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"Pull, my lads, pull with heart," cried Erling; "and let these slaves see how freemen can make their ocean steeds leap across the sea! Pull! I see a breeze just off the mouth of the fiord. If we reach that, we may laugh at the tyrant King." "What may yonder line on the water be?" said Haldor, with an anxious look, as he pointed towards the mouth of the fiord.
"Here is a ring," said Erling, "which thou wilt take to Herfrida, the wife of Haldor, and say that her son Erling sent thee, and would have thee and thy mother well cared for." He took from his finger, as he spoke, a gold ring, and placed it in the woman's hand, but she shook her head sadly, and said in an absent tone: "I dare not go. Swart might come back and would miss me."
Haldor caught it on his shield, which it pierced through, but did him no hurt. "Mistaken thou art, but thou hast found me now," cried Erling, thrusting his father aside and leaping upon the Dane. Skarpedin changed his bill to his left hand, drew his sword, and made such a blow at his adversary, that the point cut right through his shield.
This vessel lay alongside that of King Harald; and although the King was fully engaged with Haldor at the time, he observed the conquest of Skialdvarsson by Ulf, and also perceived that Ulf's men were crowding the side of the vessel, and throwing grappling-irons into his own ship with a view to board it; for there was a space between the ships a little too wide for men to leap.
They barely touched hands. .At which the magistrate expressed his delight by a short whistle, while the inspector broke into a loud guffaw. Haldor quietly turned to him. "What are you laughing at?" he said. The inspector was at a loss for an answer. With Karin there he did not wish to say anything that might give offence.
Seeing this the thrall leaped forward, seized the stone, ran back to the line, bent his body almost to the ground, and, exerting himself to the utmost, threw it into the same hollow from which he had lifted it. "Equal!" cried Ulf. "Come, Haldor, try again." "Nay, I will not try until he beats me," replied Haldor with a good-natured laugh. "But do thou take a cast, Ulf.
"Impossible," said Haldor; "I have tried it before, and failed. Of course we must make the attempt, but I have no hope except in this," he added, touching his sword, "and not much in that either, now." "But I have tried it before, and did not fail, and I'll try it again," cried Erling heartily. "Come aft, men, quick, all of ye; every man except the rowers.
Meanwhile in the centre there was an equally uncertain and obstinate conflict for the chiefs on either side were mighty men of valour. Wherever Old Guttorm's voice was heard, there victory inclined. Haldor, on the other hand, did not shout, but he laid about him with such wild ferocity that many men quailed at the very sight of him, and wherever he went he was victorious.
Old Hans himself answered the thought by opening the door at that moment. He was a short, thick-set, and very powerful man, of apparently sixty years of age, but his eye was as bright and his step as light as that of many a man of twenty. "The war-token," he said, almost gaily, stepping back into the cottage as Alric leaped in. "What is doing, son of Haldor?"
Now, when the report was brought that Harald's fleet had doubled the distant cape beyond Hafurdsfiord, the people crowded to the top of the cliffs behind Ulfstede to watch it; and when it was clearly seen that it was so much larger than their own, there were a few who began to say that it would be wiser to refrain from resistance; but Haldor called a Thing together on the spot by sound of horn, and a great many short pithy speeches were made on both sides of the question.
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