"Fool! and thou only tellest me of this now! Konrad—the boldest youth and the best in all old Norway!" exclaimed the burly governor. "Hah! and hath the last of an ancient and gallant race to peril his life on such a night as this, when these baseborn drawers of nets and fishers of seals hang back?"
"His boat vanished into the gloom in a moment, and we heard but one gallant blast from his bugle ring above the roar of the waves that boil round that terrible promontory."
"The mother of God pray for him—brave lad! What the devil! Sueno, I would not for all the ships on the northern seas, a hair of Konrad's head were injured; for though he is no kin to me, I love the lad as if he were mine own and only son. See that my niece Anna knoweth not of this wild adventure till he returns safe. She has seemed somewhat cold to him of late; some lover's pique"——
"I pray he may return, Sir Erick."
"He must—he shall return!" rejoined the impetuous old knight, stamping his foot. "Yea, and in safety too, or I will sack Bergen, and scourge every fisher in it. From whence thought these knaves the stranger came?"
"From Denmark."
"Malediction on Denmark!" said Rosenkrantz, feeling his old Norse prejudices rising in his breast. "Assure me that she is Danish, and I will extinguish the beacon and let them all drown and be——!"
"Nay, nay, Sir Governor, they know her to be a good ship of Scotland, commanded by a certain great lord of that country, who is on an embassy to Frederick of Denmark, and hath been cruising in these seas."
"Then my double malediction on the Scots, too!" said the governor, as he turned away from the hall window.
"And so say I, noble Sir," chimed in the obsequious chamberlain, as he raised the skirts of his gaberdine, and warmed his voluminous trunk hosen before the great fire.