That they did with somewhat more readiness than one would have expected. The Dane shook himself and looked round him. And then, without a word of warning, he sprang straight at the slaver and wrested his whip from him. Then he swung him round by the collar of his leather jerkin, and lashed him in spite of the sword which the man drew. The idlers shouted, and Werbode laughed, while the two men had all they could do to prevent the other slaves from breaking away; or else they themselves had no reason to object to seeing their master tasting his own sauce. The heavy plaits of the whiplash curled round the legs of the trader, and he writhed. They caught his short sword and twitched it from his hand, to send it flying among the gathering crowd, and then the man lay down and howled for mercy. But the thralls of the crowd were only too pleased with the sport, and as I and Werbode did not interfere, to do so was no one else's business. At last the Dane held his hand, and left his tyrant groaning. He broke the whip stock and twisted the thong from the end of the fragment. Then he tied it round the neck of the slaver, and rose up and saluted me in the way of the Danish courtman. "Whither, lord?" he asked, quite coolly. "I am ready." "Better go back to the sheriffs," I said. "Maybe we shall have to answer for this, and we will tell him first." "No," he said, with the ghost of a smile; "you will not set eyes on this man again. What I told you is true. He has no more right to me than the thrall who found me; less, maybe, for I suppose the thrall would have taken me to his lord, who had some claim on me for a castaway." The crowd closed in round the slaver, and the other slaves raised a sort of wretched cheer as we went away. Soon we turned the corner of the street and came to the outskirts of the fair again, and none had followed us. There the decent folk stared at us and our ragged follower somewhat, and a thought came to me. "Comrade," I said, for I could not mind his name, "let me rig you out afresh before we part." "They call me Erling," he said. "Have you so many men to serve you that we must needs part?" "No," I answered, "but I am no sort of a master to serve. I will help an old comrade home, however." "Home was burnt a year ago," he said. "Let me bide with you, thane; I must be some man's man. You will go back to the west presently, I suppose?" "Yes, after a time. What of that? for it is not your way." "Your way is mine, unless you drive me from you. You have given me my freedom, and I know it. Let me serve you freely." "Well," said I, "you will be my only servant when once I leave King Carl's train, with which I have come." "So much the better," he said. "I am likely to be as handy a servant as you can find, in most things." "Oh," said Werbode, laughing, "take him, Wilfrid. Free service is not to be despised. Moreover, if you want any one well and soundly beaten, here is your man."