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Rh Then the lady laughed merrily. “Thou canst make me pretty speeches, Lord Thorgills, and all the while thou art mooning in grief because of a poor little Irish maid who will not smile upon thee.”

Thorgills flushed uncomfortably. Again the woman laughed; this time with some scorn. ‘Why should my Lord Thorgills go grieving for a maid that was but a slave of the Danes? Oh! I have heard of thy viking with King Olaf, and of his ransom of the maid from the pirate Ulf. So that is the woman that the scald of King Olaf grieves over? Olaf Tryggevesson, with his White Christ on the Cross, hath surely stolen the spirit of the Norsemen, when such things can be. Ye vikings were wont to be masterful with your women; now ye are but a poor craven crowd, afraid of a maiden’s frown. My Lord Haakon was a man; but thou—” she laughed harshly, contemptuously, “art only fit to sing to the Lady Aastrid—she that doth look upon me with such black glances; thou art only fit to sing and sigh after a poor, spiritless girl. Why dost thou not come to my merry home at Rimul? Such merry days we have, feasting and full pleasure! But thou must not leave Olaf Tryggevesson. Thou art the king’s hired hind; and thou art house-thrall to the Lady Aastrid, and bond-servant to the Irish maid.”

Thorgills stood in dumb anger. Shame, too, came over him that this beautiful woman should so scorn