IN one of those great halls which the winter darkens and which are proper to the North, there sat a group of men, kindly and full of the winter night and of their food and drink, upon which for many hours they had regaled together, and not only full of song, but satiated with it, so long and so loudly had they sung. They all claimed descent from the Gods, but in varying degrees, and their Chief was descended from the father of the Gods, by no doubtful lineage, for it was his granfer’s mother to whom a witch in the woods had told the story of her birth. In the midst of them as they so sat, a large fire smouldered, but having been long lit, sent up so strong a shaft of rising air as drew all smoke with it, towering to a sort of open cage upon the high roof tree of that hall whence it could escape to heaven.
I say they were tired of song and filled with many good things, but chiefly with companionship. They had landed but recently from the sea; the noise of the sea was in their ears as they so sat round the fire, still talking low, and a Priest who was among them refused to interpret the sound; but he said in a manner that some mocked doubtfully, others heard[262] with awe, that the sea never sounded save upon nights when the Gods were abroad. He was the Priest of a lesser God, but he was known throughout the fleet of those pirate fishermen for his great skill in the interpretation of dreams, and he could tell by the surface of the water in the nightless midsummer where the shoals were to be found.
He said that on that night the Gods were abroad, and, indeed, the quality of the wind as it came down the gulf of the fjord provoked such a fancy, for it rose and fell as though by a volition, and sometimes one would have said that it was a quiet night, and, again, a moment after, one heard a noise like a voice round the corners of the great beams, and the wind pitied or appealed or called. Then a man who was a serf, but very skilled in woodwork, lying among the serfs in the outer ring beyond the fire in the straw, called up and said: “Lords, he is right; the Gods have come down from the Dovrefield; they are abroad. Let us bless our doors.”
It was when he had so spoken that upon the main gate of that Hall (a large double engine of foot-thick pine swung upon hinges wrought many generations ago by the sons of the Gods) came a little knocking. It was a little tapping like the tapping of a bird. It rang musically of metal and of hollow metal; it moved them curiously, and a very young man who was of the blood said to his father: “Perhaps a God would warn us.”
The keeper of the door was a huge and kindly[263] man, foolish but good for lifting, with whom by daylight children played, and who upon such evenings lay silent and contented enough to hear his wittier fellows. This serf rose from the straw and went to unbar. But the Chief put his hand forward, and bade him stay that they might still hear that little tapping. Then he lowered his hand and the gate was swung open.
Cold came with it for a moment, and the night air; light, and as though blown before that draught, drifted into the hall a tall man, very young, who bowed to them with a gesture they did not know, and first asked in a tongue they could not tell, whether any man might interpret for him.
Then one old man who was their pilot and who had often run down into the vineyard lands, sometimes for barter, sometimes for war, always for a wage, said two words or three in that new tongue, hesitatingly. His face was wrinkled and hard; he had very bright but very pale grey eyes that were full of humility. He said three words of greeting which he had painfully learned twenty years before, from a priest, upon the rocks of Brittany, who had also given him smooth stones wherewith to pray; and with these smooth stones the old Pilot continually prayed sometimes to the greater and sometimes to the lesser Gods. His wife had died during the first war between Hrolf and the Twin Brothers; he had come home to find her dead and sanctified, and, being Northern, he had since been also a silent man. This Pilot, I say,[264] quoted the words of greeting in the strange tongue. Then the tall young stranger man advanced into the circle of the firelight and made a sign upon his head and his breast and his shoulders, which was like the sign of the Hammer of Thor, and yet which was not the sign of the Hammer of Thor. When he had done this, the Pilot attempted that same sign, but he failed at it, for it was many years since he had been taught it upon the Breton coast. He knew it to be magical and beneficent, and he was ashamed to fail.
The Chief of those who were descended from the Gods and were seated round the fire, turned to the Priest and said: “Is this a guest, a stranger sent, or is he a man come as an enemy who should be led out again into the night? Have you any divination?”
“I have no divination,” said the Priest. “I cannot tell one thing or the other, nor each from the other in the case of this young man. But perhaps he is one of the Gods seeking shelter among men, or perhaps he is a fancy thing, warlock, but not doing evil. Or perhaps he is from the demons; or perhaps he is a man like ourselves, and seeking shelter during some long wandering.”
When the Chief heard this he asked the Pilot, not as a man possessing divine knowledge, but as one who had travelled and knew the sea, whether he knew this Stranger and whence he came. To which the Pilot answered:
“Captain, I do not know this young man nor whence he comes, nor any of his tribe, nor have I[265] seen any like him save once three slaves who stood in a market-place of the Romans in a town that was subject to a great lord who was a Frank and not a Breton, and who was hated by the people of his town so that later they slew him. Then these three slaves were loosened, and they came to the house of the Priest of the Gods of that country, and they told me the name of the people whence they sprang. But I have forgotten it. Only I know that it is among the vineyard lands. There the day and the night are equally divided all the year long, and if the snow falls it falls gently and for a very little while, and there are all manner of birds, and those people are very rich, and they have great houses of stone. Now I believe t............