earth before I have seen my vengeance.

LADY INGER. Then is there a long life before you. What would
you do?

OLAF SKAKTAVL. Do? How should I know what I will do? It has
never been my part to plot and plan. That is where you must help
me. You have the wit for that. I have but my sword and my two arms.

LADY INGER. Your sword is rusted, Olaf Skaktavl! All the swords
in Norway are rusted.

OLAF SKAKTAVL. That is doubtless why some folk fight only with
their tongues.--Inger Gyldenlove--great is the change in you. Time
was when the heart of a man beat in your breast.

LADY INGER. Put me not in mind of what was.

OLAF SKAKTAVL. 'Tis for that alone I am here. You _shall_ hear
me, even if----

LADY INGER. Be it so then; but be brief; for--I must say it--
this is no place of safety for you.

OLAF SKAKTAVL. Ostrat is no place of safety for an outlaw?
That I have long known. But you forget that an outlaw is unsafe
wheresoever he may wander.

LADY INGER. Speak then; I will not hinder you.

OLAF SKAKTAVL. It is nigh on thirty years now since first I
saw you. It was at Akershus* in the house of Knut Alfson and
his wife. You were scarce more than a child then; yet you were
bold as the soaring falcon, and wild and headstrong too at times.
Many were the wooers around you. I too held you dear--dear as
no woman before or since. But you cared for nothing, thought of
nothing, save your country's evil case and its great need.

* Pronounce _Ahkers-hoos_.

LADY INGER. I counted but fifteen summers then--remember that.
And was it not as though a frenzy had seized us all in those days?

OLAF SKAKTAVL. Call it what you will; but one thing I know--even
the old and sober men among us doubted not that it was written in
the counsels of the Lord that you were she who should break our
thraldom and win us all our rights again. And more: you yourself
then thought as we did.

LADY INGER. It was a sinful thought, Olaf Skaktavl. It was my
proud heart, and not the Lord's call, that spoke in me.

OLAF SKAKTAVL. You could have been the chosen one had you but
willed it. You came of the noblest blood in Norway; power and
riches were at your feet; and you had an ear for the cries of
anguish--then!---- ----
Do you remember that afternoon when Henrik Krummedike and the
Danish fleet anchored off Akershus? The captains of the fleet
offered terms of settlement, and, trusting to the