"Lead on," said Olvir, eager to draw nearer the private passage by which Hildegarde and her maidens were entering the hall. Liutrad advanced at once; but the move failed to bring his earl that which he sought. Hildegarde had paused just across the threshold, to meet the boisterous welcome of Gerold; and while brother and sister exchanged greetings, Olvir looked in vain for the face he longed to see among the half-score of maidens who slipped into the hall behind the queen. While he yet stood there, disappointed and hesitating, the queen turned to him from Gerold.
"Welcome to my lord's bright Dane!" she said. "I see, Olvir, that your wrist is still burdened with my ring."
"I have never ceased to wear it, dear dame, with reverence and gratitude for the giver," replied Olvir, as he bowed to kiss the queen's extended hand.
Hildegarde gazed graciously into his dark face, and answered him with quiet earnestness: "We seek to make you a gift, Olvir, far more precious than any ring,--a pearl beyond price. There is now but one thing in the way,--your resistance to the voice of Holy Church. You have won a warm place in our hearts, Olvir. Consider well, and do not let your pride bar your way into Christ's fold."
"I shall weigh the matter with utmost care," said Olvir; and the answer brought a glow to the anxious face of the queen. But while Liutrad and her brother escorted the royal dame to the dais, he stood lost in thought, his eyes fixed upon the rushes at his feet.
He was aroused by a well-remembered voice, whose soft murmur would have been inaudible but for its sibilance: "Welcome to Count Olvir! Will he not let bygones be bygones, and swear the peace-oath?"
Olvir started and stared keenly about him. On his right, framed as it were by the curtained doorway, and almost within arm's length, stood the daughter of Rudulf, gazing at him from beneath her drooping lashes with an indescribable look,--a half-smile, full of insolence and dread, of love and hate. For the moment all the wild whirl of conflicting emotions which the unexpected sight of her former lover had aroused in the Thuringian's breast stood out plain to view on her face, through its court-mask of dissimulation.
Olvir had no need to look twice to assure himself that Liutrad was not mistaken when he spoke of the maiden's ripened beauty. She had certainly lost none of her former loveliness, and art had added no little to her charms. The purple dress, cut low after the latest Frankish fashion, suggested every soft curve of the girl's rounded form; her brown hair, with its gleams of gold, was bound by a diadem of all but queenly splendor; while the fingers of her right hand were covered with gem-rings half to the tips. But on her left hand, which she held out to the Northman, there was only one ornament,--the ring whose reputed magical powers had caused Liutrad so much uneasiness. It was fashioned of two miniature serpents, one black, the other red, which held in their jaws an opal of great size and peculiar fire.
For a moment Olvir stood hesitating; then he took the girl's hand, and answered her gravely: "I take the peace offered by Count Rudulf's daughter. There is a saying that those who have broken betrothal bonds can never join in friendship. I trust that with us it may prove otherwise. At the least, I shall seek to heal the wrong which I wrought against you."
"And I, Olvir!" murmured the girl, the rich blood leaping to her cheeks. "I give thanks for your--friendship. We were not fated to meet under the same roof with cold hearts."