The Axe (31 page)

“ ’Tis unmanly of you, Teit,” she begged—“I sit here and must tend my work—I cannot run, you know that well!”

“I had not thought of that!” He let her go at once, rather shamefacedly. “I must go and see what has become of my jade,” he said a moment later.—“We shall meet at Berg?” he called to her from the bridle-path above.

When Ingunn and Dalla came down to the house in the evening, there was no one in the courtyard, but when the door of Lady Magnhild’s living-room was opened, they heard laughter and loud voices within. Lady Magnhild had guests, two young maids, Dagny and Margret, the twin daughters of one of her foster-daughters, and this evening a number of young people had come to Berg, the girls’ kinsfolk and their friends.

Ingunn went into her grandmother’s house. Taking the bowl on her knees, she sat by the bedside and gave the old lady porridge and milk, taking a spoonful herself now and then, after that she took a knife and a basket and went out. The evenings were already fine and bright, and cummin and other wild herbs had come up on the sunny slope facing the bay, below the Bride’s Acre, as they called the best and largest cornfield on the place. She wished to dig up a basketful and make broth for her grandmother—the old lady must need to cleanse her body of rheum and unwholesome humours after the winter.

The plants were so small and young, before she had filled her basket the grey-blue dusk of the spring evening had fallen upon the land. As she came up toward the house she was met by a tall, slight man coming down in the twilight—Teit, the Icelander.

“Is it so—must you go out and toil and swink so late?” he asked kindly. He put his hand into her basket, took up a handful of the green herbs, and smelled them. Then he took hold of her wrist and stroked it gently up and down.

“There is frolic and dance in the hall. Will you not join in it, Ingunn? Come—and I will sing the best I can.”

Ingunn shook her head.

“Surely she cannot be so hard on you, your mistress? All the others are within, the whole household—”

“ ’Twould surprise them if I came,” said Ingunn quietly. “ ’Tis long since I was seen in the young folks’ dance. Dagny and Margret would wonder, if I went in to them and their friends.”

“ ’Tis only that they are jealous of your beauty. They like it not that the maid is fairer than—” He clasped her, crushing the basket she held before her. “I shall come to you by and by,” he whispered.

Ingunn stood for a while before the door, looking out into the grey spring night and listening to the sound of song and harping which came faintly from Magnhild’s hall. She would not go in there—they were young and wanton. But there could not be any harm in it if she let Teit in tonight. She too had a mind to talk with a stranger once again. She left the door ajar and lay down fully clad.

The time dragged on, and she tried to deny to herself that she was disappointed at his not coming after all. At last she must have fallen asleep—she was awakened with a start by the man’s jumping into her bed and lying down beside her, in no very seemly fashion. But when she thrust him roughly from her, he was tame at once.

He excused himself, saying there had been so much noise and revelry in the hall. But when Ingunn lay so still and answered so coldly to all he told her of their merry-making, Teit grew more and more subdued. At last he said meekly: “You must know, what rejoiced me most was that I was to speak with you—and now you are angry with me, I wis? My sweet, what would you that I should say to you that will give you pleasure in the hearing?”

“Nay, that you must find for yourself,” said Ingunn; she fell to laughing again. “If you have come a-courting, you must not ask me how to set about it!”

“How so? Could I then win your heart—would you not gladly leave Berg, Ingunn?”

“Oh—oh—that may well be—”

“Would you have a mind to flit over to Iceland and dwell there?”

“Is it very far to Iceland?” asked Ingunn.

Teit said yes. But it was a good land to live in, better than Norway—in any case better than the Upplands, for here the winter
was so horridly cold. At home where he came from there was many a winter with no snow on the ground—the sheep were out all year round and the ponies.—This sounded tempting to Ingunn, for she too thought the winter was horrid—when the beast starved in the byre, and the bedcover was frozen fast to the wall in the morning, and one’s feet were always cold, and one had to break a hole in the ice for every drop of water wanted in the house.

Teit waxed eloquent as he spoke of his native land. Ingunn thought it must be beautiful—those heaths, where they herded sheep and goats in the autumn, must be like the mountain she had climbed, when they were north in the dale. The world was wide and great—for the men, who could roam afar in it. She fell to thinking of Olav, how he had roamed abroad—to England and Denmark and Sweden—Teit had seen no other lands but Iceland and Norway. She wished Olav had been one who would tell her something of all he had seen—but Olav was always so silent about the things that had happened to him. But it might be because Teit had great learning—she had never thought that a learned man could be so young and frank and full of life. But then she had never before met a layman who was a clerk—save Arnvid, and he was so much older and so serious-minded.

At last they grew sleepy, both of them—several times their talk came to a standstill. Then the boy crept closer to her and began to fondle and caress her. Ingunn repelled him, at first rather sleepily and half-heartedly—but then she took fright, Teit was so wild. She bade him remember that Lady Aasa slept in the other bed; were she to wake and find that Ingunn had a bedfellow, it would go ill with her.

Teit made some show of wailing and lamenting, as if in jest-but then he mended his manners, wished her good-night, and thanked her. Ingunn followed him to the door and barred it—then she saw that it was already past midnight.

She was up late next morning and it was the middle of the day before she was out in the courtyard. She caught sight of the Icelander, who was hovering by the stable door, looking as if he had sold butter and not been paid for it. Ingunn went up to him, wished him good-morning, and thanked him for their last meeting.

Teit feigned not to see her outstretched hand; he gazed gloomily before him.

“ ’Twas a good jest you thought to play on me, that—I was such a dullard that you could cozen me to your heart’s content?”

“I know not what you mean!”

“Was it not a fine conceit to lead on a poor young lad to woo you—the daughter of Berg?”

“I am not the daughter of Berg, Teit—the niece am I. That makes a great difference.”

Teit looked at her suspiciously.

“I thought it was
you
who jested—when you spoke of wooing, and when you would fondle—I took it not for earnest. But I did not believe you would mock me—for my simplicity, I mean. And you must know that I, who have never been beyond these parts, where I was born, have little wit or knowledge; I thought it solace to speak with you, so wise and learned and far-faring a man as you are.”

She smiled at him with gentle entreaty. Teit looked down. “That you surely do not mean.”

“Yes, I mean it. I had thought perhaps you would stay here some days—and that I should be cheered by hearing and learning more of you.”

“Nay, I must go home now. But I expect that Gunnar Bergsson will send me hither again after the holy-days,” he said, a little annoyed.

“Then you will be welcome!” Ingunn gave him her hand in farewell and went back to her house.

A
RNVID
F
INNSSON
came down at John’s Mass to see to his aunt-it was up and down with Mistress Aasa now; she might go out at any moment, but she might also live a good while yet, if it was God’s will. Arnvid had heard no more news of Olav since his last visit.

The day after he came, he and Ingunn were walking together in the courtyard. Then Teit Hallsson came in, ran past them, and went into Magnhild’s house. Arnvid stopped and followed the young man with his eyes: “He has errands here day after day, that clerk?”

Ingunn said yes.

“I know not whether you ought to talk so much with him, Ingunn—”

“Why so?—know you aught of him?” she asked after a moment.

“I heard of him at Hamar,” said Arnvid curtly.

“What was it?” asked Ingunn rather uneasily. “Do they charge him with—any
vice?”

“A double one,” said Arnvid quietly, as though with reluctance. It was Master Torgard, the cantor, who had first had the knave in his service, and he praised him too. The Icelander wrote the fairest hand, and he wrote quickly and correctly; he also knew how to illuminate, so Master Torgard had entrusted him with drawing and colouring the initials in an antiphonal and in a copy of the law of the land, and the work was fairly done. And when the bookbinder’s wife, who usually helped her husband, fell sick, Teit had assisted the man in her place, and he proved to be as skilful a bookbinder as the Bishop’s own man. So Master Torgard had been loath to send the lad away. But his weakness was that he went clean out of his wits when he touched dice or tables. And there was a good deal of such play in the town. He was a man who could play away hose and shoes, this Teit, and then he would come home to his master in borrowed clothes. In short, he had no sense to take care of his own welfare—he was in debt to ale-wives and chapmen. Unwilling as he was to be rid of so skilful a writer, Master Torgard thought that for the boy’s own sake he must get him disposed where so many temptations would not beset his feet. He was in other ways a likable fellow, the cantor had said. But when the Sheriff at Reyne required a clerk who was good at reading and writing, Master Torgard had got the Icelander the place.

That he had also been involved in some irregularities with women Arnvid thought there was no need to mention to Ingunn; he was loath enough to spread rumours about the boy in any case. But he thought he must tell her this other thing about Teit—the Icelander had borrowed money from Master Torgard’s old sisters and the like.

The day before John’s Mass the people of Berg had been to morning mass—it was Sir Viking’s anniversary—and as they were on their way home from church, a terrible thunderstorm broke.
It rained so that one would have thought the world had not seen the like since the days of Noah. The church folk sought shelter under some great overhanging rocks; for all that, they were drenched to the skin when they reached home late in the day.

Tora Steinfinnsdatter was visiting her aunt for the holy-day and had brought her two eldest children with her. She had been very friendly with her sister this time, and in the course of the afternoon she came into Aasa’s house to get Ingunn to come over to them—they had several guests today.

Ingunn sat crouching by the fire on the hearth; she had let down her hair to get it to dry quicker. She objected at first that she could not leave her grandmother. Tora thought Dalla might well sit with the old lady. Then Ingunn said she had no fitting gown to wear—her only Sunday kirtle had been soaked that day on the church road.

Tora walked about the room, humming to herself. She was still a very handsome young wife, though she had grown very stout with years. But she was bravely clad, in a blue velvet kirtle and a silken coif—and her brooches and gilt belt made a goodly show on her broad figure. She had opened Ingunn’s clothes-chest.

“Can you not put on this?” Tora came forward into the light of the fire carrying the green silk gown that her mother had given Ingunn for the feast after Mattias Haraldsson’s slaying.

Ingunn bent her head shyly. Tora went on: “You have not worn it many times, sister. I mind me I grudged it you a little when Mother gave it you.
Have
you worn it more than that one evening?”

“I wore it to the wedding at Eldridstad.”

“Ay, I heard say you looked so bravely there.” Tora sighed. “And I lay abed and was vexed I could not be there too—the greatest wedding there has been in the dale these twenty years. Come now, sister,” she begged. “Oh, I have such a mind to dance and play tonight—’tis the first summer I have been free to do the like since I was wed. Come now, my Ingunn—we have Arnvid to sing for us, and that Icelander, your friend—I know not which has the finer voice!”

Ingunn got up hesitatingly. With a laugh Tora took the gown, cast it over her head, and helped her to arrange the folds under the silver belt.

“My hair is still half wet,” murmured Ingunn in embarrassment, as she gathered it in her hands.

“Then let it hang loose,” laughed Tora. She took her sister’s hand and led her out.

“Nay, look at Aunt Ingunn, look at Aunt Ingunn!” screamed Tora’s little daughter as she came into the light. Ingunn picked up the child in her arms. The little maid threw her arms about her neck and sniffed at her half-dried hair, which enshrouded the woman like a mantle of some dark golden texture and reached below her knees. “Mother,” she cried, “I will have hair like that when I am a grown maid!”

“Ay, you may well wish that.”

Ingunn put the little one down. She was conscious of her own beauty tonight, it even dazzled herself. Olav, she thought, and her heart beat with a heavy thump—he
must
be here tonight. She passed her hand over her face, pushing the hair from it, and looked about her; she met Arnvid’s strange, dark glance; and Teit’s yellow-brown eyes blazed at her like torches. But the one she sought was not there. She clasped her hands crosswise over her bosom—
he
was not here who ought to have seen that tonight she was the fairest woman present. For an instant she felt she would rather run back to her grandmother, pluck off her finery, and give way to her tears.