Güldmar uttered a sharp cry, and shook himself free from her touch. In

the same instant his hand flew to the hilt of the hunting-knife in his

girdle.

"_Killed_ her! By the gods--"

Ulrika sprang before him. "Shame!" she cried sternly. "She is dying!"

"Too slowly for me!" exclaimed the _bonde_ furiously.

"Peace--peace!" implored Ulrika. "Let her speak!"

"Strike, Olaf Güldmar!" said Lovisa, in a deep voice, harsh, but all

untremulous--"Strike, pagan, with whom the law of blood is

supreme--strike to the very center of my heart--I do not fear you! I

killed her, I say--and therein I, the servant of the Lord, was

justified! Think you that the Most High hath not commanded His elect to

utterly destroy and trample underfoot their enemies?--and is not

vengeance mine as well as thine, accursed slave of Odin?"

A spasm of pain here interrupted her--she struggled violently for

breath--and Ulrika supported her. Güldmar stood motionless, white with

restrained fury, his eyes blazing. Recovering by slow degrees, Lovisa

once more spoke--her voice was weaker, and sounded a long way off.

"Yea, the Lord hath been on my side!" she said, and the hideous

blasphemy rattled in her throat as it was uttered. "Listen--and hear how

He delivered mine enemy into my hands. I watched her always--I followed

her many and many a time, though she never saw me. I knew her favorite

path across the mountains,--it led past a rocky chasm. On the edge of

that chasm there was a broad, flat stone, and there she would sit often,

reading, or watching the fishing-boats on the Fjord, and listening to

the prattle of her child. I used to dream of that stone, and wonder if I

could loosen it! It was strongly imbedded in the earth--but each day I

went to it--each day I moved it! Little by little I worked--till a mere

touch would have set it hurling downwards,--yet it looked as firm as

ever." Güldmar uttered a fierce ejaculation of anguish--he put one hand

to his throat as though he were stifling. Lovisa, watching him, smiled

vindictively, and continued--

"When I had done all I could do, I lay in wait for her, hoping and

praying--my hour came at last! It was a bright sunny morning--a little

bird had been twittering above the very place--as it flew away, _she_

approached--a book was in her hand,--her child followed her at some

little distance off. Fortune favored me--a cluster of pansies had opened

their blossoms a few inches below the stone,--she saw them,--and, light

as a bird, sprang on it and reached forward to gather them--ah!"--and

the wretched woman clapped her hands and broke into malignant

laughter--"I can hear her quick shriek now--the crash of the stones and

the crackle of branches as she fell down,--down to her death! Presently

the child came running,--it was too young to understand--it sat down

patiently waiting for its mother. How I longed to kill it! but it sang

to itself like the bird that had flown away, and I could not! But _she_

was gone--_she_ was silent for ever--the Lord be praised for all His

mercies! Was she smiling, Olaf Güldmar, when you found her--_dead_?"

A strange solemnity shadowed the _bonde's_ features. He turned his eyes

upon her steadily.

"Blessing and honor be to the gods of my fathers!" he said--"I found

her--_living_!"

The change that came over Lovisa's face at these words was inexpressibly

awful--she grew livid and her lips twitched convulsively.

"Living--living!" she gasped.

"Living!" repeated Güldmar sternly. "Vile hag! Your purpose was

frustrated! Your crime destroyed her beauty and shortened her days--but

she lived--lived for ten sweet, bitter years, hidden away from all eyes

save mine,--mine that never grew tired of looking in her patient,

heavenly face! Ten years I held her as one holds a jewel--and, when she

died, her death was but falling asleep in these fond arms--"

Lovisa raised herself with a sharp cry, and wrung her hands together--

"Ten years--ten years!" she moaned. "I thought her dead--and she lived

on,--beloved and loving all the while. Oh God, God, why hast thou made a

mockery of Thy servant!" She rocked herself to and fro--then looked up

with an evil smile. "Nay, but she _suffered_! That was best. It is worse

to suffer than to die. Thank God, she _suffered_!"

"Ay, she suffered!" said Güldmar fiercely, scarce able to restrain

himself from seizing upon the miserable old woman and shaking the

sinking life out of her--"And had I but guessed who caused her

sufferings, by the sword of Odin, I would have--"

Ulrika laid her hand on his suddenly upraised arm.

"Listen!" she whispered. A low wailing, like the cry of a distressed

child, swept round and round the house, followed by a gust of wind and a

clattering shower of hailstones. A strange blue light leaped up from the

sparkling log fire, and cast an unearthly glow through the room. A deep

stillness ensued.

Then--steady and clear and resonant--a single sound echoed through the

air, like a long note played on an exceedingly sweet silver trumpet. It

began softly--swelled to a crescendo--then died delicately away. Güldmar

raised his head--his face was full of rapt and expectant gravity,--his

action, too, was somewhat singular, for he drew the knife from his

girdle and kissed the hilt solemnly, returning it immediately to its

sheath. At the same moment Lovisa uttered a loud cry, and flinging the

coverings from her, strove to rise from her bed. Ulrika held her

firmly,--she struggled feebly yet determinedly, gazing the while with

straining, eager, glassy eyes into the gloom of the opposite corner.

"Darkness--darkness!" she muttered hoarsely,--"and the white faces of

dead things! There--there they lie!--all still, at the foot of the black

chasm--their mouths move without sound--what--what are they saying? I

cannot hear--ask them to speak louder--louder! Ah!" and she uttered a

terrified scream that made the rafters ring. "They move!--they stretch

out their hands--cold, cold hands!--they are drawing me down to

them--down--down--to that darkness! Hold me--hold me! don't let me go to

them--Lord, Lord be merciful to me--let me live--live--" Suddenly she

drew back in deadly horror, gesticulating with her tremulous lean hands

as though it shut away the sight of some loathsome thing unveiled to her

view. "Who is it"--she asked in an awful, shuddering whisper--"who is it

that says there is no hell? _I see it_!" Still retreating backwards,

backwards--the clammy dew of death darkening her affrighted

countenance,--she turned her glazing eyes for the last time on Güldmar.

Her lips twitched into a smile of dreadful mockery.

"May--thy gods--reward thee--Olaf Güldmar--even--as

mine--are--rewarding--_me_!"

And with these words, her head dropped heavily on her breast. Ulrika

laid her back on her pillow, a corpse. The stern, cruel smile froze

slowly on her dead features--gradually she became, as it were, a sort of

ancient cenotaph, carved to resemble old age combined with unrepenting

evil--the straggling white hair that rested on her wrinkled forehead

looking merely like snow fallen on sculptured stone.

"Good Lord, have mercy on her soul!" murmured Ulrika piously, as she

closed the upward staring eyes, and crossed the withered hands.

"Good devil, claim thine own!" said Güldmar, with proudly lifted arm and

quivering, disdainful lips. "Thou foolish woman! Thinkest thou thy Lord

makes place for murderers in His heaven? If so, 'tis well I am not bound

there! Only the just can tread the pathway to Valhalla,--'tis a better

creed!"

Ulrika looked at his superb, erect figure and lofty head, and a

strangely anxious expression flitted across her dull countenance.

"Nay, _bonde_, we do not believe that the Lord accepteth murderers,

without they repent themselves of their backslidings,--but if with

penitence they turn to Him even at the eleventh hour, haply they may be

numbered among the elect."

Güldmar's eyes flashed. "I know not thy creed, woman, nor care to learn

it! But, all the same, thou art deceived in thy vain imaginings. The

Eternal Justice cannot err--call that justice Christ or Odin as thou

wilt. I tell you, the soul of the innocent bird that perishes in the

drifting snow is near and dear to its Creator--but the tainted soul that

had yonder vile body for its tenement, was but a flame of the evil one,

and accursed from the beginning,--it must return to him from whom it

came. A heaven for such as she? Nay--rather the lowest circle of the

furthest and fiercest everlasting fires--and thither do I commend her!

Farewell!"

Rapidly muffling himself up in his wraps, he strode out of the house. He

sprang into his sledge, throwing a generous gratuity to the small

Laplander who had taken charge of it, and who now ventured to inquire--

"Has the good Lovisa left us?"

Güldmar burst into a hard laugh. "_Good_! By my soul! The folks of

Talvig take up murderers for saints and criminals for guides! 'Tis a

wild world! Yes--she has gone--where all such blessed ones

go--to--heaven!" He shook his clenched fist in the air--then hastily

gathering up the reins, prepared to start.

The Lapp, after the manner of his race, was easily frightened, and

cowered back, terrified at the _bonde's_ menacing gesture and fierce

tone,--but quickly bethinking himself of the liberal fee he clutched in

his palm, he volunteered a warning to this kingly old man with the

streaming white hair and beard, and his keen eyes that were already

fixed on the dark sweep of the rough, uneven road winding towards the

Altenfjord.

"There is a storm coming, Jarl Güldmar!" he stammered.

Güldmar turned his head. "Why call me Jarl?" he demanded half angrily.

"'Tis a name I wear not."

He touched the reindeer lightly with his long whip--the sensitive beast

started and sprang forward.

Once more the Lapp exclaimed, with increased excitement and uncouth

gestures--

"Storm is coming!--wide--dark, deep! See how the sky stoops with the

hidden snow!"

He pointed to the north, and there, low on the horizon, was a lurid red

gleam like a smouldering fire, while just above it a greenish blackness

of cloud hung heavy and motionless. Towards the central part of the

heaven two or three stars shone with frosty brightness, and through a

few fleecy ribbons of greyish mist limmered the uncertain promise of a

faint moon.

Güldmar smiled slightly. "Storm coming?" he answered almost gaily. "That

is well! Storm and I are old friends, my lad! Good night!"

Once more he touched his horned steeds, and with a jingle-jangle of

musical bells and a scudding, slippery hissing across the hard snow, the

sledge sped off with fairy-like rapidity, and in a few moments its one

little guiding lantern disappeared in the darkness like a suddenly

extinguished candle.

The Lapp stood pondering and gazing after it, with the _bonde's_ money

in his palm, till the cold began to penetrate even his thick

skin-clothing and his fat little body, well anointed with whale-oil

though it was,--and becoming speedily conscious of this, he scampered

with extraordinary agility, considering the dimensions of his

snow-shoes, into the hut where he had his dwelling, relating to all who

choose to hear, the news of old Lovisa Elsland's death, and the account

of his brief interview with the dreaded but generous pagan.

Ulrika, watching by the corpse of her aged friend, was soon joined by

others bent on sharing her vigil, and the house was presently filled

with woman's religious wailings and prayers for the departed. To all the

curious inquiries that were made concerning the cause of Lovisa's desire

to see the _bonde_ before she died, Ulrika vouchsafed no reply,--and the

villagers, who stood somewhat in awe of her as a woman of singular

godliness and discreet reputation, soon refrained from asking any more

questions. An ambitious young Lutheran preacher came, and, addressing

himself to all assembled, loudly extolled the superhuman virtues of the

dead "Mother of the village," as Lovisa had been called,--amid the

hysterical weeping and moaning of the mourners, he begged them to look

upon her "venerated face" and observe "the smile of God's own peace

engraven there,"--and amid all his eloquence, and the shrieking

excitement of his fanatical hearers, Ulrika alone was silent.

She sat stern and absorbed, with set lips and lowered eyelids at the

head of the bed whereon the corpse was now laid out, grimly rigid,--with

bound-up jaws, and clasped fingers like stiff, dried bones. Her thoughts

dwelt gloomily and intently on Güldmar's words--"The Eternal Justice

cannot err." Eternal Justice! What sentence would Eternal Justice pass

upon the crime of murder?--or attempt to murder? "I am guilty," the

unhappy woman reflected, with a strong shudder chilling her veins,

"guilty even as Lovisa! I tried to kill my child--I thought, I hoped it

was dead! It was not my meaning that it should live. And this Eternal

Justice, may be, will judge the intention more than the crime. O Lord,

Lord! save my soul! Teach me how to escape from the condemning fires of

Thine anger!" Thus she prayed and wrestled with her accusing self in

secret--despair and fear raging in her heart, though not a flicker of

her inward agitation betrayed itself outwardly on her stolid,

expressionless features.

Meanwhile the wind rose to a tearing, thunderous gale, and the night,

already so dark, darkened yet more visibly. Olaf Güldmar, driving

swiftly homewards, caught the first furious gust of the storm that came

rushing onward from the North Cape, and as it swooped sideways against

his light sledge, he was nearly hurled from his seat by the sudden

violence of the shock. He settled himself more firmly, encouraging with

a cheery word the startled reindeer, who stopped short,--stretching out

their necks and sniffing the air, their hairy sides heaving with the

strain of trotting against the blast, and the smoke of their breath

steaming upwards in the frosty air like white vapor. The way lay now

through a narrow defile bordered with tall pines,--and as the terrified

animals, recovering, shook the tinkling bells on their harness, and once

more resumed their journey, the road was comparatively sheltered, and

the wind seemed to sink as suddenly as it rose. There was a hush--an

almost ominous silence.

The sledge glided more slowly between the even lines of upright giant

trees, crowned with icicles and draped in snow,--the _bonde_

involuntarily loosened the reins of his elfin steeds, and again returned

to those painful and solemn musings, from which the stinging blow of the

tempest had for a moment roused him. The proud heart of the old man

ached bitterly. What! All these years had passed, and he, the descendant

of a hundred Vikings, had been cheated of justice! He had seen his

wife,--the treasured darling of his days, suffering,--dying, inch by

inch, year by year, with all her radiant beauty withered,--and he had

never known her destroyer! Her fall from the edge of the chasm had been

deemed by them both an accident, and yet--this wretched Lovisa

Elsland--mad with misplaced, disappointed passion, jealousy, and

revenge,--had lived on to the extreme of life, triumphant and

unsuspected.

"I swear the gods have played me false in this!" he muttered, lifting

his eyes in a sort of fierce appeal to the motionless pinetops stiff

with frost. The mystery of the old hag's hatred of his daughter was now

made clear--she resembled her mother too closely to escape Lovisa's

malice. He remembered the curse she had called down upon the innocent

girl,--how it was she who had untiringly spread abroad the report among

the superstitious people of the place, that Thelma was a witch whose

presence was a blight upon the land,--how she had decoyed her into the

power of Mr. Dyceworthy--all was plain--and, notwithstanding her

deliberate wickedness, she had lived her life without punishment! This

was what made Güldmar's blood burn, and pulses thrill. He could not

understand why the Higher Powers had permitted this error of justice,

and, like many of his daring ancestors, he was ready to fling defiance

in the very face of Odin, and demand--"Why,--O thou drowsy god, nodding

over thy wine-cups,--why didst thou do this thing?"

Utter fearlessness,--bodily and spiritual,--fearlessness of past,

present, or future, life or death,--was Güldmar's creed. The true Norse

warrior spirit was in him--had he been told, on heavenly authority, that

the lowest range of the "Nastrond" or Scandinavian Hell, awaited him, he

would have accepted his fate with unflinching firmness. The

indestructibility of the soul, and the certainty that it must outlive

even centuries of torture, and triumph gloriously in the end, was the

core of the faith he professed. As he glanced upwards, the frozen

tree-tops, till then rigidly erect, swayed slightly from side to side

with a crackling sound--but he paid no heed to this slight warning of a

fresh attack from the combative storm that was gathering together and

renewing its scattered forces. He began to think of his daughter, and

the grave lines on his face relaxed and softened.

"'Tis all fair sailing for the child," he mused. "For that I should be

grateful! The world has been made a soft nest for my bird,--I should not

complain,--my own time is short." His former anger calmed a little--the

brooding irritation of his mind became gradually soothed.

"Rose of my heart!" he whispered, tenderly apostrophizing the memory of

his wife,--that lost jewel of love, whose fair body lay enshrined in the

king's tomb by the Fjord. "Wrongfully done to death as thou wert, and

brief time as we had for loving;--in spite of thy differing creed, I

feel that I shall meet thee soon! Yes--in the world beyond the stars,

they will bring thee to me in Valhalla,--wheresoever thou art, thou wilt

not refuse to come! The gods themselves cannot unfasten the ties of love

between us!"

As he half thought, half uttered, these words, the reindeer again

stopped abruptly, rearing their antlered heads and panting heavily.

Hark! what was that? A clear, far-reaching note of music seemingly

wakened from the waters of the Fjord and rising upwards, upwards, with

bell-like distinctness! Güldmar leaned from his motionless sledge and

listened in awe--it was the same sound he had before heard as he stood

by Lovisa Elsland's death-bed--and was in truth nothing but a strong

current of wind blowing through the arched and honeycombed rocks by the

sea, towards the higher land,--creating the same effect as though one

should breathe forcibly through a pipe-like instrument of dried and

hollow reeds,--and being rendered more resonant by the intense cold, it

bore a striking similarity to the full blast of a war-trumpet. For the

worshipper of Odin, it had a significant and supernatural meaning,--and

he repeated his former action--that of drawing the knife from his girdle

and kissing the hilt. "If Death is near me," he said in a loud voice, "I

bid it welcome! The gods know that I am ready!"

He waited as though expecting some answer--but there was a brief,

absolute silence. Then, with a wild shriek and riotous uproar, the

circling tempest,--before uncertain and vacillating in its

wrath,--pounced, eagle-like, downward and grasped the mountains in its

talons,--the strong pines rocked backwards and forwards as though bent

by Herculean hands, crashing their frosted branches madly together:--the

massive clouds in the sky opened and let fall their burden of snow. Down

came the large fleecy flakes, twisting dizzily round and round in a

white waltz to the whirl of the wind--faster--faster--heavier and

thicker, till there seemed no clear space in the air. Güldmar urged on

the reindeer, more anxious for their safety than his own--the poor

beasts were fatigued, and the blinding snow confused them, but they

struggled on patiently, encouraged by their master's voice and the

consciousness that they were nearing home. The storm increased in

fury--and a fierce gust of frozen sleet struck the sledge like a strong

hammer-stroke as it advanced through the rapidly deepening

snow-drifts--its guiding lantern was extinguished. Güldmar did not stop

to relight it--he knew he was approaching his farm, and he trusted to

the instinct and sagacity of his steeds.

There was indeed but a short distance to go,--the narrow wooded defile

opened out on two roads, one leading direct to Bosekop--the other, steep

and tortuous, winding down to the shore of the Fjord--this latter passed

the _bonde's_ gate. Once out of the shadow of the pines, the way would

be more distinctly seen,--the very reindeer seemed to be conscious of

this, for they trotted more steadily, shaking their bells in even and

rhythmical measure. As they neared the end of the long dark vista, a

sudden bright blue glare quivered and sprang wave-like across the

snow--a fantastic storm-aurora that flashed and played among the

feathery falling flakes of white till they looked like knots and

closters of sparkling jewels. The extreme point of the close defile was

reached at last, and here the landscape opened up wide, rocky and

desolate--a weird picture,--with the heavy clouds above repeatedly

stabbed through and through by the needle-pointed beams of the aurora

borealis,--and the blank whiteness of the ground below. Just as the

heads of the reindeer were turned into the homeward road, half of the

aurora suddenly faded, leaving the other half still beating out its

azure brilliance against the horizon. At the same instant, with abrupt

swiftness, a dark shadow,--so dark as to seem almost palpable,--descended

and fell directly in front of the advancing sledge--a sort of mist that

appeared to block the way.

Güldmar leaned forward and gazed with eager, straining eyes into that

drooping gloom--a shadow?--a mere vapor, with the Northern Lights

glimmering through its murky folds? Ah no--no! For him it was something

very different,--a heavenly phantasm, beautiful and grand, with solemn

meaning! He saw a Maiden, majestically tall, of earnest visage and

imperial mien,--her long black hair streamed loose upon the wind--in one

hand she held a shining shield--in the other a lifted spear! On her

white brow rested a glittering helmet,--her bosom heaved beneath a

corslet of pale gold--she fixed her divine, dark eyes full upon his face

and smiled! With a cry of wonder and ecstacy the old man fell back in

his sledge,--the reins dropped from his hands,--"The _Valkyrie_! the

_Valkyrie_!" he exclaimed.

A mere breathing space, and the shadow vanished,--the aurora came out

again in unbroken splendor--and the reindeer, feeling no restraint upon

them, and terrified by something in the air, or the ceaseless glitter,

of the lights in the sky, started off precipitately at full gallop. The

long reins trailed loosely over their backs, lashing their sides as they

ran--Güldmar, recovering from his momentary awe and bewilderment, strove

to seize them, but in vain. He called, he shouted,--the frightened

animals were utterly beyond control, and dashed madly down the steep

road, swinging the sledge from side to side, and entangling themselves

more and more with the loose reins, till, irritated beyond endurance,

confused and blinded by the flash of the aurora and the dizzy whirl of

the swiftly falling snow, they made straight for a steep bank,--and

before the _bonde_ had time to realize the situation and jump from the

sledge--crash! down they went with a discordant jangle of bells, their

hoofs splitting a thin, sharp shelf of ice as they leaped

forward,--dragging the light vehicle after them, and twisting it over

and over till it was a mere wreck,--and throwing out its occupant head

foremost against a jagged stone.

Then more scared than ever, they strove to clamber out of the gully into

which they had recklessly sprung, but, foiled in these attempts, they

kicked, plunged, and reared,--trampling heedlessly over the human form

lying helpless among the shattered fragments of the sledge,--till tired

out at last, they stood motionless, panting with terror. Their antlered

heads cast fantastic patterns on the snow in the varying rose and azure

radiance that rippled from the waving ribbons of the aurora,--and close

to them, his slowly trickling life-blood staining the white ground,--his

hair and beard glittering in the light like frosted silver,--his eyes

fast closed as though he slept,--lay Olaf Güldmar unconscious--dying.

The spear of the Valkyrie had fallen!

CHAPTER XXXII.

"Bury me not when I am dead--

Lay me not down in a dusty bed;

I could not bear the life down there,

With the wet worms crawling about my hair!"

ERIC MACKAY.

Long hours passed, and the next day dawned, if the dim twilight that

glimmered faintly across the Altenfjord could be called a dawn. The

snow-fall had ceased,--the wind had sunk--there was a frost-bound,

monotonous calm. The picturesque dwelling of the _bonde_ was white in

every part, and fringed with long icicles,--icicles drooped from its

sheltering porch and gabled windows--the deserted dove-cote on the roof

was a miniature ice-palace, curiously festooned with thin threads and

crested pinnacles of frozen snow. Within the house there was

silence,--the silence of approaching desolation. In the room where

Thelma used to sit and spin, a blazing fire of pine sparkled on the

walls, casting ruddy outward flashes through the frost-covered

lattice-windows,--and here, towards the obscure noon, Olaf Güldmar awoke

from his long trance of insensibility. He found himself at home,

stretched on his own bed, and looked about him vacantly. In the earnest

and watchful countenance that bent above his pillow, he slowly

recognized his friend, companion, and servant, Valdemar Svensen, and

though returning consciousness brought with it throbs of agonizing pain,

he strove to smile, and feebly stretched out his hand. Valdemar grasped

it--kissed it--and in spite of his efforts to restrain his emotion, a

sigh, that was almost a groan, escaped him. The _bonde_ smiled

again,--then lay quiet for a few moments as though endeavoring to

collect his thought. Presently he spoke--his voice was faint yet

distinct.

"What has happened, Valdemar?" he asked. "How is it that the strength

has departed from me?"

Svensen dropped on his knees by the bedside. "An accident, my Lord

Olaf," he began falteringly.

Güldmar's eyes suddenly lightened. "Ah, I remember!" he said. "The rush

down the valley--I remember all!" He paused, then added gently, "And so

the end has come, Valdemar!"

Svensen uttered a passionate exclamation of distress.

"Let not my lord say so!" he murmured appealingly, with the air of a

subject entreating favor from a king. "Or, if it must be, let me also

travel with thee wherever thou goest!"

Olaf Güldmar's gaze rested on him with a musing tenderness.

"'Tis a far journey," he said simply. "And thou art not summoned." He

raised his arm to test its force--for one second it was uplifted,--then

it fell powerless at his side. "I am conquered!" he went on with a

cheerful air. "The fight is over, Valdemar! Surely I have had a long

battle, and the time for rest and reward is welcome." He was silent for

a little, then continued, "Tell me--how--where didst thou find me? It

seems I had a dream, strange, and glorious--then came a rushing sound of

wheels and clanging bells,--and after that, a long deep silence."

Speaking in low tones, Valdemar briefly related the events of the past

night. How he had heard the reindeer's gallop down the road, and the

quick jangling of the bells on their harness, and had concluded that the

_bonde_ was returning home at extraordinary speed--how these sounds had

suddenly and unaccountably ceased,--how, after waiting for some time,

and hearing nothing more, he had become greatly alarmed, and, taking a

pine-torch, had gone out to see what had occurred,--how he had found the

reindeer standing by the broken sledge in the gully, and how, after some

search, he had finally discovered his master, lying half-covered by the

snow, and grievously injured. How he had lifted him and carried him into

the house, . . .

"By my soul!" interrupted the _bonde_ cheerfully, "thou must have found

me no light weight, Valdemar! See what a good thing it is to be a

man--with iron muscles, and strong limbs, and hardy nerve! By the Hammer

of Thor! the glorious gift of strong manhood is never half appreciated!

As for me--I am a man no longer!"

He sighed a little, and, passing his sinewy hand across his brow, lay

back exhausted. He was racked by bodily torture, but,--unflinching old

hero as he was,--gave no sign of the agonizing pain he suffered.

Valdemar Svensen had risen from his knees, and now stood gazing at him

with yearning, miserable eyes, his brown, weather-beaten visage heavily

marked with lines of grief and despair. He knew that he was utterly

powerless--that nothing could save the noble life that was ebbing slowly

away before him. His long and varied experience as a sailor, pilot, and

traveller in many countries had given him some useful knowledge of

medicine and surgery, and if anything was possible to be done, he could

do it. But in this case no medical skill would have been availing--the

old man's ribs were crushed in and his spine injured,--his death was a

question of but a few hours at the utmost, if so long.

"Olaf the King!" muttered the _bonde_ presently, "True! They make no

mistakes yonder,--they know each warrior by name and rank--'tis only in

this world we are subject to error. This world! By the gods! . . . 'tis

but a puff of thistle-down--or a light mist floating from the sunset to

the sea!"

He made a vigorous attempt to raise himself from his pillow--though the

excruciating anguish caused by his movement, made him wince a little and

grow paler.

"Wine, Valdemar! Fill the horn cup to the brim and bring it to me--I

must have strength to speak--before I depart--on the last great

journey."

Obediently and in haste, Svensen filled the cup he asked for with old

Lacrima Christi, of which there was always a supply in this far Northern

abode, and gave it to him, watching him with a sort of superstitious

reverence as he drained off its contents and returned it empty.

"Ah! That warms this freezing blood of mine," he said, the lustre

flashing back into his eyes. "'Twill find fresh force to flow a brief

while longer. Valdemar--I have little time to spend with thee--I feel

death _here_"--and he slightly touched his chest--"cold--cold and heavy.

'Tis nothing--a passing, chilly touch that sweeps away the world! But

the warmth of a new, strong life awaits me--a life of never-ending

triumph! The doors of Valhalla stand wide open--I heard the trumpet-call

last night--I saw the dark-haired Valkyrie! All is well--and my soul is

full of rejoicing. Valdemar--there is but one thing now thou hast to do

for me,--the one great service thou hast sworn to render. _Fulfill thine

oath!_"

Valdemar's brown cheek blanched,--his lips quivered,--he flung up his

hands in wild appeal. The picturesque flow of his native speech gained

new fervor and eloquence as he spoke.

"Not yet--not yet, my lord!" he cried passionately. "Wait but a

little--there is time. Think for one moment--think! Would it not be well

for my lord to sleep the last sleep by the side of his beloved

Thelma--the star of the dark mountains--the moonbeam of the night of his

life? Would not peace enwrap him there as with a soft garment, and would

not his rest be lulled by the placid murmur of the sea? For the days of

old time and storm and victory are past--and the dead slumber as stones

in the silent pathways--why would my lord depart in haste as though he

were wrathful, from the land he has loved?--from the vassal who implores

his pardon for pleading against a deed he dares not do!"

"Dares not--dares not!" cried the _bonde_, springing up half-erect from

his couch, in spite of pain, and looking like some enraged old lion with

his tossed, streaming hair and glittering eyes. "Serf as thou art and

coward! Thinkest thou an oath such as thine is but a thread of hair, to

be snapped at thy pleasure? Wilt thou brave the wrath of the gods and

the teeth of the Wolf of Nastrond? As surely as the seven stars shine on

the white brow of Thor, evil shall be upon thee if thou refusest to

perform the vow thou hast sworn! And shall a slave have strength to

resist the dying curse of a King?"

The pride, the supreme authority,--the magnified strength of command

that flushed the old man's features, were extraordinary and almost

terrible in their impressive grandeur. If he indeed believed himself by

blood a king and a descendant of kings,--he could not have shown a more

forcible display of personal sovereignty. The effect of his manner on

Valdemar was instantaneous,--the superstitious fears of that bronzed

sea-wanderer were easily aroused. His head drooped--he stretched out his

hands imploringly.

"Let not my lord curse his servant," he faltered. "It was but a tremor

of the heart that caused my tongue to speak foolishly. I am ready--I

have sworn--the oath shall be kept to its utmost end!"

Olaf Güldmar's threatening countenance relaxed, and he fell back on his

pillows.

"It is well!" he said feebly and somewhat indistinctly. "Thy want of

will maddened me--I spoke and lived in times that are no more--days of

battle--and--glory--that are gone--from men--for ever. More wine,

Valdemar!--I must keep a grip on this slippery life--and yet--I

wander--wander into the--night--"

His voice ceased, and he sank into a swoon--a swoon that was like death.

His breathing was scarcely perceptible, and Svensen, alarmed at his

appearance, forced some drops of wine between his set lips, and chafed

his cold hands with anxious solicitude. Slowly and very gradually he

recovered consciousness and intelligence, and presently asked for a

pencil and paper to write a few farewell words to his daughter. In the

grief and bewilderment of the time, Valdemar entirely forgot to tell him

that a letter from Thelma had arrived for him on the previous afternoon

while he was away at Talvig,--and was even now on the shelf above the

chimney, awaiting perusal. Güldmar, ignorant of this, began to write

slowly and with firmness, disregarding his rapidly sinking strength.

Scarcely had he begun the letter, however, than he looked up meaningly

at Svensen, who stood waiting beside him.

"The time grows very short," he said imperatively. "Prepare everything

quickly--go! Fear not--I shall live to see thee return--and to bless

thee for thy faithful service."

As he uttered these words he smiled;--and with one wistful, yearning

look at him, Valdemar obediently and instantly departed. He left the

house, carrying with him a huge pile of dry brushwood, and with the air

of a man strung up to prompt action, rapidly descended the sloping path,

thick with hardened snow, that led downwards to the Fjord. On reaching

the shore, he looked anxiously about him. There was nothing in sight but

the distant, twinkling lights of Bosekop--the Fjord itself was like a

black pool,--so still that even the faintest murmur of its rippling

against the _bonde's_ own private pier could be heard,--the tide was

full up.

Out of the reach of the encroaching waters, high and dry on the beach,

was Güldmar's brig, the _Valkyrie_, transformed by the fingers of the

frost into a white ship, fantastically draped with threads of frozen

snow and pendent icicles. She was placed on a descending plank, to which

she was attached by a chain and rope pulley,--so that at any time of the

weather or tide she could be moved glidingly downwards into deep

water--and this was what Valdemar occupied himself in doing. It was a

hard task. The chains were stiff with the frost,--but, after some

patient and arduous striving, they yielded to his efforts, and, with

slow clank and much creaking complaint, the vessel slid reluctantly down

and plunged forward, afloat at last. Holding her ropes, Valdemar sprang

to the extreme edge of the pier and fastened her there, and then getting

on board, he untied and began to hoist the sails. This was a matter of

the greatest difficulty, but it was gradually and successfully

accomplished; and a strange sight the _Valkyrie_ then presented, resting

nearly motionless on the black Fjord,--her stretched and frosted canvas

looking like sheeted pearl fringed with silver,--her masts white with

encrusted snow, and topped with pointed icicles. Leaving her for a

moment, Valdemar quickly returned, carrying the pile of dry brushwood he

had brought,--he descended with this into the hold of the ship, and

returned without it. Glancing once more nervously about him, he jumped

from the deck to the pier--thence to the shore--and as he did so a long

dark wave rolled up and broke at his feet. The capricious wind had

suddenly arisen,--and a moaning whisper coming from the adjacent hills

gave warning of another storm.

Valdemar hurriedly retraced his steps back to the house,--his work with

the _Valkyrie_ had occupied him more than an hour--the _bonde_, his

friend and master, might have died during his absence! There was a cold

sickness at his heart--his feet seemed heavy as lead, and scarcely able

to carry him along quickly enough--to his credulous and visionary mind,

the hovering shadow of death seemed everywhere,--in every crackling twig

he brushed against,--in every sough of the wakening gale that rustled

among the bare pines. To his intense relief he found Güldmar lying

calmly back among his pillows,--his eyes well open and clear, and an

expression of perfect peace upon his features. He smiled as he saw his

servant enter.

"All is in readiness?" he asked.

Valdemar bent his head in silent assent.

The _bonde's_ face lightened with extraordinary rapture.

"I thank thee, old friend!" he said in low but glad accents. "Thou

knowest I could not be at peace in any other grave. I have suffered in

thine absence,--the sufferings of the body that, being yet strong in

spite of age, is reluctant to take leave of life. But it is past! I am

as one numbed with everlasting frost,--and now I feel no pain. And my

mind is like a bird that poises for a while over past and present, ere

soaring into the far future. There are things I must yet say to thee,

Valdemar,--give me thy close hearing, for my voice is weak."

Svensen drew closer, and stood in the humble attitude of one who waits a

command from some supreme chief.

"This letter," went on the old man, giving him a folded paper, "is to

the child of my heart, my Thelma. Send it to her--when--I am gone. It

will not grieve her, I hope--for, as far as I could find words, I have

expressed therein nothing but joy--the joy of a prisoner set free. Tell

her, that with all the strength of my perishing body and escaping soul,

I blessed her! . . . her and the husband in whose arms she rests in

safety." He raised his trembling hands solemnly--"The gods of my fathers

and their attendant spirits have her young life in their glorious

keeping!--the joy of love and purity and peace be on her innocent head

for ever!"

He paused,--the wind wailed mournfully round the house and shook the

lattice with a sort of stealthy clatter, like a forlorn wanderer

striving to creep in to warmth and shelter.

"Here, Valdemar," continued the _bonde_ presently, in fainter accents,

at the same time handing him another paper. "Here are some scrawled

lines--they are plainly set forth and signed--which make thee master of

this poor place and all that it contains."

A low, choked sob broke from Valdemar's broad breast--he covered his

face with his hands.

"Of what avail?" he murmured brokenly. "When my lord departs, I am alone

and friendless!"

The _bonde_ regarded him with kindly pity.

"Tears from the stout heart?" he inquired with a sort of grave wonder.

"Weep for life, Valdemar--not for death! Alone and friendless? Not while

the gods are in heaven! Cheer thee--thou art strong and in vigorous

pride of manhood--why should not bright days come for thee--" He broke

off with a gasp--a sudden access of pain convulsed him and rendered his

breathing difficult. By sheer force of will he mastered the cruel agony,

though great drops of sweat stood on his brow when he at last found

voice to continue--

"I thought all suffering was past," he said with a heroic smile. "This

foolish flesh and blood of mine dies hard! But, as I was saying to thee,

Valdemar--the farm is thine, and all it holds--save some few trifles I

have set down to be given to my child. There is little worth in what I

leave thee--the soil--is hard and ungrateful--the harvest uncertain, and

the cattle few. Even the reindeer--didst thou say they were injured by

their fall last night?--I--I forget, . . ."

"No harm has come to them," said Svensen hastily, seeing that the very

effort of thinking was becoming too much for the old man. "They are safe

and unhurt. Trouble not about these things!"

A strange, unearthly radiance transfigured Güldmar's visage.

"Trouble is departing swiftly from me," he murmured.

"Trouble and I shall know each other no more!" His voice died away

inarticulately, and he was silent a little space. Suddenly, and with a

rush of vigor--that seemed superhuman, he raised himself nearly erect,

and pointed outwards with a commanding gesture.

"Bear me hence!" he cried in ringing tones. "Hence to the mountains and

the sea!"

With a sort of mechanical, swift obedience, Valdemar threw open the

door--the wind rushed coldly into the house, bringing with it large

feathery flakes of snow. A hand sledge stood outside the porch,--it was

always there during the winter, being much used for visiting the

outlying grounds of the farm,--and to this, Valdemar prepared to carry

the _bonde_ in his herculean arms. But, on being lifted from his couch,

the old man, filled with strange, almost delirious force, declared

himself able to stand,--and, though suffering deadly anguish at every

step, did in truth manage to reach and enter the sledge, strongly

supported by Valdemar. There, however, he fainted--and his faithful

servant, covering his insensible form with, furs, thought he was dead.

But there was now no time for hesitation,--dead or living, Olaf

Güldmar's will was law to his vassal,--an oath had been made and must be

kept. To propel the sledge down to the Fjord was an easy matter--how the

rest of his duty was accomplished he never knew.

He was conscious of staggering blindly onward, weighted with a heavy,

helpless burden,--he felt the slippery pier beneath his feet--the

driving snow and the icy wind on his face,--but he was as one in a

dream, realizing nothing plainly, till with a wild start, he seemed to

awake--and lo! he stood on the glassy deck of the _Valkyrie_ with the

body of his "King" stretched senseless before him! Had he brought him

there? He could not remember what he had done during the past few mad

minutes,--the earth and sky whirled dizzily around him,--he could grasp

nothing tangible in thought or memory. But there, most certainly, Olaf

Güldmar lay,--his pallid face upturned, his hair and beard as white as

the snow that clung to the masts of his vessel--his hand clenched on the

fur garment that enwrapped him as with a robe of royalty.

Dropping on his knees beside him, Valdemar felt his heart--it still

throbbed fitfully and feebly. Watching the intense calm of the grand,

rugged face, this stern, weather-worn sailor--this man of superstitious

and heathen imaginations--gave way to womanish tears--tears that were

the outcome of sincere and passionate grief. His love was of an

exceptional type,--something like that of a faithful dog that refuses to

leave the grave of its master,--he could contemplate death for himself

with absolute indifference,--but not for the _bonde_, whose sturdy

strength and splendid physique had seemed to defy all danger.

As he knelt and wept unrestrainedly, a soft change, a delicate

transparency, swept over the dark bosom of the sky. Pale pink streaks

glittered on the dusky horizon--darts of light began to climb upward

into the clouds, and to plunge downward into the water,--the radiance

spread, and gradually formed into a broad band of deep crimson, which

burned with a fixed and intense glow--topaz-like rays flickered and

streamed about it, as though uncertain what fantastic shape they should

take to best display their brilliancy. This tremulous hesitation of

varying color did not last long; the whole jewel-like mass swept

together, expanding and contracting with extraordinary swiftness for a

few seconds--then, suddenly and clearly defined in the sky, a Kingly

Crown blazed forth--a Crown of perfect shape, its five points distinctly

and separately outlined and flashing as with a million rubies and

diamonds. The red lustre warmly tinged the pale features of the dying

man, and startled Valdemar, who sprang to his feet and gazed at that

mystic aureola with a cry of wonder. At the same moment Olaf Güldmar

stirred, and began to speak drowsily without opening his eyes.

"Dawn on the sea!" he murmured--"The white waves gleam and sparkle

beneath the prow, and the ship makes swift way through the water! It is

dawn in my heart--the dawn of love for thee and me, my Thelma--fear not!

The rose of passion is a hardy flower that can bloom in the north as

well as in the south, believe me! Thelma--Thelma!"

He suddenly opened his eyes, and realizing his surroundings, raised

himself half-erect.

"Set sail!" he cried, pointing with a majestic motion of his arm to the

diadem glittering in the sky. "Why do we linger? The wind favors us, and

the tide sweeps forward--forward! See how the lights beckon from the

harbor!"

He bent his brows and looked almost angrily at Svensen. "Do what thou

hast to do!" and his tones were sharp and imperious. "I must press on!"

An expression of terror, pain, and pity passed over the sailor's

countenance--for one instant he hesitated--the next, he descended into

the hold of the vessel. He was absent for a very little space,--but when

he returned his eyes were wild as though he had been engaged in some

dark and criminal deed. Olaf Güldmar was still gazing at the brilliancy

in the heavens, which seemed to increase in size and lustre as the wind

rose higher. Svensen took his hand--it was icy cold, and damp with the

dew of death.

"Let me go with thee!" he implored, in broken accent. "I fear nothing!

Why should I not venture also on the last voyage?"

Güldmar made a faint but decided sign of rejection.

"The Viking sails alone to the grave of his fathers!" he with a serene

and proud smile. "Alone--alone! Neither wife, nor child, nor vassal may

have place with him in his ship--even so have the gods willed it.

Farewell, Valdemar! Loosen the ropes and let me go!--thou servest me

ill--hasten--hasten--I am weary of waiting--"

His head fell back,--that mysterious shadow which darkens the face of

the dying a moment before dissolution, was on him now.

Just then a strange, suffocating odor began to permeate the air--little

wreaths of pale smoke made their slow way through the boards of the

deck--and a fierce gust of wind, blowing seawards from the mountains,

swayed the _Valkyrie_ uneasily to and fro. Slowly, and with evident

reluctance, Svensen commenced the work of detaching her from the

pier--feeling instinctively all the while that his master's dying eyes

were fixed upon him. When but one slender rope remained to be cast off,

he knelt by the old man's side said whispered tremblingly that all was

done. At the same moment a small, stealthy tongue of red flame curled up

through the deck from the hold,--and Güldmar, observing this, smiled.

"I see thou hast redeemed thine oath," he said, gratefully pressing

Svensen's hand. "'Tis the last act of thine allegiance,--may the gods

reward thy faithfulness! Peace be with thee!--we shall meet hereafter.

Already the light shines from the Rainbow Bridge,--there,--there are the

golden peaks of the hills and the stretch of the wide sea! Go,

Valdemar!--delay no longer, for my soul is impatient--it burns, it

struggles to be free! Go!--and--farewell!"

Stricken to the heart, and full of anguish,--yet serf-like in his

submission and resignation to the inevitable,--Svensen kissed his

master's hand for the last time. Then, with a sort of fierce sobbing

groan, wrung from the very depths of his despairing grief, he turned

resolutely away, and sprang off the vessel. Standing at the extreme edge

of the pier, he let slip the last rope that bound her,--her sails filled

and bulged outward,--her cordage creaked, she shuddered on the

water--lurched a little--then paused.

In that brief moment a loud triumphant cry rang through the air. Olaf

Güldmar leaped upright on the deck as though lifted by some invisible

hand, and confronted his terrified servants, who gazed at him in

fascinated amazement and awe. His white hair gleamed like spun

silver--his face was transfigured, and wore a strange, rapt look of pale

yet splendid majesty--the dark furs that clung about him trailed in

regal folds to his feet.

"Hark!" he cried, and his voice vibrated with deep and mellow clearness.

"Hark to the thunder of the galloping hoofs!--see--see the glitter of

the shield and spear! She comes-ah! Thelma! Thelma!" He raised his arms

as though in ecstacy. "Glory!--joy!--Victory!"

And, like a noble tree struck down by lightning, he fell--dead!

Even as he fell, the _Valkyrie_ plunged forward, driven forcibly by a

swooping gust of wind, and scudded out to the Fjord like a wild bird

flying before a tempest,--and, while she thus fled, a sheet of flame

burst through her sides and blazed upwards, mingling a lurid, smoky glow

with the clear crimson radiance of the still brilliant and crown-like

aurora. Following the current, she made swift way across the dark water

in the direction of the island of Seiland, and presently became a

wondrous Ship of Fire! Fire flashed from her masts--fire folded up her

spars and sails in a devouring embrace,--fire, that leaped and played

and sent forth a million showering sparks hissingly into the waves

beneath.

With beating heart and straining eyes, Valdemar Svensen crouched on the

pier-head, watching, in mute agony, the burning vessel. He had fulfilled

his oath!--that strange vow that had so sternly bound him,--a vow that

was the outcome of his peculiar traditions and pagan creed.

Long ago, in the days of his youth,--full of enthusiasm for the worship

of Odin and the past splendors of the race of the great Norse

warriors,--he had chosen to recognize in Olaf Güldmar a true descendant

of kings, who was by blood and birth, though not in power, himself a

king,--and tracing his legendary history back to old and half-forgotten

sources, he had proved, satisfactorily, to his own mind, that he,

Svensen, must lawfully, and according to old feudal system, be this

king's serf or vassal. And, growing more and more convinced of this in

his dreamy and imaginative mind,--he had sworn a sort of mystic

friendship and allegiance, which Güldmar had accepted, imposing on him,

however, only one absolute command. This was that he should be given the

"crimson shroud" and sea-tomb of his war-like ancestors,--for the idea

that his body might be touched by strange hands, shut in a close coffin,

and laid in the earth to moulder away to wormy corruption,--had been the

one fantastic dread of the sturdy old pagan's life. And he had taken

advantage of Svensen's devotion and obedience to impress on him the

paramount importance of his solitary behest.

"Let no hypocritical prayers be chanted over my dumb corpse," he had

said. "My blood would ooze from me at every pore were I touched by the

fingers of a Lutheran! Save this goodly body that has served me so well

from the inferior dust,--let the bright fire wither it, and the glad sea

drown it,--and my soul, beholding its end afar off, shall rejoice and be

satisfied. Swear by the wrath and thunder of the gods!--swear by the

unflinching Hammer of Thor,--swear by the gates of Valhalla, and in the

name of Odin!--and having sworn, the curse of all these be upon thee if

thou fail to keep thy vow!"

And Valdemar had sworn. Now that the oath was kept--now that his

promised obedience had been carried out to the extremest letter, he was

as one stupefied. Shivering, yet regardless of the snow that began to

fall thickly, he kept his post, staring, staring in drear fascination

across the Fjord, where the _Valkyrie_ drifted, now a mass of flame

blown fiercely by the wind, and gleaming red through the flaky

snow-storm.

The aurora borealis faded by gradual degrees, and the flaming ship was

more than ever distinctly visible. She was seen from the shore of

Bosekop, by a group of the inhabitants, who, rubbing their dull eyes,

could not decide whether what they beheld was fire, or a new phase of

the capricious, ever-changing Northern Lights,--the rapidly descending

snow rendering their vision bewildered and uncertain. Any way, they

thought very little about it,--they had had excitement of another kind

in the arrival of Ulrika from Talvig, bringing accounts of the godly

Lovisa Elsland's death.

Moreover, an English steam cargo-boat, bound for the North Cape, had,

just an hour previously, touched at their harbor, to land a

passenger,--a mysterious woman closely veiled, who immediately on

arrival had hired a sledge, and had bidden the driver to take her to the

house of Olaf Güldmar, an eight miles journey through the drifted snow.

All this was intensely interesting to the good, stupid, gossiping

fisher-folks of Bosekop,--so much so, indeed, that they scarcely paid

any heed to the spectacle of the fiery ship swaying suggestively on the

heaving water, and drifting rapidly away--away towards the frosted peaks

of Seiland.

Further and further she receded,--the flames around her waving like

banners in a battle--further and further still--till Valdemar Svensen,

from his station on the pier, began to lose sight of her blazing

timbers,--and, starting from his reverie, he ran rapidly from the shore,

up through the garden paths to the farm-house, in order to gain the

summit, and from that point of vantage, watch the last glimmering spark

of the Viking's burial. As he reached the house, he stopped short and

uttered a wild exclamation. There,--under the porch hung with sparkling

icicles,--stood Thelma! . . . Thelma,--her face pale and weary, yet

smiling faintly,--Thelma with the glint of her wondrous gold hair

escaping from under her hat, and glittering on the folds of her dark fur

mantle.

"I have come home, Valdemar!" said the sweet, rich, penetrating voice.

"Where is my father?"

As a man distraught, or in some dreadful dream, Valdemar approached

her--the strangeness of his look and manner filled her with sudden

fear,--he caught her hand and pointed to the dark Fjord--to the spot

where gleamed a lurid waving wreath of flames.

"Fröken Thelma--he is _there_!" he gasped in choked, hoarse tones.

"_there_--where the gods have called him!"

With a faint shriek of terror, Thelma's blue eyes turned toward the

shadowy water,--as she looked, a long up-twisting snake of fire appeared

to leap from the perishing _Valkyrie_,--a snake that twined its

glittering coils rapidly round and round on the wind, and as rapidly

sank--down--down--to one glimmering spark which glowed redly like a

floating lamp for a brief space,--and was then quenched for ever! The

ship had vanished! Thelma needed no explanation,--she knew her father's

creed--she understood all. Breaking loose from Valdemar's grasp, she

rushed a few steps forward with arms outstretched on the bitter, snowy

air.

"Father! father!" she cried aloud and sobbingly. "Wait for me!--it is I

Thelma!--I am coming--Father!"

The white world around her grew black--and, shuddering like a shot bird,

she fell senseless.

Instantly Valdemar raised her from the ground, and holding her tenderly

and reverently in his strong arms, carried her, as though she were a

child, into the house . . . clouds darkened--the snow-storm

thickened--the mountain-peaks, stern giants, frowned through their

sleety veils at the arctic desolation of the land below them,--and over

the charred and sunken corpse of the departed servant of Odin, sounded

the solemn De Profundis of the sea.

CHAPTER XXXIII.

"The body is the storm;

The soul the star beyond it, in the deep

Of Nature's calm. And, yonder, on the steep,

The Sun of Faith, quiescent, round, and warm!"

Late on that same night, the pious Ulrika was engaged in prayer. Prayer

with her was a sort of fanatical wrestling of the body as well as of the

soul,--she was never contented unless by means of groans and contortions

she could manage to work up by degrees into a condition of hysteria

resembling a mild epileptic attack, in which state alone she considered

herself worthy to approach the Deity. On this occasion she had some

difficulty to attain the desired result--her soul, as she herself

expressed it, was "dry"--and her thoughts wandered,--though she pinched

her neck and arms with the hard resoluteness of a sworn flagellant, and

groaned, "Lord, have mercy on me a sinner!" with indefatigable

earnestness. She was considerably startled in the midst of these

energetic devotions by a sudden jangling of sledge--bells, and aloud

knocking--a knocking which threatened to break down the door of the

small and humble house she inhabited. Hastily donning the coarse gown

and bodice she had recently taken off in order to administer

chastisement to her own flesh more thoroughly, she unfastened her bolts

and bars, and, lifting the latch, was confronted by Valdemar Svensen,

who, nearly breathless with swift driving through the snow-storm, cried

out in quick gasps--

"Come with me--come! She is dying!"

"God help the man!" exclaimed Ulrika startled. "Who is dying?"

"She--the Fröken Thelma--Lady Errington--she is all alone up there," and

he pointed distractedly in the direction from whence he had come. "I can

get no one in Bosekop,--the women are cowards all,--all afraid to go

near her," and he wrung his hands in passionate distress.

Ulrika pulled a thick shawl from the nail where it hung and wrapped it

round her.

"I am ready," she said, and without more delay, stepped into the waiting

sledge, while Valdemar, with an exclamation of gratitude and relief,

took his place beside her. "But how is it?" she asked, as the reindeer

started off at full speed, "how is it that the _bonde's_ daughter is

again at the Altenfjord?"

"I know not!" answered Svensen despairingly. "I would have given my life

not to have told her of her father's death."

"Death!" cried Ulrika. "Olaf Güldmar _dead_! Impossible! Only last night

I saw him in the pride of his strength,--and thought I never had beheld

so goodly a man. Lord, Lord! That he should be _dead_!"

In a few words Svensen related all that had happened, with the exception

of the fire-burial in the Fjord.

But Ulrika immediately asked, "Is his body still in the house?"

Svensen looked at her darkly. "Hast thou never heard Ulrika," he said

solemnly, "that the bodies of men who follow Olaf Güldmar's creed,

disappear as soon as the life departs from them? It is a

mystery--strange and terrible! But this is true--my master's

sailing-ship has gone, and his body with it--and I know not where!"

Ulrika surveyed him steadily with a slow, incredulous smile. After a

pause, she said--

"Fidelity in a servant is good, Valdemar Svensen! I know you well--I

also know that a pagan shrinks from Christian burial. Enough said--I

will ask no more--but if Olaf Güldmar's ship's has gone, and he with

it,--I warn you, the village will wonder."

"I cannot help it," said Svensen with cold brevity. "I have spoken

truth--he has gone! I saw him die--and then vanish. Believe it or not as

you will, I care not!"

And he drove on in silence. Ulrika was silent too.

She had known Valdemar Svensen for many years--he was a man universally

liked and respected at all the harbors and different fishing-stations of

Norway, and his life was an open book to everybody, with the exception

of one page, which was turned down and sealed,--this was the question of

his religious belief. No one knew what form of faith he followed,--it

was only when he went to live with the _bonde_, after Thelma's

marriage,--that the nature of his creed was dimly suspected. But Ulrika

had no dislike for him on this account,--her opinions had changed very

much during the past few months. As devout a Lutheran as ever, she began

to entertain a little more of the true spirit of Christianity--that

spirit of gentle and patient tolerance which, full of forbearance

towards all humanity, is willing to admit the possibility of a little

good in everything, even in the blind tenets of a heathen creed. Part of

this alteration in her was due to the gratitude she secretly felt

towards the Güldmar family, for having saved from destruction,--albeit

unconscious of his parentage,--Sigurd, the child she had attempted to

murder. The hideous malevolence of Lovisa Elsland's nature had shown her

that there _may_ be bad Lutherans,--the invariable tenderness displayed

by the Güldmars for her unrecognized, helpless and distraught son,--had

proved to her that there _may_ be good heathens. Hearing thus suddenly

of the _bonde's_ death, she was strangely affected--she could almost

have wept. She felt perfectly convinced that Svensen had made away with

his master's body by some mysterious rite connected with pagan

belief,--she knew that Güldmar himself, according to rumor, had buried

his own wife in some unknown spot, with strange and weird ceremonials,

but she was inclined to be tolerant,--and glancing at Svensen's grave,

pained face from time to time as she sat beside him in the sledge, she

resolved to ask him no more questions on the subject, but to accept and

support, if necessary, the theory he had so emphatically set

forth,--namely, the mystical evanishment of the corpse by some

supernatural agency.

As they neared their destination, she began to think of Thelma, the

beautiful, proud girl whom she remembered best as standing on a little

green-tufted hillock with a cluster of pansies in her hand, and

Sigurd--Sigurd clinging fondly to her white skirts, with a wealth of

passionate devotion in his upturned, melancholy, blue eyes. Ulrika had

seen her but once since then,--and that was on the occasion when, at the

threat of Lovisa Elsland, and the command of the Reverend Mr.

Dyceworthy, she had given her Sir Philip Errington's card, with the

false message written on it that had decoyed her for a time into the

wily minister's power. She felt a thrill of shame as she remembered the

part she had played in that cruel trick,--and reverting once more to the

memory of Sigurd, whose tragic end at the Fall of Njedegorze she had

learned through Valdemar, she resolved to make amends now that she had

the chance, and to do her best for Thelma in her suffering and trouble.

"For who knows," mused Ulrika, "Whether it is not the Lord's hand that

is extended towards me,--and that in the ministering to the wants of her

whom I wronged, and whom my son so greatly loved, I may not thereby

cancel the past sin, and work out my own redemption!"

And her dull eyes brightened with hope, and her heart warmed,--she began

to feel almost humane and sympathetic,--and was so eager to commence her

office of nurse and consoler to Thelma that she jumped out of the sledge

almost before it had stopped at the farm gate. Disregarding Valdemar's

assistance, she clambered sturdily over the drifted heaps of slippery

snow that blocked the deserted pathways, and made for the

house,--Valdemar following her as soon as he had safely fastened up the

sledge, which was not his own, he having in emergency borrowed it from a

neighbor. As they approached, a sound came floating to meet them--a

sound which made them pause and look at each other in surprise and

anxiety. Some one was singing,--a voice full and clear, though with a

strange, uncertain quiver in it, rippled out in wild strains of minor

melody on the snow-laden air. For one moment Ulrika listened doubtedly,

and then without more delay ran hastily forward and entered the house.

Thelma was there,--sitting at the lattice window which she had thrown

wide open to the icy blast,--she had taken off her cloak and hat, and

her hair, unbound, fell about her in a great, glittering tangle of

gold,--her hands were busy manipulating an imaginary spinning-wheel--her

eyes were brilliant as jewels, but full of pain, terror, and pathos. She

smiled a piteous smile as she became hazily conscious that there were

others in the room--but she went on with her song--a mournful, Norwegian

ditty,--till a sudden break in her voice caused her to put her hand to

her throat and look up perplexedly.

"That song pleases you?" she asked softly, "I am very glad! Has Sigurd

come home? He wanders so much, poor boy! Father, dear, you must tell him

how wrong it is not to love Philip. Every one loves Philip--and I--I

love him too, but he must never know that." She paused and sighed. "That

is my secret,--the only one I have!" And she drooped her fair head

forlornly.

Moved by intense pity, such as she had never felt in all her life

before, Ulrika went up and tried to draw her gently from the window.

"Poor thing, poor thing!" she said kindly. "Come away with me, and lie

down! You mustn't sit here,--let me shut the lattice,--it's quite late

at night, and too cold for you, my dear."

"Too cold?" and Thelma eyed her wonderingly. "Why, it is summer-time,

and the sun never sets! The roses are all about the walls--I gave one to

Philip yesterday--a little pale rose with a crimson heart. He wore it,

and seemed glad!"

She passed her hand across her forehead with a troubled air, and watched

Ulrika, who quietly closed the window against the darkness and

desolation of the night. "Are you a friend?" she asked presently in

anxious tones. "I know so many that say they are my friends--but I am

afraid of them all--and I have left them. Do you know why?" and she laid

her hand on Ulrika's rough arm. "Because they tell me my Philip does not

love me any more. They are very cruel to say so, and I think it cannot

be true. I want to tell my father what they say--because he will

know--and if it is true, then I wish to die,--I could not live! Will you

take me to my father?"

The plaintive, pleading gentleness of her voice and look brought more

tears into Ulrika's eyes than had ever been forced there by her

devotional exercises,--and the miserable Valdemar, already

broken-hearted by his master's death, turned away and sobbingly cursed

his gods for this new and undeserved affliction. As the Italian

peasantry fall to abusing their saints in time of trouble, even so will

the few remaining believers in Norse legendary lore, upbraid their

fierce divinities with the most reckless hardihood when things go wrong.

There were times when Valdemar Svensen secretly quailed at the mere

thought of the wrath of Odin,--there were others when he was ready to

pluck the great god by the beard and beat him with the flat of his own

drawn sword. This was his humor at the present moment, as he averted his

gaze from the pitiful sight of his "King's" fair daughter all desolate

and woe-begone, her lovely face pale with anguish,--her sweet wits

wandering, and her whole demeanor that of one who is lost in some dark

forest, and is weary unto death. She studied Ulrika's rough visage

attentively, and presently noticed the tears on her cheeks.

"You are crying!" she said in a tone of grave surprise. "Why? It is

foolish to cry even when the heart aches. I have found that,--no one in

the world ever pities you! But perhaps you do not know the world,--ah!

it is very hard and cold;--all the people hide their feelings, and

pretend to be what they are not. It is difficult to live so,--and I am

tired!"

She rose from her chair, and stood up unsteadily, stretching out her

little cold white hands to Ulrika, who folded them in her own strong

coarse palms. "Yes--I am very tired!" she went on dreamily. "There seems

to be nothing that is true--all is false and unreal--I cannot

understand! But you seem kind,"--here her swaying figure tottered, and

Ulrika drew her more closely to herself--"I think I know you--you came

with me in the train, did you not? Yes--and the little baby smiled and

slept in my arms nearly all the way." A violent shuddering seized her,

and a quiver of agony passed over her face.

"Forgive me," she murmured, "I feel ill--very ill--and cold--but do not

mind--I think--I am--dying!" She could scarcely articulate these last

words--she sank forward, fainting, on Ulrika's breast, and that devout

disciple of Luther, forgetting all her former dread of the "white witch

of the Altenfjord"--only remembered that she held in her arms a helpless

woman with all the sorrows and pangs of womanhood thick upon her,--and

in this act of warm heart-expansion and timely tenderness, it may be

that she cleansed her soiled soul in the sight of the God she

worshipped, and won a look of pardon from the ever-watchful eyes of

Christ.

As far as mundane matters were concerned, she showed herself a woman of

prompt energy and decision. Laying Thelma gently down upon the very

couch her dead father had so lately occupied, she sent the distracted

Valdemar out to gather fresh pine-logs for the fire, and then busied

herself in bringing down Thelma's own little bed from the upper floor,

airing it with methodical care, and making it as warm and cosy as a

bird's-nest. While she was engaged in these preparations, Thelma

regained her consciousness, and began to toss and tumble and talk

deliriously; but with it all she retained the innate gentleness and

patience, and submitted to be undressed, though she began to sob

pleadingly when Ulrika would have removed her husband's miniature from

where it lay pressed against her bosom,--and taking it in her own hand

she kissed and held it fast. One by one, the dainty articles of delicate

apparel she wore were loosened and laid aside, Ulrika wondering at the

embroidered linen and costly lace, the like of which was never seen in

that part of Norway,--but wondering still more at the dazzling skin she

thus unveiled, a skin as exquisitely soft and pure as the satiny cup of

a Nile lily.

Poor Thelma sat resignedly watching her own attire taken from her, and

allowing herself to be wrapped in a comfortable loose garment of white

wadmel, as warm as eider-down, which Ulrika had found in a cupboard

upstairs, and which, indeed, had once belonged to Thelma, she and Britta

having made it together. She examined its texture now with some faint

interest--then she asked plaintively--

"Are you going to bury me? You must put me to sleep with my mother--her

name was Thelma, too. I think it is an unlucky name."

"Why, my dear?" asked Ulrika kindly, as she swept the rich tumbled hair

from the girl's eyes, and began to braid it in one long loose plait, in

order to give her greater ease.

Thelma sighed. "There is an old song that says--" She broke off. "Shall

I sing it to you?" she asked with a wild look.

"No, no," said Ulrika. "Not now. By-and-by!" And she nodded her head

encouragingly. "By-and-by! There'll be plenty of time for singing

presently," and she laid her in bed, tucking her up warmly as though she

were a very little child, and feeling strongly inclined to kiss her.

"Ah, but I should like to tell you, even if I must not sing--" and

Thelma gazed up anxiously from her pillow--"only my head is so heavy,

and full of strange noises--I do not know whether I can remember it."

"Don't try to remember it," and Ulrika stroked the soft cheek, with a

curious yearning sensation of love tugging at her tough heartstrings.

"Try to sleep--that will be better for you!" And she took from the fire

a warm, nourishing drink she had prepared, and gave it to her. She was

surprised at the eagerness with which the poor girl seized it.

"Lord help us, I believe she is light-headed for want of food!" she

thought.

Such indeed was the fact,--Thelma had been several days on her journey

from Hull, and during that time had eaten so little that her strength

had entirely given way. The provisions on board the Black Polly were

extremely limited, and consisted of nothing but dried fish, hard bread,

and weak tea, without milk or sugar,--and in her condition of health,

her system had rebelled against this daily untempting bill of fare.

Ulrika's simple but sustaining beverage seemed more than delicious to

her palate,--she drained it to the last drop, and, as she returned the

cup, a feint color came back to her cheeks and lips.

"Thank you," she said feebly. "You are very good to me! And now I do

quite know what I wished to say. It was long ago--there was a queen,

named Thelma, and some one--a great warrior, loved her and found her

fair. But presently he grew tired of her face--and raised an army

against her, and took her throne by force, and crowned himself king of

all her land. And the song says that Queen Thelma wandered on the

mountains all alone till she died--it was a sad song--but I forget--the

end."

And her voice trailed off into broken murmurs, her eyes closed, and she

slept. Ulrika watched her musingly and tenderly--wondering what secret

trouble weighed on the girl's mind. When Valdemar Svensen presently

looked in, she made him a warning sign--and, hushing his footsteps, he

went away again. She followed him out into the kitchen, where he had

deposited his load of pine-wood, and began to talk to him in low tones.

He listened,--the expression of grief and fear deepened on his

countenance as he heard.

"Will she die?" he asked anxiously.

"Let us hope not," returned Ulrika, "But there is no doubt she is very

ill, and will be worse. What has brought her here, I wonder? Do you

know?"

Valdemar shook his head.

"Where is her husband?" went on Ulrika. "He ought to be here. How could

he have let her make such a journey at such a time! Why did he not come

with her? There must be something wrong!"

Svensen looked, as he felt, completely perplexed and despairing. He

could think of no reason for Thelma's unexpected appearance at the

Altenfjord--he had forgotten all about the letter that had come from her

to her father,--the letter which was still in the house, unopened.

"Well, well! It is very strange!" Ulrika sighed resignedly. "But it is

the Lord's will--and we must do our best for her, that's all." And she

began to enumerate a list of things she wanted from Bosekop for her

patient's sustenance and comfort. "You must fetch all these," she said,

"as soon as the day is fairly advanced." She glanced at the clock--it

was just four in the morning. "And at the same time, you had better call

at the doctor's house."

"He's away," interrupted Valdemar. "Gone to Christiania."

"Very well," said Ulrika composedly. "Then we must do without him.

Doctors are never much use, any way,--maybe the Lord will help me

instead."

And she returned to Thelma, who still slept, though her face was now

feverishly flushed and her breathing hurried and irregular.

The hours of the new day,--day, though seeming night, passed on and it

was verging towards ten o'clock when she woke, raving deliriously. Her

father, Sigurd, Philip, the events of her life in, London, the fatigues

of her journey, were all jumbled fantastically together in her

brain--she talked and sang incessantly, and, like some wild bird

suddenly caged, refused to be quieted. Ulrika was all alone with

her,--Valdemar having gone to execute his commissions in Bosekop,--and

she had enough to do to make her remain in bed. For she became suddenly

possessed by a strong desire to go sailing on the Fjord--and

occasionally it took all Ulrika's strength to hold and keep her from

springing to the window, whose white frosted panes seemed to have some

fatal attraction for her wandering eyes.

She spoke of things strange and new to her attendant's ears--frequently

she pronounced the names of Violet Vere and Lady Winsleigh with an

accent of horror,--then she would talk of George Lorimer and Pierre

Duprèz,--and she would call for Britta often, sometimes

endearingly--sometimes impatiently.

The picture of her home in Warwickshire seemed to haunt her,--she spoke

of its great green trees, its roses, its smooth sloping lawns--then she

would begin to smile and sing again in such a weak, pitiful fashion that

Ulrika,--her stern nature utterly melted at the sight of such innocent

helpless distraction and sorrow,--could do nothing but fold the

suffering creature in her arms, and rock her to and fro soothingly on

her breast, the tears running down her cheeks the while.

And after long hours of bewilderment and anguish, Errington's child, a

boy, was born--dead. With a regretful heart, Ulrika laid out the tiny

corpse,--the withered blossom of a promised new delight, a miniature form

so fair and perfect that it seemed sheer cruelty on the part of nature

to deny it breath and motion. Thelma's mind still wandered--she was

hardly conscious of anything--and Ulrika was almost glad that this was

so. Her anxiety was very great--she could not disguise from herself that

Thelma's life was in danger,--and both she and Valdemar wrote to Sir

Philip Errington, preparing him for the worst, and urging him to come at

once,--little aware that the very night the lifeless child was born, was

the same on which he had started from Hull for Christiansund, after his

enforced waiting for the required steamer. There was nothing more to be

done now, thought Ulrika piously, but to trust in the Lord and hope for

the best. And Valdemar Svensen made with his own hands a tiny coffin for

the body of the little dead boy who was to have brought such pride and

satisfaction to his parents, and one day rowed it across the Fjord to

that secret cave where Thelma's mother lay enshrined in stone. There he

left it, feeling sure he had done well.

Ulrika asked him no questions--she was entirely absorbed in the duties

that devolved upon her, and with an ungrudging devotion strange to see

in her, watched and tended Thelma incessantly, scarcely allowing herself

a minute's space for rest or food. The idea that her present

ministration was to save her soul in the sight of the Lord, had grown

upon her, and was now rooted firmly in her mind--she never gave way to

fatigue or inattention,--every moan, every restless movement of the

suffering girl, obtained her instant and tender solicitude, and when she

prayed now, it was not for herself but for Thelma.

"Spare her, good Lord!" she would implore in the hyperbolical language

she had drawn from her study of the Scriptures--"As the lily among

thorns, so is she among the daughters! Cut her not off root and branch

from the land of the living, for her countenance is comely, and as a

bunch of myrrh which hath a powerful sweetness, even so must she surely

be to the heart of her husband! Stretch forth Thy right hand, O Lord,

and scatter healing, for the gates of death shall not prevail against

Thy power!"

Day after day she poured out petitions such as these, and with the

dogged persistency of a soldier serving Cromwell, believed that they

would be granted,--though day after day Thelma seemed to grow weaker and

weaker. She was still light-headed--her face grew thin and shadowy,--her

hands were almost transparent in their whiteness and delicacy, and her

voice was so faint as to be nearly in-audible. Sometimes Ulrika got

frightened at her appearance, and heartily wished for medical assistance

but this was not to be had. Therefore she was compelled to rely on the

efficacy of one simple remedy,--a herbal drink to allay fever,--the

virtues of which she had been taught in her youth,--this, and the

healing mercies of mother Nature together with the reserved strength of

her own constitution, were the threads on which Thelma's life hung.

Time passed on--and yet there was no news from Sir Philip. One night,

sitting beside her exhausted patient, Ulrika fancied she saw a change on

the wan face--a softer, more, peaceful look than had been there for many

days. Half in fear, half in hope, she watched,--Thelma seemed to

sleep,--but presently her large blue eyes opened with a calm yet

wondering expression in their clear depths. She turned slightly on her

pillows, and smiled faintly.

"Have I been ill?" she asked.

"Yes, my dear," returned Ulrika softly, overjoyed, yet afraid at the

girl's returning intelligence. "Very ill. But you feel better now, don't

you?"

Thelma sighed, and raising her little wasted hand, examined it

curiously. Her wedding and betrothal rings were so loose on her finger

that they would have fallen off had they been held downwards. She seemed

surprised at this, but made no remark. For some time she remained quiet,

steadfastly gazing at Ulrika, and evidently trying to make out who she

was. Presently she spoke again.

"I remember everything now," she said, slowly. "I am at home, at the

Altenfjord--and I know how I came--and also _why_ I came." Here her lips

quivered. "And I shall see my father no more, for he has gone--and I am

all--all alone in the world!" She paused--then added, "Do you think I am

dying? If so, I am very glad!"

"Hush my dear!" said Ulrika. "You mustn't talk in that way. Your husband

is coming presently--" she broke off suddenly, startled at the look of

utter despair in Thelma's eyes.

"You are wrong," she replied wearily. "He will not come--he cannot! He

does not want me any more!"

And two large tears rolled slowly down her pale cheeks. Ulrika wondered,

but forebore to pursue the subject further, fearing to excite or

distress her,--and contented herself for the present with attending to

her patient's bodily needs. She went to the fire, and began to pour out

some nourishing soup, which she always had there in readiness,--and

while she was thus engaged, Thelma's brain cleared more and more,--till

with touching directness, and a new hope flushing her face, she asked

softly and beseechingly for her child. "I forgot!" she said simply and

sweetly. "Of course I am not alone any more. Do give me my baby--I am

much better--nearly well--and I should like to kiss it."

Ulrika stood mute, taken aback by this demand. She dared not tell her

the truth--she feared its effect on the sensitive mind that had so

lately regained its balance. But while she hesitated, Thelma

instinctively guessed all she strove to hide.

"It is dead!" she cried. "Dead!--and I never knew!"

And, burying her golden head in her pillows, she broke into a passion of

convulsive sobbing. Ulrika grew positively desperate at the sound,--what

_was_ she to do? Everything seemed to go against her--she was inclined

to cry herself. She embraced the broken-hearted girl, and tried to

soothe her, but in vain. The long delirium and subsequent

weakness,--combined with the secret trouble on her mind,--had deprived

poor Thelma of all resisting power, and she wept on and on in Ulrika's

arms till nature was exhausted, and she could weep no longer. Then she

lay motionless, with closed eyes, utterly drained in body and spirit,

scarcely breathing, and, save for a shivering moan that now and then

escaped her, she seemed almost insensible. Ulrika watched her with

darkening, meditative brows,--she listened to the rush of the storm-wind

without,--it was past eleven o'clock at night. She began to count on her

fingers--it was the sixteenth day since the birth of the child,--sixteen

days exactly since she had written to Sir Philip Errington, informing

him of his wife's danger--and the danger was not yet past. Thinking over

all that had happened, and the apparent hopelessness of the case, she

suddenly took a strange idea into her head. Retiring to a distant

corner, she dropped on her knees.

"O Lord, God Almighty!" she said in a fierce whisper, "Behold, I have

been Thy servant until now! I have wrestled with Thee in prayer till I

am past all patience! If Thou wilt not hear my petition, why callest

Thou Thyself good? Is it good to crush the already fallen? Is it good to

have no mercy on the sorrowful? Wilt Thou condemn the innocent without

reason? If so, thou art not the Holy One I imagined! Send forth Thy

power now--now, while there is time! Rescue her that is lying under the

shadow of death--for how has she offended Thee that she should die?

Delay no longer, or how shall I put my trust in Thee? Send help speedily

from Thine everlasting habitations--or, behold! I do forsake Thee--and

my soul shall seek elsewhere for Eternal Justice!"

As she finished this extraordinary, half-threatening, and entirely

blasphemous petition, the boisterous gale roared wildly round the house

joining in chorus with the stormy dash of waves upon the coast--a chorus

that seemed to Ulrika's ears like the sound of fiendish and derisive

laughter.

She stood listening,--a trifle scared--yet with a sort of fanatical

defiance written on her face, and she waited in sullen patience

evidently expecting an immediate answer to her outrageous prayer. She

felt somewhat like a demagogue of the people, who boldly menaces an

all-powerful sovereign, even while in dread of instant execution. There

was a sharp patter of sleet on the window,--she glanced nervously at

Thelma, who, perfectly still on her couch, looked more like a white,

recumbent statue than a living woman. The wind shook the doors, and

whistled shrilly through the crevices,--then, as though tired of its own

wrath, surged away in hoarse murmurs over the tops of the creaking pines

towards the Fjord, and there was a short, impressive silence.

Ulrika still waited--almost holding her breath in expectation of some

divine manifestation. The brief stillness grew unbearable.. . . Hush!

What was that! Jingle--jangle--jingle--jangle!--Bells! Sledge bells

tinkling musically and merrily--and approaching swiftly, nearer--nearer!

Now the sharp trotting roofs on the hard snow--then a sudden slackening

of speed--the little metallic chimes rang slower and yet more slowly,

till with a decisive and melodious clash they stopped!

Ulrika's heart beat thickly--her face flushed--she advanced to Thelma's

bedside, hoping, fearing,--she knew not what. There was a tread of firm,

yet hurried, footsteps without--a murmur of subdued voices--a

half-suppressed exclamation of surprise and relief from Valdemar,--and

then the door of the room was hastily thrown open, and a man's tall

figure, draped in what seemed to be a garment of frozen snowflakes,

stood on the threshold. The noise startled Thelma--she opened her

beautiful, tired, blue eyes. Ah! what a divine rapture,--what a dazzling

wonder and joy flashed into them, giving them back their old lustre of

sunlight sparkling on azure sea! She sprang up in her bed and stretched

out her arms.

"Philip!" she cried sobbingly. "Philip! oh my darling! Try--try to love

me again! . . . just a little!--before I die!"

As she spoke she was clasped to his breast,--folded to his heart in that

strong, jealous, passionate embrace with which we who love, would fain

shield our nearest and dearest from even the shadow of evil--his lips

closed on hers,--and in the sacred stillness that followed, Ulrika

slipped from the room, leaving husband and wife alone together.

CHAPTER XXXIV.

"I have led her home, my love, my only friend;

There is none like her, none!

And never yet so warmly ran my blood,

And sweetly on and on,

Calming itself to the long-wished-for end,

Full to the banks, close on the promised good."

TENNYSON.

Britta was in the kitchen, dragging off her snow-wet cloak and fur

mufflers, and crying heartily all the while. The stalwart Svensen stood

looking at her in perplexity, now and then uttering a word of vague

sympathy and consolation, to which she paid not the slightest heed. The

poor girl was tired out, and half-numb with the piercing cold,--the

excitement which had kept her up for days and days, had yielded to the

nervous exhaustion, which was its natural result,--and she kept on

weeping without exactly knowing why she wept. Throughout the long and

fatiguing journey she had maintained unflinching energy and

perseverance,--undaunted by storm, sleet, and darkness, she had driven

steadily over long miles of trackless snow--her instinct had guided her

by the shortest and quickest routes--she seemed to know every station

and village on the way,--she always managed to obtain relays of reindeer

just when they were needed,--in short, Errington would hardly have been

able to reach the Altenfjord without her.

He had never realized to its full extent her strong, indomitable,

devoted character, till he saw her hour after hour seated beside him in

the _pulkha_, her hands tightly gripping the reins of the horned

animals, whose ways she understood and perfectly controlled,--her

bright, bird-like eyes fixed with watchful eagerness on the bewildering

white landscape that opened out incessantly before her. Her common sense

was never at fault--she forgot nothing--and with gentle but respectful

firmness she would insist on Sir Philip's taking proper intervals of

rest and refreshment at the different farms they passed on their road,

though he, eager to press on, chafed and fretted at every little delay.

They were welcomed all along their route with true Norse hospitality,

though the good country-folk who entertained them could not refrain from

astonishment at the idea of their having undertaken such a journey at

such a season, and appeared to doubt the possibility of their reaching

their destination at all. And now that they had reached it in safety,

Britta's strength gave way. Valdemar Svensen had hastily blurted out the

news of the _bonde's_ death even while she and Sir Philip were alighting

from their sledge--and in the same breath had told them of Thelma's

dangerous illness. What wonder, then, that Britta sobbed hysterically,

and refused to be comforted,--what wonder that she turned upon Ulrika as

that personage approached, in a burst of unreasonable anger.

"Oh dear, oh dear!" she cried, "to think that the Fröken should be so

ill--almost dying! and have nobody but _you_ to attend to her!"

This, with a vindictive toss of the brown curls. Ulrika winced at her

words--she was hurt, but she answered gently--

"I have done my best," she said with a sort of grave pathos, "I have

been with her night and day--had she been a daughter of my own blood, I

know not how I could have served her with more tenderness. And, surely,

it has been a sore and anxious time with me also--for I, too, have

learned to love her!"

Her set mouth quivered,--and Britta, seeing her emotion, was ashamed of

her first hasty speech. She made an act of contrition at once by putting

her arms round Ulrika's neck and kissing her--a proceeding which so much

astonished that devout servant of Luther, that her dull eyes filled with

tears.

"Forgive me!" said the impetuous little maiden. "I was very rude and

very unkind! But if you love the Fröken, you will understand how I

feel--how I wish I could have helped to take care of her. And oh! the

_bonde_!"--here she gave way to a fresh burst of tears--"the dear, good,

kind, brave _bonde_! That he should be dead!--oh! it is too cruel--too

dreadful--I can hardly believe it!"

Ulrika patted her consolingly on the shoulder, but said nothing--and

Valdemar sighed. Britta sought for her handkerchief, and dried her

eyes--but, after a minute, began to cry again as recklessly as ever.

"And now"--she gasped--"if the Fröken--dies--I will die too. I will--you

see if I don't! I _w-w-won't_ live--without her!"

And such a big sob broke from her heaving bosom that it threatened to

burst her trimly laced little bodice.

"She will not die," said Ulrika decisively. "I have had my fears--but

the crisis is passed. Do not fret, Britta--there is no longer any

danger. Her husband's love will lift the trouble from her heart--and

strength will return more speedily than it left her."

And turning a little aside on the pretence of throwing more wood on the

fire, she muttered inaudibly, "O Lord, verily thou hast done well to

grant my just demand! Even for this will I remain Thy servant for ever!"

After this parenthesis, she resumed the conversation,--Valdemar Svensen

sitting silently apart,--and related all that had happened since

Thelma's arrival at the Altenfjord. She also gave an account of Lovisa

Elsland's death,--though Britta was not much affected by the loss of her

grandmother.

"Dreadful old thing!" she said with a shudder. "I'm glad I wasn't with

her! I remember how she cursed the Fröken,--perhaps her curse has

brought all the trouble--if so, it's a good thing she's dead, for now

everything will come right again. I used to fancy she had some crime to

confess,--did she say anything wicked when she was dying?"

Ulrika avoided a direct reply to this question. What was the good of

horrifying the girl by telling her that her deceased relative was to all

intents and purposes a murderess? She resolved to let the secret of old

Lovisa's life remain buried with her. Therefore she simply answered--

"Her mind wandered greatly,--it was difficult to hear her last words.

But it should satisfy you, Britta, to know that she passed away in the

fear of the Lord."

Britta gave a little half-dubious, half-scornful smile. She had not the

slightest belief in the sincerity of her late grandmother's religious

principles.

"I don't understand people who are so much _afraid_ of the Lord," she

said. "They must have done something wrong. If you always do your best,

and try to be good, you needn't fear anything. At least, that's my

opinion."

"There is the everlasting burning," began Ulrika solemnly.

"Oh, nonsense!" exclaimed Britta quite impatiently. "I don't believe

it!"

Ulrika started back in wonder and dismay. "You don't believe it!" she

said in awed accents. "Are you also a heathen?"

"I don't know what you mean by a heathen," replied Britta almost gaily.

"But I can't believe that God, who is so good, is going to everlastingly

burn anybody. He couldn't, you know! It would hurt Him so much to see

poor creatures writhing about in flames for ever--we would not be able

to bear it, and I'm quite sure it would make Him miserable even in

heaven. Because He is all Love--He says so,--He couldn't be cruel!"

This frank statement of Britta's views presented such a new form of

doctrine to Ulrika's heavy mind that she was almost appalled by it. God

_couldn't_ burn anybody for ever--He was too good! What a daring idea!

And yet so consoling--so wonderful in the infinite prospect of hope it

offered, that she smiled,--even while she trembled to contemplate it.

Poor soul! She talked of heathens--being herself the worst type of

heathen--namely, a Christian heathen. This sounds incongruous--yet it

may be taken for granted that those who profess to follow Christianity,

and yet make of God, a being malicious, revengeful, and of more evil

attributes than they possess themselves,--are as barbarous, as

unenlightened, as hopelessly sunken in slavish ignorance as the lowest

savage who adores his idols of mud and stone. Britta was quite

unconscious of having said anything out of the common--she was

addressing herself to Svensen.

"Where is the _bonde_ buried, Valdemar?" she asked in a low tone.

He looked at her with a strange, mysterious smile.

"Buried? Do you suppose his body could mix itself with common earth?

No!--he sailed away, Britta--away--yonder!"

And he pointed out through the window to the Fjord now, invisible in the

deep darkness.

Britta stared at him with roundly opened, frightened eyes--her face

paled.

"Sailed away? You must be dreaming! Sailed away! How could he--if he was

dead?"

Valdemar grew suddenly excited. "I tell you, he sailed away!" he

repeated in a low, hoarse whisper. "Where is his ship, the _Valkyrie_?

Try if you can find it anywhere--on sea or land! It has gone, and he has

gone with it--like a king and warrior--to glory, joy, and victory!

Glory--joy--victory!--those were his last words!"

Britta retreated, and caught Ulrika by the arm. "Is he mad?" she asked

fearfully.

Valdemar heard her, and rose from his chair, a pained smile on his face.

"I am not mad, Britta," he said gently. "Do not be afraid! If grief for

my master could have turned my brain, I had been mad ere this,--but I

have all my wits about me, and I have told you the truth." He

paused--then added, in a more ordinary tone, "You will need fresh logs

of pine--I will go and bring them in."

And he went out. Britta gazed after him in speechless wonder.

"What does he mean?" she asked.

"What he says," returned Ulrika composedly. "You, like others, must have

known that Olaf Güldmar's creed was a strange one--his burial has been

strange--that is all!"

And she skillfully turned the conversation, and began to talk of Thelma,

her sorrows and sufferings. Britta was most impatient to see her beloved

"Fröken," and quite grudged Sir Philip the long time he remained alone

with his wife.

"He _might_ call me, if only for a moment," Britta thought plaintively.

"I do so want to look at her dear face again! But men are all alike--as

long as they've got what _they_ want, they never think of anybody else.

Dear me! I wonder how long I shall have to wait!" So she fumed and

fretted, and sat by the kitchen-fire, drinking hot tea and talking to

Ulrika--all the while straining her ears for the least sound or movement

from the adjoining room. But none came--there was the most perfect

silence. At last she could endure it no longer--and, regardless of

Ulrika's remonstrances, she stole on tip-toe to the closed door that

barred her from the sight of her heart's idol, and turning the handle

softly, opened it and looked in. Sir Philip saw her, and made a little

warning sign, though he smiled.

He was sitting by the bedside, and in his arms, nestled against his

shoulder, Thelma rested. She was fast asleep. The lines of pain had

disappeared from her sweet face--a smile was on her lips--her breath

came and went with peaceful regularity,--and the delicate hue of a pale

rose flushed her cheeks. Britta stood gazing on this fair sight till her

affectionate little heart overflowed, and the ready tears dropped like

diamonds from her curly lashes.

"Oh, my dear--my dear!" she whispered in a sort of rapture when there

was a gentle movement,--and two star-like eyes opened like blue flowers

outspreading to the sun.

"Is that you, Britta?" asked a tender, wondering voice--and with a

smothered cry of ecstacy, Britta sprang to seize the outstretched hand

of her beloved Fröken, and cover it with kisses. And while Thelma

laughed with pleasure to see her, and stroked her hair. Sir Philip

described their long drive through the snow, and so warmly praised

Britta's patience, endurance, and constant cheerfulness, that his voice

trembled with its own earnestness, while Britta grew rosily red in her

deep shyness and embarrassment, vehemently protesting that she had done

nothing,--nothing at all to deserve so much commendation. Then, after

much glad converse, Ulrika was called, and Sir Philip seizing her hand,

shook it with such force and fervor that she was quite overcome.

"I don't know how to thank you!" he said, his eyes sparkling with

gratitude. "It's impossible to repay such goodness as yours! My wife

tells me how tender and patient and devoted you have been--that even

when she knew nothing else, she was aware of your kindness. God bless

you for it! You have saved her life--"

"Ah, yes, indeed!" interrupted Thelma gently. "And life has grown so

glad for me again! I do owe you so much."

"You owe me nothing," said Ulrika in those harsh, monotonous tones which

she had of late learned to modulate. "Nothing. The debt is all on my

side." She stopped abruptly--a dull red color flushed her face--her eyes

dwelt on Thelma with a musing tenderness.

Sir Philip looked at her in some surprise.

"Yes," she went on. "The debt is all on my side. Hear me out, Sir

Philip--and you too,--you 'rose of the northern forest', as Sigurd used

to call you! You have not forgotten Sigurd?"

"Forgotten him?" said Thelma softly. "Never! . . . I loved him too

well!"

Ulrika's head dropped. "He was my son!" she said.

There was a silence of complete astonishment. Ulrika paused--then, as no

one uttered a word, she looked up boldly, and spoke with a sort of

desperate determination.

"You see you have nothing to thank me for," she went on, addressing

herself to Sir Philip, while Thelma, leaning back on her pillows, and

holding Britta's hand, regarded her with a new and amazed interest.

"Perhaps, if you had known what sort of a woman I am, you might not have

liked me to come near--_her_." And she motioned towards Thelma. "When I

was young--long ago--I loved--" she laughed bitterly. "It seems a

strange thing to say, does it not? Let it pass--the story of my love, my

sin and shame, need not be told here! But Sigurd was my child--born in

an evil hour--and I--I strove to kill him at his birth."

Thelma uttered a faint cry of horror. Ulrika turned an imploring gaze

upon her.

"Don't hate me!" she said, her voice trembling. "Don't, for God's sake,

hate me! You don't know what I have suffered! I was mad, I think, at the

time--I flung the child in the Fjord to drown;--your father, Olaf

Güldmar, rescued him. I never knew that till long after;--for years the

crime I had committed weighed upon my soul,--I prayed and strove with

the Lord for pardon, but always, always felt that for me there, was no

forgiveness. Lovisa Elsland used to call me "murderess;" she was

right--I was one, or so I thought--till--till that day I met you, Fröken

Thelma, on the hills with Sigurd,--and the lad fought with me." She

shuddered,--and her eyes looked wild. "I recognized him--no matter how!

. . . he bore my mark upon him--he was my son,--_mine_!--the deformed,

crazy creature who yet had wit enough to love _you_--you, whom then I

hated--but now--"

She stopped and advanced a little closer to Thelma's bedside.

"Now, there is nothing I would not do for you, my dear!" she said very

gently. "But you will not need me any more. You understand what you have

done for me,--you and your father? You have saved me by saving

Sigurd,--saved _me_ from being weighed down to hell with the crime of

murder! And you made the boy happy while he lived. All the rest of my

days spent in your service could not pay back the worth of that good

deed. And most heartily do I thank the Lord that he has mercifully

permitted me to tend and comfort you in the hour of trouble--and,

moreover, that He has given me strength to speak and confess my sin and

unworthiness before you ere I depart. For now the trouble is past, I

must remove my shadow from your joy. God bless you!--and--try to think

as kindly as you can of me for--for Sigurd's sake!"

Stooping, she kissed Thelma's hand,--and, before any one had time to

speak a word, she left the room abruptly.

When, in a few minutes, Britta went to look after her, she was gone. She

had departed to her own house in Bosekop, where she obstinately

remained. Nothing would induce her to present herself again before Sir

Philip or Thelma, and it was not till many days after they had left the

Altenfjord that she was once more seen about the village. And then she

was a changed being. No longer harsh or forbidding in manner, she became

humble and gentle,--she ministered to the sick, and consoled the

afflicted--but she was especially famous for her love of children. All

the little ones of the place knew her, and were attracted by her,--and

the time came when Ulrika, white-haired, and of peaceful countenance,

could be seen knitting at her door in the long summer afternoons

surrounded by a whole army of laughing, chattering, dimpled youngsters,

who would play at hide-and-seek behind her chair, and clamber up to kiss

her wrinkled cheeks, putting their chubby arms round her neck with that

guileless confidence children show only to those whom they feel can

appreciate such flattering attentions. Some of her acquaintance were

wont to say that she was no longer the "godly" Ulrika--but however this

might be, it is certain she had drifted a little nearer to the Author of

all godliness, which--after all,--is the most we dare to strive for in

all our differing creeds.

It was not long before Thelma began to recover. The day after her

husband arrived, and Ulrika departed, she rose from her bed with

Britta's assistance, and sat by the blazing fire, wrapped in her white

gown and looking very fragile, though very lovely, Philip had been

talking to her for some time, and now he sat at her feet, holding her

hand in his, and, watching her face, on which there was an expression of

the most plaintive and serious penitence.

"I have been very wicked!" she said, with such a quaint horror of

herself that her husband laughed. "Now I look back upon it all, I think

I have behaved so very badly! because I ought never to have doubted you,

my boy--no--not for all the Lady Winsleighs in the world. And poor Mr.

Neville! he must be so unhappy! But it was that letter--that letter in

your own writing, Philip!"

"Of course!" he answered soothingly. "No wonder you thought me a

dreadful fellow! But you won't do so again, will you, Thelma? You will

believe that you are the crown and centre of my life--the joy of all the

world to me?"

"Yes, I will!" she said softly and proudly. "Though it is always the

same, I never do think myself worthy! But I must try to grow very

conceited, and assure myself that I am very valuable! so that then I

shall understand everything better, and be wiser."

Philip laughed. "Talking of letters," he said suddenly, "here's one I

wrote to you from Hull--it only got here today. Where it has been

delayed is a mystery. You needn't read it--you know everything in it

already. Then there's a letter on the shelf up there addressed in your

writing--it seems never to have been opened."

He reached it down, and gave it to her. As she took it, her face grew

very sad.

"It is the one I wrote to my father before I left London," she said. And

her eyes filled with tears. "It came too late!"

"Thelma," said Sir Philip then, very gently and gravely, "would you

like--can you bear--to read your father's last words to you? He wrote to

you on his death-bed, and gave the letter to Valdemar--"

"Oh, let me see it!" she murmured half-sobbingly. "Father,--dear father!

I knew he would not leave me without a word!"

Sir Philip reverently opened the folded paper which Svensen had

committed to his care that morning, and together they read the _bonde's_

farewell. It ran as follows:--

"THELMA, MY BELOVED,"

"The summons I have waited for has come at last, and the doors of

Valhalla are set open to receive my soul. Wonder not that I

depart with joy! Old as I am, I long for youth--the everlasting

youth of which the strength and savor fails not. I have lived

long enough to know the sameness of this world--though there is

much therein to please the heart and eye of a man--but with that

roving restlessness that was born within me, I desire to sail new

seas and gaze on new lands, where a perpetual light shines that

knows no fading. Grieve not for me--thou wilt remember that,

unlike a Christian, I see in death the chiefest glory of

life--and thou must not regret that I am eager to drain this cup

of world-oblivion offered by the gods. I leave thee,--not

sorrowfully,--for thou art in shelter and safety--the strong

protection of thy husband's love defends thee and the safeguard

of thine own innocence. My blessing upon him and thee! Serve him,

Thelma mine, with full devotion and obedience--even as I have

taught thee,--thus drawing from thy womanlife its best measure of

sweetness,--keep the bright shield of thy truth untarnished--and

live so that at the hour of thine own death-ecstasy thou mayest

depart as easily as a song-bird soaring to the sun! I pass hence

in happiness--if thou dost shed a tear thou wrongest my

memory,--there is naught to weep for. Valdemar will give me the

crimson shroud and ocean grave of my ancestors--but question him

not concerning this fiery pomp of my last voyage--he is but a

serf, and his soul is shaken to its very depths by sorrow. Let

him be--he will have his reward hereafter. And now farewell,

child of my heart--darling of mine age--clear mirror in which my

later life has brightened to content! All partings are brief--we

shall meet again--thou and I and Philip--and all who have loved

or who love each other,--the journey heavenwards may be made by

different roads, but the end--the glory--the immortality is the

same! Peace be upon thee and on thy children and on thy

children's children!"

"Thy father,

OLAF GÜLDMAR."

In spite of the brave old pagan's declaration that tears would wrong his

memory, they dropped bright and fast from his daughter's eyes as she

kissed again and again the words his dying hand had pencilled,--while

Errington knew not which feeling gained the greater mastery over

him,--grief for a good man's loss, or admiration for the strong, heroic

spirit in which that good man had welcomed Death with rejoicing. He

could not help comparing the _bonde's_ departure from this life with

that of Sir Francis Lennox, the man of false fashion, who had let slip

his withered soul with an oath into the land of Nowhere. Presently

Thelma grew calmer, and began to speak in hushed, soft tones--

"Poor Valdemar!" she said meditatively. "His heart must ache very much,

Philip!"

Philip looked up inquiringly.

"You see, my father speaks of the 'crimson shroud,'" she went on. "That

means that he was buried like many of the ancient Norwegian sea

kings;--he was taken from his bed while dying and placed on board his

own ship to breathe his last; then the ship was set on fire and sent out

to sea. I always knew he wished it so. Valdemar must have done it

all--for I,--I saw the last glimpse of the flames on the Fjord the night

I came home! Oh, Philip!" and her beautiful eyes rested tenderly upon

him, "it was all so dreadful--so desolate! I wanted--I prayed to die

also! The world was so empty--it seemed as if there was nothing left!"

Philip, still sitting at her feet, encircled her with both arms, and

drew her down to him.

"My Thelma!" he whispered, "there _is_ nothing left--nothing at all

worth living for,--save Love!"

"Ah! but that," she answered softly, "is everything!"

* * * * * *

Is it so, indeed? Is Love alone worth living for--worth dying for? Is it

the only satisfying good we can grasp at among the shifting shadows of

our brief existence? In its various phases and different workings, is

it, after all, the brightest radiance known in the struggling darkness

of our lives?

Sigurd had thought so,--he had died to prove it. Philip thought

so,--when once more at home in England with his recovered "treasure of

the golden midnight" he saw her, like a rose refreshed by rain, raise

her bright head in renewed strength and beauty, with the old joyous

lustre dancing in her eyes, and the smile of a perfect happiness like

summer sunshine on her fair face. Lord Winsleigh thought so;--he was

spending the winter in Rome with his wife and son,--and there among the

shadows of the Caesars, his long, social martyrdom ended, and he

regained what he had once believed lost for ever--his wife's affection.

Clara gentle, wistful, with the softening shadow of a great sorrow and a

great repentance in her once too-brilliant eyes, was a very different

Clara to the dashing "beauty" who had figured so conspicuously in London

society. She clung to her husband with an almost timid eagerness as

though she dreaded losing him--and when he was not with her, she seemed

to rely entirely on her son, whom she watched with a fond, almost

melancholy pride, and who responded to her tenderness though proffered

so late, with the full-hearted frankness of his impulsive, ardent

nature. She wrote to Thelma asking her pardon, and in return received

such a sweet, forgiving, generous letter as caused her to weep for an

hour or more. But she felt she could never again meet the clear regard

of those beautiful, earnest, truthful eyes--never again could she stand

in Thelma's presence, or call her friend--that was all over. Still Love

remained,--a Love, chastened and sad, with drooping wings and a somewhat

doubting smile,--yet it was Love--

"Love, that keeps all the choir of lives in chime--

Love, that is blood--within the veins of time."

And Love, no matter how abused and maltreated, is a very patient god,

and even while suffering from undeserved wounds, still works on, doing

magical things. So that poor Edward Neville, the forsaken husband of

Violet Vere, when he heard that that popular actress had died suddenly

in America from a fit of delirium tremens brought on by excessive

drinking, was able, by some gentle method known only to Love and

himself, to forget all her frailties--to obliterate from his memory the

fact that he ever saw her on the boards of the Brilliant Theatre,--and

to think of her henceforth only as the wife he had once adored, and who,

he decided in vague, dreamy fashion, must have died young. Love also

laid a firm hand on the vivacious Pierre Duprèz--he who had long scoffed

at the _jeu d'amour_, played it at last in grave earnest,--and one bright

season he introduced his bride into Parisian society,--a charming little

woman, with very sparkling eyes and white teeth, who spoke French

perfectly, though not with the ''haccent' recommended by Briggs. It was

difficult to recognize Britta in the _petite élégante_ who laughed and

danced and chattered her way through some of the best _salons_ in Paris,

captivating everybody as she went,--but there she was, all the same,

holding her own as usual. Her husband was extremely proud of her--he was

fond of pointing her out to people as something excessively precious and

unique--and saying--"See her! That is my wife! From Norway! Yes--from

the very utmost north of Norway! I love my country--certainly!--but I

will tell you this much--if I had been obliged to choose a wife among

French women--_ma foi!_ I should never have married!"

And what of George Lorimer?--the idle, somewhat careless man of "modern"

type, in whose heart, notwithstanding the supposed deterioration of the

age, all the best and bravest codes of old-world chivalry were written?

Had Love no fair thing to offer _him_? Was he destined to live out his

life in the silent heroism of faithful, unuttered, unrequited, unselfish

devotion? Were the heavens, as Sigurd had said, always to be empty?

Apparently not,--for when he was verging towards middle age, a young

lady besieged him with her affections, and boldly offered to be his wife

any day he chose to name. She was a small person, not quite five years

old, with great blue eyes and a glittering tangle of golden curls. She

made her proposal one summer afternoon on the lawn at Errington Manor,

in the presence of Beau Lovelace, on whose knee sat her little brother

Olaf, a fine boy a year younger than herself. She had placed her dimpled

arms round Lorimer's neck,--and when she so confidingly suggested

marriage to her "Zordie," as she called him, she was rubbing her rosy,

velvety cheek against his moustache with much sweet consideration and

tenderness. Lovelace, hearing her, laughed aloud, whereat the little

lady was extremely offended.

"I don't tare!" she said, with pretty defiance. "I do love oo, Zordie,

and I will marry oo!"

George held her fondly to his breast as though she were some precious

fragile flower of which not a petal must be injured.

"All right!" he answered gaily, though his voice trembled somewhat, "I

accept! You shall be my little wife, Thelma. Consider it settled!"

Apparently she did so consider it, for from that day, whenever she was

asked her name, she announced herself proudly as "Zordie's 'ittle wife,

Thelma"--to the great amusement of her father, Sir Philip, and that

other Thelma, on whom the glory of motherhood had fallen like a new

charm, investing both face and form with superior beauty and an almost

divine serenity. But "Zordie's wife" took her _sobriquet_ very

seriously,--so much so, indeed, that by-and-by "Zordie" began to take it

rather seriously himself--and to wonder whether, after all, marriages,

unequal in point of age, might not occasionally turn out well. He

condemned himself severely for the romanticism of thinking such

thoughts, even while he indulged in them, and called himself "an old

fool," though he was in the actual prime of manhood, and an exceedingly

handsome fellow withal.

But when the younger Thelma came back at the age of sixteen from her

convent school at Arles,--the same school where her mother had been

before her,--she looked so like her mother, so very like, that his heart

began to ache with the old, wistful, passionate longing he fancied he

had stilled for ever. He struggled against this feeling for a while,

till at last it became too strong for him,--and then, though he told

himself it was absurd,--that a man past forty had no right to expect to

win a girl's first love, he grew so reckless that he determined to risk

his fate with her. One day, therefore, he spoke out, scarcely knowing

what he said, and only conscious that his pulses were beating with

abnormal rapidity. She listened to his tremulous, rather hesitating

proposal with exceeding gravity, and appeared more surprised than

displeased. Raising her glorious blue eyes--eyes in which her mother's

noble, fearless look was faithfully reflected, she said simply, just in

her mother's own quaint way--

"I do not know why you talk about this at all. I thought it was all

settled long ago!"

"Settled!" faltered Lorimer astonished,--he was generally

self-possessed, but this fair young lady's perfect equanimity far

surpassed his at that moment--"Settled! My darling! my child--I am so

much older than you are--"

"I don't like _boys_!" she declared, with stately disdain. "I was your

wife when I was little--and I thought it was to be the same thing now I

am big! I told mother so, and she was quite pleased. But of course, if

you don't want me--"

She was not allowed to finish her sentence, for Lorimer, with a sudden

rush of joy that almost overpowered him, caught her in his arms and

pressed the first lover's kiss on her pure, innocently smiling lips.

"Want you!" he murmured passionately, with a strange sweet mingling of

the past and present in his words. "I have always wanted--Thelma!"