"If Gilli is what I suspect him to be, that is more than enough," Helga
said slowly. She raised her head and looked straight into his eyes.
"Answer me this,--you know and must tell,--is he a high-minded warrior
like Leif, or is he a money-loving trader?"

"Lady," said Alwin desperately, "if you will have the truth, he is a
mean-spirited churl who thinks that the only thing in the world is to
have property."

Helga drew a long breath, and her slender hands clenched in her lap.
"Now I have found what I have suspected. Answer this truthfully also: If
I go back to him, is it not likely that he will marry me to the first
creature who offers to make a good bargain with him?"

"Yes," said Alwin.

For days he had been watching her with uneasy pity, whenever in his
mind's eye he saw her in the power of the unscrupulous trader, It had
made him uncomfortable to feel that he was the tool that had brought it
about, even though he knew he was as innocent as the bark on which he
had written.

Drop by drop the blood sank out of Helga's face. Spark by spark, the
light died out of her eyes. Like some poor trapped animal, she sat
staring dully ahead of her.

It was more than Alwin could bear in silence. He leaned forward and
shook her arm. "Lady, do anything rather than despair. Get into a rage
with me,--though Heaven knows I never intended your misfortune! Yet it