They stepped out of the shadow into the light of the leaping flames.  On the farther side of the long fire, men were busy with dripping bear-steaks and half-plucked fowls; while others bent over the steaming caldron or stirred the big mead-vat.  On the near side, ringed around by stalwart forms, showing black against the fire-glow, the chief sat at his ease.  The flickering light revealed his bronzed eagle face and the richness of his gold-embroidered cloak.  At his elbow Helga the Fair waited with his drinking-horn.  Tyrker hovered behind him, touching now his hair and now his broad shoulders with an old man’s tremulous fondness.  All were listening reverently to his quick, curt narrative.

Sigurd’s laughing carelessness fell from him.  He walked forward with the gallant air that sat so well upon his handsome figure.  “Health and greeting, foster-father!” he said in his clear voice.  “I have come back to you, an outlaw seeking shelter.”

Helga spilled the ale in her consternation.  The old German began a nervous plucking at his beard.  The heads that had swung around toward Sigurd, turned back expectantly.

More than one heart sank when it was seen that the chief neither held out his hand nor moved from his seat.  Silver-Tongued and sunny-hearted, the Jarl’s son was well-beloved.  There was a long pause, in which there was no sound but the crackling of flames and the loud sputtering of fat.

At last Leif said sternly, “You are my foster-son, and I love your father more than anyone else, kinsman or not; yet I cannot offer you hand or welcome until I know wherein you have broken the law.”

Through the breathless hush, Sigurd answered with perfect composure:  “That was to be expected of Leif Ericsson.  I would not have it otherwise.  All shall be without deceit on my side.”

He folded his arms across his breast, and, standing easily before his judge, told his story.  “In the games last fall it happened that I shot against Hjalmar Oddsson until he was obliged to acknowledge himself beaten; and for that he wished me ill luck.  When the Assembly was held in my district this spring, he came there and three times tried to make me angry, so that I should forget that the Assembly Plain is sacred ground.  The first time, he spoke lightly of my skill; but I thought that a jest, since it had proved too much for him.  The second time, he spoke slightingly of my courage, saying that the reason I did not go in my father’s Viking ship this spring was because I was wont to be afraid in battle.  Now it had been seen by everybody that I wished to go.  I had spent the winter in Normandy, yet I returned by the first ship, that I might make one of my father’s crew.  It was not my doing that my ship got lost in the fog and did not fetch me here until after the Jarl had sailed.  It angered me that such slander should be spoken of me.  Yet, remembering that men are peace-holy on the Assembly Plain, I did manage to turn it aside.  A third