She stayed out the long and bitter winter alone in the house with Thorstan Black. No man could have been kinder to her than he was. She felt with him the happy relation which there is between a father and his married child, when you have the equality which comes of experiences shared and have not lost the old sense of degrees—but that lingers still like a scent which recalls times past.

He was as good as his word, when the spring came. The bodies of all the crew were redeemed from the snow and put aboard ship; the settlement at Lucefrith was broken up. He gave the survivors their freedom, and free passage to Ericsfrith; for he himself intended to settle there when he had restored Gudrid to Brattalithe. So they set sail, and made a good passage, and came into the frith on a day of fresh southerly wind and strong sunshine. Gudrid, standing on the afterdeck, looked at the little town and the green fields about it, at the snow-peaks whose shapes she knew well, whereunder, as she felt, her life had been passed; and then she saw old Eric in his red cloak being helped into his boat, and Freydis, bareheaded, with her yellow hair flying in the wind, and her strong arms folded over her chest—and felt the comfort of home growing about her, and the dew of happy tears in her eyes.

Eric's eyes looked anxiously up at her. "Is all well, daughter?" he called out in a brave voice—but she could only answer with her own wet eyes. He was hauled on ship-board, and soon had her in his arms. Her hidden voice and shaking shoulders told him the rest. "There then, my sweetheart, it is done. Yet cry your fill. I have a fine son left—and you into the bargain. Come home now, and leave me no more." So said old Eric Red, a man not easily downed by fate. He made Thorstan Black free of Brattalithe for as long as he would, and promised him the best land that he had. So they all went ashore, and Freydis hailed Gudrid and made much of her. Freydis was not changed at all. She was very fond of Gudrid, and for her sake put up with her father and mother who, without Gudrid, would have fretted her to a rag. Leif came in that evening and embraced Gudrid like a sister. He heard her dreadful story and shook his head over his brother's fate. "Thorstan was born to misfortune," he said. "He had the second sight, and there is no worse gift for a man than that. Brave as he was, that foreknowledge always baulked his effort. But he was a fine man. You have had the best of us, Gudrid."

"I love you all so much," she said, "that I must have been happy with any one of you, since he would have made me free of the others. I would not have my Thorstan back again. He told me that he was at rest—and how can you look for rest in this life?"

She went to see Theodhild in her hermitage. To her only she told Thorstan's prediction, that she should be married yet again, and outlive her husband, and then find the life that she loved the best. Theodhild nodded her head. "That was a true saying of my son's. You will find the only rest there can be in this life." Gudrid asked her more, but she would not tell her. "I know, I see," said Theodhild, "but God will reveal it to you when the time comes."

Gudrid, who had left Ericshaven still a girl in her bloom, had come back to it a woman, made so by pity and terror. Her beauty was now ripe, and her mind in accord with it. They held her at Brattalithe for the fairest and wisest of women. She was rich, too, for she had her father's and Thore's estates, as well as her share of Eric's wealth which had been Thorstan's. She sold her father's house and land to Thorstan Black, who settled down there, and came to great honour in Ericshaven, as he deserved to do.