ed at the three of us, and her face grew
bright.

"Now I have one thing to ask you," she said, "and that is to let me
arm you once more. It is not fitting that you three should fall and
pass to Asgard all unlike warriors--in that thrall-like gear.

"Come with me, Malcolm, and bring what I shall find for you."

I followed her until she stayed at the entrance to the penthouse,
and I half feared that she would bid me open and enter it. In
truth, we had almost forgotten what lay there, but now I could not
but remember, and the old dread came back to me. But she did not do
so. She pointed to one of the great chests which had been stowed
between the boats, and bade me open it. I had to tug at it to bring
it forward, for it was heavy, and then threw the lid back.

It was full of mail, and with the close-knit ring shirts were
helms, and some few short, heavy swords.

"War spoils of the old days before Harald Fairhair," she said.
"When my grandfather had many foes, and knew how to guard himself.
All these would have been rent and spoiled before they were laid in
the ship mound--but at the last there was not time--thus."

Now she called to Dalfin, and he came eagerly, with a cry of
delight on seeing the war gear.

"Lift them, and choose what you will for yourselves and Bertric,"
she said. "It will be strange if, among all, you do not find what
will suit you."

Now there was no difficulty in finding suits of the best for the
other two. There were seven in all in the chest, and we set two
aside. Dalfin was tall and slight, and very active, and Bertric was
square and sturdy, and maybe half a head shorter than either of us.
But after the way of my forebears, both Norse and Scottish, I was
somewhat bigger than most men whom I have met, though not so much
in height as in breadth of shoulder. Maybe, however, I was taller
than Dalfin, for I think he was not over six feet.

So it happened that as Dalfin, in all light-heartedness, as if no
enemy was nearer than Ireland, took up suit after suit of the
bright ring mail and stretched them across my shoulders, trying to
fit me, not one of these would do by any means. Gerda stood by us,
watching quietly.

"It does not matter," I said at last. "Let me have a weapon, and I
shall not be the first of us who has fallen unmailed."

"No," said Gerda, "it is my fancy that my champions shall be well
armed. Open the small chest yonder."

I did so, and in that lay a most beautiful byrnie a