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"My house," answered Ebbe, still sulkily, "has had enough borrowing of Egeskov; and my horse may be valueless, but he is one of the few things dear to me, and I must keep him." "Truly then," said she, "your words were nought, last night, when you professed to offer me the gifts most precious to you in the world." And before he could reply to this, she had pricked on and was lost in the woodland.
As touching my lack of land, I have Nebbegaard left; a poor estate and barren, yet I think you would be glad of it, to add to the lands of which you robbed us." "Well," said Borre, "I would give a certain price for it, but not my daughter, nor anything near so precious to me." "Give me one long ship," said Ebbe; "the swiftest of your seven which ride in the strait between Egeskov and Stryb.
All these woods, as far away as to Rosenvold, had been the good knight his father's, but were lost to us before Ebbe's birth, and leased on pledge to the Knight Borre, of Egeskov, of whom I am to tell; and with them went all the crew of verderers, huntsmen, grooms, prickers, and ostringers that had kept Nebbegaard cheerful the year round.
I did not know then that the lad's heart was honestly given to this maid; but so it was, and had been from the moment when she stood before him in the gateway. So to Egeskov we rode, and there found no less than forty suitors assembled, and some with a hundred servants in retinue.
He kissed me and rode away to Egeskov. "I thought that the Squire of Nebbe had done with us," Sir Borre began to sneer, when Ebbe found audience. "But the Bride-show is over, my man, and I give not my answer for a month yet." "Your word is long to pledge, and longer to redeem," said Ebbe. "I know that, were I to wait a twelvemonth, you would not of free will give me Mette."
To this she made no reply, but with her hand on the palfrey's bridle went slowly back to meet her father, who reined up at a little distance and waited, offering Ebbe no salutation. Then a groom helped her to the saddle, and the company rode away towards Egeskov, leaving the lad with the dead bird in his hand. For weeks after this meeting he moped more than usual.
Brockenhuus, of Egeskov, of whom the people still talked. Palle Dyre had, after the example of Brockenhuus, caused an iron chain with a hunting-horn to be hung in his gateway; and when he came riding home, he used to seize the chain, and lift himself and his horse from the ground, and blow the horn. "Come yourself, and see me do that, Dame Marie," he said.
But I thought that the forest was my father's? My name," said she, "is Mette, and my father is the Knight Borre, of Egeskov." "I am Ebbe of Nebbegaard, and," said he, perceiving the mirth in her eyes, "you have heard the rhyme upon me "'Ebbe from Nebbe, with all his men good, Has neither food nor firing-wood."
On the morrow of the Bride-show the suitors took their leave of Egeskov, under promise to return again at the month's end and hear how the lady Mette had chosen. So they went their ways, none doubting that the fortunate one would be Olaf of Trelde; and, for me, I blamed myself that we had ever gone to Egeskov.
But after this meeting with Sir Borre's daughter, I could see that my young lord went heavily troubled; and I began to think of other means than force. It may have been six months later that word fame to us of great stir and bustle at Egeskov. Sir Borre, being aged, and anxious to see his daughter married before he died, had proclaimed a Bride-show.
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