By his side sat a lovely dark-haired girl, with great gold torcs
upon her throat and wrists, and a great gold brooch fastening a shawl
which had plainly come from the looms of Spain or of the East, and next to
her again, feeding her with titbits cut off with his own dagger, and laid
on barley cake instead of a plate, sat a more gigantic personage even than
Alef, the biggest man that Hereward had ever seen, with high cheek bones,
and small ferret eyes, looking out from a greasy mass of bright red hair
and beard.
No questions were asked of the new-comers. They set themselves down in
silence in empty places, and, according to the laws of the good old
Cornish hospitality, were allowed to eat and drink their fill before they
spoke a word.
"Welcome here again, friend," said Alef at last, in good enough Danish,
calling the eldest merchant by name. "Do you bring wine?"
The merchant nodded.
"And you want tin?"
The merchant nodded again, and lifting his cup drank Alef's health,
following it up by a coarse joke in Cornish, which raised a laugh all
round.
The Norse trader of those days, it must be remembered, was none of the
cringing and effeminate chapmen who figure in the stories of the Middle
Ages. A free Norse or Dane, himself often of noble blood, he fought as
willingly as he bought; and held his own as an equal, whether at the court
of a Cornish kinglet or at that of the Great Kaiser of the Greeks.
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