Part 4 (1/2)

Torarin was delighted with these fancies, and Grim too found pleasure in them. He did not move from his place on the load, but lay still and blinked.

But just as Torarin had finished speaking he drove past a lofty pole to which a broom was fastened.

”If we were strangers here, Grim, my dog,” said Torarin, ”we might well ask ourselves what sort of heath this was, where they set up such marks as we use at sea. 'This can never be the sea itself?'

we should say at last. But we should think it utterly impossible.

This that lies so firm and fast, can this be only water? And all the rocky knolls that we see so firmly united, can they be only holms and skerries parted by the rolling waves? No, we should never believe it was possible, Grim, my dog.”

Torarin laughed and Grim still lay quiet and did not stir. Torarin drove on, until he rounded a high knoll. Then he gave a cry as though he had seen something strange. He put on an air of great surprise, dropped the reins and clapped his hands.

”Grim, my dog, so you would not believe this was the sea! Now you can tell what it is. Stand up, and then you will see that there is a big s.h.i.+p lying before us! You would not recognize the beacons, but this you cannot mistake. Now I think you will not deny that this is the sea itself we are driving over.”

Torarin stayed still awhile longer as he gazed at a great vessel which lay frozen in. She looked altogether out of place as she lay with the smooth and even snowfields all about her.

But when Torarin saw a thin column of smoke rising from the vessel's p.o.o.p he drove up and hailed the skipper to hear if he would buy his fish. He had but a few codfish left at the bottom of his load, since in the course of the day he had been round to all the vessels which were frozen in among the islands, and sold off his stock.

On board were the skipper and his crew, and time was heavy on their hands. They bought fish of the hawker, not because they needed it, but to have someone to talk to. When they came down on to the ice, Torarin put on an innocent air.

He began to speak of the weather. ”In the memory of man there has not been such fine weather as this year,” said Torarin. ”For wellnigh three weeks we have had calm weather and hard frost. This is not what we are used to in the islands.”

But the skipper, who lay there with his great gallias full-laden with herring barrels, and who had been caught by the ice in a bay near Marstrand just as he was ready to put to sea, gave Torarin a sharp look and said: ”So then you call this fine weather?”

”What should I call it else?” said Torarin, looking as innocent as a child. ”The sky is clear and calm and blue, and the night is fair as the day. Never before have I known the time when I could drive about the ice week after week. It is not often the sea freezes out here, and if once and again the ice has formed, there has always come a storm to break it up a few days after.”

The skipper still looked black and glum; he made no answer to all Torarin's chat. Then Torarin began asking him why he never found his way to Marstrand. ”It is no more than an hour's walk over the ice,” said Torarin. But again he received no answer. Torarin could see that the man feared to leave his s.h.i.+p an instant, lest he might not be at hand when the ice broke up. ”Seldom have I seen eyes so sick with longing,” thought Torarin.

But the skipper, who had been held ice-bound among the skerries day after day, unable to hoist his sails and put to sea, had been busy the while with many thoughts, and he said to Torarin: ”You are a man who travels much abroad and hears much news of all that happens: can you tell me why G.o.d has barred the way to the sea so long this year, keeping us all in captivity?”

As he said this Torarin ceased to smile, but put on an ignorant air and said: ”I cannot see what you mean by that.”

”Well,” said the skipper, ”I once lay in the harbour of Bergen a whole month, and a contrary wind blew all that time, so that no s.h.i.+p could come out. But on board one of the s.h.i.+ps that lay there wind-bound was a man who had robbed churches, and he would have gone free but for the storm. Now they had time to search him out, and as soon as he had been taken ash.o.r.e there came good weather and a fair wind. Now do you understand what I mean when I ask you to tell me why G.o.d keeps the gates of the sea barred?”

Torarin was silent awhile. He had a look as though he would make an earnest answer. But he turned it aside and said: ”You have caught the melancholy with sitting here a prisoner among the skerries. Why do you not come in to Marstrand? I can tell you there is a merry life with hundreds of strangers in the town. They have naught else to do but drink and dance.”

”How can it be they are so merry there?” asked the skipper.

”Oh,” said Torarin, ”there are all the seamen whose s.h.i.+ps are frozen in like yours. There is a crowd of fishermen who had just finished their herring catch when the ice stayed them from sailing home. And there are a hundred Scottish mercenaries discharged from service, who lie here waiting for a s.h.i.+p to carry them home to Scotland. Do you think all these men would hang their heads and lose the chance of making merry?”

”Ay, it may well be that they can divert themselves, but, as for me, I have a mind to stay out here.”

Torarin gave him a rapid glance. The skipper was a tall man and thin; his eyes were bright and clear as water, with a melancholy look in them. ”To make that man merry is more than I or any other can do,” thought Torarin.

Again the skipper began of his own accord to ask a question.

”These Scotsmen,” he said, ”are they honest folk?”

”Is it you, maybe, that are to take them over to Scotland?” asked Torarin.

”Well,” said the skipper, ”I have a cargo for Edinburgh, and one of them was here but now and asked me would I take them. But I have small liking to sail with such wild companions aboard and I asked for time to think on it. Have you heard aught of them? Think you I may venture to take them?”