Saga of Halfred the Sigskald Part 6

Is it my crime that Dame Harthild was differently minded?

And it was no lie that I bore love to her, on that night.

Love's fulness truly it was not--as Sudha named it.

That may be. Never knew I love's fulness.

And be it so. If the G.o.ds hate me for an evil deed, wherefore do they not punish me alone?

Wherefore let others--so many others--suffer and atone for _my_ sin?

Wherefore should King Hartstein perish, and many other princes, and thousands of men from all coasts and islands?

Wherefore should Dame Harthild perish, whom they would have avenged, and our unborn son?

How have all these sinned? Answer me, ye two, if ye know more than do I and the stars?"

But his blood brethren were silent, and Halfred continued--

"Yet there must be G.o.ds!

Who has else bound the giants, calmed the sea, levelled the earth, arched the heavens, and strewn the stars? Who else guides the battle?

and how, after death, come mighty heroes to Valhalla, and the evil to the dark serpent h.e.l.l?

For that awful fearful thought which already from afar has come darkly into my mind, that perhaps no G.o.ds live! I will think it no more.

There must be G.o.ds. I cannot cannot think otherwise, and my throbbing brain is driven to frenzy.

And if there are G.o.ds, they must be also good, and wise, and mighty, and just.

Else it would be indeed yet more frightful to think that beings, mightier and wiser than mankind, delighted in the misery of men, like an evil urchin who for sport impales a captured beetle.

This, therefore, one dare not think,--neither, indeed,--that there are no G.o.ds, or that there are evil G.o.ds.

And therefore will I in devout submission endure this awful calamity, waiting till, in the course of years, I guess this riddle also. So hard an one was never yet set before me.

But ye, ye faithful ones, who stood by me to the death, and spared not your own kindred, and have lost your nearest through me; ye will I never forsake, all my life long; and great grat.i.tude will I bear ye, and my dearest shall ye be for evermore. For ye alone will I live."

Then spake Hartvik--

"Not thus must thou speak, Halfred. The harp thou shalt again strike victoriously, the hammer shalt thou again joyously wield under the blue heavens of Greece. The blood of the vine shalt thou quaff, and a woman more enchanting than----"

Then Halfred sprang up from the black stone--

"Silence, Hartvik: Thou blasphemest.

Who is stricken so heavily as I, by the hatred of the G.o.ds, who live and are just, he stands as a lightning-blasted tree by the way.

Birds sing not upon it, the dew moistens it not, the sun kisses it not.

How should I sing and laugh, drink and kiss, through whom hath fallen upon so many thousand men and women utter destruction, or the sorrow of death for evermore?

No, otherwise have I vowed to myself.

Long did I doubt if I still could live, after such a calamity as the G.o.ds have laid upon this head, and I could not, did I not believe in good G.o.ds, and tarry for the solving of this riddle.

But joy and happiness have no more part in Halfred Hamundson. I renounce them for ever."

And he kneeled down, and took from his breast pouch a leathern bottle, which was filled with white ashes. And slowly he strewed them all over his long flowing black locks, and his face, and breast, and body.

"Hear me, ye good all ruling G.o.ds, and ye glittering all seeing stars of heaven; and of men-kind upon earth, Hartvik and Eigil, my blood brethren!

Here I renounce, on account of the awful calamity which I have drawn down upon wife and child, and many hundred friends and strangers, I renounce for ever happiness and joy, song, wine, and the love of women.

To the dead alone, slain for my crime, with whose ashes I here cover myself upon their grave mound, do I belong; and among the living, to my faithful blood brethren.

And if I break this solemnly sworn vow, then be Dame Harthild's curse wholly fulfilled."

And the stars and his friends in silence heard his vow.

CHAPTER X.

And Halfred kept his word.

Year after year pa.s.sed away--he told me he no longer knew how often.

Meanwhile midsummer returned--and Halfred lived a life which was as a living death.

Hartvik and Eigil commanded the Singing Swan, and ruled their sailing comrades. They chose the design, the port, and the course of their voyages. Halfred without word, wish, or choice, let everything be.

Only, when the south wind grew too strong for Hartvik's hand, Halfred strode silently to the helm, and steered until the sea was calm again.

Also, when Vikings attacked the s.h.i.+p, Halfred had forbidden that the Singing Swan, either by sea or land, should do harm to any--and the danger became overwhelming, Halfred silently--he raised the battle cry no more--grasped his hammer, and dashed among the enemy until they gave way.

But he wielded his hammer only with his left hand--his s.h.i.+eld he had laid aside--and neither with helmet nor mail did he protect his head and breast.

And throughout the whole year he wore the garment which on that midsummer night smoke, flame and blood had darkly dyed.

When the Singing Swan drew near the land--the black flame marks on the wings none were allowed to efface--and Hartvik and Eigil and the sailors went to the halls of kings, Halfred stayed lying upon deck, and kept guard over the s.h.i.+p.

And he drank only water out of a cup of the bitter juniperwood.

Eigil brought once, from a king's halls where the Sigskald of yore had often been a guest, a splendid golden harp, which the queen, in greeting to her old friend, had sent as a present.

But as the s.h.i.+p turned out of the bay the harp, with a light rush, glided into the sea.

And once Halfred lay at midsummer in Iceland, on the sh.o.r.e by the black stone--for every midsummer night he spent alone there, his friends must remain on the s.h.i.+p--and looked very very sad. For his face had grown very pale.

Then there came a woman, and a wonderfully beautiful maiden, who was her daughter, and stood before him; and he turned away his face, but the mother spoke--

"I know thee, even yet, Halfred Sigskald. I can never forget thy face, although the smile of Oski no longer plays thereon, and though the furrows on thy brow are deeply scored as with a plough. This maiden dids't thou, fifteen years ago, lay in my arms a sleeping child. See how beautiful she has become, as no other in all Iceland. And this wreath of summer flowers has she twined for thee. Set it upon thy pale brow, and thou shalt be healed, for grat.i.tude has woven it."

Then Halfred sprang up, took the wreath from the beautiful blus.h.i.+ng maiden's hand, lifted with mighty force the huge block upwards, threw the wreath under it, and let the black stone fall heavily in its place again.

The mother and maiden, weeping, departed.

And during these years Halfred spoke hardly to any, save Hartvik and Eigil, and to them only when he must.

And what he said was weak and mournful.

And his voice had become very low.