XVI
“He that guesseth, often goes wrong”—Northern saying.
“He that guesseth, often goes wrong”—Northern saying.
“He that guesseth, often goes wrong”—Northern saying.
“He that guesseth, often goes wrong”
—Northern saying.
In the sudden darkness that shut down upon them, the Songsmith felt Helvin’s body dash against his, heard Helvin’s hiss at his ear:
“Let me after him,—do you hear?”
“Let you betray your state to all men? Lord, I have saved your secret—”
“I will kill him only for coming so near to guessing it!”
“Has all sense left you?”
“Off, or he will reach the hall-door before I can catch him! Would you turn my wrath upon yourself?”
“Keep your wrath within bounds, lord, as I kept mine. Do you suppose that after stripping off my pride to wrap it about your cursed secret, I shall allow your folly to undo—”
“Allow? Mother of Heaven! do you know what you are defying?”
“Do you forget that I am not the rabbit-hearted thing I feigned to be—”
“Out of the way!”
“No—”
Short as the word was, it was cut in two by the slam of the great doors at the guard-room’s farther end. One breath Randvar let out in relief, then drew in one in dread and braced himself for the grapple.
But nothing came.
No use to strain his eyes, for darkness was now so thick upon them that it carried a sense of smothering with it. He strained his woodsman’s ear, trained to catch the lightest bending of a twig beneath a fox’s foot, but not so much as the sound of a faintly drawn breath rewarded him. Delicately as a butterfly uses its feelers, he put out a finger, then, and found that the spot where Helvin had stood was empty. More silent than the stealthiest wind that tries to creep unnoted through the forest, he had withdrawn to some quarter of the darkness.
From his head to his feet, shuddering shook the song-maker as his mind strove to follow that withdrawal to its goal, to picture him who stood hidden there. The temptation to let in the firelight to show what thing he faced was so torture-strong that he took his hands off the door-panelson which they were spread out and locked them before him, and gave himself the relief of speaking Helvin’s name in a low voice, entreating, soothing.
No answer came. A windless cavern in the marrow of the earth’s bones had not been stiller. From the living-room without came the rattle of knife and trencher, as the evening meal wore on; the clink of horns with the arrival of drinking-time; by-and-by, snatches of maudlin song. Even the shuffling patter of the thralls the Songsmith caught through the oaken panels, but in the room where he kept vigil, only the thundering echo of his heart throbbing in his ears.
Perhaps its pealing was enough to blunt his hearing. Though he detected no rustle of approach, his cheek was touched of a sudden by a fiery breath, which like a poisonous vapor brought with it dizzy horror. The torture of two hands falling stealthily upon his shoulders—tightening swift to the grip of claws—recalled him for an instant to himself; then again his brain whirled, as a bushy thing that he knew for the mass of Helvin’s blood-red hair was pressed against his face.
Back from it he strained with all his might, fought it off with all the power of his toughened sinews; but with a strength beyond the strength of man, the hands drew him slowly steadily downward.
Suddenly, to his mounting madness, it was no longer Helvin with whom he struggled. It was some being from another world, some nameless Thing against which his gorge rose up in loathing hate. Twice he gasped out warning, then loosened his grasp on the bushy hair, wrenched out his sword and stabbed downward.
With the sinking of blade in flesh, a sharp unhuman scream rang out; the clutch on his shoulders loosened. Even before he could tear off the dragging weight and hurl it from him, it had fallen heavily, shaking the timbered floor.
Like an echo came cries from the guard-room without, thunder of feet, clangor of weapons. Randvar was sent staggering across the room as the door behind him was burst open by a dozen brawny shoulders. On the threshold appeared Visbur, the grizzled old leader; behind him, two-score excited faces.
On the threshold they paused, staring at the sight the inrushing firelight revealed,—Helvin Jarl lying in a pool of blood; beyond him the figure of his song-maker, bristling-haired, a bloody sword in his hand. Half wrathful, half incredulous, their voices rose:
“Rolf’s son a traitor!”
But no thought had the Songsmith for them. On the face upturned from the blood pool his gazewas riveted. It was Helvin’s face, unmarred, unchanged; in the gray eyes only unutterable anguish; anguish unutterable on the finely cut mouth that was trying vainly to form and send forth words. It was Helvin, his friend, that his madness had laid low. With a hoarse cry, he flung the weapon from him, and turned and buried his head in the bed-curtains.
As from a distance, he heard the scuffling of feet staggering under a heavy burden, and felt the jar of the bed as they lowered their load upon it; but he came back to consciousness only when stern hands laid hold of him and drew him from his shelter. He realized, then, the consequences of his deed as he met the awful reproach of the looks bent on him and saw the barrier of crossed spears that had been set before him.
Visbur said: “Chief, there is no need for us to wait for lawmen. Say only whether he is to be shot or hanged.”
Pushing off those who were trying to cut away his robe and find his wound, the Jarl dragged himself up by the bed-draperies, turning a ghastly face upon the room.
“Free him,” his lips made out to shape.
After a bewildered pause, the old warrior said slowly: “I suppose what you are trying to order is, ‘Slay him,’ not understanding that I said itshould be done before the clots on his blade were dry. All I ask, chief, is in what manner he is to suffer death?”
With as much force as his half-swoon left him, the Jarl shook his head, repeating the words so that there was no mistaking them: “Free him—and let him to me.”
But even as the Songsmith turned, speaking his friend’s name unsteadily, Visbur made his men a sign; and the spear-wall remained.
“Hold him and take him forth,” the leader commanded. “Starkad’s son has gone astray out of his wits. I will answer for the act when he is sane again.”
“You will answer—with your life,” the Jarl said between gasping breaths. “While I live—I shall have my way. And my luck is not so good that I am dying. It is no more than a flesh-wound. I swooned from—from my rage. Let him to me.”
This time he stretched out a shaking hand, and the spears fell. In a moment the Songsmith was kneeling beside the bed, the arm that had so nearly mastered him lying around his neck.
“Tell them—enough. Enough to clear yourself,” Helvin murmured.
Around the circle of hard old faces that until now had met his glance so cordially, Rolf’s sonsent a beseeching look, then dropped his eyes in despair.
“Jarl, I could never say so much as to make them believe me; before them I stand proved a traitor who has turned blade against his lord. And how shall I speak against the truth of that judgment? I am every man’s dastard. Lord, I would as lief go out with them.” His voice broke, and he did not seek to mend it.
But Helvin spoke as curtly as his faintness allowed, “Raise me up,” and when that was done, “Bring me wine.” From the beaker, he lifted a face pitched to determination.
“Let all listen to my words, that I need not speak twice. He bore from me more than any of you would have borne. He lost his temper only when I drove him to frenzy. He struck only to save his life.”
“To save his life, chief? And you with bare hands!” old Visbur said slowly.
Of a sudden, sick shuddering seized upon the Jarl, so that his head drooped and sank. But even as they started towards him, he raised it—raised himself with the force of his passion.
“Now damnation take such loyalty!” he cried. “I have told you that he is not guilty as you think,—I will lower myself to no more explaining. He goes free because I will it. And if any man reportsthis happening outside, so that even in people’s thoughts my friend be held up to reproach, that man shall be outlawed, and have my wrath besides. Bear that in mind—and leave me now to him—whose support I have always found best.”
Upon the song-maker’s shoulder he fell, spent; and the guard who went last from the room heard his moan:
“My friend, my friend, this is that one thing that could tear us asunder! It will be your life or mine.”
The man had passed out of hearing when Randvar answered slowly: “If that be true, lord, then mine is the life that will end. I know now which would be the easier to bear.”