The North Star/Chapter 38
XXXVIII
“THE LUTE THAT COULD SOFTEN MY VERY WORST PAIN INTO BLISS”
The murder of Father Meilge lay heavily upon the minds of Thorgills and Maidoch. The girl seemed so silent and so sorrowful that Thorgills scarce knew what words to say in his longing to comfort her. One evening the scald walked to the home of Earl Sigvalde. The Lady Aastrid was busy about the household, and Maidoch was alone in the guest-room. She sat with her face turned from the doorway, and was playing softly upon her lute.
Thorgills stood at the portals. He made no sound, and rested a space in thought, watching the girl. She was touching the lute, as if she were confiding to the sensitive instrument the sad memories of the past, and the chilling presentiments of the future that crowded around her. Thorgills longed to enter and kneel by her side, and take in his loving grasp the white hand that caressed the lute-strings. But he feared to arouse her lest she should take from his sight the beautiful picture that feasted his longing eyes.
When the lute proved to be in accord, Maidoch struck the strings with firmer touch, and sang in her rich, sweet young voice, a saga of home yearning:
On the foam of the billows far sweeping
On the wind of the never still sea,
The sighs of my waking and sleeping
Are wafted on sure wings to thee,
My far, fair land!
For the dear holy sound of the ringing
Of abbey bells, filling the day,
Comes the fierce oath, the wrath of swords swinging—
With thee let my memory stay,
My far, fair land!
Drear heart of me, rest thee forever,
In hope of the blessed sweet light
Of my green island home, that may never
Bring heaven to my tear-darkened sight,
My far, fair land!
Thorgills was still standing when Maidoch finished her song and laid aside her lute. The Lady Aastrid came in. “Thou art right welcome!” she said to the scald. Maidoch started and turned around. Thorgills smiled into Aastrid’s gracious face, and he bowed gravely to the young girl.
“How is thy honored father?” he asked; and Maidoch answered sadly that he grew no stronger.
“I would speak to him, if so I might,” Thorgills said; and Maidoch moved to conduct him to the sick chamber.
Thorgills turned to the Lady Aastrid. “Thou wilt come with us, also,” he said, “for there is that I would say to Jarl Fiachtna I would thou shouldst hear.”
Maidoch’s face grew pale as death at the words. With trembling steps she led the way to the door of her father’s room. Upon a couch drawn close to the window, lay the dying man. He smiled lovingly at Maidoch, and held out his hand in cordial greeting to Thorgills. “I am coming near the end of the way, my friend,” he said, “and life has held so many sorrows I am not greatly loath to part with it.”
The tall blond bard bent over the feeble old man. “My Jarl,” he said, in a voice as soothing as a mother to an ailing child, “is there aught I can do to make the close of thy life secure from care? I have been thy friend. My fealty has been given to thee, and to thine. My voice and my sword, in word and in deed, would gladly have been pledged to protect thee and thine. Is there any dear care I might take from thee at this hour? My own heart would ask to share that which hath been thy dearest. Now would I ask thy blessing on my desire to wed thy maiden, Maidoch.”
The little maid had sunk down beside the couch and had hidden her face in her hands. Thorgills did not look at her nor move towards her.
Fiachtna gazed affectionately at the scald, and took the strong-muscled hand in his own wasted one. “Thou hast been as a son to me in this strange land,” said the old earl, “and I believe thou wilt be a faithful lord to this little maid when I am gone.”
Thorgills raised the crucifix upon his breast to his lips. “Christ helping me,” he said impressively, “I will be her faithful lord.” No other word he said, although his heart was full and words rushed to his lips. Fiachtna took Maidoch’s hand, and placed it in the hand of Thorgills. “I leave thee, my beloved,” the father’s voice said in tenderest accents, “to the mercy of Christ, the protection of the Holy Virgin, and in the care of thy faithful Christian lord.”
Maidoch gazed silently at her father. Her hand rested unresisting in Thorgills’ grasp, but she had eyes only for the dying man, thought only of obedience to his wish, and will only to follow his last command. After a pause Fiachtna said: “Now, my daughter, thou art betrothed to this true, Christian lord, and after I am laid at rest, thou wilt be plighted to him for life by Holy Mother Church. So I die in peace, since thou wilt be secure in his protecting care.”
Lady Aastrid was weeping softly, and feeling a deep sympathy in her kind heart for the betrothed, for Thorgills, in his earnest, unspoken love, and for Maidoch in her absorbing grief. She drew the girl to her arms and nodded a gracious dismissal to the scald. He stooped and kissed Maidoch’s hand, and softly left the room. Straight to the king must he go with the tidings of his betrothal.
Thorgills sat before the king, and tuned his harp in an aimless way. Olaf, his head resting upon his hand, looked thoughtfully at the scald. Such moods came over the viking when he and the harper sat alone; and it seemed as if they both travelled again in memory the many and difficult ways of their former life.“My King!” at last said the scald, lifting his keen blue eyes to his master’s face, “I have striven to serve thee faithfully. All that may make a man happy I have forborne, until thou wert safe upon thy throne. My own heart, my own life, the light of a fireside, the smile of a wife, all have I forborne. Sometimes in that Irish land, I have watched thee and thy blue-eyed princess, until my own heart beat time to the music of thy happiness, and I longed to melt my own life into the melody of such marriage. But I remembered that we only tarried there awhile. Now thou art king in thy own land. Thy throne is safe, and Thorgills will ask thee not to say him nay when he would light the fire at his own hearthstone.”
Olaf looked sadly at the harper. “Didst thou see but my joy, my true scald? Didst thou not sing Gyda’s funeral saga, even as thou didst ring our marriage song? Upon such music as my marriage made waits the awful silence when the song is sung.”
“But, my King,” the scald said eagerly, “it were better once to have heard that melody than to have lived ever the dumb, dark life. Even now, my King, thou wouldst not forego the shadow of the song that sounds within thy heart.”
“True! true!” Olaf said gently. “And thou wouldst take a wife? Of what father?”
“She is the daughter of the Irish jarl whom thou didst ransom at sea from the Danes.”
“Aye! I remember the little blue-eyed maid, who clung so sturdily to the white-haired man. Poor little maid! As if any of that wild crew could not have crushed out her life as it were an egg-shell. But she stood by the old jarl—her blue eyes flashing—it made me wander back to my Gyda—blue as the violets under the ferns on the rocks of Viken, where I went as a boy. Where dwell the jarl and his little maid?”
“In the home of the Lady Aastrid. The jarl is ill unto death, and hath betrothed the little maid to me. The Lady Aastrid gave them full welcome, for the maid Maidoch can weave and spin, and hath full learning. Her hands can fashion laces that are finer than the spider weaves. Fiachtna was instructing the youth of the Lady Aastrid’s household, before this mortal illness seized him.”
“Tell me further of the maid.” Olaf smiled indulgently at the bard. Thorgills bent over his harp.
“Nay! nay! my scald!” laughed the king. “I know thou hast not notes enough on thy strings nor words enough on thy tongue to tell the charm of the maiden. It must be so. Say only she is a true Christian.”
“She is of thy Gyda’s land—of Patrick’s land, my King.”
“Then she must be true to Christ, and true to her lord; then thou wilt find her all that a man’s fancy may fashion in the flush of his early love. I give thee full joy on thy marriage. Some jewels will I send to the maid, something weightier from my coffers, and a house and lands for thyself. Then, Thorgills, thou mayest rest thy harp awhile, and harvest happiness in the heart’s holiday of thy life.”