It was this new expression which caught King Olaf’s eye, when he and his outlaw faced each other again.
With the first burst of morning sunshine, the king came out of the hall on his way to mass, followed by the high-born people of his household. Blinking laughingly in the dazzle, and drawing in great breaths of the fresh sweet air, the retinue made an odd contrast to the other group waiting on the doorstep—three swarthy thralls testing a coil of rope in their hairy fists, and Sigurd Asbiornsson once more ironed and guarded.
King Olaf stopped abruptly.
“How is it that things which I dislike are always kept before my mind?” he demanded. “Why was he not put to death at sunrise?” The guard answered that the king had named no definite time, and they feared to misunderstand his will.
“I have seldom heard a poorer excuse,” King Olaf returned coldly.
But he did not make his will clearer. He remained scrutinizing the prisoner with a touch of uncertainty in his strongly marked brows. Fearless, Sigurd Asbiornsson looked, as always, but for the first time that something seemed gone from his boldness which had stirred the king’s temper against him.
Olaf smiled slowly as a test came to his mind.
“To please your friends, Sigurd,” he said, “I will make you an offer which you can do as you like about accepting. It is the law of the land that a man who kills a servant of the king shall undertake that man’s service, if the king will. Would you submit to that law, and undertake the office of bailiff which Thorer Sel had, if I gave you life and safety in return?”
He gathered up his mantle to depart, as he concluded, so sure was he that his offer would be rejected. Of all the throng, from Gudbrand’s daughter to Erling, not one believed that it stood any chance of acceptance. They almost ceased to breathe when—slowly—with a flaming face and the stiffness of a pride that was cracking at the joints, Sigurd Asbiornsson bent his head and kissed the king’s hand.
Not to save his life could he have spoken. His power of speech did not come back to him until the churchgoers had swept on across the court, and he was left alone with Astrid in his arms.