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Again Ottar granted her his aid to set her free, and again he tried to move her, addressing her in this fashion: "Wouldst thou rather hearken to my counsels, and embrace me even as I desire, than be here and tend the flock of rank goats?
There might be no chanting of choir or swinging of censer at that burying; but when the holy rites were ended Ottar the scald sang the deeds of those who were gone, while the mound was closed. And that would be what those valiant warriors loved to hear.
So when Ottar found that even by the merits of his double service he could not stir the maiden's gaze towards him, he went back to the fleet, wearied out with shame and chagrin. Sigrid, in her old fashion, ran far away over the rocks, and chanced to stray in her wanderings to the abode of Ebb; where, ashamed of her nakedness and distress, she pretended to be a daughter of paupers.
Now that word of common sense was the best that he could have spoken, for I was waxing angry at being thus played with, as I thought. But at that moment Olaf and Ottar came in with clang and ring of mail and sword, and so no more was said, and soon Ailwin rose to depart. But I followed him out, and asked him for the last time: "Will you not tell me where Hertha bides?" "No, my son not yet.
Now Ottar had been to Penhurst with me, and we had come thence together to the ships. And when the old walls of the great castle were lost to sight as the vessel plunged eastward, he said: "Relf's daughter is a fair maiden, friend Redwald. It is in my mind that she will long to see you back again." "Not so," I answered; "she is but friendly."
Truly no Englishman, whether of Saxon or Danish kin, grudges praise to a stranger when he has won it well, but Olaf had few to speak for him after he had gone hence. But I have told what I saw, and think that it should not be forgotten, for it was a great deed. Men sing the song that Ottar the scald wrote thereon in Olaf's Norway, and I think that they will sing it for many an age to come.
The other warrior was Ottar the scald, my friend, and now I had all that I could wish. We sat together in the old places, and he said presently: "You seem contented enough with Cnut, to judge by your face, my cousin." "I had forgotten him. I am content with all things," I answered. "How came you here?" "Nay, but you shall tell me of yourself first," he said.
She could not tell who I was, nor would she think it likely that I would seek her there, and would easily forgive me for doing so, when we met. I bade Brand the thrall goodnight, and went back into the great room of the house, where Olaf sat with Ottar resting and talking together. There was no one else in the place, for we had no fear of aught, and Olaf cared not to have many men about him.
In this fight Jarl Erlend, the last descendant in the male line of Thorfinn then alive, was slain, while drunk, his body being found next day transfixed by a spear, and he left no issue to inherit his title of earl or the other Moddan lands, left to him by Earl Ottar, which probably devolved on Eric Stagbrellir in 1156, as he could hold them against Thorbiorn Klerk.
But before I could do so there was work to be done, and I was content to look forward and wait. Now I might make a long story of the doings of Olaf the king during this summer. Ottar the scald has much to sing of what we wrought. For we went through the fair land of Kent with our Norsemen and the new levies, and brought back all the folk to Ethelred.
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