he needs must weep; and Goldberga stepped a little before him, and set
her hand on his, for I think that she knew the loneliness that came on him.

Yet he was not alone in his sorrow, for down in the hall were men to
whom the lost call brought back the memory of a bright young king riding
to his home, and calling the son whom he loved with the call that he had
made for him alone; and they saw the fair child running from the hall,
and the mother following more slowly with smiles of welcome; and they
saw the grim courtmen, who looked on and were glad; and they minded how
they had lifted the boy to the war saddle; and their eyes grew hot with
tears also, and they had no need to be ashamed.

And as men stood motionless, with the last notes of the wild horn yet
ringing in their ears, there drifted a shadow across the days, and, lo!
beside Havelok, with his hand on his shoulder, stood the form of Gunnar
the king for a long moment, bright as any one of us who lived, in the
morning sunlight, and his face was full of joy and of hope and promise
for the time to come. And then he passed, but as he faded from us his
hand was on the hand of Goldberga that clasped her husband's, as though
he would wed them afresh there on the high place of his friend's hall.

Now there went a sigh of wonder among the chiefs, and Havelok looked up
as if he followed the going of one whom he would not lose, and I know
that he saw Gunnar after he was unseen to us.

"Surely," he said, "surely that was my father who was here?"

And Sigurd answered, "With your own call you called him, and he was here."

But now the last lurking doubt was gone, and there was no more delay,