"No sword will be drawn on my side, I assure you, sir," said Errington, advancing and laying one hand on the bonde's shoulder. "I hope you will believe me when I say I shall esteem it an honor and a privilege to know more of you."
"And though you won't accept me as a servant of Odin," added Lorimer, "you really cannot prevent me from trying to make myself agreeable to you. I warn you, Mr. Güldmar, I shall visit you pretty frequently! Such men as you are not often met with."
Olaf Güldmar looked surprised. "You really mean it?" he said. "Nothing that I have told you affects you? You still seek our friendship?"
They both earnestly assured him that they did, and as they spoke Thelma rose from her low seat and faced them with a bright smile.
"Do you know," she said, "that you are the first people who, on visiting us once, have ever cared to come again? Ah, you look surprised, but it is so, is it not, father?"
Güldmar nodded a grave assent.
"Yes," she continued demurely, counting on her little white fingers, "we are three things—first, we are accursed; secondly, we have the evil eye; thirdly, we are not respectable!"
And she broke into a peal of laughter, ringing and sweet as a chime of bells. The young men joined her in it; and, still with an amused expression on her lovely face, leaning her head back against a cluster of pale roses, she went on—
"My father dislikes Mr. Dyceworthy so much, because he wants to—to—oh, what is it they do to savages, father? Yes, I know,—to convert us,—to make us Lutherans. And when he finds it all no use, he is angry; and, though he is so religious, if he hears any one telling some untruth about us in Bosekop, he will add another thing equally untrue, and so it grows and grows, and—why! what is the matter with you?" she exclaimed in surprise as Errington scowled and clenched his fist in a peculiarly threatening manner.
"I should like to knock him down!" he said briefly under his breath.
Old Güldmar laughed and looked at the young baronet approvingly.
"Who knows, who knows!" he said cheerfully. "You may do it some day! It will be a good deed! I will do it myself if he troubles me much more. And now let us make some arrangement with you. When will you come and see, us again?"
"You must visit me first," said Sir Philip quickly. "If you and your daughter will honor me with your company to-morrow, I shall be proud and pleased. Consider the yacht at your service."
Thelma, resting among the roses, looked across at him with serious, questioning eyes—eyes that seemed to be asking his intentions towards both her and her father.
Güldmar accepted the invitation at once, and, the hour for their visit next day being fixed and agreed upon, the young men began to take their leave. As Errington clasped Thelma's hand in farewell, he made a bold venture. He touched a rose that hung just above her head almost dropping on her hair.
"May I have it?" he asked in a low tone.
Their eyes met. The girl flushed deeply, and then grew pale. She broke off the flower and gave it to him,—then turned to Lorimer to say good-bye. They left her then, standing under the porch, shading her brow with one hand from the glittering sunlight, as she watched them descending the winding path to the shore, accompanied by her lather, who hospitably insisted on seeing them into their boat. They looked back once or twice, always to see the slender, tall white figure standing there like an angel resting in a bower of roses, with the sunshine flashing on a golden crown of hair. At the last in the pathway Philip raised his hat and waved it, but whether she condescended to wave her hand in answer he could not see.
Left alone, she sighed, and went slowly into the house to resume her spinning. Hearing the whirr of the wheel, the servant Britta entered.
"You are not going in the boat, Fröken?" she asked in a tone of mingled deference and affection.
Thelma looked up, smiled faintly, and shook her head in the negative.
"It is late, Britta, and I am tired."
And the deep blue eyes had an intense dreamy light within them as they wandered from the wheel to the wide-open window, and rested on the majestic darkness of the overshadowing, solemn pines.
CHAPTER VII.
| "In mezzo del mio core c' e una spina; Non c' e barbier che la possa levare,— Solo il mio amore colla sua manina" |
Rime Popolari.
Errington and Lorimer pulled away across the Fjord in a silence that lasted for many minutes. Old Güldmar stood on the edge of his little pier to watch them out of sight. So, till their boat turned the sharp corner of the protecting rock, that hid the landing-place from view, they saw his picturesque figure and gleaming silvery hair outlined clearly against the background of the sky—a sky now tenderly flushed with pink like the inside of a delicate shell. When they could no longer perceive him they still rowed on speaking no word,—the measured, musical plash of the oars through the smooth, dark olive-green water alone breaking the stillness around them. There was a curious sort of hushed breathlessness in the air; fantastic, dream-like lights and shadows played on the little wrinkling waves; sudden flushes of crimson came and went in the western horizon, and over the high summits of the surrounding mountains mysterious shapes, formed of purple and grey mist, rose up and crept softly downwards, winding in and out deep valleys and dark ravines, like wandering spirits sent on some secret and sorrowful errand. After a while Errington said almost vexedly—
"Are you struck dumb, George? Haven't you a word to say to a fellow?"
"Just what I was about to ask you," replied Lorimer carelessly; "and I was also going to remark that we hadn't seen your mad friend up at the Güldmar residence."
"No. Yet I can't help thinking he has something to do with them, all the same," returned Errington meditatively. "I tell you, he swore at me by some old Norwegian infernal place or other. I dare say he's an Odin worshipper, too. But never mind him. What do you think of her?"
Lorimer turned lazily round in the boat, so that he faced his companion.
"Well, old fellow, if you ask me frankly, I think she is the most beautiful woman I ever saw, or, for that matter, ever heard of. And I am an impartial critic—perfectly impartial."
And, resting on his oar, he dipped the blade musingly in and out of the water, watching the bright drops fall with an oil-like smoothness as they trickled from the polished wood and glittered in the late sunshine like vari-colored jewels. Then he glanced curiously at Philip, who sat silent, but whose face was very grave and earnest,—even noble, with that shade of profound thought upon it. He looked like one who had suddenly accepted a high trust, in which there was not only pride, but tenderness. Lorimer shook himself together, as he himself would have expressed it, and touched his friend's arm half-playfully.
"You've met the king's daughter of Norroway after all, Phil;" and his light accents had a touch of sadness in them; "and you'll have to bring her home, as the old song says. I believe the 'eligible' is caught at last. The 'woman' of the piece has turned up, and your chum must play second fiddle—eh, old boy?"
Errington flushed hotly, but caught Lorimer's hand and pressed it with tremendous fervor.
"By Jove, I'll wring it off your wrist if you talk in that fashion, George!" he said, with a laugh. "You'll always be the same to me, and you know it. I tell you," and he pulled his moustache doubtfully, "I don't know quite what's the matter with me. That girl fascinates me! I feel a fool in her presence. Is that