Part 3 (1/2)

”It seems to me that Gudrun's tale is a fine one, for when I tell it, my breast swells for the injuries done to her, and her bold resolve in avenging herself.” After this, they stopped talking of this tale, and Gunnar asked Pall Hallvardsson to show him some of the pictures and the words in his little book.

Now Nikolaus the Priest became very ill, and took to his bed for almost the entire winter. This illness was the occasion for even more frequent visits by Pall Hallvardsson, for he was sent by the bishop to care for the paris.h.i.+oners of Vatna Hverfi, which was a populous district. On one of these visits he brought with him a book of tales written in the Norse tongue, and he began to teach Gunnar to read, and Gunnar was a much more avid student than he had been many years before with Olaf. The result was that by the time Nikolaus the Priest was on his feet again in the spring, and Pall Hallvardsson stopped coming, Gunnar could read most of the book he had brought, and Birgitta, who was younger and sharper-eyed, could read all of it, so that between them they knew all of Pall Hallvardsson's tales better than he did. When this became known in the district, there was much talk, for everyone knew Gunnar Asgeirsson to be lazy and dull. Some attributed his new knowledge to the vision of Our Lady in the Gunnars Stead homefield, and others said that he was merely coming late to his wits. Most people talked about it for a little while and then forgot the whole thing, for, they said, knowledge of reading was small and useless knowledge, anyway, and without Olaf no books would keep the Gunnars Stead folk from starving as they nearly had done before.

In this winter there was a great sickness, and many people died. The course of the illness was swift, lasting only three or four days, and often it was the old people and the children who survived and those in the strength of their years who died. The first sign was always great vomiting, so that the victim could not keep the least drop of sourmilk or bit of meat inside, but must heave it all up as soon as he tasted it. Accompanying this was a great fever, so that the person seemed to be aflame within his flesh, and could not stand the touch of any hand on his cheek or even the weight of the lightest coverlet. In these signs it was not a little like other vomiting ills that came every so often, but much more severe.

One of the first to take sick and die was Thordis of Ketils Stead, and at her funeral, Pall Hallvardsson, who was still sharing the duties of Nikolaus the Priest, preached a sermon about Thordis' red dress and her lively ways, that had seemed to bode years of good health and prosperity, and had brought her nothing but the grave. And so, he said, are we all. And people of the district were much cast down by the weight of this sermon and there was much talk of the plague in Norway. Also at Ketils Stead, Geir Erlendsson died of the sickness, and then people began taking sick and dying everywhere in the district, usually one or two at each farmstead. At Gunnars Stead, Maria, the wife of Hrafn, died, and Birgitta and Olaf got sick, but managed to survive, although Birgitta was very weak, and stayed near to her bed for many days. Petur, the plague priest, also died, and two of the bishop's singing boys, and two of the other boys as well, so that services were not so elaborate as they had been. Pall Hallvardsson and the bishop himself also fell ill, but Pall Hallvardsson would take nothing but water from a tarn high in the mountains, and soon recovered, and so the bishop followed his example and recovered also.

The sickness did not depart from the Greenlanders until after Easter, and many farms were left with but one or two recuperating folk to work the fields, tend to the lambing and calving, and oversee all the spring work, so in this spring, a few farms were abandoned, as it happened never to be worked again, and on many others calves and lambs and kids were lost through neglect and the gra.s.s was left to grow in the fields however it might. In this summer, Gunnar first left his spinning and his lazy ways and worked long days in the fields doing tasks he was unaccustomed to and had little talent for.

Shortly before the morning meal, he would come to Olaf in his bedcloset and ask what was to be done that day, and Olaf would say, for example, that Gunnar should walk along the south wall of the homefield and replace any stones that might have fallen, and Gunnar would exclaim at what quick work that would be and go out into the chill morning light. But the walking would be heavy in the snow, and the stones weighty and difficult to fit, so that some he managed to put back would fall out again as he turned away. At last, toward mid-day, Birgitta would go out with his food and find him staring at a stone, seeking to find the proper turning for it with his eyes, and she would come in and say that he was doing well enough, and would surely finish very soon. Or he would be set to rake up the manure in the cowbyre, and he would rake it up under the feet of the cows themselves, so that they would flatten and scatter it before he was finished. When the gra.s.s turned green shortly after Easter, it was Gunnar who took down the last vestiges of the byre wall and carried the cows into the homefield. Hrafn and his sons, who did not take the sickness, a.s.sisted the ewes at lambing, but Gunnar had to deliver the three calves, one of whom presented hind legs first and was lost, but Hrafn and Olaf, who rose weakly from his bed, managed between them to save the cow. Now Olaf began getting up more frequently and coming out of the farmhouse, and then he began turning his hand to a little work, helping Gunnar here and there, more and more often, especially after Hrafn and his sons herded the sheep into the hill pastures and Gunnar and Olaf were alone on the farm, and the result was that when haying came around, Gunnar had not lain late in his bed one morning since the beginning of Lent, and there was much laughter about this.

When in the summer the representative and ombudsman of King Hakon and Queen Margarethe arrived in a s.h.i.+p from Norway, he found the settlement much depleted. The king's two farms, Foss in the south, and Thjodhilds Stead, in Kambstead Fjord, had fallen into great disrepair, and Kollbein Sigurdsson, for that was the name of this...o...b..dsman, was not a little put out to find that the Greenlanders could not rebuild his buildings and dig out his water system at once. He kept his great tapestries rolled up and his golden vessels wrapped and put away at Gardar, and worked his fields along with his sailors. He was a man of choleric temper who had left a prosperous district in Norway and come to Greenland after incurring the displeasure of Queen Margarethe herself, it was said, though the full tale of this did not get about quickly enough to suit the curiosity of the Greenlanders.

Many farmers in Vatna Hverfi district and in the district of Hrafns Fjord declared that there was much to be said for settling one's disputes within the district and being well out of sight of the king's tax gatherer, no matter how highly the king himself was held in respect.

Not long after the arrival of the s.h.i.+p, a man in sailor's clothing appeared at Gunnars Stead and declared that he was known there, but neither Birgitta nor Gunnar nor Olaf recognized his face or his name, although they gave him refreshment and invited him to stay for the night, as decent folk do with travelers. Margret was away in the mountains, gathering herbs, for Birgitta was with child, and the child, said Margret, did not seem to be thriving. As it was summer, Margret did not return until late, after Olaf and Birgitta had gone to their bedclosets. Only Gunnar was sitting up with the sailor, asking him of his adventures in Norway and elsewhere, and telling him of the deaths of Asgeir and Ingrid. They were sitting out of doors in the long rays of the late sun when Margret appeared carrying her bag and striding toward them. After a few moments, she stopped, turned, and disappeared. Some time later, she came up behind them, from the direction of the steading, and she set on the bench before them Gunnar's little boat, still neatly carved, but now missing two sailors and the high k.n.o.b of the bowsprit. Then she said, even before Gunnar could speak, ”Good evening, Skuli Gudmundsson, welcome to Gunnars Stead.” Now Gunnar, too, remembered who Skuli was, for the little boat had been his favorite plaything as a child, and he embraced the visitor.

Skuli grinned, and withdrew from his pocket the presents that he had brought from Norway: four ornately carved wooden cups, made, Skuli said, of olive wood from Jerusalem, and a small sharp knife with a silver handle Skuli had brought to Asgeir but now gave to Gunnar. To Margret, Skuli told the news of Thorleif and others she remembered. The tale of Thorleif was the unluckiest, for shortly after his return to Bergen from Greenland, he had fallen afoul of a group of merchants there known as the Hanseatic Brotherhood. These were Germans who hoped to take all of the Bergen trade for themselves, and who dealt harshly with other traders when they thought they could get away with it. This group of foreigners numbered three or more thousand, according to some, and they carried arms, refused to marry, and kept to themselves. When Thorleif returned from Greenland with his s.h.i.+p fully laden, his cargo had been so rich that the archbishop of Nidaros himself had insured its safety, but after the cargo was disposed of, Thorleif was at the mercy of this Hanseatic Brotherhood, who treacherously burned his s.h.i.+p to the waterline, and then, when he had another s.h.i.+p built with the money he had made from the Greenland venture, they raided the s.h.i.+pyard and cut the throats of the guards who were watching it, and destroyed it with axes, so that not one splinter of wood adhered to another. After this Thorleif was much discouraged, and talked of taking pa.s.sage to England, but then he died in the Great Death of the year 1362. At this tale, Margret was much cast down, and she and Skuli spoke of Thorleif's loud laugh and defiant ways, and Margret said that no s.h.i.+p had ever come again so full of treasures as Thorleif's s.h.i.+p. Skuli recollected the voyage of Thorleif and Hauk Gunnarsson to Markland, and Margret told him of the English monk Nicholas, and Hauk's death among the ice floes of the Greenland bottoms.

Skuli told of himself. After returning from Greenland, Skuli had gone back to his father's small farm and farmed for a year or two, but the work seemed stupid to him after his travels, and peasants to help with the work were hard to find and asked wages that only the best men in the district were able to pay, so Skuli's father had gone into the service of a prosperous cousin, and Skuli had attached himself to another man of the district, who was anxious to make his fortune with the new young king, Hakon, and Queen Margarethe, although she preferred Danes and Germans around her. Thus Skuli had spent many of the last years in great houses, doing what he was told, and he had married the daughter of another man such as himself, of no lineage, but serviceable abilities. Her name was Hrefna, and she had borne him four boys. But, unluckily, Hrefna had died in a more recent childbirth, of a daughter who also died, and the little boys had gone to Hrefna's brother, who had a large farm in the Trondelag, and was not dependent for his meat on the whims of others. Now he was in the service of this very powerful man, Kollbein Sigurdsson, who meant to make much of his Greenland service to the king, and after this journey, Skuli would go back to his father's farm near Bergen with some wealth and try it again, for his father had died and the farm now belonged to him.

By this time the sun had approached the horizon and begun upward again, and the birds, after a brief quiet, had started their raucous calling again. Gunnar had fallen asleep. Margret showed Skuli a place to sleep, but she herself stayed up sorting through what she had gathered and hanging bunches of plants from the beams of the farmhouse. It was said in the district that Margret knew many things about the qualities and powers of plants, though her knowledge was not so deep as Ingrid's had been. Soon Olaf rose, and Margret put his morning meat before him, with an extra measure of b.u.t.ter for his dried meat, and then she went to him and sat close beside him in a way that was unusual. Now Olaf looked at his wife and laughed and said, ”Have you been trying your own potions, then, so that you have blinded yourself to my low brow and swarthy looks?” Margret had no answer for this, and Olaf went outside.

There was a man who had a large farm on the north side of Eriks Fjord, and this farm was called Solar Fell, because of the southern slope of the fields there. It was just across Eriks Fjord from the Gardar landing, and the folk from Solar Fell had more intercourse with the Gardar folk than they had with anyone else. It was a prosperous farm, and Ragnvald Einarsson, the master of this farm, had many folk, and six healthy sons. One day during the harvest, one of the sons, a grown man by the name of Vestein who had a reputation as a simple fellow, espied a lone skraeling in his skin boat, paddling up out in Eriks Fjord and playing with his bow and arrows. This Vestein began to shout to the skraeling from the sh.o.r.e, saying in the skraeling tongue, ”Let's see whether you can hit me from so far away.” There was at this time a large group of skraelings settled about halfway up Isafjord, behind Solar Fell, and so many of the Greenlanders who lived nearby knew something of the skraeling tongue, and these farmers were enriched by the goods the skraelings had to trade, for the demons seemed to hold their own goods very cheaply, and the Greenlanders' goods very dear.

When the skraeling paid little attention to Vestein, he jumped up from his net and began to call out more loudly, so that Ragnvald himself came out of the cowbyre. Vestein was now calling out and jumping around, and other folk from the farmstead stopped their work to look, until at last Ragnvald shouted to the skraeling, ”Go ahead, since he wants it so, and take good aim!” and it is true that many fathers wish to teach their sons what foolishness is by allowing them to feel its effects. The skraeling nocked his bird arrow, and indeed he did take good aim, for the tip entered Vestein at the base of his throat, and he fell down dead. Ragnvald ran down to the sh.o.r.e and gathered Vestein into his arms, but he called out to the skraeling in the boat, ”We cast no blame on you, since you have only done what you were told to do!” Nonetheless, many of the skraelings that had settled nearby went away shortly thereafter.

Of this incident there was much talk among the Greenlanders, and blame fell on all three parties, but especially on the skraeling, for being so ready to slay a Christian. Vigdis and Erlend said that the first victim of the skraelings might have been anyone, might have been one of their sons, or their folk, in fact, during the summer when the skraelings spent so much time at Ketils Stead. When Lavrans Kollgrimsson came to visit his daughter at Gunnars Stead, he reported that Vebjorn and Oli, Vestein's brothers, had spoken ill of their father in the hearing of many, and called him a coward for his speech to the skraeling, and some folk in Hvalsey Fjord and Brattahlid district were saying that the skraeling had shot his arrow at Vestein without provocation.

After a few days of talk, it was no little difficulty to sort out the actual case of things, and the talk had gotten into every ear, including that of Kollbein Sigurdsson at Thjodhilds Stead in Kambstead Fjord, and though it was the middle of harvest, Kollbein decided to take some men and make a visit to Ragnvald, for the sake of inquiring into this matter in the name of the king.

It was the case that most of the Greenlanders did not know what to make of Kollbein Sigurdsson. He always went about in bright clothing, as did the courtiers he had brought with him, and he kept things magnificently at Thjodhilds Stead, so that Greenlanders who visited there reported a great quant.i.ty of all sorts of meat, beautiful tapestries on the walls, and lovely furnis.h.i.+ngs lying here and there about the place. But, indeed, all was in great disorder, and in the midst of the magnificence, Kollbein always took folk aside and complained of how quickly his livestock were dwindling, or how poor the harvest from his fields looked to be, or how stingy the Greenlanders were with the sealmeat and reindeer meat they allowed him. And he always spoke of one thing, and that was the Northsetur, where men had once gained a wealth of walrus ivory, and narwhal tusks, and polar bear skins and white falcons. In addition to this, it seemed to the Greenlanders that he was always looking for amus.e.m.e.nt at other folk's tables. When he was invited, he never failed to bring most of his household.

On the evening of Kollbein's arrival (with five of his men and six horses) at Solar Fell, Ragnvald gave him a great feast and showed him over the farm, and Kollbein was much impressed with it. He spoke not at all of the matter of Vestein, but only of Ragnvald's numbers of sheep and goats and cattle, and of the drying racks that stood about everywhere, and of the magnificence of the steading, and of the good looks of Ragnvald's wife and his sons.

However, on the morning of the second day, Kollbein sequestered himself with Ragnvald, and again in the afternoon, until the time of the evening meal.

On the morning of the third day, Kollbein spoke at length to Vebjorn and Oli, one in the morning and one in the afternoon.

On the morning of the fourth day, Kollbein spoke again with Ragnvald, and in the afternoon, he sat with one of his men, then took a nap.

On the fifth day, each man or woman who had knowledge of the incident came to Kollbein in the bath house, where he sat, and spoke about what he or she had seen.

On the sixth day there was a large feast in the middle of the day. The skraelings had moved off, and Ragnvald showed no inclination to pursue them, and so the result of Kollbein's visit was that Vebjorn and Oli apologized to Ragnvald in the presence of Kollbein. During these days, Kollbein's five men and their six horses all ate heartily of Ragnvald's stores and provisions, and many in the district said that by now Ragnvald had surely been sufficiently punished for having one foolish son in six.

In this fall, after the seal hunt, the farmers of Brattahlid district and Dyrnes district went to the bishop and gained permission for a great reindeer hunt on Hreiney, an island that stood at the mouth of Einars Fjord, and was teeming with reindeer at this time of year. Every fall, most farmers went to hunt the reindeer here and there in the pastures north of the settlement, or on the islands at the mouth of the fjords, but for a number of years there had been no great reindeer hunt, and the bishop had not given permission for the taking of animals on Hreiney. In this year, however, he listened closely to the farmers' tales of hards.h.i.+p, and declared that he shared their fears about the coming winter after so many deaths in the spring and such a poor harvest in the summer. He also ruled that one animal in ten would go to the church. Many thought that this was a stiff price, with the t.i.the on top as well, but others spoke glowingly of the abundance of reindeer on the island, and cared little for the price.

Gunnar and Hrafn the shepherd, who was not bad at hunting, were to go along to claim the Gunnars Stead share, and Olaf was to stay behind and care for the farm animals. Gunnar found all the tools on the farm, and all the weapons and knives, and arrayed them on the gra.s.s in front of the farmhouse for repair and sharpening. Many of these instruments had belonged to Hauk Gunnarsson-two small spears and one large one, three hand knives with long blades, although the blade of one of these was moon-shaped with use and sharpening, a large bow and eighteen long arrows, nine tipped in iron and nine tipped in sharpened bone, and a small bow and eight blunt arrows, for hunting birds, a hatchet, two larger knives, and nets of various sizes. There were also two other hand knives that had belonged to Asgeir, and two more small bows that had belonged to Asgeir and his father Gunnar Asgeirsson. The sheep-shearing knife with which Asgeir had killed Thorunn the witch could not be found. Hrafn had his own bow and arrows and a large sheep-shearing knife with a handle made of carved reindeer antler.

After sharpening and greasing the weapons, Gunnar and Olaf turned to the two Gunnars Stead boats. Both of these were ancient in age, and small enough, but both were put together of planks sawed from Markland timber, rather than of driftwood covered by sealskins. The better of the two had been taken apart and rebuilt just before the coming of the bishop by Asgeir, his steward, and a man from Isafjord named Koll the s.h.i.+pbuilder, who had a good reputation for this work, as well as for making barrels and house beams. Both boats were seaworthy enough to be rowed out of the fjord into the sea, and both would be taken on the hunt, for some farmsteads no longer had boats in good repair. For these two boats Olaf and Gunnar made seal tar, by digging a large pit near the bath house, and filling it with seal blubber, which they then boiled by dropping in burning stones. When this cooled, they smeared it over the bottoms of the boats to make them watertight and slippery. No one had carried pitch to the Greenlanders in many years, since the time of Thorleif, but many men said that seal tar was as good for this work.

Hreiney was the only place in Greenland where reindeer pits had been dug as they are in Norway, for the Greenlanders had many ways of killing a few reindeer, and reindeer were abundant near most districts. These reindeer pits were considered very valuable, however, and often in former times, men would go from Gardar to Hreiney and clear them out. This had not been done for many years. Most men in the district, however, declared that there would be little trouble with the pits, for they were well made and deep. Thirty-nine farms sent men and hounds to the hunt, and from Gardar set forth Pall Hallvardsson the priest and two servingmen who were skilled with game. There were forty-one small boats, almost all of them plank-built. At this, Gunnar exclaimed to Hrafn, ”I had not thought the Greenlanders' were so well provided with boats. Thus it looked when Harald Harf.a.gri set out for England, do you not think so?”

”I don't know about that,” said Hrafn, ”but we will be badly off if we have Harald's luck.”

It was now that time of year when the days are half light and half darkness, and the ice is beginning to form again in the fjords. The fleet of boats arrived at the jetty on the island, where the sea cuts deeply between Hreiney and Stone-ey, just as the sun was rising behind Einars Fjord. They drew the many boats up on the strand, and spread out to seek the largest herds of deer, but indeed, at this time of year, Hreiney is one large herd of deer from end to end, and they had not far to seek. Gunnar stared with amazement, for he had heard of such numbers only in tales of Markland and Vinland. The hunters were in high spirits, and some rushed in among the deer with spears, greedy to take them as soon as they could. It was in this way that the young man Thorbjorn Thorgilsson was injured, through the panicked trampling of the deer, so that he always walked lamely and his breath came with the sound of twigs sc.r.a.ping together forever after this until the end of his life. Others had better luck, and five deer were killed before Hoskuld Hrutsson, of Dyrnes, and Osmund Thordarson of Brattahlid, who had arranged the hunt, could find the old pits.

The pits, a series of seven, were overgrown with willow scrub, and partially filled with sand, but Osmund declared that they were serviceable enough. Now the men walked some distance in a large half-circle, so that they could come up in a line behind the beasts and move them toward the pits. At first it seemed that they would have little success with this plan, for the reindeer were so plentiful that no part of the herd would move toward the pits, but the herd simply seethed and turned upon itself. At last, however, one group became frightened and broke away, and the Greenlanders were able to turn them toward the pits with deerhounds and arrows. Soon the animals were running, and the Greenlanders and their dogs after them, shouting, waving their weapons, and making a great din. At the pits, another group of men was waiting, wearing their deerskin hoods, and hiding in makes.h.i.+ft blinds. Gunnar and Hrafn now hid with these men, near the lip of the first pit, which had been disguised with willow brush and turves. As the first animals of the stampede stopped here, they threw up their heads and tried to turn, but the rush behind them was too great, and they slid and toppled into the first pit. Others clambered after and over them, only to fall into the second pit, or the third. There was a great bellowing. Gunnar, Hrafn, and the rest of the men ran forward after the herd had pa.s.sed, and laid about themselves with spears, knives, and axes, trying to kill as many of the animals as possible before they could struggle to their feet and out of the pit, but always wary of the tossing antlers and the kicking hindquarters. Soon Gunnar, who was bruised and pummeled by the struggling of the deer, was standing in blood up to his knees.

This was the hunt on the first day. Because of the disrepair that the pits had gotten into, many deer who might have been taken got away. After the animals who had been killed were gutted and counted, it was discovered that there weren't even enough for one to each farmstead, with the bishop's price and the bishop's t.i.the, so Osmund and Hoskuld and Pall Hallvardsson took counsel among themselves and decided to try another way of hunting that had often been used in the western settlement, where deer were even more abundant than they were in the eastern settlement.

The next morning, before light, the men pulled half their boats into the water just beside the strand, and in each boat sat one man with a pair of oars and another with a weapon. Other men once again made a half-circle and came up behind a group of deer, this one a very large group with many head, and these they herded toward the boats, without letting them near the flat beach, but forcing them, with many yells and much clatter, to run over a high cliff near where the boats were waiting, so that the animals soon found themselves swimming in the sea. Now the men in the boats, and others with them, carrying clubs and spears and arrows, rowed among the deer and grabbed them by the antlers, jerking back their heads and cutting their throats or thrusting spears into their necks. The runners on land also got into the other boats and helped with this work. Soon the sea was boiling with the thras.h.i.+ng of the beasts, and red with their blood. Many deer were taken this way, although some were lost through sinking before they could be taken into the boats and carried to land. When all of these reindeer were counted, it was discovered that five would go to each farmstead and more than forty to the bishop, although some complained that the sea did not belong to the bishop, and so Gardar should only receive a price for using the pits. Others said that it was the island itself that belonged to the bishop, and therefore the reindeer on it, and anyway, there was small likelihood that the bishop, if asked to decide the case, would decide against himself.

Of the hunters, no one was killed, and only Thorbjorn was badly hurt, although three others had been gored or kicked by the struggling deer. The Greenlanders spent the rest of the day gutting the deer, and toward dusk, the fleet of laden boats made its way up Einars Fjord toward Vatna Hverfi and Gardar. Gunnar had little to say, but rowed with Hrafn at the rear of the flotilla.

Now for a few days all farm work was put aside so that the reindeer could be taken care of. Olaf stretched the hides fur side down on the gra.s.s of the homefield, and Margret hung strips of meat up to dry on the drying racks. The bones were boiled clean and stacked in the storehouse along with the antlers. The hooves were boiled for broth, and the heads skinned and singed like sheeps' heads, and the blood ran out and was made into blood puddings, and of these Birgitta was required to sup on twice daily, which she didn't mind, as she was especially fond of blood puddings. The meat from this hunt, and from the seal hunt earlier, was especially welcome to the Greenlanders in this year, for there were not as many sheep to slaughter as there had been, and when people visited from farm to farm they spoke of hunting in this way every year, for indeed, after the dozens of deer taken, Hreiney was still as full of deer as the ocean is of water after a dipperful is lifted out, and they remarked at the plenitude of game and sea animals in their land and gave thanks for G.o.d's bounty in the western ocean.

In these days the weather smiled on the folk preparing their deer, for the sky was high and clear and day after day the sun sparkled on the fields and on the blue icebergs floating in the fjords. A brisk, dry wind blew steadily from the east and the meat dried on the racks in less than a day. People were well able to work at night, for the moon shone brightly, unringed and full. Each night the northern lights waved and fluttered in the midheaven. On one of these nights, Birgitta Lavransdottir arose from her bed cupboard soaked to the waist with her waters, and Margret arose with her, and gave her a little sourmilk mixed with honey. Then they sat down with their spinning to await the coming of the pains, but after many hours and into the day they did not come. After the morning meal, Birgitta took off her headdress and brushed and arranged her hair, then she went to her bedcloset. Margret went outside to oversee the boiling of the reindeer bones, for these would later be of great use to the farmstead. With Birgitta she left Svava Vigmundsdottir, an old nurse who had come to Gunnars Stead from Kristin in Siglufjord, who was an ugly old woman indeed, with a humped back and one walleye, but knowledgeable about children nonetheless, and experienced at births.

After the evening meal, Svava said that Birgitta must be made to walk about, for sometimes this would bring on the pains, but Birgitta refused to walk, and indeed, it seemed as though she could barely stand upright. Then Svava said that once in such a case as this, she had seen a man go to lie with his wife, and soon afterward the pains had come on and the baby had been born, but Margret said that Gunnar and Birgitta would not like this, and she feared to ask them. While they were talking, Birgitta fell asleep and she slept until sunrise, but when she awoke, the pains still had not come on. At this, Svava and Margret lifted her from her bed and made her go back and forth between her room and Margret's, but they were supporting her, and her legs hardly moved.

Now the girl began to toss her head and mutter, and her cheeks became very red and warm to the touch. When they laid her in her bed, a foul odor rose around her, so that Margret was not a little reluctant to raise her s.h.i.+ft. When Margret gave her sips of cool water from a cup, she eagerly took some, but then tossed her hand so that the rest flew onto the floor. Gunnar now came in, looked at the girl on the bed, and went out again. After a while, he came back with the ”wife” of Nikolaus the Priest and two of her servants. This woman went up to Birgitta at once and undid the top of her s.h.i.+ft. Then she placed her hands on Birgitta's b.r.e.a.s.t.s and began to rub vigorously, although Birgitta cried out and shook her head and tried to push her away. When the priest's wife no longer had the strength to do it, one of her servants stepped in for her, and then Margret, and then the wife again. Svava held her hand on Birgitta's belly, and the other servant stood by the girl's face with a bit of cloth, wiping away tears and sweat. After some time, Svava felt the belly go rigid beneath her hand, and then again a little while later. But the women did not stop their rubbing, for Nikolaus'”wife” said that if they did, the pains would stop, too, and the baby would never be born-she had heard that some babies had to be cut out of their mothers, though of course she had never seen this.

It was well into the night when Svava declared that she could just see the top of the baby's head for the first time, and almost morning before the baby was born, a boy as small as a puppy, his nostrils flaring and his chest heaving like a horse that had just run itself into a sweat. The ”wife” took one look and whispered to her servant, who ran for Nikolaus the Priest. Margret bent down and asked Birgitta if she wanted to see the baby, but Birgitta could not speak, and lay there with her eyes closed, so Margret walked back and forth with the baby, who heaved and trembled and sometimes gave out little cries. Svava blew gently in its face, and after a while, they carried it out to Gunnar and asked him what the name would be, and he said Asgeir. And then the priest arrived just as the baby lay still in Margret's arms, and he baptized him with the name Asgeir Gunnarsson, and then after a moment he blessed him and prayed over him, and then wrapped the baby up tightly in a piece of wadmal and laid him in his cradle, and Gunnar bent down over him, and then stood up and said that they would bury him near the farmstead, where other infants had been buried in past times, and that he and Olaf would do this in the morning.

Now folk left the steading, and Gunnar went to his bedcloset, but Margret and Svava could not sleep and sat down at the table for some refreshment, and Margret said, ”Do you remember the birth of Ketil the Unlucky?”

”Nay,” said Svava, ”but you may say that most children are unlucky for the women who give them life. I have seen enough hard births in my time. They are ill to speak of.”

”Kristin has four children, and there are folk with more than that.”

”Even so, I have taken care of others' children since I was twelve winters old, and it is no accident, nor the result of my ugliness that I have never known a man, because more often than not, a Christian woman gives up her life to her child, if not the first, then a later one. Hafgrim Hafgrimsson has three children about him now, and the woman hardly lay down for the births, folk say. These skraelings are different, and it matters not whether they are baptized.”

”But folk will be married, and then they must have children.”

”Nay,” said Svava, ”it seems to me that folk wish only one thing above all, and that is to have goods for themselves, to hold and to keep, and then they are surprised at the cost of these goods, for this cost is either almost more than they can pay, or more than they can pay.” Now she fell silent for a s.p.a.ce, and then she gazed at Margret across the table and said, ”I have gone from steading to steading all my life, and never taken things for my own, and I have no regrets.”

After this, it was many days before Birgitta Lavransdottir was able to get up on her feet again. Svava went back to Siglufjord and a servant of Nikolaus the Priest came in the days to help take care of the girl. When Margret spoke of the baby, and its death, Birgitta looked at her for a long time, and then said she was little surprised, for on the day of Svava Vigmundsdottir's coming, she had seen Margret run off and come back with a strange woman, and then, as quickly as an eye blink, the woman had turned into a blazing fire, and Margret had put her hand in the fire and brought it forth burning like a torch, and Birgitta had been so afraid that she had fallen down in a faint. Since then she had had little hope for the baby, and was grateful enough to G.o.d that he had spared her life, for she had looked forward to death with certainty. Afterwards, Margret and Birgitta did not speak of these things again, and neither mentioned this to Gunnar. At Yule, Birgitta was strong enough to be churched again, and she went forth on her own two feet, wearing the gray cloak she had received at her wedding, and leading her husband, at her left, and her father Lavrans at her right. And that was the tale of Gunnar's firstborn son.

The folk at Gunnars Stead were much diverted at this time by the visits of Skuli Gudmundsson, whose duties on the king's farm at Thjodhilds Stead were rather light. Skuli had much to say, about the court in Norway where he had lived for many years, and about Kollbein the ombudsman, and he had a way of telling these stories that made their subjects seem foolish. Margret sometimes teased him, wondering in what sly ways he spoke of Gunnars Stead when he was at Thjodhilds Stead, but Skuli knit his brows and feigned ignorance of this.

He also told them what sorts of things folk were wearing at Queen Margarethe's court, for, he said, the court always dressed in a rich and colorful way even when they had no meat for the table and no wood for the fire. Queen Margarethe herself, Skuli said, was low and dark, not at all pretty, though all of the courtiers said she was, but she had an attentive way about her that showed she knew where to step. King Hakon was more handsome, like his father Magnus, and in Skuli's view, this caused folk to pay attention to him when they might better be watching the queen, and indeed, this very thing had overtaken Kollbein the ombudsman, who had been a tax collector in the Trondelag and had made a rich man of himself. He had purchased two estates for next to nothing, though they were much improved with good byres, rich chapels, and water systems in excellent repair. It was the queen who noted the richness of these estates and compared them to the relative leanness of the tax collections for these years. Although Kollbein had in fact purchased these estates for much less than it appeared, and probably had not cheated the treasury, he had spent so much time flattering the king and so little flattering the queen, that the queen had turned a displeased ear to his protestations when he made them, and sent him off to Greenland as his punishment, placing some Danes upon his farms as ”stewards.”

”We should pity him for these hards.h.i.+ps,” said Margret, ”but folk only laugh at him.”

”He knows not what to do with Thjodhilds Stead and Foss,” said Skuli, ”though they are goodly pieces of land. He chatters on and on only about bearskins and walrus tusks. And he has slaughtered nearly all the sheep that the Greenlanders gave him. It doesn't seem to the sailors that the Greenlanders will be so generous again. We all look forward to empty bellies.”

Now Olaf spoke up, and said, ”This Kollbein is the king's tax collector, is he not? He must know that there are farms in other districts, and that generosity has little to do with it, come to that.”