laughing said they had lost their
ship, so, seeing ours, had tried to rush into it, and get away before we
could beat them off.

So we asked them to sit and have meat with us, and they sat down; though
we were careful of our arms till they had eaten.

And the next day we landed them at a town, where they might build
another ship.

This is the tale of the marriage of my lord just as it happened.

WHERE THE WOLVES DANCE

Three years before, in the winter time, I had brought my wife Elsa from
her father's, loving her as fools and lonely men love dogs and women. So
I kept ever near her, but was shy of her. Now this is the tale of a very
strange thing, and it begins from her. Though my hall stood far to the
west on the main, where even the sight of the sand-hills could be found
from the highest tower, yet there were trees and gardens on the other
side, and paths ran down to little ponds, and cattle browsed over rich
uplands and sheep grew fat. There were sixty men in my hall; heavy men
and slow, but slow to change, and as their fathers leant before them, so
they leant also from the worn castle windows, and the window-sills were
smooth with the rubbing of their elbows. As to the hall and its build,
there is little need be said. It was square and large, and partly of
stone, with a banqueting-hall, and enough of small rooms and of cellars
for the storage of meat and milk and beer. In the summer sometimes I
would go down to the coast, and crossing in my ship over to Foen, buy
cattle or grain or go to the south ports for some strange rare thing for
my lady; thus it was for three years, and contentment had grown round me
like a woof.

So one day a horseman came riding slowly. He bore to me a message that
three of the priests of the Lord-Bishop of Lund demanded shelter that
night under my roof. I was standing dressed in my best leather suit and
with my handsomest sword-belt by my chair at the head of the table, when
the door swung open and they entered. They came slowly up the hall into
the light, and lifting their heads when they came to the bottom steps at
the top of which I stood, they showed the faces of three old worldly
men, fed on the follies and the agonies of man. They were all pale and
stooping, but the one to the right, a tall man with one shoulder higher
than the other, bent the most, and leant upon the shortest priest, who
was in the middle.

"Greeting," I said; "you are most welcome."

They advanced