to her own chamber, where she stood for a moment motionless, then twice stamped her little foot, after which she sat down on a stool, and, covering her face with both hands, burst into a passionate flood of tears.
Chapter Fourteen.
In which Alric boasts a little, discovers Secrets, confesses a little, and distinguishes himself greatly
Next day there was great bustle at Ulfstede, and along the shores of the fiord, for the men of Horlingdal were busy launching their ships and making preparations to go to the Springs to meet and hold council with King Harald Haarfager.
It had been finally resolved, without a dissentient voice, that the whole district should go forth to meet him in arms, and thus ensure fair play at the deliberations of the Thing. Even Haldor no longer objected; but, on the contrary, when he heard his son’s account of his meeting with the King, and of the dastardly attempt that had been made to assassinate him and his friend, there shot across his face a gleam of that wild ferocity which had procured him his title. It passed quickly away, however, and gave place to a look of sad resignation, which assured those who knew him that he regarded their chance of opposing the King successfully to be very small indeed.
The fleet that left the fiord consisted of the longships of Ulf, Haldor, Erling, Glumm, and Guttorm, besides an innumerable flotilla of smaller crafts and boats. Many of the men were well armed, not only with first-rate weapons, but with complete suits of excellent mail of the kinds peculiar to the period—such as shirts of leather, with steel rings sewed thickly over them, and others covered with steel scales—while of the poorer bonders and the thralls some wore portions of defensive armour, and some trusted to the thick hides of the wolf, which were more serviceable against a sword-cut than many people might suppose. All had shields, however, and carried either swords, bills, spears, javelins, axes, or bows and arrows, so that, numbering as they did, about a thousand men, they composed a formidable host.
While these rowed away over the fiord to the Springs to make war or peace—as the case might be—with King Harald, a disappointed spirit was left behind in Horlingdal.
“I’m sure I cannot see why I should not be allowed to go too,” said little Alric, on returning to Haldorstede, after seeing the fleet set forth. “Of course I cannot fight so well as Erling yet, but I can do something in that way; and can even face up to a full-grown man when occasion serves, as that red-haired Dane knows full well, methinks, if he has got any power of feeling in his neck!”
This was said to Herfrida, who was in the great hall spreading the board for the midday meal, and surrounded by her maidens, some of whom were engaged in spinning or carding wool, while others wove and sewed, or busied themselves about household matters.
“Have patience, my son,” said Herfrida. “Thou art not yet strong enough to go forth to battle. Doubtless, in three or four years—”
“Three or four years!” exclaimed Alric, to whom such a space of time appeared an age. “Why, there will be no more fighting left to be done at the end of three or four years. Does not father say that if the King succeeds in his illegal plans all the independence of the small kings will be gone for ever, and—and—of course I am old enough to see that if the small kings are not allowed to do as they please, there will be no more occasion for war—nothing but a dull time of constant peace!”
Herfrida laughed lightly, while her warlike son strutted up and down the ancestral hall like a bantam cock, frowning and grunting indignantly, as he brooded over the dark prospects of peace that threatened his native land, and thought of his own incapacity, on account of youth, to make glorious hay while yet the sun of war was shining.
“Mother,” he said, stopping suddenly, and crossing his arms, as he stood with his feet planted pretty wide apart, after the fashion of those who desire to be thought very resolute— “mother, I had a dream last night.”
“Tell it me, my son,” said Herfrida, sitting down on a low stool beside the lad.
Now, it must be known that in those days the Northmen believed in dreams and omens and warnings—indeed, they were altogether a very superstitious people, having perfect faith in giants, good and bad; elves, dark and bright; wraiths, and fetches, and guardian spirits—insomuch that there was scarcely one among the grown-up people who had not seen some of these fabulous creatures, or who had not seen some other people who had either seen them themselves or had seen individuals who said they had seen them! There were also many “clear-sighted” or “fore-sighted” old men and women, who not only saw goblins and supernatural appearances occasionally, and, as it were, accidentally, like ordinary folk, but who also had the gift—so it is said—of seeing such things when they pleased—enjoyed, as it were, an unenviable privilege in that way. It was therefore with unusual interest that Herfrida asked about her son’s dream.
“It must have been mara (nightmare), I think,” he said, “for though I never had it before, it seemed to me very like what Guttorm Stoutheart says he always has after eating too hearty a meal.”
“Relate it, my son.”
“Well, you must know,” said Alric, with much gravity and importance, for he observed that the girls about the room were working softly that they might hear him, “I dreamed that I was out on the fells, and there I met a dreadful wolf, as big as a horse, with two heads and three tails, or three heads and two tails, I mind not which, but it gave me little time to notice it, for, before I was aware, it dashed at me, and I turned to run, but my feet seemed to cleave to the earth, and my legs felt heavy as lead, so that I could scarce drag myself along, yet, strange to say, the wolf did not overtake me, although I heard it coming nearer and nearer every moment, and I tried to shout, but my voice would not come out.”
“What hadst thou to supper last night?” asked Herfrida.
“Let me think,” replied the boy meditatively; “I had four cuts of salmon, three rolls of bread and butter, half a wild-duck, two small bits of salt-fish, some eggs, a little milk, and a horn of ale.”
“It must have been mara,” said she, thoughtfully; “but go on with thy dream.”
“Well, just as I came to the brink of the river, I looked back and saw the wolf close at my heels, so I dropped suddenly, and the wolf tumbled right over me into the water, but next moment it came up in the shape of another monster with a fish’s tail, which made straight at me. Then it all at once came into my head that my guardian spirit was behind me, and I turned quickly round but did not see it.”
“Art thou quite sure of that, my son?”
Herfrida asked this in a tone of great anxiety, for to see one’s own guardian spirit was thought unlucky, and a sign that the person seeing it was “fey”, or death-doomed.
“I’m quite sure that I did not,” replied Alric, to the manifest relief of his mother; “but I saw a long pole on the ground, which I seized, and attacked the beast therewith, and a most notable fight we had. I only wish that it had been true, and that thou hadst been there to see it. Mara fled away at once, for I felt no more fear, but laid about me in a way that minded me of Erling. Indeed, I don’t think he could have done it better himself. Oh! how I do wish, sometimes, that my dreams would come true! However, I killed the monster at last, and hurled him into the river, after which I felt tossed about in a strange way, and then my senses left me, and then I awoke.”
“What thinkest thou of the dream?” said Herfrida to a wrinkled old crone who sat on a low stool beside the fire.
The witch-like old creature roused herself a little and said:
“Good luck is in store for the boy.”
“Thanks for that, granny,” said Alric; “canst say what sort o’ good luck it is?”
“No; my knowledge goes no further. It may be good luck in great things, it may be only in small matters; perhaps soon, perhaps a long time hence: I know not.”
Having ventured this very safe and indefinite prophecy, the old woman let her chin drop on her bosom, and recommenced the rocking to and fro which had been interrupted by the question; while Alric laughed, and, taking up a three-pronged spear, said that as he had been disappointed in going to see the fun at the Springs, he would console himself by going and sticking salmon at the foss (waterfall).
“Wilt thou not wait for midday meal?” said Herfrida.
“No, mother; this roll will suffice till night.”
“And then thou wilt come home ravening, and have mara again.”
“Be it so. I’d run the risk of that for the sake of the chance of another glorious battle such as I had last night!”
Saying this the reckless youth sallied forth with the spear or leister on his shoulder, and took the narrow bridle path leading up the glen.
It was one of those calm bright days of early autumn in which men feel that they draw in fresh life and vigour at each inhalation. With the fragrant odours that arose from innumerable wild flowers, including that sweetest of plants, the lily of the valley, was mingled the pleasant smell of the pines, which clothed the knolls, or hung here and there like eyebrows on the cliffs. The river was swollen considerably by recent heat, which had caused the great glaciers on the mountain tops to melt more rapidly than usual, and its rushing sound was mingled with the deeper roar of the foss, or waterfall, which leaped over a cliff thirty feet high about two miles up the valley. Hundreds of rills of all sizes fell and zigzagged down the mountains on either side, some of them appearing like threads of silver on the precipices, and all, river and rills, being as cold as the perpetual ice-fields above which gave them birth. Birds twittered in the bushes, adding sweetness to the wild music, and bright greens and purples, lit up by gleams of sunshine, threw a charm of softness over the somewhat rugged scene.
The Norse boy’s nature was sensitive, and peculiarly susceptible of outward influences. As he walked briskly along, casting his eager gaze now at the river which foamed below him, and anon at the distant mountain ridges capped with perennial snows, he forgot his late disappointment, or, which is the same thing, drowned it in present enjoyment. Giving vent to his delight, much as boys did a thousand years later, by violent whistling or in uproarious bursts of song, he descended to the river’s edge, with the intention of darting his salmon spear, when his eye caught sight of a woman’s skirt fluttering on one of the cliffs above. He knew that Hilda and Ada had gone up the valley together on a visit to a kinswoman, for Herfrida had spoken of expecting them back to midday meal; guessing, therefore, that it must be them, he drew back out of sight, and clambered hastily up the bank, intending to give them a surprise. He hid himself in the bushes at a jutting point which they had to pass, and from which there was a magnificent view of the valley, the fiord, and the distant sea.
He heard the voices of the two girls in animated conversation as they drew near, and distinguished the name of Glumm more than once, but, not being a gossip by nature, he thought nothing of this, and was intent only on pouncing out on them when they should reach a certain stone in the path. Truth constrains us to admit that our young friend, like many young folk of the present day, was a practical joker—yet it must also be said that he was not a very bad one, and, to his honour be it recorded, he never practised jokes on old people!
It chanced, however, that the two friends stopped short just before reaching the stone, so that Alric had to exercise patience while the girls contemplated the view—at least while Hilda did so, for on Ada’s face there was a frown, and her eyes were cast on the ground.
“How lovely Horlingdal looks on such a day!” observed Hilda.
“I have no eyes for beautiful things to-night,” said Ada pettishly; “I cannot get over it—such cool, thankless indifference when I took the trouble to dress his—his—stupid head, and then, not satisfied with telling the whole story over to thee, who cares no more for it than if it were the slaying of half a dozen sheep, he must needs go and pay frequent visits to Ingeborg and to Halgerda of the Foss—and—and— But I know it is all out of spite, and that he does not care a bodkin for either of them, yet I cannot bear it, and I won’t bear it, so he had better look to himself. And yet I would not for the best mantle in the dale that he knew I had two thoughts about the matter.”
“But why play fast and loose with him?” said Hilda, with a laugh at her companion’s vehemence.
“Because I like it and I choose to do so.”
“But perchance he does not like it, and does not choose to be treated so.”
“I care not for that.”
“Truly thy looks and tone belie thee,” said Hilda, smiling. “But in all seriousness, Ada, let me advise thee again to be more considerate with Glumm, for I sometimes think that the men who are most worth having are the most easily turned aside.”
“Hast thou found it so with Erling?” demanded Ada half-angrily.
Hilda blushed scarlet at this and said:
“I never thought of Erling in this light; at least I never—he never—that is—”
Fortunately at this point Alric, in his retreat among the bushes, also blushed scarlet, for it only then flashed upon him that he had been acting the mean part of an eavesdropper, and had been listening to converse which he should not have heard. Instead, therefore, of carrying out his original intention, he scrambled into the path with as much noise as possible, and coughed, as he came awkwardly forward.
“Why, the wicked boy has been listening,” cried Ada, laying her hand upon the lad’s shoulder, and looking sternly into his face.
“I have,” said Alric bluntly.
“And art thou not ashamed?”
“I am,” he replied, with a degree of candour in his self-condemnation which caused Ada and Hilda to burst into a hearty fit of laughter.
“But,” said Ada, becoming grave again, “thou hast heard too much for thy good.”
“I know it,” he replied, “and I’m sorry, Ada, but cannot help it now. This will I say, however: I had no wish or intention to hear when I hid myself. My desire was only to startle thee and Hilda, and before I thought what thou wert talking of the thing was out, and now I have got it I cannot unget it.”
“True, but thou canst keep it,” said Ada.
“I can, and ye may rest assured no word or look of mine shall betray thee. I’ll even try to conceal it from myself, and think it was a dream, unless, indeed, I see a good chance of helping thee in this affair!”
Alric laughed as he said this, and the girls joined him, after which they all went on towards Haldorstede together.
On reaching the place where Alric had intended to fish, Ada suggested that he should go and try his fortune, so he ran down to the river, and the girls followed him to the bank.
The spot selected was a rapid which terminated in a small and comparatively quiet but deep pool. We say comparatively, because in the state of the river at that time even in the quietest places there was considerable commotion. Just below the pool the river opened out into a broad shallow, over which it passed in noisy foam, but with little depth, except in the centre. Below this, again, it narrowed, and formed another deep pool.
Alric ran into the water till he was about knee-deep, and then plunged his spear. Nothing resulted from the first plunge, but the effect of the second was more tremendous than had ever before happened to the young sportsman, for the pole of the trident received a twist so violent that it would infallibly have been torn from the boy’s grasp had he not held on with the tenacity of a vice, and allowed himself to be dragged bodily into the pool. As we have said, the pool was deep, but that was nothing to Alric, who could swim like a duck. The Norse maidens who watched him knew this, and although slightly alarmed, felt on the whole more inclined to laugh than to tremble as his head emerged and sank again several times, while the fish which he had struck dragged him about the pool. After a few seconds of violent and wild exertion it rushed down the pool into the rapid, and then it was that the girls perceived that Alric had struck and was clinging to one of the largest-sized salmon that ever appeared in Horlingdal river.
Fortunate it was for the boy that the fish took the rapid, for it had almost choked him in the deep pool; but now he scrambled on his feet, and began to do battle gallantly—endeavouring to thrust the fish downwards and pin it to the stones whenever it passed over a shallow part, on which occasions its back and silver sides became visible, and its great tail—wide spreading, like a modern lady’s fan—flashed in the air as it beat the water in terror or fury. Alric’s spirit was ablaze with excitement, for the fish was too strong for him, so that every time it wriggled itself he was made to shake and stagger in a most ridiculously helpless manner, and when it tried to bolt he was pulled flat down on his face and had to follow it—sometimes on his knees, sometimes at full length, for, over and over again, when he was about to rise, or had half-risen, there was another pull, and down he went again, quite flat, while the roaring torrent went right over him.
But no limpet ever stuck to rock with greater tenacity than did Alric to the handle of that trident; and it is but just to add, for the information of those who know it not, that the difficulty of retaining one’s foothold on the pebbly bed of a river when knee-deep in a foaming rapid is very great indeed, even when one has nothing more to do than attend to the balancing of one’s own body—much greater, of course, in circumstances such as we describe.
At last the salmon made a rush, and was swept over a shallow part of the rapid, close under the bank on which the girls stood. Here Alric succeeded in thrusting it against a large stone. For the first time he managed to stand up erect, and, although holding the fish with all his might, looked up, and breathed, or rather gasped, freely:
“Hoch! hah! what a fish! sk–ho!”
“Oh, I wish we could help thee!” exclaimed the girls, with flashing eyes and outstretched hands, as if they could hardly restrain themselves from leaping into the water, which was indeed the case!
“N–no! ye can’t! ’s not poss’ble—hah! my! oh there ’e goes again—s–t–swash!”
Down he went, flat, as he spoke, and water stopped his utterance, while the fish wriggled into the centre of the channel, and carried him into the deep pool below!
Here the scene was not quite so exciting, because the battle was not so fierce. The salmon had it all his own way in the deep water, and dragged his attached friend hither and thither as he pleased. On the other hand, Alric ceased to contend, and merely held on with his right hand, while with his left he kept his head above water. The pool circled about in large oily wavelets flecked with foam, so that there was a great contrast in all this to the tremendous turmoil of the raging rapid. But the comparative calm did not last long. The huge fish made a frantic, and apparently a last, effort to get free. It rushed down to the foot of the pool, and passed over the edge into the next rapid.
The girls shrieked when they saw this, for, unlike the former, this one was a deep rush of the river, between narrower banks, where its course was obstructed by large rocks. Against these the stream beat furiously. Alric knew the spot well, and was aware of the extreme danger of his position. He therefore made a violent effort to drag the fish towards a point where there was a slight break or eddy among a number of boulders, intending to let him go, if necessary, rather than lose his life. He succeeded, however, in getting upon one of the rocks quite close to the bank, and then endeavoured to lift the fish out of the water. In this also he was successful; made a splendid heave, and flung it with all his force towards the bank, on which it alighted, trident and all, at the feet of Hilda. But in letting go his hold of the handle Alric lost his balance, flung his arms above his head in a vain endeavour to recover himself, and, with a loud shout, fell back into the roaring torrent and was swept away.
A few moments sufficed to carry him into the pool below, to the edge of which the girls rushed, and found that he was floating round and round in a state of insensibility, every moment passing near to the vortex of the rapid that flowed out of it. Hilda at once rushed in waist-deep and caught him by the collar. She would have been swept away along with him, but Ada also sprang forward and grasped Hilda by the mantle. She could not, however, drag her back; neither could Hilda in any way help herself. Thus they stood for a few moments swaying to and fro in the current, and, doubtless, one or more of them would have soon been carried down had not efficient aid been at hand.
High up on the cliff over the scene where this incident occurred, Christian the hermit was seated on a log before his door. He sat gazing dreamily out upon the landscape when Alric began to fish, but, seeing the danger to which the lad exposed himself, after he had speared the fish, and fearing that there might be need of his aid, he quickly descended to the scene of action. He did not arrive a moment too soon, for the whole event occurred very rapidly. Running to the rescue he caught Ada round the waist with both hands, and drew her gently back; she was soon out of danger, after which there was no great difficulty in dragging the others safely to land.
At once the hermit stripped off the boy’s coat, loosened the kerchief that was round his throat, and sought, by every means in his power, to restore him to consciousness. His efforts were successful. The boy soon began to breathe, and in a short time stood up, swaying himself to and fro, and blinking.
The first thing he said was:
“Where is the salmon?”
“The salmon? Oh, I forgot all about it,” said Ada.
“Never mind it, dear Alric,” said Hilda.
“Never mind it?” he cried, starting into sudden animation; “what! have ye left it behind?”
Saying this he burst away from his friends, and ran up the bank of the river until he came to where the fish was lying, still impaled on the barbed prongs of the trident. The run so far restored him that he had sufficient strength to shoulder the fish, although it afterwards turned out to be a salmon of thirty-five pounds weight, and he quickly rejoined his friends, who returned with him to Haldorstede, where, you may be quite sure, he gave a graphic account of the adventure to willing and admiring ears.
“So, granny,” he said, at the conclusion of the narrative, to the old crone who was still seated by the fire, “thy prophecy has come true sooner than ye expected, and it has come doubly true, for though the good luck in store for me was a matter of small general importance, no one can deny that it is a great fish!”