Page:The collected works of Henrik Ibsen (Heinemann Volume 2).djvu/41



Örnulf of the Fiords!

[Glad, yet uneasy.] My father and my brothers

Stand thou behind me.

Nay, no need. [Approaching ] I no sooner saw thee than I knew thee, and therefore I stirred the strife; I was fain to prove the fame that tells of thee as the stoutest man of his hands in Norway. Hereafter let peace be between us.

Best if so it could be.

Here is my hand. Thou art a warrior indeed; stouter strokes than these has old Örnulf never given or taken.

[Seizes his outstretched hand.] Let them be the last strokes given and taken between us two; and be thou thyself the judge in the matter between us. Art willing?

That am I, and straightway shall the quarrel be healed. [To the others.] Be the matter, then, known to all. Five winters ago came Sigurd and Gunnar Headman as vikings to Iceland; they lay in harbour close under my homestead. Then Gunnar, by force and craft, carried away my