Part 6 (1/2)

”In Nidaros when I was a boy, an old man was carried on his bier into the cathedral, and set for a moment near the bones of St. Olaf so that the tomb could be opened, and in this moment St. Olaf in his mercy gave him life again, and after that he lived in the chapter house as a lay brother for eleven years, so that he was eighty-four years old when he died, and this was an attested miracle.”

”All, of course, have heard of such things, but not every man can hope to escape death.”

”No right-thinking man hopes to escape his reunion with our Lord, but alas, those on earth who have great needs dearly wish that death would-” He stopped, then went on. ”May the Lord look down with mercy on His helpless flock.” At last he looked at Pall Hallvardsson, and for a long moment, then said, ”Sira Pall Hallvardsson, you are welcome to sit down. Sorrow makes me careless.”

Pall Hallvardsson drew a stool forward from under the table beside him and settled himself upon it. This table was piled with the books in which Pall Hallvardsson knew that Jon had always kept the accounts. There were three of them, so large that a year's business usually took only a spread of two pages, in Jon's minuscule hand. The books themselves were valuable enough-most writing in Greenland was done on rolls of parchment, and all books were owned by the bishopric or folk who had been across the ocean. It had been the bishop's wish that some of the Greenlandic boys would learn the art of bookbinding, but with the vomiting ill and one thing and another, this had not come to pa.s.s. Although there was plenty of calfskin and goatskin in Greenland, ma.n.u.scripts illuminated at Gardar or in the monastery were poorly bound things, crude and easily damaged.

Pall Hallvardsson said, ”I well remember these nine summers past, when we embarked with the bishop for Greenland, and all the treasures he carried with him. Only he guessed how low a state things would have come to. St. Nikolaus Church was a great cold place, with the wallhangings tattered and black with mildew and a fungus growing over the stones, and the altar furnis.h.i.+ngs tarnished and dinted, and the servants and other folk careless about their work and the dishonor they brought to the Lord's house. He brought such a change upon the state of Greenland that his loss need not destroy it, or take us back to earlier days. It may be that we long for the magnificence that speaks the glory of the Lord, so that what we have seems poor to us, but the Lord sees our means and our endeavors as well as our handiwork.”

Sira Jon turned his eyes upon the other priest and said, ”Every day, summer and winter, I have gone into the chamber of Bishop Alf and sat below him and imparted to him all the intelligence of the day.” He stopped, then went on, ”And for many days he has not seen fit to speak to me, or to raise his hand as a sign, and this was my only prayer and hope, that once before death he would hear my voice and know my presence. Had he cast his gaze upon me, I would have been surfeited. Had his hand moved under mine, I would have been content, but nothing came. His flesh was cold and shrinking to my touch. No prayer, no mult.i.tude of prayers brought the slightest flicker of his eyelid.”

”Sometimes men are so very old and ill-”

”My uncle had but sixty-two winters. He came to this place a strong and vigorous man. Once, you may not know, and not as a young man, he went on skis from Stavanger to Nidaros, accompanied only by a dog, and this took him but seventeen days in the depths of winter. When he lived among the Flemings, a walk from Ghent to Bruges was little to him, not worthy of remark. My mother, too, was known for the hardiness of her sanguine nature. It was said that her cousin refused to die in the Great Death, but recovered even as he was being carted to the burial pits.”

Pall Hallvardsson made no response.

”This may or may not be a true account. Many tales were abroad during the Great Death.”

Pall Hallvardsson nodded, then said, ”Is it not the case that all who survived that time, even you and I, who were but little children, have received G.o.d's grace, and a sign that our work on earth was worthy?”

”Perhaps, but the import of the signs granted us by the Lord during the Great Death is much debated. What can be said about signs and portents, after all? The fate of men is to yearn for an answer from the Lord.” After speaking thus, Sira Jon sighed a deep sigh.

Now Sira Pall Hallvardsson s.h.i.+fted on his stool, for he had never heard such speeches from the other priest. After a while, he said, ”I recall as well the three priests the bishop saw fit to carry with him. It has often occurred to me that the first lost and least regarded of us was in fact the straightest and most solid. After Sira Petur's death, I was even less eager for this day.” Jon gave an audible sniff. ”The Lord has laid upon the hands of any priest a deal of work, but I say humbly that this work in the western ocean is work that not a few would s.h.i.+rk. Not a few did, after all, when Bishop Alf was seeking priests to accompany him. The folk about us are unlike even those with whom they share a tongue, Norwegians. They are half-wild, like horses left in the mountains to fend for themselves. They have made their own paths through the wilderness, and they balk at being led. And anyone who would lead them must sometimes confess that the paths they have made are as good as or better than those he would bring them to. They are not, perhaps, men of our world, as men in France or men in Flanders or Germany are, though they seek after the fas.h.i.+ons and ways of the world and consider themselves like us. But they are new men and Vikings at the same time. This was something that Petur didn't have to think of or to be told. For myself, every time I am among them, I must consider everything very carefully, as if I were learning a new tongue, except that each day it gets no less difficult. For you, please pardon me if I say that you expect them to mold themselves and their habits to yours. But they are like horses who come when they are called because such peculiar noises arouse their curiosity, although the farmer esteems himself for the success of his training.” Sira Jon sat still as a post. ”And now I must speak hardly to you, for guiding these folk has come to you and not to me. Before Bishop Alf, twenty-six years went by after the death of Bishop Arni. It was always true when Bishop Alf spoke of the Lord, he spoke of Him as the king of Heaven, whose steward upon earth the bishop was, so that the power of G.o.d's law flowed through him and into the settlement of the Greenlanders. And the Greenlanders, for the most part, saw the rightness and truth of this, and brought their disputes and crimes to his wisdom. But you never speak of G.o.d's law. You speak only of His love and His displeasure, and signs from Him, as if He were but your Heavenly Father and not your Heavenly King.” Now he stopped, and waited for a reply.

Sira Jon spoke. ”You have little experience with many servants or a large establishment. You were raised among monks. You would not know what to do with the means at Gardar, or how to rule the men.”

Pall Hallvardsson stood up. ”This is indeed true, and about this I will never contradict you, nor will I ever challenge your authority at Gardar or among the Greenlanders. I am pleased to place in your hands my faith and my friends.h.i.+p, and I ask only to serve the see as you consider fit.”

Now Jon inhaled deeply, and looked at Pall Hallvardsson with a flicker of pleasure. ”On such a day as this, there is no little difficulty in attending to all that folk wish to say to us. But this speech is clear and easy to grasp, and we thank you for it. It shall be the staff that steadies our steps.”

Now Sira Pall Hallvardsson went out and found the room where the bishop had been laid out, and he got to his knees at the feet of the corpus and said many prayers. After a few days he returned to Hvalsey Fjord for the seal hunt. The death of the bishop was the subject of great talk among the Greenlanders, especially in light of how young he had been next to Sira Nikolaus and his ”wife.” Some folk laughed and said that Sira Nikolaus would come to be the bishop after all, if he hung on long enough. Folk found it rea.s.suring that activities at Gardar went on as before, with no change or diminishment, for all greatly feared even the slightest falling off, declaring that this would betoken only a steeper decline into the G.o.dlessness of the earlier time. Families hurried to send their sons to Gardar for training, and some of these were taken on and taught some letters. There were, perhaps, fewer feasts and ma.s.ses, but folk said that this was less important than other things, namely the richness of the Gardar hay crop, the good repair of the buildings, and the state of the beasts. Although he was not the bishop, Sira Jon began wearing bits of Bishop Alf's apparel, and speaking to folk with more of the distance and formality that the bishop had used, and the Greenlanders spoke of this with approval, and recalled how lowly Ivar Bardarson had held himself, so that others, too, held him lowly, and his office.

It was a fact that Erlend Ketilsson was one of the two or three most prosperous farmers south of Gardar. He farmed not only Ketils Stead, but also two other farms in Vatna Hverfi. Sigmund Sigmundsson of Petursvik, the husband of Thorunn's niece, had died during the vomiting ill, willing his farm to Erlend as well, for, folk said, the case Erlend had won for him against Asgeir Gunnarsson had made his rotten dried sealmeat taste like roast lamb and his sourmilk taste like wine to him, and he had never considered himself a poor man again. Nonetheless, the farm fell waste, for Petursvik was far away, and the folk there hard put, and Erlend could not find anyone to do the farming for him.

When folk died, or farms were abandoned, as had happened more and more after the vomiting ill and the famine, people came to Erlend and Vigdis first, asking to be put to work and bringing their livestock and their goods, and most of these folk Erlend and Vigdis took in. Erlend was as tight-lipped as ever, and Vigdis as stern, and in addition folk were made to work long hours, but, it was said, folk always work long hours, and at Ketils Stead, the hours ended in a full trencher. In addition to this, wherever many folk gather, there is talk, and jesting, and tale-telling, no matter whether the master gains enjoyment or not. Erlend had many friends.

It happened that in this year the seal hunt was especially lucky, with many seals taken and no man killed, nor even injured, and so folk prepared for the winter with more confidence than they had in recent years. At Gunnars Stead, a third child was conceived, and Birgitta Lavransdottir had such experience at these things now that she went about her business unfatigued and full of joy, for it came to her in a dream that the child was a boy. Svava Vigmundsdottir had become a regular member of the Gunnars Stead household, and two chests of her treasures had been carried from Siglufjord to Gunnars Stead. She was given Margret Asgeirsdottir's bedcloset, and Olaf went to the one Ingrid had used.

Folk in Vatna Hverfi no longer spoke of the dull wits of Gunnar Asgeirsson, but declared that although others had sometimes doubted Gunnar's future, they had never done so, but had always considered that the shrewdness of Asgeir Gunnarsson and his brother Hauk would surface in the boy sooner or later. Gunnar was not as powerful or prosperous as the richest men in the district, but the storehouses were nearly as full as they had been in Asgeir's time, and far better disposed, for Birgitta Lavransdottir, it was said, was the sort of wife who must always know what she has. Concerning the killing of Skuli Gudmundsson, it was widely remarked that he was a Norwegian after all, and given to wearing peculiar bright clothing, as all of the ombudsman's men had been, and in addition had been given too little to do by his lord. Did not Norwegians who came to Greenland always turn out thus-idle and troublemaking? That he had gone forward to his death without cowardice, however, was something to be praised.

And of course Skuli had done Thorkel Gellison a great turn, for after the killing, his was the only stallion anyone cared to breed their mares to, although it must be said that most of the farmers came to him shamefacedly and as if looking after other business. Thorkel kept the great gray horse in a round pen just in front of the door to his steading, and always conducted business in the open doorway, and it always happened that after talk of other things, the visitor would remark at how attractive the horse was, and Thorkel would declare the animal an unlucky one, who had caused the death of a man, and then the other would remark that even so, it was a fine horse indeed, and they would walk forward and lean upon the wall of the pen. Thorkel grew very rich.

Gunnar was a very fair man, as fair as Olaf Finnbogason was ugly, and at least a head taller than his foster brother. He still busied himself spinning and weaving and sewing and tale-telling during the long dark months of winter, and his dress was somewhat peculiar, as he devised it himself. One time his hood would have a face piece with slits for the eyes. Another time his gown would have patch pockets of different sizes st.i.tched all down the front, and into these pockets he would put his tools. Another time his gown would be very short, as the Norwegians had worn theirs, and his hose very thick, or his shoes would have peculiar flaps and fastenings. He tried weaving oddly colored threads into the Gunnars Stead wadmal and sometimes the Gunnars Stead folk appeared in outlandish stripes. Concerning all of this, Birgitta Lavransdottir said nothing and seemed to have no thoughts. When Gunnar wore stripes that ran from arm to arm, or even from neck to knee, Birgitta wore them as well, and dressed little Gunnhild and Helga in them. She even wore gowns that Gunnar contrived for her, although she did not make Katla or the other servants put on such things.

Birgitta had six servants about her now, including Svava. Besides Hrafn and his sons, Gunnar and Olaf had taken on a new man with a great fondness for hunting and fis.h.i.+ng, who looked to have skraeling blood in him, though his name was Finn Thormodsson and he spoke and dressed as a Norseman. He was somewhat old, and had come from the western settlement as a boy of twelve. He had never owned land in the eastern settlement, but had moved from farmstead to farmstead and working at game-taking and tanning skins. After the famine, such men had come to be greatly in demand, for it was said by some that a man's cattle could no longer carry him through the winter as they once had. Gunnar considered himself lucky to have Finn, and he treated him well.

All these folk sat at Gunnars Stead during the winter, and helped Gunnar to gather together the goods that would be needed for the payment that would regain Asgeir's second field. Birgitta and the women servants had been busy at their tablet weaving for two winters, and had produced a green and white altar cloth with a wide border, that depicted the angel speaking to the Virgin Mary of the coming of the Lord. Olaf had gotten together a great pile of sheepskins, half of them white and half black, and the dairy had furnished two dozen large round cheeses. There were reindeer hides from the great hunt and bags of seal blubber. But the man Finn had done something few had done since the end of the Northsetur, and that was to procure a narwhal tusk and a white hawk, which he was training. These were very desirable and valuable goods, and Gunnar expected that Sira Jon would be pleased with them, even though he was not friends with the Gunnars Stead folk.

Days pa.s.sed quietly at Gunnars Stead, and the winter was no colder than previous ones, Lent no longer, and Easter no warmer. The sheep were just beginning to lamb when the time arrived for Gunnar to take his goods to Gardar and reclaim Asgeir's second field. The custom was in such cases that on the day nine years to the day after the sentence was pa.s.sed, the guilty man or his heirs would appear with goods to a value already fixed upon, pay them over, and receive his rights again, but if he did not appear on this day, then he was to lose his rights permanently and the duty of the bishop, or in this case, his representative, was to dispose of the confiscated property as he saw fit. Everyone in the district knew which day this was to be-two days before the feast of St. Hallvard of Oslo-and Pall Hallvardsson went forth himself to Gardar to make sure of Sira Jon.

Now it happened that on the evening before the day of the journey, the goods were placed in chests and all things were made ready, as Gunnar and Olaf intended to stay at Gardar for two or three days, and then the folk went to their bedclosets and slept.

After dark, some men came over the hill from the south, and they were servants of Erlend Ketilsson, led by Ketil the Unlucky, who was now a young man with an evil reputation about the district. There were six in the band. The first thing they did was to drag the two small Gunnars Stead boats north over the hill to the waters of the fjord, where they set them adrift. After this, they returned to Gunnars Stead and began to round up the four horses, thinking to take them into the mountains and hobble them where they would be difficult to find, but it so happened that the mare Mikla would not at first allow herself to be caught, and when she was caught through the effort of four of the men, she began whinnying and fighting so that Ketil took out his knife and cut her throat and left her lying in the horse pen. The other horses were taken off and left at the spot where Skuli Gudmundsson had met his death. The Gunnars Stead folk slept as if under a spell.

Now it was almost morning. Ketil's last act was to open the fence of the sheep pen and drive the flock into the homefield, where the gra.s.s was new and the earth wet from snow melt. When, a while later, Olaf rose to make ready for his journey, he found livestock scattered everywhere.

At Ketils Stead, Erlend and Vigdis made ready their goods, and had them carried to their boat, which was moored near the church in Einars Fjord, and sometime in the morning, they, too, along with Ketil and their steward, set out for Gardar, arriving just after mid-day. Now everyone at Gardar sat still and waited for the appearance of Gunnar and Olaf, but the day went on and then declined into darkness, and they neither came themselves nor sent a message. Pall Hallvardsson sat with Sira Jon so that Erlend might not get at him, and the two priests stayed up through the whole night until the morning light, but day did not s.h.i.+ne upon the folk from Gunnars Stead, and Sira Jon came out into the hall and greeted Erlend and Vigdis, and received their goods, but asked them to stay one more day in case Gunnar might show up, for Pall Hallvardsson was determined that Gunnar not be cheated or tricked.

But on this day, the day before the feast of St. Hallvard, a great storm blew off the ice cap so that no journeys could be made, and folk were hard put even to go from the farmstead to the byre, and the ewes at Gardar chose this day to drop their lambs, and so there was a great stir there. This storm lasted all that day and all the next, and then Erlend and Vigdis made ready to go back to Ketils Stead, and as there still had been no message from Gunnar, they were awarded the great field, to have entirely as their own. It happened that as they rowed back to Vatna Hverfi, they espied the two Gunnars Stead boats, smashed to pieces by the storm.

When they arrived at Ketils Stead, Erlend's shepherd came up to him and took him to one side, and he remarked that a certain gray mare with a dark stripe down her back had been discovered in the horse pen at Gunnars Stead with her throat slit, and at this news, Erlend took Ketil into the dairy house and began to beat him. Erlend was a big, heavy man with large hands, and Ketil was a slight fellow better known for his sour wit than his strength. And Erlend said, ”It is certain truth that you are indeed an unlucky fellow, and you have brought our lineage nothing but evil since the day you were born. When you and Vigdis set your heads together, every man can be sure that mischance will follow.” And Ketil lay recuperating from this beating for many weeks. Vigdis only remarked to Erlend, ”Most men are pleased to get what they want, especially if it means felling an enemy at the same time.” To this, Erlend replied, ”Ill luck only can follow such an unlucky fellow as Ketil Ragnarsson, and you will know this better than anyone one of these days.”

About his misfortunes Gunnar spoke little. One day he took the narwhal tusk to Axel Njalsson, a powerful man, and traded it for a small boat made from the remains of an old s.h.i.+p, and in very good condition. Another day he took the altar cloth the women had made and decorated to Thorkel Gellison in the southern part of the district, and came back a few days later leading a handsome mare who was in foal to the famous gray stallion. The white hawk was set free. The other goods in their chests were put away and not spoken of. The homefield dried up, but it took much labor to break up the hard clods churned up by the sheep, and the hay crop was set back a week or so. Gunnar and Finn Thormodsson could frequently be seen conferring, but the subject of their talk was unknown even to Birgitta, even to Olaf. Olaf buried Mikla on the hillside above the byre, and set up a small cairn over the grave. After that, he worked all the time that he wasn't sleeping, and never took meals with the rest of the farm folk. It was said in the district that he minded the death of the mare more than the departure of his wife, but if he did, it was not something he mentioned to anyone.

Now Gunnar set about arranging his case for the Thing. He named witnesses to attest that he was summoning Erlend Ketilsson of Ketils Stead to lesser outlawry for the destruction of property in the form of the hay crop of his homefield, and for greater outlawry for the destruction of property in the form of two serviceable boats and one excellent breeding and riding mare. Then Gunnar and Olaf went about the district, looking for supporters in the case. At first these suits looked promising, for Axel Njalsson agreed to support the Gunnars Stead folk, and he was a rich and powerful man. In addition, Thorkel Gellison and a neighbor of his said they would aid Gunnar, for they were from a part of the district where Erlend owned no property. But the other men of the district, especially those who lived on the steadings around the sh.o.r.es of the great lakes, Antler Lake and Broad Lake, had little wish to offend Erlend, to whom they went every winter for hay when their own provisions ran short. In addition, a few recalled the mutilation of a certain Ketils Stead cow. So it was that Gunnar rode from farm to farm dressed in his best, most pleasing clothing, and he was received cordially in all places, but he ended as he had begun, with the support of three men and the knowledge that all of the others in the district could not fail to support Erlend and destroy his case.

Now Gunnar took his new boat and went to Hvalsey Fjord and stayed with Lavrans for a few days. On the first day they spoke only of the Gunnars Stead folk and especially Birgitta, for Lavrans could never speak enough of Birgitta and her health and her neat ways and her many talents. She expected her confinement, Gunnar remarked, around St. Bartholomew's Day.

On the second day they spoke of the events at Gunnars Stead, the killing of the mare, the destruction of the boats, and the trampling of the homefield, and Lavrans declared that of all of these, the last was the most serious, and he said to Gunnar, ”How have you declared this case?”

”I have asked for greater outlawry for the smas.h.i.+ng of the boats and the killing of the mare, who was excellent both for breeding and riding, and I have asked for lesser outlawry for the trampling of the homefield.”

Lavrans shook his head, and said, ”My son, you have asked the lesser penalty for the greater offense, and it may be that Erlend will catch this procedural flaw, because he has a great reputation for knowledge of the law. We will see what comes of this.” Then Lavrans went to his bedcloset for the night.

There were six farmsteads in Hvalsey Fjord near Lavrans Stead, and the next day Lavrans went out and gained the support of these six farmers, poor though they were, but the difficulty was that Gunnar had to go after him and give presents. ”These two rolls of wadmal, for your wife who is pregnant,” or ”This ivory-handled knife with silver chasing in thanks for your services to my wife's father in the instance of his illness,” for it was the case in these times that it was an offense against the court to offer payment for support. Lavrans' counsel, however, was that gifts need have nothing to do with cases, when all men were agreeable. On the fourth day, Gunnar returned to Gunnars Stead and waited for the Thing.

Although there were some killings from Brattahlid to be brought before the Thing court in addition to Gunnar's case, the men involved were neither powerful nor rich, and folk were far more taken with the case against Erlend, especially as Erlend came to the Thing field in great state, and set up four large booths for his many supporters. Erlend was seen to be a fine man now, for his hair was nearly white, and he had lost the lowering dark looks of his younger days. He spoke to everyone at the Thing, even to Gunnar, in good-humored, loud tones, and was everywhere in evidence. He had a long conference with Sira Jon in the middle of one day, escorting him with great ceremony from the hall to his booth, and seating him inside on the high seat with the flap of the booth open to pa.s.sersby. The result of all of this was that when Gunnar made his suit, the thirteen judges did not even hesitate to decide against him, on the grounds that his procedures were flawed, and none could gainsay this, for such was the law of Greenland. After this the Thing broke up and everyone returned home.

It happened that one evening, just after midsummer, Gunnar and Birgitta were outside the farmstead with Gunnhild and Helga at the end of a fine day. The two little girls were busy trying to entice one of Olaf's sheep dogs, an ancient b.i.t.c.h named Nalli, to come to them. Nalli sat on her haunches looking past them toward where Olaf had disappeared into the byre. When they came near her, she stood up and moved away, then sat down again. Birgitta walked to and fro. As she walked one way, her spindle twirled downward, drawing the thread out of the wool she carried. As she walked the other way, she wound the new thread onto the shaft of the spindle. Since growing so great with this child she spun a quant.i.ty of wool, for she only felt at ease when she was walking about. Gunnar sat near her with a large pile of shearings, carding bits of gra.s.s and twigs out of them. Now he looked up at her and remarked that if her scissors were at hand, he would like to have her cut his hair. Gunnar's hair was thick and very fair, for he wore no hat in the sun, only a thin band about his forehead.

Birgitta put down her spinning and went for the case that held the scissors, as well as a piece of cloth for his shoulders and a stool for him to sit on. She possessed a fine ivory comb, made in Bergen and neatly carved, which was also kept in a case. This comb had come to her through her mother and was missing only two teeth. Now Gunnar sat down on the stool and Birgitta began to comb his hair upon his shoulders. Nalli stood up and trotted down the hillside before the farmstead and Gunnhild began to run after her, and little Helga after her. Many times the smaller child tumbled and rolled, and each time her sister came back and set her on her feet again. The dog came to the sh.o.r.e of the lake and began toward the byre, far outdistancing the girls, who stopped and sat down among the wild flowers on the hillside. Now Gunnar said, ”Some would say that we have fallen on evil days.”

”No doubt some do say it,” replied Birgitta.

”Some say that there is little hope now of Gunnars Stead regaining the place it once had among the farms of Vatna Hverfi. It is true that Hafgrim himself, who came with Erik to Greenland, gave this farmstead to Gunnar Asgeirsson, and there was always one great field to feed folk and one great field to grow prosperous on.”

Birgitta took out the scissors and began to snip along the bottom fringe of Gunnar's hair. She said, ”Some would say that in these days, one field feeds you in the summer and the other feeds you in the winter. The richest farms eat some of their breeding stock before the winter is over, not only middling farms such as ours.”

Now Birgitta went to put away the scissors, but Gunnar stopped her, and asked her to cut more off. Then he said, ”Even so, the evilest days have not come when one can look upon one's children tumbling about and laughing, and see one's wife as you are, and sit upon one's own stool for the pleasure of a haircut.”

Birgitta smiled.

”Gunnhild is much like you. She looks about her, and sees what her eyes fall upon. She laughs little but smiles often, and she takes great pains over her dress and her hair. When I am with her, it seems to me that she is my favored child.”

Birgitta caught her comb in the hair and lifted it up, then snipped off what the comb held.

”Then Helga comes to me and climbs upon my lap and speaks nonsense exactly as if it were gossip, and looks into my face for a reply, and it seems to me that she is my favored child, although she is as unlike Gunnhild as she could be.”