Page:Once a Week Jul - Dec 1859.pdf/17

6 food. So they went both of them till they found King Sweyn. He greeted Auki, the bailiff, well, but asked the man who came with him who he was, for he did not know him.

Audun answers: “I am a man from Iceland, new come from Norway, but before that I came from Greenland. My errand hither was to give you this white bear, which I bought out there in Greenland with all my goods; but a great change has befallen me, for now I own no more than half the beast.”

After that he told the king the whole story, and all that passed between him and Auki.

Then the king said: “Is this true, Auki, what he says?”

“True it is,” says Auki.

Then the king said: “And thoughtest thou it fell to thee, when I had set thee over my goods and given thee great place, to tax and toll what an outlander and a stranger had undertaken to bring me as a treasure—who gave for it all his goods, and that too when our greatest foes thought it good to let him go on his way in peace? Think, now, how truthless it was in thee to do such a thing, and see what a great difference there is between thee and Harold, when he gave him safe conduct. And now it were meet thou shouldst lose, not only all thy goods, but thy life also; and though I will not slay thee this time, still thou shalt go away at once on the spot a beggar from my realm, and never come more unto my sight. But for thee, Icelander, as thou hast given me the whole of the beast, and that worth far more than the food which Auki sold, but which he ought to have given thee, I accept it, and ask thee to stay here with me.”

Then Audun thanked the king for his words and invitation, and stayed there awhile, but Auki went away unhappy, and lost great goods because he coveted that which did not belong to him.

Audun had only been with King Sweyn a little while when he said he was eager to go away. The king was rather slow in answering him.

“What wilt thou do, then?” he asked, “if thou wilt not be with us?”

“I will go south to Rome,” he says.

Then the king said:

“Hadst thou not taken such good counsel, I had been very angry at thy eagerness to go away, but now thou shalt not be thwarted in the least.”

So the king gave him much silver, and settled all about his journey, and put him in the way of going in company with other pilgrims, and bade him to come to see him when he came back.

So Audun went south; but when he was coming back he took a great sickness and lay long a-bed. All the money was spent which Sweyn had given him, and his companions went on and left him. At last he rose from his sickness, and was quite thin and weak, nor had he a penny to buy food. Then he took a beggar’s wandering, and went along begging his food, till he came back to Denmark about Easter, to a town where King Sweyn happened to be. By this time Audun had his hair close cropped and scarce a rag to his back, vile and poor in every way; and so he dared not show himself among the throng of men. He hung about the cloisters of the church, and thought to choose his time to meet the king when he went to Nones; but when he saw the king coming and his train so bravely dressed, he was ashamed to show himself before their eyes. But when the king had sat down to the board, Audun went and took his meat outside under the wall of the hall, as is pilgrims’ wont, so long as they have not thrown away staff and scrip. And now he made up his mind to throw himself in the king’s way as he went to even-song; but, so bold as this seemed to him earlier in the day, just half as bold again must he have been to let the king see him now that they had well drunk. So, when Audun saw them coming, he turned short off and ran away to hide himself. But the king thought he caught a glimpse of a man, and as he came out of church, and all his train had come inside their lodging, he turned round and went out again, and called out with a loud voice as soon as he was out of doors:

“If there be any man near here, as methinks there is, who wishes to see me, and has hardly heart to do so, let him come forward now and let himself be seen.”

Then Audun came forward, and fell at the king’s feet. The king knew him at once, and took him by the hand and bade him welcome.

“And now,” he says, “thou art greatly changed since we saw one another last, for I scarce knew thee!”

So the king led him into the hall there and then; but all the king’s train laughed at Audun as soon as they saw him. But the king said:

“Ye have no need to laugh at him, vile and mean though he seems to ye to look on; he hath looked better for his soul’s health than ye, and therefore to God’s eye he will seem bright and fair.”

Then the king made them get ready a bath, and waited on him with his own hands, and gave him afterwards good clothes, and made much of him in every way. So Audun soon got back his strength and health, for he was young in years, and there he stayed awhile. He knew, too, how to behave himself among the crowd of men; he was an easy-tempered, word-weighing man, and not given to gossip. So all men liked him, and as for King Sweyn he was most gracious to him.

So it fell out one day, when springtide was drawing on, that they two were talking together, and all at once the king said:

“Sooth to say, Audun, I have never yet repaid thee in a way thou wouldest like by a gift in return for the white bear. And now, if thou wilt, thou shalt be free to stay long here with me, and I will make thee my henchman; and, at the same time, treat thee honourably in all things.”

Audun answers, “God thank you, lord, for your generous offer, and for all the honour you show me, but I have set my heart on sailing out to Iceland.”

“This seems to me a most wonderful choice,” said the king.

Then Audun said, “I can’t bear to think that I am sitting here with you in great honour and happiness, while my mother tramps about on the beggar’s path out yonder in Iceland; for now the time is up, during which I gave her means to live, before I sailed away from home.”

“Spoken like a good man and true,” answers the king, “and no doubt thou wilt be a man of luck.