I to say less, dear
lad. There is a man's courage in your boy's body, and I think a woman
could not be more faithful in her love--How! Are you cold that you
shiver so? Pull the corner of my cloak about you."

But the page cast it off impatiently. "No, no, it is nothing; no more
than that one of those men out there may have walked across the spot
that is to be my grave. Sooner would I bite my tongue off than interrupt
you. I ask you not to let it hinder your speech."

Again a kind of affectionate pity came into the young noble's face.
"Does it mean so much to you to hear that you have been faithful in your
service?"

"It means--so much to me!" the boy repeated softly; and if the man's ear
had not been far afield, he might have divined the secret of the green
tunic only from the tenderness of the low voice. But when his mind came
back to his companion again, the lad was looking at him with a little
smile touching the curves of his wistful mouth.

"Do you know why this mishap which has occurred to you seems great luck
for me? Because otherwise it is not likely that you would have found out
how true a friend I could be. If it had happened that I had gone with
Rothgar's messenger that night, you would have remembered me only as one
who could entertain you when it was your wish to laugh. But now, since
it has been allowed me to endure suffering with you and to share your
mind when it was bitterest, you have given me a place in your heart.
And to-morrow, when we go forth together, and the Dane slays me with
you because it will be open to him then that for your sake I have become
unfaithful to him, you will remember our fellowship even to--"

But Sebert's hand silenced the tremulous lips. "No more, youngling! I
adjure you by your gentleness," he whispered unsteadily. "You owe me no
such love; and it makes my helplessness a thousand-fold more bitter. Say
no more, little comrade, if you would not turn my heart into a woman's
when it has need to be of flint. Sit you here on the ledge the while
that I take one more turn. You will not? Then come with me, and we will
make the round together, and apply our wits once more to the riddle.
Until swords have put an end to me, I shall not cease to believe that it
has an answer."

Below, in the dense blackness of the forest, an occasional owl sounded
his echoless cry. From still deeper in the dark, where the Danish
camp-fires glowed, a harp-note floated up on the wind with a fragment