and so swift that Liot appeared to answer promptly enough:

"It would be a good thing for us all if we should hear a new story.
As for me, the game is up. I can think of nothing to-night but my
poor kinsman Gisli, and he was not a lucky man, nor is it lucky to
speak of him."

"Is it Gisli you are talking about?" asked Wolf Skegg. "Let us bring
the man among us; I like him best of all."

"He had much sorrow," said Andrew Grimm.

"He had a good wife," answered Gust Havard; "and not many men are
so lucky."

"'Twas his fate," stammered a very old man, crouching over the fire,
"and in everything fate rules."

"Well, then, Snorro, fate is justice," said Matilda; "and as well
begin, Liot, for it will be the tale of Gisli and no other--I see
that."

Then Liot stood up, and Karen, busy with her knitting, watched
him. She saw that he had brown hair and gray eyes and the fearless
carriage of one who is at home on the North Sea. His voice at first
was frank and full of brave inflections, as he told of the noble,
faithful, helpful Gisli, pursued by evil fortune even in his dreams.
Gradually its tones became sad as the complaining of the sea, and a
brooding melancholy touched every heart as Gisli, doing all he
might do to ward off misfortune, found it of no avail. "For what
must be must be; there is no help for it," sighed Liot. "So, then,
love of wife and friends, and all that good-will dared, could not
help Gisli, for the man was doomed even before his birth."

Then he paused, and there was a dead silence and an unmistakable
sense of expectation; and Liot's face changed, and he looked as Gisli
might have looked when he knew that he had come to his last fight
for life. Also for a moment his eyes rested on old Snorro, who was
no longer crouching over the hearth, but straight up and full of
fire and interest; and Snorro answered the look with a nod, that
meant something which all approved and understood; after which Liot
continued in a voice full of a somber passion:

"It was the very last night of the summer, and neither Gisli nor his
true wife, Auda, could sleep. Gisli had bad dreams full of fate if
he shut his eyes, and he knew that his life-days were nearly over.
So they left their house and went to a hiding-place among the crags,
and no sooner were they there than they heard the voice of their
enemy Eyjolf, and there were fourteen men with him. 'Come on like
men,' shouted Gisli, 'for I am not going to fare farther aw