CHAPTER 3.

THE DAYS Pa.s.sED. At first Kristin wasn't worried. She didn't want to ponder over what Erlend might have meant by his behavior-fleeing from home like that in the middle of the night in a fit of rage-or how long he intended to stay north on his upland farm, punishing her with his absence. She was furious at her husband, but perhaps most furious because she couldn't deny that she too had been wrong and had said things she sincerely wished had not been said.

Certainly she had been wrong many times before, and in anger she had often spoken mean and vile words to her husband. But what offended her most bitterly was that Erlend would never offer to forget and forgive unless she first humbled herself and asked him meekly to do so. She didn't think she had let her temper get the better of her very often; couldn't he see that it was usually when she was tired and worn out with sorrows and anguish, which she had tried to bear alone? That was when she could easily lose mastery over her feelings. She thought Erlend might have remembered, after all the years of worry she had borne about the future of their sons, that during the past summer she had twice endured a terrible agony over Naakkve. Her eyes had been opened to the fact that after the burdens and toil of a young mother comes a new kind of fear and concern for the aging mother. Erlend's carefree chatter about having no fear for the future of his sons had angered her until she felt like a wild she-bear or like a b.i.t.c.h with pups. Erlend could go ahead and say that she was like a female dog with her children. She would always be alert and vigilant over them for as long as she had breath in her body.

If, for that reason, he chose to forget that she had stood by him every time it mattered, with all her strength, and that she had been both reasonable and fair, in spite of her anger, when he struck her and when he betrayed her with that hateful, loose woman from Lensvik, then she could do nothing to stop him. Even now, when she thought about it, she couldn't feel much anger or bitterness toward Erlend over the worst of the wrongs he had done her. Whenever she turned on him to complain about that that, it was because she knew that he regretted it himself; he knew it was a great offense. But she had never been so angry with Erlend-nor was she now-that she didn't feel sorrow for the man himself when she remembered how he struck her or betrayed her, with everything that followed afterward. She always felt that with these outbursts of his unruly spirit he had sinned more against himself and the well-being of his own soul than he had against her.

What continued to vex her were all the small wounds he had caused her with his cruel nonchalance, his childish lack of patience, and even the wild and thoughtless kind of love he gave her whenever he showed that he did indeed love her. And during all those years when her heart was young and tender, when she realized that neither her health nor her strength of will would be sufficient-as she sat with her arms full of such defenseless little children-if their father, her husband, didn't show that he was both capable and loving enough to protect her and the young sons in her arms. It had been such torment to feel her body so weak, her mind so ignorant and inexperienced, and yet not dare rely on the wisdom and strength of her husband. She felt as if she had suffered deep wounds back then, which would never heal. Even the sweet pleasure of lifting up her infant, placing his loving mouth to her breast, and feeling his warm, soft little body in her arms was soured by fear and uneasiness. So small, so defenseless you are, and your father doesn't seem to remember that above all else he needs to keep you safe.

Now that her children had gained marrow in their bones and mettle in their spirits but still lacked the full wisdom of men, now he was luring them away from her. They were whirling away from her, both her husband and all her sons, with that strange, boyish playfulness which she seemed to have glimpsed in all the men she had ever met and in which a somber, fretful woman could never partic.i.p.ate.

For her own sake then she felt only sorrow and anger when ever she thought about Erlend. But she grew fearful when she wondered what her sons were thinking.

Ulf had gone up to Dovre with two packhorses and taken Erlend the things he had sent for: clothing and a good many weapons, all four of his bows, sacks of arrowpoints and iron bolts, and three of his dogs. Munan and Lavrans wept loudly when Ulf took the small, short-haired female with the silky soft, drooping ears. It was a splendid foreign animal which the abbot of Holm had given to Erlend. That their father should own such a rare dog seemed, more than anything else, to elevate him above all other men in the eyes of the two young boys. And their father had promised that when the dog had pups, they would each be allowed to choose one from the litter.

When Ulf Haldorssn returned, Kristin asked him whether Erlend had mentioned when he intended to come back home.

"No," said Ulf. "It looks like he means to settle in up there."

Ulf volunteered little else about his journey to Haugen. And Kristin had no desire to ask.

In the fall, when they moved from the new storeroom into other quarters, her oldest sons said that this winter they wanted to sleep upstairs in the high loft. Kristin granted them permission to do so; she would sleep alone with the two youngest boys in the main room below. On the first evening she said that now Lavrans could sleep in her bed as well.

The boy lay in bed, rolling around with delight and burrowing into the ticking. The children were used to having their beds made up on a bench, with leather sacks filled with straw and furs to wrap around them. But in the beds there was blue ticking to lie on and fine coverlets as well as furs, and their parents had white linen cases on their pillows.

"Is it just until Father comes home that I can sleep here?" asked Lavrans. "Then we'll have to move back to the bench, won't we, Mother?"

"Then you can sleep in the bed with Naakkve and Bjrgulf," replied his mother. "If the boys don't change their minds, that is, and move back downstairs when the weather turns cold." There was a little brick fireplace up in the loft, but it produced more smoke than heat, and the wind and cold were felt much more in the upper story.

As the fall wore on, an uncertain fear crept over Kristin; it grew from day to day, and the strain was difficult to bear. No one seemed to have heard from Erlend or seen him.

During the long, dark autumn nights she would lie awake, listening to the even breathing of the two little boys, noting the swirl of the wind around the corners of the house, and thinking about Erlend. If only he wasn't staying at that particular farm.

She hadn't been pleased when the two cousins had begun talking about Haugen. Munan Baardsn was visiting them at the hostel in Oslo on one of the last evenings before their departure. Back then Munan had inherited sole ownership of the small manor of Haugen from his mother. Both he and Erlend had been quite drunk and boisterous, and while she sat there feeling tormented by their talk of that place of misfortune, Munan suddenly gave Erlend the farm-so that he wouldn't be entirely bereft of land in Norway. This happened amid much bantering and laughter; they even jested about the rumors that no one could live at Haugen because of the ghosts. The horror that Sir Munan Baardsn had harbored in his heart ever since the violent death of his mother and her husband up there now seemed to have eased somewhat.

He ended up giving Erlend the deed and doc.u.ments to Haugen. Kristin couldn't hide her displeasure that he had become the owner of that ignominious place.

But Erlend merely jested, "It's unlikely that either you or I will ever set foot in those buildings-if they're still standing, that is, and haven't collapsed. And surely neither Aunt Aashild nor Herr Bjrn will bring us the land rent themselves. So it shouldn't matter to us if it's true what people say, that they still haunt the place."

The year came to an end, and Kristin's thoughts were always circling around one thing: How was Erlend doing up north at Haugen? She grew so reticent that she barely spoke a word to her children or the servants except when she had to answer their questions. And they were reluctant to address their mistress unless it was absolutely necessary, for she gave such curt and impatient replies when they interrupted and disturbed her restless, anxious brooding. She was so unaware of this herself that when she finally noticed that the two youngest children had stopped asking her about their father or talking about him, she sighed and concluded that children forget so quickly. But she didn't realize how often she had scared them away with her impatient words when she told them to keep quiet and stop plaguing her.

To her oldest sons she said very little.

As long as the hard frost lasted, she could still tell strangers who pa.s.sed by the manor and asked for her husband that he was up in the mountains trying his luck at hunting. But then a great snowfall descended upon both the countryside and the mountains during the first week of Advent.

Early in the morning on the day before Saint Lucia's Day, while it was still pitch-dark outside and the stars were bright, Kristin came out of the cowshed. She saw by the light of a pine torch stuck in a mound of snow that three of her sons were putting on their skis outside the door of the main house. And a short distance away stood Gaute's gelding with snowshoes under its feet and packs on its back. She guessed where they were headed, so she did-n't dare say a word until she noticed that one of the boys was Bjr-gulf; the other two were Naakkve and Gaute.

"Are you going out skiing, Bjrgulf? But it's going to be clear today, son!"

"As you can see, Mother, I am."

"Perhaps you'll all be home before the holy day?" she asked helplessly. Bjrgulf was a very poor skier. He couldn't tolerate the brilliance of the snow in his eyes and spent most of the winter indoors. But Naakkve replied that they might be gone for several days.

Kristin went home feeling fearful and uneasy. The twins were cross and sullen, so she realized that they had wanted to go along but their older brothers had refused to take them.

Early on the fifth day, around breakfast time, the three boys returned. They had left before dawn for Bjrgulf's sake, said Naakkve, in order to reach home before the sun came up. The two of them went straight up to the high loft; Bjrgulf looked dead tired. But Gaute carried the bags and packs into the house. He had two handsome pups for the small boys, who at once forgot all about their questions and grievances. Gaute seemed embarra.s.sed but tried not to show it.

"And this," he said as he took something out of a sack, "this Father asked me to give to you."

Fourteen marten pelts, exceedingly beautiful. Kristin took them, greatly confused; she couldn't utter a single word in reply. There were far too many things she wanted to ask, but she was afraid of being overwhelmed if she opened even the smallest part of her heart. And Gaute was so young.

She could only manage to say, "They've already turned white, I see. Yes, we're deep into the winter half of the year now."

When Naakkve came downstairs and he and Gaute sat down to the porridge bowl, Kristin quickly told Frida that she would take food to Bjrgulf up in the loft herself. It occurred to her that she might be able to talk about things with the taciturn boy, who she knew was much more mature in spirit than his brothers.

He was lying in bed, holding a linen cloth over his eyes. His mother hung a kettle of water on the hook over the hearth, and while Bjrgulf propped himself up on his elbow to eat, she boiled a concoction of eyebright and celandine.

Kristin took away the empty food bowl, washed his red and swollen eyes with the concoction, and placed moist linen cloths over them. Then she finally gathered her courage to ask, "Didn't your father say anything about when he intends to come back home to us?"

"No."

"You always say so little, Bjrgulf," replied his mother after a moment.

"That seems to run in the family, Mother." After a pause he continued, "We met Simon and his men north of Rost Gorge. They were headed north with supplies."

"Did you speak to them?" she asked.

"No," he said with a laugh. "There seems to be some kind of sickness between us and our kinsmen that makes it impossible for friendship to thrive."

"Are you blaming me for that?" fumed his mother. "One minute you complain that we talk too little, and the next you say that we can't keep our friends."

Bjrgulf merely laughed again. Then he lifted himself up on his elbow, as if he were listening to his mother's breathing.

"In G.o.d's name, Mother, you mustn't cry now. I'm tired and dejected, unaccustomed as I am to traveling on skis. Pay no mind to whatever I say. Of course I know that you're not a woman who's fond of quarrels."

Kristin then left the loft at once. But she no longer dared, for any price, to ask this son what her children thought of these matters.

She would lie in bed, night after night, when the boys had gone up to the loft, listening and keeping watch. She wondered whether they talked to each other when they were alone up there. She could hear the thump of their boots as they dropped them to the floor, the clatter of their knife belts falling. She heard their voices but couldn't make out their words. They talked all at the same time, growing boisterous; it seemed to be half quarrel, half banter. One of the twins shouted loudly; then something was dragged across the floor, making dust sprinkle down from the ceiling into the main room. The gallery door crashed open with a bang, there was a stomping from outside on the gallery, and Ivar and Skule threatened and carried on as they pounded on the door. She heard Gaute's voice, loud and full of laughter. She could tell that he was standing just inside the door; he and the twins had been fighting again, and Gaute had ended up throwing the twins out. Finally she heard Naakkve's grown-up man's voice. He intervened, and the twins came back inside. For a little while longer their chatter and laughter reached her, and then the beds creaked overhead. Gradually silence fell. Then a steady drone interrupted by pauses could be heard-a drone like the sound of thunder deep inside the mountains.

Kristin smiled in the dark. Gaute snored whenever he was especially tired. Her father had done the same. Such similarities pleased her; the sons who took after Erlend in appearance were also like him in that they slept as soundlessly as birds. As she lay in bed, thinking about all the small likenesses that could be recognized in offspring, generation after generation, she had to smile to herself. The painful anguish in her heart loosened its grip for a moment, and the trance of sleep descended, tangling up all the threads of her thoughts as she sank down, first into well-being and then into oblivion.

They were young, she consoled herself. They probably didn't take it so hard.

But one day, shortly after New Year's, the curate Sira Solmund came to see Kristin at Jrundgaard. It was the first time he arrived uninvited, and Kristin welcomed him courteously, even though she had her suspicions at once. And it turned out just as she had thought: He felt it was his duty to inquire whether she and her husband had arbitrarily, and without Church consent, ended their marriage and, if so, which of the spouses was responsible for this unlawful act.

Kristin felt as if her eyes flitted restlessly, and she spoke too swiftly, using far too many words, as she explained to the priest that Erlend thought he should tend to his property up north in Dovre. It had been sorely neglected over the past few years, and the buildings were apparently in ruins. Considering that they had so many children, they needed to look after their welfare-and many other such matters. She gave much too detailed an account of the situation, so that even Sira Solmund, as dull-witted as he was, had to notice that she was feeling uncertain. She talked on and on about what an eager hunter Erlend was; surely the priest must know that. She showed him the marten pelts she had received from her husband, and in her confusion, before she realized it or could reconsider, she gave them to the priest.

Anger overtook her after Sira Solmund had gone. Erlend should have known that if he stayed away in this manner, their priest, being the kind of man he was, would show up to investigate the reason for his absence.

Sira Solmund was a little trifle of a man in appearance; it wasn't easy to guess his age, but he was supposedly about forty winters old. He was not very shrewd and apparently didn't possess an overabundance of learning, but he was an upright, pious, and moral priest. One of his sisters, an aging, childless widow and a wicked gossip, managed his meager household.

He wanted to be seen as a zealous servant of the Church, but he concerned himself mostly with paltry matters and common folk. He had a timid disposition and was reluctant to meddle with the gentry or take up difficult questions, but once he did so, he grew quite fierce and stubborn.

In spite of this, he was well liked by his parishioners. On the one hand, people respected his quiet and honorable way of living; on the other hand, he was not nearly as avaricious or strict when it came to the rights of the Church or people's obligations as Sira Eirik had been. This was doubtless due to the fact that he was much less bold than the old priest.

But Sira Eirik had loved and respected every man and every child in all the surrounding villages. In the past people often grew angry when the priest strove, with unseemly greed, to secure the fortunes and wealth of the children he had conceived out of wedlock with his housekeeper. During the first years he lived in the parish, the people of Sil had a difficult time tolerating his imperious harshness toward anyone who overstepped the slightest dictate of Church law. He had been a soldier before he took his vows, and he had accompanied the pirate earl, Sir Alf of Tornberg, in his youth. This was all quite evident in his behavior.

But even back then the people had been proud of their priest, for he surpa.s.sed nearly all other parish priests in the realm in terms of knowledge, wisdom, physical strength, and courtly manners; he also had the loveliest singing voice. As the years pa.s.sed and he had to endure the heavy trials G.o.d seemed to have placed on His servant because of his willfulness in his youth, Sira Eirik Kaaressn grew so much in wisdom, piety, and righteousness that his name was now known and respected throughout the entire bishopric. When he journeyed to ecclesiastical meetings in the town of Hamar, he was honored as a father by all the other priests, and it was said that Bishop Halvard wanted to have him moved to a church which would have granted him a n.o.ble t.i.tle and a seat in the cathedral chapter. But Sira Eirik supposedly requested to stay where he was; he gave his age as his excuse, and the fact that his sight had been failing him for many years.

On the main road at Sil, a little south of Formo, stood the beautiful cross carved from soapstone that Sira Eirik had paid to have erected where a rockslide on the slope had taken the lives of both his promising young sons forty years before. Older people in the parish never pa.s.sed that way without stopping to say a Pater noster Pater noster and and Ave Maria Ave Maria for the souls of Alf and Kaare. for the souls of Alf and Kaare.

The priest had married off his daughter with a dowry of property and cattle. He gave her to a handsome farmer's son of good family from Viken. No one had any other thought but that Jon Fis was a good lad. Six years later she had returned home to her father, starving, her health broken, wearing rags and full of lice, holding a child by each hand, and with another one under her belt. The people living in Sil back then all knew, although they never mentioned it, that the children's father had been hanged as a thief in Oslo. The sons of Jon didn't turn out well either, and now all three of them were dead.

While his offspring were still alive, Sira Eirik had greedily sought to adorn and honor his church with gifts. Now it was the church that would doubtless acquire the majority of his fortune and his precious books. The new Saint Olav and Saint Thomas Church in Sil was much larger and more splendid than the old one that had burned down, and Sira Eirik had endowed it with many magnificent and costly adornments. He went to church every day to say his prayers and to reflect, but now he only said ma.s.s for the parishioners on high holy days.

It was Sira Solmund who now handled most of the other official priestly duties. But when people had a heavy sorrow, or if their souls were troubled by great difficulties or pangs of conscience, they preferred to seek out their old parish priest, and they all felt that they took home solace from a meeting with Sira Eirik.

One evening in early spring Kristin Lavransdatter went to Romundgaard and knocked on the door of Sira Eirik's house. She didn't know how to bring up the subject she wanted to discuss, so she talked about one thing and another after she had expressed her greetings.

Finally the old man said a little impatiently, "Have you just come here to bring me greetings, Kristin, and to see how I am? If so, that is most kind of you. But it seems to me that you have something on your mind, and if this is true, tell me about it now, and don't waste time with idle talk."

Kristin clasped her hands in her lap and lowered her eyes. "I'm so unhappy, Sira Eirik, that my husband is living up there at Haugen."

"Surely the road isn't any longer," said the priest, "than that you can easily journey up there to talk to him and ask him to return home soon. He can't have so much to do up there on such a small one-man farm that he should need to stay any longer."

"I feel frightened when I think of him sitting alone up there in the winter nights," said Kristin, shivering.

"Erlend Nikulaussn is old enough and strong enough to look out for himself."

"Sira Eirik . . . you know about everything that happened up there, back in the old days," whispered Kristin, her voice barely audible.

The priest turned his dim old eyes toward her; once they had been coal-black, sharp, and gleaming. He didn't say a word.

"Surely you must have heard what people say," she continued, speaking in the same low voice. "That the dead . . . still haunt the place."

"Do you mean you don't dare seek him out because of that? Or are you afraid the ghosts might break your husband's neck? If they haven't done it by now, Kristin, then no doubt they'll let him stay there in peace." The priest laughed harshly. "It's mostly just ignorance-heathen nonsense and superst.i.tion-when people start gossiping about ghosts and the return of dead men. I fear there are stern guards at the door, in that place where Herr Bjrn and Fru Aashild now find themselves."

"Sira Eirik," she whispered, her voice trembling, "do you believe there is no salvation for those two poor souls?"

"G.o.d forbid that I should dare judge the limits of His mercy. But I can't imagine that those two could have managed to settle their debts so quickly; all the slates the two of them have had a hand in carving have not yet been presented: her children, whom she abandoned, and the two of you, who took lessons from the wise woman. If I thought that it might help, so that some of the misdeeds she committed could be rectified . . . but since Erlend is living up there, G.o.d must not think it would be of any benefit for his aunt to reappear and warn him. For we know that it is through the grace of G.o.d and the compa.s.sion of Our Lady and the intercessionary prayers of the Church that a poor soul may be allowed to return to this world from the fires of purgatory if his sin is such that it can be absolved with the help of someone who is alive and in this manner shorten his time of torment. Such was the case with the wretched soul who moved the boundary between Hov and Jarpstad, or the farmer in Musudal with the false doc.u.ments about the millstream. But souls cannot leave the fires of purgatory unless they have a lawful errand. It's mostly nonsense what people say about ghosts and phantoms or the mirages of the Devil, which disappear like smoke if you protect yourself with the sign of the cross and the name of the Lord."

"But what about the blessed ones who are with G.o.d, Sira Eirik?" she asked softly.

"You know quite well that the holy ones who are with G.o.d can be sent out to bring gifts and messages from Paradise."

"I once told you that I saw Brother Edvin Rikardssn," she said in the same tone of voice.

"Yes, either it was a dream-and it might have been sent by G.o.d or one of his guardian angels-or else the monk is a holy man."

Shivering, Kristin whispered, "My father . . . Sira Eirik, I have prayed so often that I might be allowed to see his face one more time. I long so fervently to see him, Sira Eirik. And perhaps I might be able to tell from his expression what he wants me to do. If my father could give me advice in that way . . ." She had to bite her lip, and she used a corner of her wimple to brush away the tears that had welled up.

The priest shook his head.

"Pray for his soul, Kristin-although I'm convinced that Lavrans and your mother have long ago found solace with those from whom they sought comfort for all the sorrows they endured here on earth. And certainly Lavrans still holds you firmly in his love there too, but your prayers and the ma.s.ses said for his soul will bind you and all the rest of us to him. How this occurs is one of the secret things that are difficult to fathom, but I have no doubt that this is a better way than if he should be disturbed in his peace to come here and appear before you."

Kristin had to sit still for a moment before she gained enough mastery over herself that she dared speak. But then she told the priest about everything that had happened between Erlend and her on the evening in the hearth house, repeating every word that was said, as best as she could remember.

The priest sat in silence for a long time after she was finished.

Then Kristin clapped her hands together harshly. "Sira Eirik! Do you think I was the one most at fault? Do you think I was so wrong that it wasn't a sin for Erlend to desert me and all our sons in this manner? Do you think it is fair for him to demand that I seek him out, fall to my knees, and take back the words I spoke in anger? Because I know know that unless I do, he will never return home to us!" that unless I do, he will never return home to us!"

"Do you think you need to call Lavrans back from the other world to ask his advice in this matter?" The priest stood up and placed his hand on the woman's shoulder. "The first time I saw you, Kristin, you were a tiny maiden. Lavrans made you stand between his knees as he crossed your little hands on your breast and told you to say the Pater noster Pater noster for me. You repeated it in a lovely, clear voice, even though you didn't understand a single word. Later you learned the meaning of every prayer in our language; perhaps you've forgotten about that now. for me. You repeated it in a lovely, clear voice, even though you didn't understand a single word. Later you learned the meaning of every prayer in our language; perhaps you've forgotten about that now.

"Have you forgotten that your father taught you and honored you and loved you? He honored the man before whom you are now afraid of humbling yourself. Or have you forgotten how splendid the feast was that he held for the two of you? And then you rode away from his manor like two thieves. Did you take with you Lavrans Bjrgulfsn's esteem and honor?"

Sobbing, Kristin hid her face in her hands.

"Do you remember, Kristin? Did he ever demand that the two of you should fall to your knees before he thought he could take you back into his fatherly love? Do you think it too harsh a penance for your pride if you have to bow before a man whom you may not have wronged as much as you sinned against your father?"