“If you lay finger on me again,” she whispered, “I will caress you with this!” and for an instant a knife-blade glittered before the bulging eyes. Snorri rolled back with alacrity and an oath; and after a moment Frode’s daughter dropped down again and hid her face in her hands. If the King should be slain and she be left adrift in this foul sea! She might as well have screamed as moaned, for all that they would have noticed.
About this time Canute’s blade appeared to have become in earnest. Ceasing its airy defence, it took on the aggressive. Instead of a flitting sunbeam, it became a shaft from a burning glass; instead of one merry humming-bird, it became a whole swarm of skimming, swooping, darting swallows, waging war on a bewildered owl. Before the sudden fury of the onslaught, Edmund gave back a pace. And either because his anger made him reckless or his great bulk was against him, he presently was forced to draw back another step. Wildest cheers went up from the North-men. It seemed as though they would wade in a body across the river.
Only Eric of Norway stamped with uneasiness; and the overhanging brows of Thorkel the Tall were as lowering hoods above his eyes. “Well has he hoarded his strength,” he muttered. “Well has he saved it, yet—yet—”
At that moment such a roar went up from Northern throats as might well have startled the wolf’s shadow off the face of the sun; for Edmund Ironside had retreated a third step, and the Dane’s point appeared to lie at the Englishman’s heart. Then the uproar died somewhere in mid-air, for in what seemed the very act of thrusting, Canute had leaped backward and lowered his blade. So deep was the hush on either side the river that the whir of a bird’s wing sounded as loud as a flight of arrows. Bending forward, with strained ears and starting eyes, the spectators saw that the Northern King was speaking, eagerly, with now and then an impulsive gesture, while the English King listened motionless.
“Has he got out of his wits?” the Scar-Cheek roared, fairly dancing with impatience.
In Randalin’s face a flash of memory was struggling with bewilderment. “Other weapons than those which dwell in sheaths.” Had he meant “the sword of speech,” his tongue?
With the deliberate grace which characterized his every motion, the Ironside slid his sword back to its case, and they saw him take a slow step forward and slowly extend his hand. Then they saw Canute spring to meet him, and their palms touch in a long grasp.
From the English shore there went up a joyful shout of “Peace!” And a deafening clamor rose in answer from the Danish bank. But what sentiment predominated in that, it would be difficult to say. Blended with rejoicing over their King’s safety, were cries of bitter disappointment, the cries of thirsty men who have seen wine dashed from their lips.
In their retreat, the two Northern jarls and the young monarch’s foster-father faced each other uncertainly. “Here is mystery!” Eric of Norway said at last. “I should be thankful if you would tell me whether he thought it unwise to kill the Englishman before the face of his army; or whether he is in truth struck with love toward him, as the fools seem to believe?”
“Or whether he had reached the exact limit of his strength so that he was obliged to save himself by some trick of words?” Ulf Jarl suggested.