“There! Thorarna has gone! Please, please try to spend more of your time with her and less with me. From childhood she and I have been happy together, and nothing has ever blurred our love for each other and our unreserved mutual confidence until she began to grow jealous of me. Since she fell in love with you we have become alienated; she is chilly to me, distant, reticent, even unfriendly. I grieve that we are estranged. I love her and I want her to love me. I do not want her to hate me. Please do all you can to placate her. She keeps her countenance and is always outwardly serene, sedate and stately. But she rages inwardly and is so infuriated when you talk to me that I dread her. Please avoid me and propitiate her all you can. Please promise me that you will do as I ask.” Thorkell promised, and, for some days, barely greeted Thordis and had no converse with her whatever, whereas he spent long hours with Thorarna, and, to his amazement, found that he enjoyed her society keenly; yet, even more to his amazement, felt that, when he was not with Thorarna, he longed for Thordis so acutely that he could hardly restrain himself from seeking her out and telling her how much he loved her. The long spell of clear, mild weather merged into weather decidedly warm, weather which would have been warm even for Scotland or England. Thorstein, with a large retinue of spearmen, rode out to visit and inspect the outlying fringe of farms tenanted by his dependents or thingmen. It was a very fair day and they had expected an easy jaunt and an early return to Hofstadir. So it turned out for Thorstein and most of his company. But, early in the day, they heard a report, hardly more than a rumor, of distress at a farmstead isolated among uplands at the extreme southwestern point of Thorstein’s gothorth, very much out of their way. Thorbrand offered to ride there and investigate and Thorkell volunteered to go with him. He demurred to his father’s suggestion that he take some of the men-at-arms, declaring that he and Thorkell could make better time alone. Off they set. Their errand was easily accomplished and the rumor found untrue and everyone safe and well at Mossfell. But, on their return, they encountered conditions peculiar to Iceland. There it frequently happens during a prolonged spell of warm weather that great quantities of snow are melted high up on the plateaus or in hollows among the upper foot-hills, and, very occasionally, that the waters are dammed back by ice accumulated in some valley, ravine, gorge or glen, and, if the hot weather lasts on, are suddenly released by the crumbling of the ice-dam. Such a sudden and terrific freshet roared across their homeward way and presented a torrent of deep water not only unfordable, but impossible to swim. They were, perforce, compelled to await the ebbing of the transitory flood and so did not reach Hofstadir until the gradual twilight, insensible gloaming and lingering dusk had melted into semi-darkness.