“No, I suppose not,” said the young man.
“Here is your bundle,” said the girl. She raised it very carefully and handed it to him. He took it over his shoulder, and after all his weary work went on his way home.
The very next day a young man named Hálona, when he heard of this, said: “Ha! ha! What a fool he was! He didn’t take her enough presents; he didn’t please her. I am said to be a very pleasant fellow” (he was a very conceited young man); “I will take her a bundle that will make things all right.”
So he put into a bundle everything that a woman could reasonably want,—for he was a wealthy young man, and his bundle was very heavy,—put on his best dress, and with fine paint on his face started for the home of the maiden. Finally, his foot touched the lowermost rung of the ladder; the stalactites went jingling above as he mounted, and thud went his bundle as he dropped it on the roof.
“Somebody has come,” said the people below. “Listen to that!”
The maiden shrugged her shoulders and said: “Thou comest?”
“Yes,” answered the young man; “draw me in.”
So she reached up and pulled the huge bundle down into the room, placing it on the floor, and the young man followed it down.
Said the old man, who was sitting by the fire, for it was night: “Thou comest. Not thinking of nothing doth one stranger come to the house of another. What may be thy thoughts?”
The young man looked at the maiden and said to himself: “What a magnificent creature she is! She will be my wife, no fear that she will not.” Then said he aloud: “I came, thinking of your daughter. I would rest my hopes and thoughts on her.”