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when the two were out fishing in the fiord.
    “I have been thinking, Eirik—what if we two bound our friendship in a closer tie? Think you Olav would receive it well if I let my kinsfolk ask for the hand of your sister?”
    “You know right well,” replied Eirik gladly, “Father could but esteem so good an offer—and I know none to whom I would so gladly see her given, dear as I hold her; never would I advise her betrothal to a lesser man than you. And Father sets great store by my advice—” No sooner had he said it than Eirik believed his own words.
    From that time it was a settled matter in Eirik’s mind that Jörund and he were to be brothers-in-law. And unconsciously he began from that moment to regard his friend in a slightly different light.
    It escaped him altogether that, though he had loved Jörund Rypa ever since he first knew him as a child, it was nevertheless true that he had never entirely liked him, nor had he ever trusted Jörund so well as not to have a care—how far he might venture with him. Unsure as Eirik himself had been in everything, he was drawn to the other boy, who was so unshakably sure. But all the time he had known that what made Jörund so secure was that he was firmly resolved to keep himself safe, at whatever cost to others. Jörund Rypa would neither blink nor waver if it came to leaving a friend in the lurch. Jörund’s was not a timid nature, nor was he afraid of how folk might judge him.
    But this power of Jörund’s of being sufficient to himself had clean bewitched Eirik when they were boys. And when Jörund Rypa turned up in Ragnvald Torvaldsson’s following, Eirik had pressed himself upon him, claiming the right to call himself Jörund’s best friend from childhood. There was no one in the company with whom he was better friends than another in spite of all his efforts to please his comrades; they liked him well enough—he was ready to do them a turn, brave, a daredevil in many ways, though in other things he would show himself strangely and unexpectedly petty-minded. But they laughed alittle at him too—he was altogether too credulous for them, and he made too great demands on plain folk’s credulity when he told a story.
    Jörund accepted the position of Eirik’s best friend, and Eirik did not haggle about the price; in the course of time he had had more than once to serve as a cat’s-paw to Jörund. But Jörund affected complete ignorance when Eirik took the blame for the other’s wrongdoing, and at the sight of his friend’s innocent, blue-eyed look Eirik himself believed in Jörund’s good faith—it would be unworthy to think otherwise. He was so good-natured in his ways, was Jörund, with his genial voice and his prompt smile, when Eirik talked nonsense to him. Careless he was in many ways, to the downright alarm of Eirik—for Eirik himself was scrupulous in the performance of his duty, though he was too short of memory to do it well always, and he was hurt at any disparaging word of his conduct. Jörund knew how to take care of himself better than Eirik liked or would have admitted to be the case; Jörund spoke of women in coarser terms than Eirik could have brought himself to use even of the loose wenches who were all he yet knew. But in spite of all this, Eirik loved Jörund.
    In this way they had now kept fellowship for several years. Now and again they had been parted, for Eirik from time to time would take himself off and seek service with another lord; but it always ended in his coming back to Sir Ragnvald, with whom Jörund stayed.
    There was but one thing about his friend which Eirik could never put up with, and that was Jörund’s singing. Jörund comported himself well in a dance, and he had a powerful voice, so that he often led the dance; that was his pride. But he did not sing true. Eirik himself had a fine ear for music, and his singing voice was not so full as his friend’s, but warm and soft—and when Jörund broke into a ballad, Eirik