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"Then to-day it will be useful to go in another direction, so that any suspicions he has may go to sleep again. If Thorhall had been at home, he would have overtaken you before this. His green eyes are well fitted for spying." Perhaps it was this reference to green eyes that recalled to Alwin the scene of the foretelling. Perhaps it had never gone very far out of his mind.
In his secret heart Alwin murmured, "The Fiend take me if ever I turn my back on your knife!" But aloud he merely repeated his former compact. When it was finished, Sigurd laid an affectionate hand upon his shoulder. "We cannot bind our friend-ship closer, but it is my advice that you do not leave Helga out of the bargain. Truer friend man never had."
While their cries were still in the air, Leif's blade leaped from its scabbard, quivered in the light, and flashed down, biting through fur and hair and flesh and bone. Without a sound, Alwin fell forward heavily, and lay upon his face at his master's feet.
What a pity that the result of their short acquaintance could not have disappeared with him! The trader surveyed his new possession, standing straight and slim before him. "What are you called?" he demanded. "And whence come you? And of what kin?" "I am called Alwin," answered the thrall; "and I come from Northumbria." He hesitated, and the blood mounted to his face.
"If it please me?" "My dear lord, I pray you give over all bitterness. I pray you be prudent toward them. I have not been a shield-maiden's thrall for nearly a year without learning something." "Poor little dove in a hawk's nest! Certainly I think you have learned to weep!" "You need not pity me thus, Lord Alwin. It is likely that my mistress even loves me in her own way.
"I have heard them mention Greenland, and also the name of Leif," Alwin assured him. Sigurd smote his knee a resounding thwack. "Strangest of wonders is the time at which this news comes! Here have I just been asking for Leif in the guardroom of the King's house; and because they told me he was away on the King's business, I was minded to ride straight out of the city.
Did a girl ever wear a helmet like a silver bowl, and a kirtle that stopped at the knee? If it was a girl, she must be one of those shield-maidens of whom the minstrels sang. Alwin watched the pair curiously as they galloped down the last slope and turned into the lane beside the river. They must pass the booth, and then... His brain whirled, and he stood up in his intense interest.
It took less than that to start the brawl in which Olver was slain, which I dare say you have not forgotten." Alwin winced, and Sigurd shivered with something besides the cold. It was not the bloody tumult of the fight that they remembered the most clearly; it was what came after it.
They followed him across the grassy courtyard to the foot of the steps leading up to his sleeping-room, and would not leave him until he had consented that Valbrand and Olver should go in with him for a bodyguard. "And this boy also," he added, signing to Alwin. As Alwin approached, Kark had the impudence to shoulder himself forward also.
The honours of the evening rightfully belonged to Alwin Swoboda, who looked like De Wolf Hopper, but sang a trifle better. A favourite there is Iracema-Brügelmann; another, Erna Ellmenreich. One can sing, but acts amateurishly; the other screams, but is a clever actress. In Salome she was wonderful, singing out of tune as she often did.
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