of my folk are fair, and there
will be many other such amongst the aliens."

Then laughed the elder, and said: "Yet, my son, he who had been thy
fellow since thy sundering from thy beloved, would have said that in thy
deeming there is but one woman in the world; or at least one fair woman:
is it not so?"

Then Hallblithe reddened at first, as though he were angry; then he said:
"Yea, it is so."

Said the Grandfather in a musing way: "I wonder if before long I shall
think of it as thou dost."

Then Hallblithe gazed at him marvelling, and studied to see wherein lay
the gibe against himself; and the Grandfather beheld him, and laughed as
well as he might, and said: "Son, son; didst thou not wish me youth?"

"Yea," said Hallblithe, "but what ails thee to laugh so? What is it I
have said or done?"

"Nought, nought," said the elder, laughing still more, "only thou lookest
so mazed. And who knoweth what thy wish may bring forth?"

Thereat was Hallblithe sore puzzled; but while he set himself to consider
what the old carle might mean, uprose the hale and how of the mariners;
they cast off the hawsers from the shore, ran out the sweeps, and drave
the ship through the haven-gates. It was a bright sunny day; within, the
green water was oily-smooth, without the rippling waves danced merrily
under a light breeze, and Hallblithe deemed the wind to be fair; for the
mariners shouted joyously and made all sail on the ship; and she lay over
and sped through the waves, casting off the seas from her black bows.
Soon were they clear of those swart cliffs, and it was but a little
afterwards that the Isle of Ransom was grown deep blue behind them and
far away.

CHAPTER IX: THEY COME TO THE LAND OF THE GLITTERING PLAIN

As in the hall, so in the ship, Hallblithe noted that the folk were merry
and of many words one with another, while to him no man cast a word save
the Grandfather. As to Hallblithe, though he wondered much what all this
betokened, and what the land was whereto he was wending, he was no man to
fear an unboded peril; and he said to himself that whatever else betid,
he should meet the Hostage on the Glittering Plain; so his heart rose and
he was of good cheer, and as the Grandfather had foretold, he was a merry
faring-fellow to him. Many a gibe the old man cast at him, and whiles
Hallblithe gave him back as good as he took, and whiles he laughed as the
stroke went home and silenced him; and whiles he underst