Saga of Halfred the Sigskald Part 14

Then Halfred saw the shepherd standing above, on the cliff's edge; and he played a lovely melody upon his shepherd's pipe.

And at first he doubted whether he should ask this shepherd boy his question about the G.o.ds, for he left women and boys unquestioned. And this shepherd seemed to him but a boy.

But as he climbed nearer to him he saw that the shepherd carried a spear, and a shepherd's sling, with which to kill wolves.

And the shepherd lad believed that this was a robber or a Berseker coming against him and his sheep.

And he chose out of his leather pouch a sharp heavy stone, and laid it in his sling, and held it ready to cast it.

Halfred held his left hand over the eye that remained to him, and looked upward with difficulty, dazzled, for just then the sun broke out through the mist clouds exactly above the head of the shepherd, who thus saw clearly the figure of the half naked man, with tangled floating hair and beard, who now raising the hammer threateningly ascended the hill. Upon a slab of stone, under a great ash tree, he stopped, and cried to the shepherd--

"Are there G.o.ds, shepherd boy? Sayest thou yes, then thou must die."

"G.o.ds, there are not," replied the shepherd, in a clear voice, "but wise men have taught me there lives one Almighty Triune G.o.d, Creator of Heaven and Earth."

The man with the hammer paused for a moment as if meditating.

Such an answer had he never received.

Soon, however, he sprang threateningly upwards again.

Preventing him, however, the shepherd swung his sling; whirring flew the sharp stone; it was a sharp hard three-edged flint stone--I had carefully reserved it for some great peril--and alas! alas--woe is me, only too truly did it strike. Without a sound Halfred fell, where he stood, on his back under the ash tree, himself like to a suddenly felled tree.

With a few bounds the shepherd reached the prostrate form, cautiously holding his spear before him, lest the enemy should suddenly spring up again. For it might be that he only artfully feigned to be wounded.

As he drew nearer, however, he saw that it was no deceit, but rather evident truth.

Blood streamed over the fallen man's right cheek, and in the cavity of the right eye stuck the sharp flint stone.

But pity mingled with dread seized upon the shepherd, as he gazed in the fearful mighty face of the man who lay mute at his feet. Never before had he seen so splendid a face; at once so n.o.ble, and so sad.

And superst.i.tious fear overcame him, if it might not be the chief of the heathen G.o.ds, Odhin, the one-eyed, who in the semblance of this wanderer with the white beard had appeared to him.

But soon he felt yet deeper sympathy and compa.s.sion, for the wounded man in a weak voice began:--

"Whosoever thou mayest be, who hast cast this stone, receive the thanks, O shepherd boy, of a world and woe weary man. Thou hast taken from me the light of the second eye also. I need no longer to see men-kind and the heavens. Neither of them have I understood for a long time. And soon shall I pa.s.s to where questions are no more asked, and curses no more cursed. I thank thee, whosoever thou mayest be. Thou hast of all living beings--save one--done the best for Halfred Hamundson."

Then with a loud cry I threw my spear on one side, fell upon my knees, embraced the pale bleeding head, and cried:--

"Halfred, Halfred, my father, forgive, forgive me!--I am the murderer-- and thy son--"

Now ye who shall one day unroll this parchment--pause at this place, and look upwards to the sun, if it is day, and to the stars, if it is night, and ask with Halfred--"Are there G.o.ds?"

For I, I, who secretly and in dread write these pages during the night hours, I am the shepherd boy, Halfred's son, who have slain him.

And the G.o.ds, or the Christian G.o.d, have allowed it to come to pa.s.s that the son has blinded and murdered the father.

I wept hot tears upon my dear father's pale forehead. But he turned his head, as though he would see me, and said--

"It is hard that the curse must be so wholly fulfilled upon me, that I must be entirely blinded before death.

"Fain would I have looked closely into thy face, my dear son.

"Now I know not if the golden cloud I saw spread about thy head was thy hair or the sun rays.

"Thou seemedst to me fair to look upon, my boy.

"But tell me, how do they call thee?

"Have they verily, at thy birth, named thee Liarson Scoundrelson Harthildsvengeance? and how did it happen that thou camest into life. I believed Dame Harthild burned in the dwelling house."

Then I laid my dear father's head upon my knees, and dried with the long yellow hair I was at that time still allowed to wear, the blood from his cheek, and told him all.

How my mother would not be carried from the burning Mead hall back into the dwelling house, but rather on to one of the s.h.i.+ps of her father.

How from thence, when the battle and the flames threatened dwelling house and s.h.i.+ps, she was borne by her women and the sailors into a boat, and therein rowed out upon the Fjord.

How in the boat she had forthwith given birth to a son, but died herself; and ere she died had laid her hand upon my head, and said--

"Not Liarson--not Scoundrelson--not Harthildsvengeance shall he be named--no; Fridgifa Sigskaldson."[6]

"She was right in that," said Halfred. "Thou hast aided the Sigskald to peace at last."

And how after she was dead the fearful battle and burning on sh.o.r.e scared the sailors and women still further out to sea.

And how the small boat was almost sunk by the fury of a storm from the west, and all the bondmen and women were washed overboard by the waves, save one rower, and a bond maiden, who hid the infant under the stern seat.

And how, at last, Christian priests, who were sailing out to convert the heathen people, picked up the half starved wanderers, and brought all three hither, to the island of the holy Columban; and cleansed both the two, and the infant, with the water of baptism.

And how the two, my foster parents, told me all that they knew about my father, and mother, up to the time of the burning of the Mead hall.

And how the two were never weary of lauding to me my father's glory in battle and song.

And how the monks of Saint Columban, as I grew, would have me taught to read and write; but I loved far better to go out with the hunters and shepherds of the monastery, and liked to draw targets on the parchment leaves for my little cross-bow.

And how, at length, they declared me unfit for books, when with my small bolt I had pierced through and through a costly picture which on the gold ground of a thumb broad margin represented the whole of the Pa.s.sion, and promoted me with a sound thras.h.i.+ng to be herd boy of the monastery.

And how for many years, since my foster parents were dead, I had kept the sheep of the monastery; and my sole pleasure therein had been in fighting with the bears, the wolves, and the eagles, that attacked the lambs.

Or in playing upon my shepherd's pipe, or in listening to the roar of the sea and the forest.

And Halfred laid my head upon his broad breast, and folded both his arms around it, and laid his hand upon it, and was still and silent for a long time.

And I brought him water to drink from the fountain, and milk from my flock; and would have drawn the stone from the wound, but he said--

"Leave it, my dear son--the end draws near.

"But I feel the band taken away from my brain, which for many many years has pressed upon it.