The Axe (35 page)

The end that she saw before her—when she thought of it, she was filled with a horror that was like the stiffness of death; but it appeared to her that it was the end of the road, and she
must
reach it, though she would try to walk the last piece with closed eyes. Even when she sought a kind of easement by playing with the thought of crying for help, speaking to someone before it was too late—she never thought in earnest that she would do so. She must go on, to what she saw before her.

So far on in the spring the ground was almost always free of snow hereabouts. They would not find her footprints.—The great birch wood north of the manor stretched from the rocks where they smoked fish almost down to the lake. At its lower end it narrowed to a strip between crags—where folk hardly ever came, and where they could not be seen or heard from the house. The ice did not leave the bay so early. But on the southern shore and on the screes below the birch wood lay great heaps of stones that had been cleared off the fields in former times; there the people of Berg were used to throw down carcasses of horses and other beasts that died a natural death.

S
HE
had gone up into the bower where she had kept her things since Lady Aasa’s time, one morning of early spring—it was a few days before Lady Day. She sat and shivered with fur boots on her feet and a big sheepskin cloak over her clothes; it was now colder indoors than out. Long, glistening drops kept falling from the roof
past the opening, and the air quivered and steamed over the glimpse she saw of white roofs against the bright blue sky. She had taken the shutter from the little window to have more air—she could hardly get her breath, and she felt as though a heavy leaden hood lay upon her brain inside her skull; it pressed upon her so that the blood hammered in her neck behind the ears, and patches of red and black flickered before her eyes. She had taken refuge up here for fear anyone should speak to her—she had no strength to talk. But it was some small relief to be able to sit here in her prostration.

Ever afterwards she believed for certain that she had known what was coming when she heard the horsemen at the courtyard gate. She got up and looked out. That was Arnvid, the one who rode first through the gate; he had his black horse and the ring-bridle that he used when he went on a visit. The second horse she also knew to be his, a big-boned grey, which his groom rode. And the third horseman, he who was riding a high dappled roan, was Olav Audunsson—she knew that before he had come near enough for her to recognize him.

He looked up as he held in his horse, saw her at the window, and waved his hand in greeting. He was wearing a great black travelling-mantle, which lay in ample folds over the horse’s quarters and covered his legs down to the feet in the stirrups. He had thrown back the hood, and on his head he wore a black, foreign hat with a high crown and a narrow brim—his fair hair fringing it all round and falling to his eyebrows in front. He had smiled at her when he threw up his hand.

Ever afterwards it seemed to her she had been awakened from a nightmare at the instant she saw him—Olav had come home. To her misfortune, it was true—he would crush her in one way or another—she faced that at once. But it was as though the blinding gloom fell away from her on every side, and the devils who had swarmed about her like the stirring of the darkness itself, so thickly that they jostled each other with elbows and knees, while they surrounded her and led her blindly with them—they fell away from her too. She seemed to know, even as she came down the stairs of the loft, that, now Olav was come, she could do naught else than tell him all and accept her doom from him.

Olav stood there with the house-carls who had come to take the strangers’ horses—he turned toward her. With a pang of
wounded pride she saw how handsome he was, and she had fallen away from him—those black clothes suited the bright fairness of the man so well. He gave her his hand. “Well met, Ingunn—” Then he had a sight of her wasted face. And, unheedful of good manners and of all the strangers who stood by, he threw his arms about her, drew her to him, and gave her a kiss full on the mouth. “ ’Twas a long time you had to wait for me, Ingunn my dear. But now it is over, now I am come to take you home!”

He released her, and she and Arnvid greeted each other with a kiss on the cheek, as became kinsfolk.

She stood by while the young men cried: “All hail!” to Lady Magnhild. They told her laughing that Ivar was with them, but they had ridden from him up by the church—for neither the Galtestad sorrel nor his master was in good trim for speedy travelling.

“Nay, you know how angry he was with the haste you made in your young days,” laughed Lady Magnhild. “But since you have put off that bad habit, Olav, I believe my brother has grown more and more fond of you!”

“Have I ever seen such a fair day?” thought Ingunn. The hard snow shone like silver in the spring sun, over the fields and out on the bay. After the mild weather earlier in the week, all the snow had vanished from the woods, and the bare ground shone with young grass, as though newly washed. Across the fields the aspen trees stood with pale green stems within the brown, leafless groves.

And she felt joy bubbling up in her heart—that the world was so full of sunshine and beauty and gladness. And she had put herself outside it, banished herself to her corner. For all that, it was a good thing that it was so good to live—for the others, for all who had not undone themselves. And when at that moment she felt a violent quickening of the child within her, her own heart seemed to stir and answer it—“No, no, I no longer wish you ill.…”

They sat at table, and Ingunn listened in silence to the men’s talk. She learned that it was intended Arnvid and Ivar should go on the very next day, northward to Haftor Kolbeinsson, and place in his hands the third quarter of the blood-money for Einar. Olav held that it was more seemly he himself should not meet Haftor until he came to pay the rest of the sum, when at the same time he would receive Ingunn and her dowry at the hands of her kinsmen.

“You have no mind to go farther with us, I guess,” chuckled Ivar Toresson. “I believe ’tis not your purpose to stir from Berg till you be driven out of the house!”

“Ay, so long as Lady Magnhild will grant me shelter, and fodder for my horse.” He laughed with the others, at the same time giving Ingunn a rapid glance out of the corner of his eye. “Sooth to say, I have most liking to stay here, make an end of this matter between Haftor and me—and take Ingunn with me, so soon as I go southward to Hestviken.”

“I doubt not that could be done,” said Arnvid.

“Ay, I guess what you mean, and I thank you for it—but nevertheless I will not ask more help of you, Arnvid, since I can make shift without it. And I must do as I told you at Galtestad—go south and see how things look at Hestviken, before I bring my wife thither; and fetch the money I am to get in Oslo. And ’twill be far easier to collect the men who ought to be witnesses to our atonement if the feast be held at the time folk are on their way homeward from the Things—whether you wish that I shall receive Ingunn here or at Galtestad. Ivar is right in saying that, since this suit has been so long drawn out and tortuous, it should be brought to an end as openly as may be.”

When folk went home from the Things—that was the middle of summer. The thought crossed Ingunn’s mind like a whisper from the devils that had had her in their power the whole winter. But now she did not even feel tempted. It was impossible that she could go the rest of that road, now she had seen Olav again. All that she had fancied of her life at Hestviken with him and their children hovered before her mind. To that she could never return—if she tried to free herself of her secret in the gloom of night and hide it among the rocks, it would avail her nothing. Never more could she come to Olav.

Ivar only held up his hands in humorous amazement as he told the others that Olav had not yet set foot in Hestviken. Had anyone ever heard of such a man!

Olav laughingly excused himself—he turned red at the old man’s teasing and it made him look very young. He looked younger, more like his former self, than when he was here last—though he now had some lines across his straight, round neck, and when he stretched, a red scar could be seen under his wristband. And his face was thinner and more weatherbeaten. For all that, he looked
very young—and Ingunn guessed this was because he was so happy. Her heart sank sickeningly—would it be a
great
grief she was bringing upon him, when he heard that she had thrown herself away?

But he had been given grace, he had got his estate back, she understood that he was a man of some wealth. He had now sold Kaaretorp, the farm he had owned in Elvesyssel, where he had dwelt when at length he had been allowed to return to the country, last autumn. It would not be difficult for Olav to find a better match than she would have been—according to the agreement with her family he would have received no great portion with her, she understood.

Olav went out with her when she was crossing the yard to go to bed. “Do you sleep alone in Aasa’s house? Ay, then ’twould scarce be fitting if I came in when you are in bed,” he sighed, and gave a little laugh.

“Nay, we can scarce do that.”

“But tomorrow night? Can you not get one of the maids to sleep in the house with you—so that we may speak privily in the evenings?”

He clasped her to him, with awkward haste, so hard that she uttered a groan, and kissed her before he let her go.

Ingunn lay awake, trying to think of the future. But it was like trying to clear a path for herself amid a fall of rocks too heavy for her to move. She had no power to think what would become of her now. Nevertheless, she had staggered as far as this in a blinding darkness that lived and moved with unseen terrors, and now she saw the day before her—even if it was as grey and hopeless and impassable as a rainy day in midwinter. Forward she must go: from what she had brought upon herself there was no escape, unless she sought refuge in hell.

She knew that she had lost her rights. She had lost them already in giving herself to Olav without the knowledge and consent of her lawful guardians—they had let her know that plainly enough. If her kinsfolk had afterwards been willing to grant her the right of inheritance, this was for Olav’s sake—since they had changed their view of him and found out that it was more profitable to accept his offer of atonement and let him take her to wife in lawful fashion. What they would do when they heard that she
had made it impossible for Olav to take her—of that she dared to think only vaguely. When it came to their ears that she was with child—and the father was a man whom it were bootless for her kinsmen to pursue. They would have to let Teit go—they could have no profit of him, and if they would seek him out and punish him, the shame would only be made worse—when it was heard that she had let herself be seduced by such a man.

No, she could not guess what they would do with her—and it. But tomorrow—or in two or three days at the latest—she would have to make trial of it. And, impossible as it was for her to imagine it—it was nevertheless as sure as death that when the birch was green, she would be sitting here with her bastard in her lap, and then she would have to accept all that her kinsfolk might visit upon her in their wrath at her bringing such shame on them all, and at being forced to support her and the child.

She had bowed so completely beneath her fate that her thoughts of yesterday seemed scarcely real, when she believed she could cast off her burden. Her only thought now was that she must drag this child with her all the rest of her life. Nor did she yet feel anything like kindness or affection for it; but it was there, and she must go through with it.

Only for a moment—at the thought that Tora might again claim her for Frettastein, and she saw herself with
her
child, two outcasts, living in Haakon’s house among his rich children—only then did something wholly new awaken within her, the first tiny stirring of an instinct to protect her own offspring.

It was her brothers and sister who before all others had the duty of providing for their sustenance. That meant Haakon on Tora’s behalf and her two young brothers, whom she had scarcely seen during these years while they were growing into men. Oh, but now she might perhaps dare to hope that Lady Magnhild would be charitable enough to let her remain at Berg, until she had given birth to the child.

Arnvid—she thought of him. If he would offer to receive them; he would be kind to them both. In spite of his being Olav’s best friend—he was the friend of
all
who needed help. What if she told her story to Arnvid—to Arnvid and not to Olav? He could speak to Olav and to Lady Magnhild—and she would be spared what was as bad as walking into a living flame.

But she knew that she dared not do this. How she should find
courage to speak to Olav she could not tell—but worst of all she feared to hide the truth from Olav. He it was who was her master, he it was whom she had failed, and all at once she felt that, when she had gone through this meeting with Olav, it would come about of itself that she must fall on her knees to God repenting her sin and all the sins she had committed in her whole
life—quia peccavi nimis cogitatione, locutione, opere, et omissione, mea culpa—
the words arose in her of themselves. For each time she had said them, kneeling by Brother Vegard’s knee, they were now illumined and brought to life; as when the dark glass of the church window was suddenly illuminated by the sunshine—“because I have sinned most grievously, in thought, word, deed, and omission,
through mine own fault.”

She arose to her knees in the bed and said her evening prayers—it was long since she had dared.
Mea culpa—
she had been afraid of being saved from doing what she wished and accepting what she had brought upon herself. Now it dawned on her that, when she received God’s forgiveness for the evil she had done to herself and to Olav, she would no longer desire to escape her punishment. The mere sight of Olav had been enough to make her see the nature of Love. She had done him the most grievous wrong. And when he suffered, she could not wish herself a better lot. And behind it she caught a glimpse, as in an image, of the origin of Love. In the cup which our Lord was compelled to receive that evening in the Garden of Gethsemane He had seen all the sin that had been committed and was to be committed on earth from the creation of mankind to the last judgment and all the distress and misery that men had caused to themselves and others thereby. And since God had suffered, because of the suffering her own fault would bring her, she too would desire to be punished and made to suffer every time she thought of it. She saw that this was a different suffering from any she had suffered hitherto; that had been like falling from rock to rock down a precipice, to end in a bottomless morass—this was like climbing upward, with a helping hand to hold, slowly and painfully; but even in the pain there was happiness, for it led to something. She understood now what the priests meant when they said there was healing in penance.