satisfy this whim of mine; it is the first favour I have asked of you:
will you ask the fair, noble lady, your mother, from Siur the smith, if
she is happy now?'

'Willingly, sweet master Siur, if it pleases you; farewell.'

And with happy young faces they went away; and when they were gone, Siur
from a secret place drew out various weapons and armour, and began to
work at them, having first drawn bolt and bar of his workshop carefully.

Svend, with Harald and Robert his two brethren, went their ways to the
queen, and found her sitting alone in a fair court of the palace full of
flowers, with a marble cloister round about it; and when she saw them
coming, she rose up to meet them, her three fair sons.

Truly as that right royal woman bent over them lovingly, there seemed
little need of Siur's question.

So Svend showed her his dagger, but not the crown; and she asked many
questions concerning Siur the smith, about his way of talking and his
face, the colour of his hair even, till the boys wondered, she questioned
them so closely, with beaming eyes and glowing cheeks, so that Svend
thought he had never before seen his mother look so beautiful.

Then Svend said: 'And, mother, don't be angry with Siur, will you?
because he sent a message to you by me.'

'Angry!' and straightway her soul was wandering where her body could not
come, and for a moment or two she was living as before, with him close by
her, in the old mountain land.

'Well, mother, he wanted me to ask you if you were happy now.'

'Did he, Svend, this man with brown hair, grizzled as you say it is now?
Is his hair soft then, this Siur, going down on to his shoulders in
waves? and his eyes, do they glow steadily, as if lighted up from his
heart? and how does he speak? Did you not tell me that his words led
you, whether you would or no, into dreamland? Ah well! tell him I am
happy, but not so happy as we shall be, as we were. And so you, son
Robert, are getting to be quite a cunning smith; but do you think you
will ever beat Siur?'

'Ah, mother, no,' he said, 'there is something with him that makes him
seem quite infinitely beyond all other workmen I ever heard of.'

Some memory coming from that dreamland smote upon her heart more than the
others; she blushed like a young girl, and said hesitatingly:

'Does he work with his left hand, son Robert; for I have heard that some
men do so?' But in her heart she remembered how once, long ago in the
old