ir way, else there would have been an end of Arnkel.

Maybe in the long run it had been as well for him, but in the
scuffle he opened the door behind him and rushed out. I heard a
shout from outside, and then a trampling, and thereafter a silence.

Asbiorn was not far off. Afterwards I found that he had a ladder
against the wall, and a man was watching through a high window all
that went on, in case we needed help. Whereby it happened that
Arnkel ran into his arms.

Some of Asbiorn's men came in as soon as that was done, and the
courtmen huddled back at the sight of these newcomers, whose swords
were out. Gerda called to them that these were friends, and bade
our men sheathe their weapons.

There was quiet then, and Gerda looked round to me. Phelim had
taken charge of my arm at once, and the long blade was out, and a
scarf, which some girl who had not lost her senses had handed him,
was round the wound.

"Not much harm done," he said, smiling at Gerda, who thanked him in
words and me with a look.

Now the folk crowded round us with great shouts of welcome, and the
men came to thrust forward the hilts of their weapons that she
should touch them, in token of homage given and accepted. The women
were trying to reach her also, with words of joy and praise. So I
took her through them all to the high place, and set her there in
Thorwald's chair, and Gorm the Steward passed round some word, and
came himself with a silver cup full of mead, and set it in her
hand, and whispered to her.

Whereon she smiled and rose up, and held the cup high, and cried to
her folk:

"Skoal, friends, and thanks!"

And all down the hall, from her own folk and from Hakon's, and even
from those strangers, Eric's men, came the answer:

"Skoal to Gerda the Queen, and welcome!"

And then one lifted his voice and cried:

"Skoal to Jarl Malcolm!"

Men took that up, and it was good to hear them.

Gerda gave me the cup her lips had just touched, and I drank
"skoal" to them in turn, and so Gerda the Queen had come home.

Gerda passed to the bower presently, and left us in the hall. The
men still made merry with shout and song, and Gorm was preparing
the guest hall for us. Asbiorn had come in with the rest of his
men, grim and silent, and I asked him if he had Arnkel safe. He
nodded and reached for a horn of ale, and sat down at the end of
the high place, for at the time Bertric and I were talking with
Eric's men, and trying to settle matt