He leaned forward where all could see him, the fire showing his thin face to be unmistakably earnest.
“For what you said about Helvin’s behavior towards me, I will tell you the first half of a saying the courtmen have made, which is altogether truthful, and which is this: ‘If the Jarl’s song-maker should want the Jarl’s crown for a dog-collar, he would have to do no more than ask for it.’ And now, for what you said about my liking his service, I will give you the rest of the saying, which is even more true than what went before: ‘And if it should happen to the Jarl to want the Songsmith’s head for a hand-ball, he would have to do no more than ask for that.’ Is it clear to you now or not?”
The hunters had no opportunity to answer. While they were still adjusting their minds to the amazing conviction that their one time comrade had meant what he said, the door was flung open with a flourish. In all his bravery of embroidered cloak and silver-spurred riding-boots, Eric the Page appeared and proclaimed in his young treble:
“Way for the Jarl’s sister!”
It was the first time the woodsmen had seen this woodland sprig in his splendor. To assail him with familiar greetings and ironical comment became instantly their sole object in life, carried on under their breath even after the Jarl’s sister had entered, and they had scrambled to their feet in rough homage. Randvar was able to step unobserved behind a smoke-blackened pillar and gaze with what bitterness he would upon the face that his pride had come to curse by day while his love starved for it in his dreams.
“I would give all I own in the world had I not known how to smile!” his heart cried out in sudden sharp wretchedness. Then he cursed himself for a fool, cursed her vanity for a curse worse than Helvin’s, and wore the rut deeper between his heavy brows with scowling at her as she passed.
Of rich purple, fur-edged, was the mantle that hung from her fine shoulders; and purple was the velvet hood that lay like an evening cloud upon the sunset glory of her hair; but it needed not the royal coloring to betoken the loftiness of her temper. Even more than its wonted haughtiness was in the carriage of her head as she moved up the long room and passed into the inner chamber, which was the shrine of the jewelled ornaments and gold things.
Bolverk shut one eye expressively, when the fox-skin curtain had fallen behind her and her page.
“Every man to his taste!” he said. “Yet I for one feel no envy of Olaf, Thorgrim’s son, that he is kissing her fingers at this moment. Give me Snowfrid with the kissable mouth!” He was reaching for his horn to seal the sentiment when Randvar’s hand closed on his arm.
“Is Olaf, Thorgrim’s son, in there?” the Songsmith asked in his ear.