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246 Thorgills sat before the king, and tuned his harp in an aimless way. Olaf, his head resting upon his hand, looked thoughtfully at the scald. Such moods came over the viking when he and the harper sat alone; and it seemed as if they both travelled again in memory the many and difficult ways of their former life.

“My King!” at last said the scald, lifting his keen blue eyes to his master’s face, “I have striven to serve thee faithfully. All that may make a man happy I have forborne, until thou wert safe upon thy throne. My own heart, my own life, the light of a fireside, the smile of a wife, all have I forborne. Sometimes in that Irish land, I have watched thee and thy blue-eyed princess, until my own heart beat time to the music of thy happiness, and I longed to melt my own life into the melody of such marriage. But I remembered that we only tarried there awhile. Now thou art king in thy own land. Thy throne is safe, and Thorgills will ask thee not to say him nay when he would light the fire at his own hearthstone.”

Olaf looked sadly at the harper. “Didst thou see but my joy, my true scald? Didst thou not sing Gyda’s funeral saga, even as thou didst ring our marriage song? Upon such music as my marriage made waits the awful silence when the song is sung.”

“But, my King,” the scald said eagerly, “it were better once to have heard that melody than to have lived ever the dumb, dark life. Even now, my King,