Then if it be not your wish to win him and bind him to you—what would you with him? LADY INGER. I will tell you in few words. In a letter to me, Nils Lykke has spoken of the high fortune it were to be allied to our house; and I do not say but, for a moment, I let myself think of the matter. OLAF SKAKTAVL. Ay, see you! LADY INGER. To wed Nils Lykke to one of my house were doubtless a great step toward stanching many discords in our land. OLAF SKAKTAVL. Meseems your daughter Merete’s marriage with Vinzents Lunge might have taught you what comes of such a step. Scarce had my lord gained firm footing among us, when he began to make free with both our goods and our rights—— LADY INGER. I know it even too well, Olaf Skaktavl! But times there be when my thoughts are manifold and strange. I cannot impart them fully either to you or to any one else. Often I know not the right course to choose. And yet—a second time to make a Danish lord my son-in-law,—nought but the uttermost need could drive me to that resource; and heaven be praised—things have not yet come to _that_! OLAF SKAKTAVL. I am no wiser than before, Lady Inger;—why would you keep Nils Lykke at Östråt? LADY INGER. [_In a low voice._] Because I owe him an undying hate. Nils Lykke has done me deadlier wrong than any other man. I cannot tell you wherein it lies; but never shall I rest till I am avenged on him. See you not now? Say that Nils Lykke were to love my daughter—as meseems were like enough. I will persuade him to tarry here; he shall learn to know Elina well. She is both fair and wise.—Ah, if he should one day come before me, with hot love in his heart, to beg for her hand! Then—to chase him away like a dog; to drive him off with jibes and scorn; to make it known over all the land that Nils Lykke had come a-wooing to Östråt in vain—! I tell you I would give ten years of my life but to see that day! OLAF SKAKTAVL. In faith and truth, Inger Gyldenlöve—is _this_ your purpose towards him? LADY INGER. This and nought else, as sure as God lives! Trust me, Olaf Skaktavl, I mean honestly by my countrymen; but I am in nowise my own mistress. Things there be that must be kept hidden, or ’twere my death-blow. But let me once be secure on _that_ side, and you shall see if I have forgotten the oath I swore by Knut Alfson’s bier.