OF SKARPHEDINN AND THORKEL FOULMOUTH.
Asgrim and his fellows went to Thorkel foulmouth's booth, and Asgrim
said then to his companions, "This booth Thorkel foulmouth owns, a great
champion, and it were worth much to us to get his help. We must here
take heed in everything, for he is self-willed and bad tempered; and now
I will beg thee, Skarphedinn, not to let thyself be led into our talk."
Skarphedinn smiled at that. He was so clad, he had on a blue kirtle and
gray breeks, and black shoes on his feet, coming high up his leg; he had
a silver belt about him, and that same axe in his hand with which he
slew Thrain, and which he called the "ogress of war," a round buckler,
and a silken band round his brow, and his hair was brushed back behind
his ears. He was the most soldier-like of men, and by that all men knew
him. He went in his appointed place, and neither before nor behind.
Now they went into the booth and into its inner chamber. Thorkel sate in
the middle of the cross-bench, and his men away from him on all sides.
Asgrim hailed him, and Thorkel took the greeting well, and Asgrim said
to him--
"For this have we come hither, to ask help of thee, and that thou
wouldst come to the court with us."
"What need can ye have of my help," said Thorkel, "when ye have already
gone to Gudmund; he must surely have promised thee his help?"
"We could not get his help," says Asgrim.
"Then Gudmund thought the suit likely to make him foes," said Thorkel;
"and so no doubt it will be, for such deeds are the worst that have ever
been done; nor do I know what can have driven you to come hither to me,
and to think that I should be easier to undertake your suit than
Gudmund, or that I would back a wrongful quarrel."
Then Asgrim held his peace, and thought it would be hard work to win him
over.
Then Thorkel went on and said, "Who is that big and ugly fellow, before
whom four men go, pale-faced and sharp-featured, and unlucky-looking,
and cross-grained?"
"My name is Skarphedinn," said Skarphedinn, "and thou hast no right to
pick me out, a guiltless man, for thy railing. It never has befallen me
to make my father bow down before me, or to have fought against him, as
thou didst with thy father. Thou hast ridden little to the Althing, or
toiled in quarrels at it, and no doubt it is handier for thee to mind
thy milking pails at home than to be here at Axewater in idleness. But
stay, it were as well if thou pickedst out from thy teeth that steak of
mare's rump which thou atest ere thou rodest to the Thing, while thy
shepherd looked on all the while, and wondered that thou couldst work
such filthiness!"
Then Thorkel sprang up in mickle wrath, and clutched his short sword and
said--
"This sword I got in Sweden when I slew the greatest champion, but since
then I have slain many a man with it, and as soon as ever I reach thee I
will drive it through thee, and thou shall take that for thy bitter
words."
Skarphedinn stood with his axe aloft, and smiled scornfully and said--
"This axe I had in my hand when I leapt twelve ells across Markfleet,
and slew Thrain Sigfus' son, and eight of them stood before me, and none
of them could touch me. Never have I aimed weapon at man that I have not
smitten him."
And with that he tore himself from his brothers, and Kari his
brother-in-law, and strode forward to Thorkel.
Then Skarphedinn said--
"Now, Thorkel foulmouth, do one of these two things: sheathe thy sword
and sit thee down, or I drive the axe into thy head and cleave thee down
to the chine."
Then Thorkel sate him down and sheathed the sword, and such a thing
never happened to him either before or since.
Then Asgrim and his band go out, and Skarphedinn said--
"Whither shall we now go?"
"Home to out booths," answered Asgrim.
"Then we fare hack to our booths wearied of begging," says Skarphedinn.
"In many places," said Asgrim, "hast thou been rather sharp-tongued, but
here now, in what Thorkel had a share methinks thou hast only treated
him as is fitting."
Then they went home to their booths, and told Njal, word for word, all
that had been done.
"Things," he said, "draw on to what must be."
Now Gudmund the powerful heard what had passed between Thorkel and
Skarphedinn, and said--
"Ye all know how things fared between us and the men of Lightwater, but
I have never suffered such scorn and mocking at their hands as has
befallen Thorkel from Skarphedinn, and this is just as it should be."
Then he said to Einar of Thvera, his brother, "Thou shalt go with all my
band, and stand by Njal's sons when the courts go out to try suits; but
if they need help next summer, then I myself will yield them help".
Einar agreed to that, and sent and told Asgrim, and Asgrim said--
"There is no man like Gudmund for nobleness of mind," and then he told
it to Njal.