victim with a yell of triumph. The Frank should pay dearly for that blow!

Some of the milder vikings muttered against the deed. This Frank was no whining coward, no low-born outlander, but a fair-haired hero, such as the Sigurds and Beowulfs of the olden days.

At the best, the Danes bore little love for the cruel Jutland champion whom King Sigfrid had set over them. So now they murmured openly. But Hroar was no less fearless than he was cruel. Regardless of their protests, he turned the fallen Frank upon his back. No wolf ever fell upon his prey with fiercer greed.

Already he had set about his deed, when a cry of surprise from his followers caused him to look up. The crowd had opened, and through the midst of the warriors came a little child-maid, the like of whom the brutal Dane had never seen. Utterly lost to self in her fear for her kinsman, the girl advanced with outstretched arms, her tender eyes full of reproach, her pure young face aglow with spiritual light. Had she been Skuld, youngest of the Norns, the Dane could not have been more astonished. He glared at the child in dull wonder. Could this be Freya's maid,--Gifion, Goddess of Innocence and Maidenhood? At the thought, he started back, a superstitious dread clutching at his heart. But when the first shock of surprise had passed, he perceived the Frankish fashion of the girl's double tunic and the circlet that marked her rank.

"Spawn of Loki!" he snarled. "It's only the Frank king's daughter."

"I am Rothada, and Karl the King is my father," said the girl, with simple dignity. "Are you not the Dane count?"

Hroar scowled assent.

"Speak," he said.

The girl's courage began to falter before the ferocity of the sea-king's stare, and, shuddering, she gazed about her at the heaps of dead and wounded warriors. But she saw friendly looks upon many of the viking faces, and forgot her fears once more in the thought of her fellow-captives.

"I come to offer ransom," she said,--"wergild for all who yet live. My father will pay for every one,--Frank and Frisian alike."

"Doubtless!" sneered Hroar. "But we will talk of that in Nordmannia before King Sigfrid. Wittikind may have a word to say in the matter. One thrall at least I keep as my share of the loot. Stand aside while I put my mark on him."

For the second time the Dane turned to his victim. But Rothada was quicker than he. With a piteous cry for mercy, she flung herself upon Roland and sought to shield him from the knife with her own slender body. The sight would have melted any heart that held the slightest trace of nobleness. It stirred the vikings to open mutiny. They renewed their protests, with deeper menace in their tones, and when Hroar bent and grasped the maiden roughly by the shoulder, one of the foremost swung up his sword.

"Stay, Hroar!" he commanded. "I am not used to looking on at foul deeds. You must first pluck out my eyes before you take the Frank's tongue."

"Ay, and mine!" growled a second viking.

Hroar stood erect and glared at the daring men. But neither gave way before his terrible look. They had the backing of their fellows. The sea-king saw this, yet his hand went to the hilt of his heavy sword. The fight was averted, none too soon, by a scarred old berserk.

"Bear wisdom to Urd!" he called scoffingly. "Hroar bickers with his wolves, while the Norse hawks swoop upon him."

At the warning, every Dane aboard the trade-ship wheeled about and stared seaward. The harsh alarm of a war-horn, braying over the water, was not needed to explain the situation. A bowshot away they saw their second longship surging at full speed up the estuary. A fountain of white spray spouted from under its forefoot, and the boiling sea alongside, threshed to foam by the oar-blades, told that every bench was full, every rower pulling to the utmost of his strength. Not without cause! Close in the Dane's wake the three longships of the outer estuary came gliding over the water in swift pursuit. Each lay far over under the pressure of its great square sail, and from the mail-clad crews packed along the fighting gangway behind the weather bulwarks, rose jeers and grim laughter at the efforts of the Danes to escape.

"Norse!" shouted Hroar. "Thor! they mean to attack us! Aboard ship and man the oars--yet stay! First scuttle the trader. We leave no booty for the fiordmen!"

"They strike sail!" cried the old berserk. "Wait a little. They do not swing the red shield. It may be a jest."

"A bitter jest-- Ho! the foremost comes on alone. Aboard ship, all, and stand ready to cast off. I wait the Norse earl here."

CHAPTER III

At the alarm of the Danes, the trembling heart of the little princess leaped with joy. But the sudden hope gave way as quickly to renewed terror. Why should the cruel sea-count linger on the trade-ship alone if not to carry out his ferocious revenge? Closer than ever the girl clasped the senseless warrior in her arms, until the blood from his wounded head seeped warm through her silken kirtle, and the bell-like rim of his helmet bruised her tender bosom.

Breathless, she listened to the rush and outcry of the vikings as with their wounded fellows they poured back into the longship. Then, in the lull which followed, she could hear the smothered wail of her tiring-woman, crouched in the cubby beneath her. Gaining courage from the silence, she at last ventured to raise her head. She saw Hroar at the farther bulwark, gazing intently down the estuary. He did not move, and Rothada rose timidly to look around.

The second Dane ship was coming about only a few yards astern; but its crew, like the crew of its consort, were far too intent on watching the Norse ship to give heed to the little maiden. Even the Frisian sailors had ceased to cower, and were lined along the bulwarks forward, full of eager hope that the approaching longship might bring them a change of masters. Hroar's cruelty was only too well known throughout Frisia.

Rothada also gazed at the stately prow of the stranger and joined in the longing of her fellow-captives that the new-comers would seize the trade-ship for their own. But the little maiden's faith gave her still fairer hopes than those cherished by the Frisians. To her girlish innocence, deliverance now seemed certain. She had only to appeal to the Norse count, and he would accept ransom for all. Tears of gratitude shone in her violet eyes as she stooped to bind up with deft fingers such of Roland's wounds as the Danes had failed to stanch.

Her task ended, the girl started up again to gaze over into the Norse ship as it glided alongside. The vessel swarmed with huge warriors, whose superiority to the Danes both in discipline and armor was so striking that even the convent-bred maiden could not but perceive the