pidly from the shore,
up through the garden paths to the farm-house, in order to gain the
summit, and from that point of vantage, watch the last glimmering spark
of the Viking's burial. As he reached the house, he stopped short and
uttered a wild exclamation. There,--under the porch hung with sparkling
icicles,--stood Thelma! . . . Thelma,--her face pale and weary, yet
smiling faintly,--Thelma with the glint of her wondrous gold hair
escaping from under her hat, and glittering on the folds of her dark fur
mantle.

"I have come home, Valdemar!" said the sweet, rich, penetrating voice.
"Where is my father?"

As a man distraught, or in some dreadful dream, Valdemar approached
her--the strangeness of his look and manner filled her with sudden
fear,--he caught her hand and pointed to the dark Fjord--to the spot
where gleamed a lurid waving wreath of flames.

"Froeken Thelma--he is _there_!" he gasped in choked, hoarse tones.
"_there_--where the gods have called him!"

With a faint shriek of terror, Thelma's blue eyes turned toward the
shadowy water,--as she looked, a long up-twisting snake of fire appeared
to leap from the perishing _Valkyrie_,--a snake that twined its
glittering coils rapidly round and round on the wind, and as rapidly
sank--down--down--to one glimmering spark which glowed redly like a
floating lamp for a brief space,--and was then quenched for ever! The
ship had vanished! Thelma needed no explanation,--she knew her father's
creed--she understood all. Breaking loose from Valdemar's grasp, she
rushed a few steps forward with arms outstretched on the bitter, snowy
air.

"Father! father!" she cried aloud and sobbingly. "Wait for me!--it is I
Thelma!--I am coming--Father!"

The white world around her grew black--and, shuddering like a shot bird,
she fell senseless.

Instantly Valdemar raised her from the ground, and holding her tenderly
and reverently in his strong arms, carried her, as though she were a
child, into the house . . . clouds darkened--the snow-storm
thickened--the mountain-peaks, stern giants, frowned through their
sleety veils at the arctic desolation of the land below them,--and over
the charred and sunken corpse of the departed servant of Odin, sounded
the solemn De Profundis of the sea.

CHAPTER XXXIII.

"The body is the storm;
The soul the star beyond it, in the deep
Of Nature's calm. And, yonder, on the steep,
The Sun of Faith, quiescent, round, and warm!"