“Yes, Freda, I heard,” the girl answered, and her look seemed to make her darker and handsomer.
Freda turned to the earl’s wife, “O Lady Aastrid! let us sing King Olaf’s saga, the one of his coming to Treland, and being chosen by the beautiful Princess Gyda. Thou thyself hast taught us the song, and we know it so well, and Thorgills will give us the notes.”
Aastrid nodded to the harper, who tuned his harp, and the saga began. The girls felt all the romance in the song, and sang it with full expression. Just as they reached the last stanza, telling of Gyda’s death, and had softened their voices, and were scarcely moving their wheels, in the tender cadence of the song, a tall form filled up the portals of the outer door. The song and its memories came to him at once. He seemed as if he had seen a spirit, as he strode up to the Lady Aastrid, and cried in a voice that drowned harp and song: “By the Sign of the White Christ, my noble kinswoman, I thought I did indeed behold Gyda risen from the dead, when I heard the song and looked upon this maiden.”
It was Freda. Her beautiful face grew crimson with blushes as she felt the eyes of all in the room upon her, and her own, dark-blue and tender, fell from Olaf’s startled glance.
A swift look of pleasure passed over Aastrid’s face; but she was again the stately matron, and taking Freda’s hand, said kindly:
“She is fair enough, and good enough, and of good
