The Axe (16 page)

“Think you,” Olav broke in, “ ’twill avail much if the lord Torfinn demand it? Before now the Bishop of Hamar has had to give away to the Steinfinnssons.”

“Ay—in questions of property and the like. But for all that, they are not so ungodly as to deny that in this matter none has the right to judge but the fathers of the Church—whether marriage be marriage or not.”

“I wonder. Oh no—then I have more mind to take Ingunn with me and fare south to my own country.”

“Ah, not so long as I can wield a sword. In the devil’s name, Olav, do you expect, because I have—lacked counsel so long-that I should sit here and shut my eyes while you steal my kinswoman out of my ward?” He saw that Olav was on the point of flaring up. “Be calm,” he said curtly; “I know you are not afraid of me. And I am not afraid of you either. But I reckoned we were friends. If you feel yourself that your conduct to me has been something short of a trusty friend’s, then do as I say, seek to make an end of this matter in seemliness and honour.

“I shall go with you to the Bishop,” he added, seeing that the other still hesitated.

“Against my will I do this thing,” said Olav with a sigh.

“Is it more to your liking as things are now,” Arnvid rejoined hotly, “to let the talk go on, here on the manor and among the neighbours—of you and me and Ingunn? Can you not see that the womenfolk smirk and whisper behind her back wherever she goes—stare at her slyly? They look to see if she treads as lightly as ever—”

“There is no danger on that score,” muttered Olav angrily; “so she says.” His face was crimson again. “Ingunn must stay with us, then,” he said reflectively. “Else it might be difficult even for Bishop Torfinn to get her out of Kolbein’s clutches.”

“Ay, I shall take Tora and Ingunn with me. Think you I would let her fall into Kolbein’s hands after this?”

“So be it, then,” answered Olav; he stared gloomily before him.

Two days later they rode down and reached the town late in the evening. The maids were long abed next morning, and Olav said he would go seek the smith and fetch his axe, while the others made ready to hear the last mass that was sung in Christ Church.

They had already set out when he came back to the inn. He hurried after them along the street, and the snow crunched under him—it was fine, frosty weather. The bells rang out so sweetly in the clear air, and the southern sky was so finely tinged with gold above white ridges and dark-blue water. He saw the others by the churchyard gate and ran up to them.

Ingunn turned toward him, flushing red as a rose—Olav saw that under her hood she wore a white coif about her face like a young wife. He turned red too, and his heart began to hammer—this was dead earnest; ’twas as though he had not known it till now. Young as he was and lacking friends and kinsmen, he had taken this upon himself—to face it out that she was his wife. And it made him terribly bashful to walk beside her thus. Straight as two candles, gazing fixedly before them, they strode side by side across the churchyard.

After the morning meal Olav accompanied Arnvid to the Bishop’s palace. He was ill at ease uring the walk, and it was no better when he had to sit waiting by himself in the Bishop’s
stone hall, after a clerk had taken Arnvid up to Lord Torfinn in the Bishop’s bedchamber.

The time dragged on and on. Olav had never been in a stone hall before and there was much to look at. The roof was also of stone and vaulted, so that no light came in except from a little glazed window in the back wall; but in spite of that it was not so very dark, as the room was whitewashed within, and the walls were painted with bright flowers and birds in place of tapestries and to the same height. The room was without any sort of fireplace, but as soon as he had entered, two men came in bearing a great brazier, which they placed in the middle of the floor. Olav went up and warmed his hands over it, when he grew tired of sitting and freezing on the bench. He was left to sit alone most of the time, and he was ill at ease in this hall; there was something churchlike about it which unsettled him.

After a while three men came in, clad in furs; they placed themselves around the charcoal brazier and took no notice of the boy on the bench. They had come about a case they had—of fishing-rights. The two old ones were farmers from somewhere about Fagaberg, and the younger one was a priest and stepson of one of the farmers. Olav was made to feel very young and inexperienced—it would surely not be easy for him to assert himself here. Soon one of the Bishop’s men came and fetched them away. Olav himself would have been glad to go out into the palace yard too—there were many things to look at. But he judged that this would be unbecoming; he would have to stay where he was.

At last Arnvid came in great haste, snatched his sword, and buckled it on, saying that the Bishop was to ride out to a house in Vang and had bidden him go with him. No, he had not been able to say much about Olav’s case—folk had been coming and going in the Bishop’s chamber the whole morning. No, the Bishop had not said much, but he had invited both Arnvid and Olav to lodge in the palace, so now Olav must go back to the inn and bring his horse and their things.

“What of the maids—they cannot be left behind in the inn?”

“No,” said Arnvid. They were to lodge in a house in the town, with two pious old women who had boarders. In a day or two they would be joined by Magnhild, Steinfinn’s sister from Berg; the Bishop would send a letter tomorrow, bidding her come: “He says you and Ingunn ought not to meet until a reconciliation
be made in this affair—except, as you know, you may see each other in church and speak together there.” Arnvid dashed out.

Olav hurried to the inn, but one of these women from the guest-house was there before him, and Ingunn and Tora were ready to go with her. So he was not able to speak to her. She looked sorrowful as he gave her his hand in farewell. But Olav said to Tora, so that her sister might hear, that the Bishop had received them well; it was a great mark of favour that all four were to be his guests.

But when he came back to the Bishop’s palace, he was met by a young priest, who said they were to be
contubernales
. Olav guessed that this meant he was to sleep in this priest’s room. He was a tall, lean man with a big, bony, horse’s head, and they called him Asbjörn All-fat. He got a man to take charge of Olav’s horse, and himself showed the young man to the loft where he was to sleep. Then he said he must go down to the boat-hithe; a vessel had come that morning with goods from Gudbrandsdal—maybe ’twould amuse Olav to go with him and look on? Olav was glad to accept.

There was much shipping at Hestviken, Olav knew; and yet no man could know less of ships and boats than he, so strangely had his life been ordered. He used both eyes and ears when aboard the trading vessel, made bold even to ask about one thing and another. He took a hand with the men and helped to discharge the freight—’twas a better pastime than standing by with idle hands. Most of it was barrels of salt herrings and sea-trout, but there were also bales of hides and a quantity of furs, butter, and tallow. While the priest kept the tally, Olav helped him, notching the stick; in this he had had practice at Frettastein, as he had often done it for Grim; the old man was not very good at reckoning now.

He kept with Asbjörn Priest the whole day—followed him to prayers in the choir of the church and to supper, which Olav was to take at the same table as the Bishop’s household. And when at night he went to the loft with Asbjörn and another young priest, he was in a much better frame of mind. He no longer felt such a stranger in the palace, and there were many new things to see.—Arnvid was not yet come home.

But in the course of the night Olav awoke and lay thinking of
all that had been told him of Bishop Torfinn. He was afraid of the Bishop after all.

Rather let ten men lose their lives than one maiden be ravished, he was reported to have said. There was a case that had been much talked about in the country round, a year before. A rich man’s son in Alvheim had set his mind on a poor peasant’s daughter; as he could not tempt the woman with promises and gifts, he came one evening in springtime, when the girl was ploughing, and tried to use force. Her father was below in the wood, busy with the mending of a fence; he was old and ailing, but on hearing his daughter’s cries he took his woodcutter’s axe and ran up; he cleft the other’s skull. The ravisher was left unatoned; his kinsmen had to be content with that. But, as was natural, they tried to get the slayer to leave the country. First they offered to buy him out, but when he would not have it, they fell upon him with threats and overbearing treatment. Then Bishop Torfinn had taken the poor peasant and his children under his protection.

Then there was that case of the man at Tonstad who had been found slain in his coppice. His wife and children charged the other tenant of the farm with the murder; the man had to flee to save his life, and his wife and young children suffered affliction and cruelty without end at the hands of the murdered man’s relatives. Then it came about that the dead man’s own cousin confessed that he was the one who had killed his kinsman—they had quarrelled about an inheritance. But it was said that Biship Torfinn had forced the murderer to avow before the people what he had confessed to the Bishop—saying that no priest had power to absolve him of the sin before he had shown sincere repentance and rescued the innocent who might be suffering from his misdeed.

Arnvid said that to the poor and sorrowing this Bishop would stoop with the gentlest kindness, praying them to turn to him as to a loving father. But he never bowed his neck the least jot when faced with self-willing or hard-hearted men, whether they were great folk or small, clergy or laity. Never would he excuse sin in any man—but if any sinner showed repentance and will to make amends, he received him with both hands, guided, consoled, and protected him.

This was nobly done, Olav had thought—and much of what he had heard of the lord Torfinn he had liked very well—a fearless
man this monk from Trondheim must be, and one who knew his own will. But then he had never thought that he himself would have a case to submit to the Bishop’s judgment. And what Arnvid said about the Bishop’s being no respecter of persons seemed to Olav to be stretching his goodness somewhat far—he could see naught else but that it did make some difference whether it were a lowly peasant who killed his neighbour for a small matter, or Steinfinn revenging himself upon Mattias. In any case, he would not like anyone to think he had turned to the Bishop and sought his protection against the Steinfinnssons because—ay, because he felt himself in a way their inferior. Then there was this other thing, that Bishop Torfinn was so strict on the point of chastity. With all other men he might hold to his assertion that this life he and Ingunn had led since the summer was wedlock in a way. But he did not feel it so himself.

Next morning he sat waiting again in the little hall. It was so called because there was a larger hall or court-house beside it. There was no door between; none of the rooms in the stone building had more than one door, and that led into the courtyard. Olav had sat there awhile when a little young man came in, clad in a greyish-white monk’s frock which was a little different from that of the preaching friars. The monk closed the door behind him and advanced rapidly to Olav—and the young man got up in great haste and knelt upon one knee; he knew at once that this must be the lord Torfinn. When the Bishop held out his hand, Olav meekly kissed the great stone in his ring.

“Welcome to Hamar, Olav Audunsson! ’Twas not well that I should be absent yesterday when you came—but I hope my house-folk have had good care of our guests?”

He was not so young after all, Olav saw—his thin wreath of hair shone like silver, and his face was shrunken, wrinkled, and grey as his frock almost. But he was slim and wonderfully lithe in all his movements—scarce so tall as Olav. It was impossible to guess his age—his smile took away the look of age; a brightness came into his great yellow-grey eyes, but upon his pale and narrow lips the smile became the faintest shadow.

Olav mumbled his thanks and stood in embarrassment—the zealous Bishop looked so utterly different from what he had expected. He remembered dimly that he had seen the former Bishop
—a man who filled a room with his voice and his presence. Olav felt that this one could also fill the room, slight and silver-grey as he was—in another way. When Lord Torfinn sat down and bade him be seated beside him, he modestly withdrew to the bench at a little distance.

“There is great likelihood that you must be content to bide here a part of the winter,” said Bishop Torfinn. “You are a man of the Vik,
I hear, and all your kinsmen dwell far away, save only the Tveits folk out in Soleyar. It will take time ere we can receive their answer as to what their testimony may be in this matter. Know you if they have resigned their guardianship of you in lawful wise?”

“My father did so, lord—was it not he who had the right to that?”

“Yes, yes. But he must have spoken of it to his kinsmen and had their consent that Steinfinn should enjoy the payment for your wardship in place of them?”

Olav was silent. This case of his did not seem so simple a matter—ay, he had guessed as much of late. No wardship payment from his estate had ever been made to Steinfinn—so far as he knew.

“I know nothing of this—I know little of the law; none has ever taught me such things,” he said dejectedly.

“Nay, I supposed that. But we must be clear about this question of guardianship, Olav—first on account of your share in the deed of arson—whether you accompanied Steinfinn as his son-in-law or as a man in his pay. Kolbein and those have got their freedom now, but you were not included in it.
I shall speak with the Sheriff about this matter, so that you may be safe here in the town. But then there is that saying of Steinfinn before he died—that he desired the marriage between you and his daughter, as Arnvid tells me. Whether
he
were your guardian at that time, or these kinsmen of yours, who are so now.”

“I thought,” said Olav, turning red, “that I was come to man’s estate. Since she was betrothed to me in lawful wise, and I have taken her to me as my wife.”