Chapter 2

The priest, who was a serious priest, and came from the south, was interested in Gudrid, and wanted her to confess and communicate; but she would not. "No, I couldn't do that," she said, "without asking my foster-mother."

"Ask her, then, my daughter," said the priest.

"But she would have to ask my father," said Gudrid, "who would not allow it."

"But your father is a Christian, surely?" said the priest.

"Certainly he is a Christian. He went into the river to be one."

"Then he will order you to do your duty."

Gudrid shook her head. "No, no. He would not like it at all."

The priest spoke to Halldis about it, and scared her. "It is not the custom here," she said, "but I will ask Orme." The priest himself asked Orme, who rubbed his chin. "One thing at a time is a good rule," he said. "We in Iceland are not much given to private talks between men and women. Husband and wife is all very well. And Thorbeorn is a peculiar man. I recommend you to wait for a little. These are early days for new customs."

The priest was vexed. He did not care to be called a man.

III

The second summer after Gudrid came to Erne Pillar a fine ship came in from Norway with a full cargo. She came in late in the evening, and everybody was on the shore to see her. Orme knew whose she was and all about her. She was Einar's ship, he said, and overdue. In the morning she would discharge her cargo in his warehouse, "and then," he said to Gudrid, "there will be matters for you to see to, which will last you a good while. Fine cloth, Einar always brings, and embroidered lengths from Russia. We shall have you going as gay as a kingfisher about the ways."

Nothing was done that night except that Orme was rowed out to the ship and stayed drinking with the master till late. But in the morning, when Gudrid went to Mass, she saw men bringing up the cargo from the quay; and when she came back from Mass, there, at the door of Orme's warehouse, was Orme himself talking to a stranger who had foreign clothes on him, a gold chain round his loins, from which hung a goodly knife in a sheath, and rings in his ears. Gudrid, being well brought up, looked neither to the right nor left, but dipped her head to her foster-father as she went by. She had on her sea-blue gown, and a blue silk handkerchief knotted in her hair. The handkerchief was there in obedience to the priest, who had told her she must not come to church bare-headed, even in the summer-time. The morning being fresh, her cheeks were a-flower with roses.

Orme greeted her with a happy word as she sped by him, but Einar, who was the stranger present, the master of the ship, looked after her, and presently said, "Tell me, who is that beautiful person?"

Orme told him who she was and of what stock. Einar's colour was high. "She is a prize for a good man indeed," he said. "And many and many a man has tried after her, beyond doubt?"

"Many and many a man," said Orme; "you are right there. But she is not for the first comer, nor yet for the second. I won't answer for herself, if herself had anything to say in it--which isn't likely. But for her father the Franklin, I will say as much as this, that he's a great man, and knows it, though not so well to do as he was. And he will be hard to come at in the matter of Gudrid."

Einar said no more about her just then, but turned to his affairs and was busy all day long. Then, at supper-time, Orme took him home to his house, where he was to stay so long as his occasions kept him in the country. Halldis made him very welcome, and then Gudrid came into the hall, and he had a greeting for her. He was young and fresh-coloured, and showed fine white teeth when he smiled, which was often. He produced his bales, presents for Halldis and Orme; and presently, while they were all pulling over the things, he held up a jointed girdle of wrought silver with crystals set in every square of it. This he offered to Gudrid.

"For you, lady, if you will accept of it," he said. Gudrid drew back and blushed. Then she looked at Halldis.

"Oh, may I?" she asked.

Halldis, who had her hands full of scarlet cloth, looked at the glittering thing. "It is too good to refuse," she said. "And why should you refuse it?"

"You will make me proud and contented if you will take it," Einar said. "It will be a kind action on your part."

"Einar speaks well," said Orme. "Put it about you, Gudrid." Gudrid put the belt round her waist and fastened it.

"That's a good fit," said Halldis. "It might have been made for you."

Einar was still looking at Gudrid, and smiling all the time.

"Does it please you, lady?" he said.

"It is beautiful," said Gudrid.

"It ought to be," Einar said. Then she thanked him fairly, and turned and ran away to show herself to the maids in the bower. Einar was very thoughtful for a time; but brightened up when Gudrid and the girls brought in the meal, and served it. He told tales of his voyages and entertained the company.

A very good tale he told of a friend of his called Biorn--Biorn Heriolfsson--who was a ship-man like himself, and had come home to Iceland two winters back expecting to find his father at home. But his father in the meantime had up-stick with everything and gone off to Greenland after Eric Red. That put Biorn out, because he was a man who liked old customs. It had always been his way to spend the winters at home with his father, and now here was his father flitted to Greenland. So Biorn stood on the deck of his ship, very much put out. "Shall we break bulk?" somebody asked him. "No," says Biorn, "you will not do that. Let me think." When he had thought he told the ship's company that he was minded to go to Greenland after his father, and they agreed to make the voyage. He fastened down his cargo again, refitted, and away. But it was one thing to resolve upon Greenland, and another thing to hit it off. He had not sailed those seas before, and falling in with bad weather, was driven out of his course; and then--to make matters worse--there came down upon him with a northerly wind a thick blanket of white fog in which he could get no hint of his whereabouts and drifted upon a strong current, fairly smothered up. He knew no more where he was than Einar himself could tell them; he lost count of days and nights, but estimated that he was three weeks at sea before the fog lifted and he saw the stars. In the morning the sun rose fair out of the sea, and he got a bearing. More than that, he saw before him--like a low bank of cloud--a strange coast lying on his starboard bow. He could not tell where he wag got to, or what land that might be, but was sure it was not Greenland. The land lay low, and was dark with woods. The shore was sandy, with hummocks of blown sand upon it, covered with grass; the surf very heavy. He coasted that country for two days and nights with a good wind off-shore, but would not try for a landing anywhere, being set upon Greenland and sure that he was not there. Other lands he saw, and a great island covered with snow, and ice-mountains rising sheer out of the sea--but still he kept on his course. After that he had a spell of heavy weather with green seas over him constantly; and last of all he saw another land, on his port bow, which he said was Greenland.

A great ness ran out far into the sea, which he made with safety, and found smooth water, a town, an anchorage, and a man in a boat fishing. Biorn drew alongside, feeling for his anchorage, and laughed to himself when the man looked up from his fishing and presently raised his hand and sawed the air once or twice. "Hail to you, father," said Biorn. "I thought you would be coming along," said his father. "You have hit me off to a nicety." Biorn said, "I don't know about the nicety of it. I have been seven weeks at sea since I left Iceland, and no man alive knows where I have been--least of all myself." "Be careful of my lines," said his father. "I am in the way to catch monsters, and have pots down and out all round me." At that Biorn threw his head up and laughed till he cried. "A scurvy on your monster pots," he said. "Here am I come from beating round the watery world to seek you, and you think only of pots."

Gudrid was thrilled to hear of the new lands; but Orme, who knew Heriolf, Biorn's father, was tickled to death with the old man's quirks. "That is Heriolf all over," he said. "And to say that such a man could get on with Eric Red. Greenland is not wide enough to hold those two."

But Gudrid held Einar with the most beautiful pair of eyes in Iceland. "And what country was it that Biorn found first?" she asked.

Einar said, "I can't tell you. He must have drifted south of Greenland, south and by west. I believe that he crossed the western ocean, which no man has ever yet done. It is a notable deed--but a thousand pities that he made no landing."

But Gudrid still gazed at him, and into him. "And will you not go yourself, and seek out that new country?"

Einar said, "I have often thought of it. It would be a fine adventure. But just now I have another adventure in my mind, which may delay me.

"And what adventure is that?"

Einar said, "I cannot tell you at the moment. It is not a settled thing by any means."

Halldis looked at Orme, and Orme nodded his head.

After that Einar saw much of Gudrid, and used to tell her tales of the sea. He was busy, of course, most of the day, but found time in the evenings; and in the mornings, too, he had the habit of going to church at Mass-time and kneeling behind her. She was pleased to find him there, and the first time showed it plainly. After that she was more than pleased, but careful not to show it. They used to walk home together, and sometimes did not go the straight road, but went round by the frith and looked at Einar's ship lying out at her moorings, swaying with the tide.

One day, looking at the ship there, Gudrid asked him again what his adventure was, and whether anything was settled. No, he said, nothing was settled; but he hoped it might be settled soon. "It does not depend altogether upon me," he said. "My mind was made up at once."

"But," said Gudrid, "if that adventure were settled and done with, would you not then think of seeking the new country which Biorn saw?"

"Well, I might do that," Einar replied. "But a man tires of the sea after a time, and I have had plenty of it. I am very well off, you must know. I might set up my house-pillars, and find me a wife."

"But you would not do that?"

"Ah," said Einar, "but I am sure that I would." She kept her gaze for the tide in the frith, feeling it would be indiscreet to say more.

A little later on he told her what the adventure was on which his heart was set, and when she had heard it she gave him her hand. But she told him that it did not rest with her--as he knew very well it did not. They sat together on the brae in the sun, and her hand remained in his keeping. Presently she said, "If my father says that we may, we will go out to find the new country together."

"We will go where you will," said Einar. "It will be all one to me."

Again she thought, with her face set towards the sea. Then she turned suddenly and put her arms round his neck.

IV

Einar spoke to Orme about the affair, and Orme put on a scared look, though he had been expecting something of the kind. "You will find Thorbeorn hard to deal with," he said.

Einar replied, "Hard or not, I intend to come at him, for I love Gudrid, and she loves me. She is worth fighting for, being as good as she is fair."

"She is so," said Orme; "but, to tell you the truth, I don't know how you will set about it."

"I shall ask you to be my friend in it," Einar said. "He will listen to you sooner than any one."

Orme put his head on one side. "I don't care much about your errand. You will get me into hot water with Thorbeorn. Don't I tell you that he is a great man, an old settler and what-not? He knows his forefathers back to Baldur the Beautiful."

"You are telling me what I know already," said Einar, who was rather red, and showed a frown. "My own birth is no such thing. My father was a freedman. Well, I couldn't help that."

"If I am telling you stale news, neighbour," said Orme, "it is only that you may see what I have to tell Thorbeorn."

"Yes, yes, I know," Einar said. "He is a man of rank, and I no such thing. I grant it. But I have money, do you see? I am well off both in ships and credit; my name stands well in the world. And I am young, and he is old. I think I could be useful to Thorbeorn, if he would allow it--and I need not tell you I set no bounds in reason upon what I would put down for the sake of the match."

"Well," said Orme, "I will go and see him."

Gudrid could hear nothing of this until the morning; but then Einar told her what he had arranged with Orme. She now considered herself as pledged to Einar, though she was nothing of the kind. Loyalty to him persuaded her of it, and he found that very sweet, and was touched. They sat close together on the brae; she allowed him her hand, and rested her cheek on his shoulder. Einar, who was an honest young man, began to fear that he was doing wrong to allow it. But he could not resist a word or two for himself. He told her of his birth, saying that his father, Thorgar, of Thorgar's Fell, had been a freedman, but had done well since. "It is right you should know these things," he said.

Gudrid said that it was nothing to her; but Einar warned her that it might be much to her father. He went on: "To you perhaps it is enough that I love you dearly--and to me it is enough. But who knows? Maybe I shall not have the right to talk to you after to-morrow or next day. Now I wish to say this to you, that I shall never look at another woman, and will bind myself to you if you will accept it of me."

She sat erect at that and looked gravely at him. "You ought not to bind yourself," she said, "since I cannot."

"You cannot. I know that," he said. "But I both can and will."

Thereupon he brought out a handful of money from his breast and chose a gold coin of thin soft gold, with the head of a ragged old king on it. He told her where it came from, and how he had had it from a dead man after a battle in the mouth of a great river in Russia. Then he bit it in the middle with his teeth, and indented it fairly. He bent it to and fro until it was broken in half; and next he bored a hole in each portion, and gave one to Gudrid.

"Now I have tokened myself to you, my love," he said. "Do you wear that upon a chain which I will give you presently, and remember when you look at it, or take it in your hands, that I wear the fellow. If ever you want me, you have only to let that half-moon of gold come into Orme's hands, and sooner or later you will see me again. And so let it be between us from henceforward if you will."

She took the coin, and closed her hand upon it until he should give her the chain, but having it, she could not be to him as she had been before. She sat up straight and looked at the sea. Her hand was free for him; but he did not take it, and she felt sure he would not.

A constraint fell upon them; neither could find anything to say. Fate was between them.

So it was until Orme came back with his news.

He had nothing good to report. Thorbeorn had heard him with impatience, and as soon as he had ended put himself into a rage. His thin neck stiffened, his faded eyes showed fire. "Do you offer for my daughter on behalf of a thrall's son? Well for him he put you forward instead of a smaller man. But I take it ill coming from you whom I have always treated as a friend."

Orme had excused himself on the score of Einar's merits--for which he could answer, he said--and well-being. "He has two ships at sea in the Norway trade. His credit stands high on each side the water. There's many a worse man than he well married--and he loves your Gudrid beyond price. There is nothing he will not put down for her."

But that had wounded Thorbeorn in his most sensitive part. He knew that he was ruined and could not bear that other men should know it also. "It is hard that his money should tempt you to insult a poor man," he said. "I am what I am, and that is a man not so poor but he can keep his honour clear. You must think me poor indeed in other things than goods when you ask me to trade my own flesh and blood. Let me hear no more of it for fear I may get angry. It is the case, I see, that I rate my daughter's marriage more highly than you seem able to conceive of. I made a great mistake when I left her in your charge precisely to avoid what you have brought upon me. Now she shall come home, where she can be valued at the worth of her name and person. That is what I have to say to you, Orme." With that he had looked Orme straight in the face, and there had been no more to urge.

Einar heard it from Orme, but it was Halldis who told Gudrid the news. Gudrid received it in silence, but put her hand up and laid it over the token which fluttered in her bosom. "My pretty one," said Halldis, "I blame myself."

"No, no," Gudrid said, "you must not do that. Nobody is at fault." But Halldis thought Einar had been much to blame. She would have comforted Gudrid and made much of her if she had been able--but Gudrid would not have that. She served the table as before, and sat by Halldis afterwards while the men talked and passed the mead about. She was pale and silent, but did not give way, nor leave them till her usual time. When she was in her bed she sobbed, and buried her hot face in the bolster; but even then she did not cry. She was always impatient of deeds which led nowhere--and crying is a great deed.

In the morning they parted. "I shall sail as soon as may be now," he told her. "Iceland will be hateful to me if it hold us two apart."

"Maybe you will seek out the new country," she said, with a bleak smile.

"Maybe," he said. "But it may be you who see it first." She shook her head sadly.

"We do foolishly when we talk of my fate," she said, and then there was a silence which was like a winter fog. She broke it by throwing herself into his arms.

"Listen," she said with passion, "listen. They will give me to another man, but I shall be yours all the while. They might give me to two men, one on the heels of another, but it would be nothing. Do you believe it? You must believe it, you must."

"I believe it," said Einar; "but it is dreadful to talk about."

"No, it is not dreadful, because I tell you it is nothing," she said. "You are free to do what you will, and you offer me yourself. I did not like to accept it, because I thought I could give you nothing. But now I know I can. Tell me that you believe me, and then I must go."

He told her as he kissed her that he believed her--but it was not true. He did not believe her because he could not.

Then they parted. She went back to Orme's house, and he went his way along the shore of the frith.

V

Gudrid did not see Einar again. Kettle, the reeve of Bathbrink, came down to fetch her away, and by now she was behind him on his pad, while Einar was far into the fells. He did not return until late, and then he told Orme that he should sail with the first tide. "Whither will you go?" He said that he must go back to Norway to discharge, and after that did not know what he should do. "I am in heavy trouble over the way this has turned out. At such times a man cares little what may become of him."

"Yes, but men get over it," Orme said.

"I think that I shall not. There is that in her which will prevent me."

"She is like all women, I fancy," Orme said; "very tender where they are loved. They set more store upon love than men do, and whosoever offers it to them, it is a valuable thing, and enhances the offerer."

"That is not Gudrid's way," said Einar.

Orme felt sorry for him.

"Thorbeorn will make a marriage for Gudrid, you may be sure," he said. "And I dare swear she will be a good wife to the man who gets her."

"It is certain," said Einar.

Early next day he weighed his anchor and went down the frith. Now he leaves the tale.

But he did not leave Gudrid's mind, who now had little else to think of. Her father said nothing to her of the reason which had brought her home. He was stately and remote. Nor did he mention his difficulties, which were gathering so close about his house. But they were common knowledge at Bathbrink, and Gudrid heard of little else from morning till night. There was scarcity there, not of provision, but of guests. No young men came about the house, or filled the great table in the hall. Other men came, who wanted money, and went grumbling away, with voices which rose higher in complaint as they went further from the house. Thorbeorn himself was often away, and used to come back more silent and proud than he had gone out. The winter set in with wind and drifting snow. Darkness drew closer about the country; the sky was lemon colour, the fells were black. It was the time of great fires, and long festivals within-doors; but Thorbeorn's hall remained empty.

In the face of such manifest misery the love she had given to Einar and received from him shone far off like a winter star, which had no warmth for the blood. She used to look fondly at her token and try to make herself believe that his strong teeth had bitten the deep gauffres into its edge. When she succeeded the scene came back to her, she felt again as she had when he had been standing there beside her on the brae overlooking the racing water. Her eyes grew misty as she looked away into the dark, holding her relic clenched in her hand. But it was not real; these were only dreams of him.

So the winter came upon Bathbrink and lapped it in snow, and love grew numb with cold.

VI

Towards winter's end Thorbeorn roused himself. He had made up his mind to face his troubles, and now saw a way of doing so with nobility. He would break up his homestead, sell his estates, pay his debts, and go abroad. That would be at once just and of good appearance in the world.

But he would not go east where he would find a life ready made for him, with the same state to maintain, and be no better off than he had been at home. It was for Greenland he intended, a new country with but few settlers in it yet. An old friend of his, one Eric Red, had gone out there for good reasons some years ago, and had often sent him messages begging him to join his colony. Now he would do it. The thought warmed him.

He set the business afoot at once, and sold the whole of his estate for a good price. When he had paid his creditors, which he did very particularly and with a great air, he had a good sum over and above the cost of his ship. His spirits rose, his taste for splendid hospitality revived. He resolved to give a great feast to all his friends and acquaintances, such a feast as should make men say that nobody had ever confronted misfortune more gallantly than Thorbeorn of Bathbrink.

It was a noble feast, lasting three days and nights; the greatest there had been made within the memory of men. Everybody came, for enmities were all forgotten. Orme was there from Erne Pillar, and Halldis was with him. Good Halldis embraced Gudrid, kissed her on both cheeks, and held her closely, very ready to revive memories. "And what have you to say to it? And how will you face the hardships of the strange land?" Gudrid was very guarded in her answers. "I shall like to see Greenland," she said; "we used to talk about it at Erne Pillar." It was true, Einar had told them of it, and of his friend Biorn who had found his father out there after seven weeks at sea.

"And you go out there without a husband?" said Halldis, with sympathy ready and waiting in her kindly eyes.