nown that I should have been here long ago--and
then, who knows? Maybe you would not be a widow this day." He said it
as if in joke, but yet he meant it. He was greatly taken with her
beauty.

Eric offered him winter quarters at Brattalithe and he accepted it
gladly. His goods were landed, and stood in Eric's warehouse, his ship
was laid up for the winter, his men boarded in Ericshaven. As for
himself, he was very soon at home in Brattalithe, and everybody liked
him well. He was a good poet, and sang his own songs; he told tales,
he made jokes--but was always good-tempered.

Towards Christmas Eric Red, who was now very much aged and apt to worry
himself over trifles, became sad and depressed. They thought that he
was grieving for the two sons he had lost, but he would not talk to any
of them of his troubles. Karlsefne asked Gudrid what was the matter
with his host. He always talked to her when he had a chance.

She told him what she thought: "He is an old man now, and cannot help
remembering his two sons."

"That is not like an Icelander," said Karlsefne. "You yourself, lady,
show the spirit of our people better. You don't fret yourself vainly.
You were wedded to a good man. You were happy in him; he died. Well,
you have had what you have had, and if there is to be no more, you will
wait your turn. Is it not so?"

"It may be," Gudrid said. "I have learned not to build too high, by
falling so far. And I think my Thorstan is at rest. He would not be
if he were here now."

"Very likely not," said Karlsefne, "if he was of a jealous turn.
Moreover he was a poet, one who can always see in his mind a state much
better than that he lives in. That's no way to be happy. But I will
talk to Eric Red. He is friendly to me."

And so he did. "What is it, host, which makes you so heavy? Your
friends say you brood over the past, but I tell them that is not
likely."

"No, no," said Eric, "that's not the way of it at all. The present is
bad enough."

"You are treating me nobly," said Karlsefne. "I should be a churl if I
did not tell you so. What else do you need?"

Then Eric said that he was aware how his house was diminished by
misfortune. "I had a wife, but she has cut herself adrift; I have a
daughter, but she has turned sour to me. Two of my sons are dead, look
you. Now the time was when with a great houseful I could give a feast
with the best. A man is best judged by his children. If they ar