Wild was the shriek that came back, as if in a fiercer spasm of inward pain, but a voice followed it, saying:
"I know thee, who thou art, thou Jesus of Nazareth! Thou holy one of God!"
Again he said, "Come out of him!" and it was as if some unseen being called out loudly in an unknown tongue and fled away.
Then arose from the ground the man in whom the evil spirit had been dwelling, and he stood erect, unharmed, like other men.
"A great rabbi!" whispered Ben Ezra. "One of the learned, from Jerusalem. Thou mayest not speak to him while he is healing."
"He that fled called him a son of Odin," replied Ulric. "He looketh like one."
"He may be one of the gods of this land," muttered Wulf the Skater. "I like him not. He commandeth evil spirits and they obey him. I am glad the jarl is also a son of Odin."
"I am glad to have seen a god," replied Knud the Bear. "He is nobler than other men. Let us see what he will do to that crippled one."
Bent and deformed, as if his arms and legs had little shape left them, was this man whom his friends now half led, half carried, before this rabbi of the Jews.
"Canst thou do anything for him?" asked one. "He hath been thus from his birth."