re in its brave scarlet cloak. "What is it
you say, my child?"

But Randalin was bending low over the green couch. "Do you know who I
am?" she was asking urgently of the woodward. "Fix your eyes on me and
try to gather together your wits."

Slowly the man's wandering gaze focussed itself; a silly laugh welled
up in his throat. "It would be no strange wonder if I did not,"
he chuckled. "Odin has changed you greatly; your face was never so
beautiful. But this once you cannot trick me, Fridtjof Frodesson."

There came a time when this mistake was a source of some comfort to
Randalin, Frode's daughter; but now she stirred impatiently.

"Look again, and try to command your tongue. Tell me the state of your
feelings. Can you live?"

The man shook with his foolish laughter. "You cub! Will not even being
killed cure you of your tricks? If you who have been in Valhalla do not
know what Odin intends about my life, how can I know, who have stayed on
earth?"

Sister Wynfreda's hand fell upon the girl's arm. "Disquiet yourself no
further," she whispered. "It is useless and to no end. If it please the
Lord to bless our labors, the wound will soon be healed. Come this way,
where he cannot hear our voices, and tell me what moves you to speak of
leaving. Is it not your intention to creep in with us?"

As she yielded reluctantly to the pressure, Randalin even showed
surprise at the question. "By no means. My errand hither was only to ask
for bread. I thought it unadvisable to venture into the castle kitchen,
yet it is needful that I keep up my strength. I go direct to the Danish
camp to get justice from King Canute."

The nun reached out and caught the gay cloak, gasping. "The Danish camp?
You speak in a raving fit! Better you thrust yourself into a den of
ravenous beasts. You know not what you say."

Offense stiffened the figure under the cloak. "It is you who do not
know. Now, as always, you think about Canute what lying English mouths
have told of him. I know him from my father's lips. No man on the Island
is so true as he, or so generous to those who ask of him. Time and
again have I heard my father bid Fridtjof to imitate him. He is the
highest-minded man in the world." Her voice as she ended was a stone
wall of defiance. Sister Wynfreda made a desperate dash down another
road.

"My daughter, I entreat that you will not despise my offer. The yoke is
not so heavy here. Here is no strict convent rule; how could there be?