Sigrid was set on the cross-bench on the dais, beside her mother, and the other womenfolk that were at the feast sat out away from them on either hand. She had a gown of blue, collared and purfled with mink’s fur, and about the neck of it sets of gold, in every set four pieces of amber. And she had above her brow a fillet of silk and twisted wire of gold, to keep back from her face the red deep masses of her hair, that came down in two thick and heavy trammels or plaits beside her bosom on either hand, and the ends tucked up under her jewelled belt.
Tosti, from his high-seat on the lower bench, called her by name and said, “Why dally, Sigrid? Are we become so slack as keep our guests waiting? and much more when ’tis the King.”
She, glancing with her dark eyes first in her father’s face then in the King’s, reached out her hand now to the great golden drinking horn which a thrall, obedient to her father’s nod, proffered to her full of mead so that the foam of it ran down the sides. As a ship’s mast, half laid over by a gust of wind, rises erect from the trough of the wave, so rose she, and with modest and downward look came past the benches till she was stood beside the King.
King Eric took the horn with one hand and the lady with the other, and made her sit beside him in the high seat. From this she at first hung aback, but he would have his way. She sat here very demure, answering but ay or no or with a flickering smile to whatso the King might say to her: very quiet and estranged. So, and in such a quietness, Sigrid sat in the high seat beside the King; till the fires burned low, and men’s eyelids waxed heavy, and it was late night, and the feast was done.
“This is what thou hast long set thy mind on,” said Skogul-Tosti to his wife at his coming to bed, “and I think thou mayst be glad at this night’s work.”
“So far, good,” said she. “But the ship’s not beached yet.”
“Not beached yet? Beached it is, and laid up,” said Tosti. “Thou shalt see, ere the King ride hence tomorrow he will bespeak her in marriage for Styrbiorn.”
“That will be well so far,” said she.
“Well? what better?” Tosti, that was sat taking off his shoes, stared wonderingly up in his wife’s smiling and doubting face. “And by thy good schemings he and she have been good friends together too.”
“She hath said no to a dozen ere now, and not one of them but had been a great match such as should do us honour. Hast forgot how thy young messmate fared, Harald the Grenlander? and he is a king now.”
“True enough,” said he. “The lass hath a stubborn will, that is true. And her very scornfulness and haughty ways seem to draw ’em on, only to send ’em packing. But there’s bigger game on the wing here.”
“That is true, too,” said Gudrid. “But, remember: thou’st a wayward daughter.”
“A right daughter of thine, mistress. As skittish as an eel.” Gudrid laughed. “But she hath wit,” he said: “she can lick a dish before a cat. She’ll ne’er say nay to Styrbiorn.”
“I say only this,” said Gudrid: “be not too certain sure.”
“ ’Tis a wonder past guessing,” said Tosti, standing up, “all these doubts and questions of thine. Hast spoke to her on’t?”
“No,” said she. “But I watched her. She smelt well enough what was toward tonight. I liked not the face she put on it.”
“But not say no to this? There’s no higher game to fly at.”
Gudrid shook her head. “ ’Tis thy giving of her her will too much, and cockering of her. She’d ne’er mind me, and now not thee neither.”
“Well,” said Tosti, “she shall have her will, too, whatsome’er she choose. Albeit, I’ll ne’er believe she’d say nay to this.”
Gudrid said nothing, but stood looking at him as on some new and entertaining thing. He, knowing not what to make of her and her looks, took her by the shoulders. “She hath this of thee,” he said, “that she is like to be an ill curse to any man save the man of her own choosing.” And he drew his wife to him and kissed her on the neck and bare shoulder.
Next morning the King took Tosti apart and said to him, “There is a matter I have to move unto thee, Tosti, and I think after last night it will not take thee napping. And it toucheth thy daughter Sigrid.”
Tosti answered, “Your drift, Lord, is not hidden from me, and I do embrace it for the greatest honour and gladness that ever did or could befall me and my kindred. Yet since true is that which is said, ‘There’s many a thing in the carle’s cot that is not in the king’s garth,’ and since this is mine only daughter, I know you will not take it ill, Lord, if I leave unto her the choosing in this. So have I alway done heretofore, and so it seemeth me will be best now, both for her and for all that have part herein.”
“I will talk to her myself,” said the King. “None did yet die of another’s wound, nor should any be content with another’s choosing.”
The King walked with Sigrid forth beyond the home-mead by sheep-ways on to the open fell-sides south toward Balingsdale. For a long while he was silent. Then suddenly he said, “I have a suit unto thee, Sigrid.”
“That is not hard to guess, Lord,” said she, dreaming not
