Lady Aashild held Kristin’s hand in her old, soft one, and spoke to her with kindly jesting; but Kristin could not answer a word. Then said Lady Aashild with a little laugh:
“Is she afraid of me, think you?”
“Nay, nay,” Kristin all but shouted. And then Lady Aashild laughed still more, and said to the mother:
“She has wise eyes, this daughter of yours, and good strong hands, nor is she used to be idle, I can see. You will need one by and by to help you tend Ulvhild, when I am gone. ’Twere well, therefore, you let Kristin be by me and help while yet I am here … she is old enough for that; eleven years is she not?”
Thereupon the Lady Aashild went out, and Kristin would have followed her, but Lavrans called to her from his bed. He lay flat upon his back with the pillows stuffed beneath his up-drawn knees; Lady Aashild had bidden that he should lie so, that the hurt in his breast might sooner heal.
“Now surely you will soon be well, sir father, will you not?” asked Kristin.
Lavrans looked up at her — the child had never said “sir” to him before. Then he said gravely:
“For me there is naught to fear; ’tis worse with your sister.”
“Ay,” said Kristin, and sighed.
She stood yet a little while by his bed. Her father said no more, and Kristin found naught to say. And when Lavrans after a while said she should go down to her mother and Lady Aashild, Kristin hastened out and ran across the courtyard down into the winter-room.
4
LADY AASHILD stayed on at Jörundgaard most of the summer. Thus it fell out that folk came thither seeking her counsel.… Kristin heard Sira Eirik fling at this now and then, and it came into her mind that her father and mother, too, were not pleased. But she put all thoughts of such things from her, nor did she ponder over what she thought of Lady Aashild, but was with her ever, and tired not of listening to the lady and of watching her.
Ulvhild still lay stretched upon her back in the great bed. Her little face was white to the lips, and dark rings had come about her eyes. Her lovely yellow hair had a stale smell, it had been unwashed for so long, and it had grown dark and lost all gloss and curl, so that it looked like old, burnt-up hay. She looked tired and suffering and patient; but she smiled faintly and wanly at her sister when Kristin sat down on the bedside by her and chattered and showed the child all the fine gifts that were for her from her father and mother and from their friends and kinsfolk from far around. There were dolls and wooden birds and beasts, and a little draught-board, trinkets and velvet caps and coloured ribbons; Kristin kept them all together in a box for her — and Ulvhild looked at them all with her grave eyes, and, sighing, dropped the treasures from her weary hands.
But when Lady Aashild came nigh, Ulvhild’s face lit up with gladness. Eagerly she drank the quenching and sleeping drinks Lady Aashild brewed for her; when Aashild tended her hurts she made no plaint, and lay happy listening when the lady played on Lavrans’ harp and sang — she had great store of ballads strange to the folk of the Dale.
Often she sang to Kristin when Ulvhild lay asleep. And then at times she would tell of her youth, when she dwelt in the South at the courts of King Magnus and King Eirik and their Queens.
Once as they sat thus and Lady Aashild told of these things, there slipped from Kristin’s lips a thought she had often had in mind:
“Methinks it is strange you can be so glad at all times, you who have been used to —” She broke off and grew red.
Lady Aashild looked down at the child with a smile:
“Mean you because I am parted from all that now?” She laughed quietly, and said: “I have had my happy time, Kristin, and I am not so foolish as to murmur, if now, since I have drunk up my wine and beer, I have to put up with skimmed milk and sour. Good days may last long if one lives wisely, and deals warily with what one has; all wise folk know that, and ’tis therefore, I trow, that wise folk must rest content with good days — for the best days of all cost very dear. In this world they call him a fool who wastes his heritage that he may make merry in the days of his youth. As to that, each man may deem as he lists. But that man only do I call a fool and a very dolt who rues his bargain after it is made; and twice a simpleton and a fool of fools is he who thinks to see more of his boon-companions after his heritage is gone …”
“… Is there aught amiss with Ulvhild?” she called gently across to Ragnfrid, who had made a sharp movement where she sat by the child’s bed.
“Nay, she sleeps well,” said the child’s mother, and came over to Lady Aashild and Kristin at the hearth. Her hands on the pole of the smoke-vent, she stood and looked down into Lady Aashild’s face.
“Kristin doth not understand such things,” she said.
“No,” answered the lady. “But she learned her prayers, too, I doubt not, before she understood them. The times when we need prayers or counsel, we are little like to be in a mood to learn, nor yet to understand.”
Ragnfrid drew her dark eyebrows together thoughtfully. At such times her bright, deep-set eyes looked like tarns below a dark-wooded hillside, so Kristin had often thought when she was little — or so she had heard others say. Lady Aashild looked at Ragnfrid with her little half-smile, and the mother seated herself upon the edge of the hearth, and, taking a twig, stuck it into the embers.
“But he who has wasted his heritage upon the sorriest goods — and thereafter beholds a treasure he would gladly give his life to own — think you not he must rue bitterly his own folly?”
“No doing without some rueing, Ragnfrid,” said Lady Aashild. “And he who is willing to give his life should make a venture and see what he can win —”
Ragnfrid plucked the burning twig from the fire, blew out the flame and bent her hand about the glowing end, so that it shone out blood-red from between her fingers.
“Oh! these are words, words, and only words, Lady Aashild.”
“Well,” said the other, “truly Ragnfrid, there is not much that’s worth buying so dear as with one’s life.”
“Nay, but there is,” said Ragnfrid passionately; and she whispered it so it could scarce be heard: “My husband.”
“Ragnfrid,” said Lady Aashild, in a low voice, “so hath many a maid thought when she strove to bind a man to her and gave her maidenhood to do it. But have you not read of men and maids who gave to God all they owned, went into a cloister or naked into the wilds, and repented after. Ay, they are called fools in the godly books. And ’twould sure be sinful to think God cheated them over their bargain.”
Ragnfrid sat quite still a while. Then Lady Aashild said:
“You must come now, Kristin; ’tis time we went and gathered dew for Ulvhild’s morning wash.”
Outside the courtyard lay all black and white in the moonlight. Ragnfrid went with them, through the farmyard, down to the gate of the cabbage garden. Kristin saw her mother’s thin dark figure leaning there, while she was shaking the dew from the big, icy-cold cabbage leaves, and the folds of the lady’s-mantles, into her father’s silver goblet.
Lady Aashild walked silent at Kristin’s side. She was there only to watch over her, for it was not well to let a child go out alone on such a night. But the dew had more virtue if gathered by an innocent maid.
When they came back to the gate Ragnfrid was gone. Kristin was shaking with the cold as she gave the icy silver cup into Lady Aashild’s hands. She ran in her wet shoes over toward the loft-room, where she slept now with her father. She had her foot upon the first step when Ragnfrid stepped out of the shadow of the balcony. In her hands she bore a steaming bowl.
“Here, I have warmed some beer for you, daughter,” said the mother.
Kristin thanked her mother gladly, and put the bowl to her lips. Then Ragnfrid asked:
“Kristin — the prayers and all the other things that Lady Aashild teaches you — you are sure there is naught sinful or ungodly in them?”
“That I can never believe,” answered the child. “There is Jesus’ name and the Virg
in Mary’s, and the names of the Saints in them all —”
“What is it she teaches you?” asked her mother again.
“Oh! — about herbs — and charms to stop running blood and cure warts and sore eyes — and moth in clothes and mice in the store-room. And what herbs one should pluck in sunshine, and which have virtue in the rain.… But the prayers I must not tell to any one, for then they lose their power,” said she quickly.
Her mother took the empty bowl and put it upon the step. Then suddenly she threw her arms around her daughter, and pressed her tightly to her and kissed her.… Kristin felt that her mother’s cheeks were wet and hot:
“May God and Our Lady guard and shield you from all evil — we have naught else but you, your father and I, that has not been touched by our ill-fortune. Darling, darling — never forget that you are your father’s dearest joy —”
Ragnfrid went back to the winter-room, undressed and crept into bed beside Ulvhild. She put an arm about the child and laid her cheek close to the little one’s, so that she felt the warmth of Ulvhild’s body and smelt the keen odour of her damp hair. Ulvhild slept heavily and soundly, as she ever did after Lady Aashild’s evening draught. The lady’s bedstraw, spread beneath the bedding, gave out a drowsy scent. None the less did Ragnfrid lie long sleepless, gazing at the little spot of light in the roof where the moon shone upon the smoke-hole’s pane of horn.
Over in the other bed lay Lady Aashild, but Ragnfrid never knew whether she slept or waked. The lady never spoke of their having known each other in former days — this frightened Ragnfrid. And it seemed to her she had never known such bitter sorrow and such haunting dread as now — even though she knew that Lavrans would have his full health again — and that Ulvhild would live.
It seemed as though Lady Aashild took pleasure in talking to Kristin, and with each day that passed the maid became better friends with her. One day, when they had gone to gather herbs, they sat together high up the hillside on a little green, close under the scree. They could look down into the farm-place at Formo and see Arne Gyrdsön’s red jerkin: he had ridden down the valley with them, and was to look after their horses while they were up the hillside seeking herbs.
As they sat, Kristin told Lady Aashild of her meeting with the dwarf-maiden. She had not thought of it for many years, but now it rose before her. And while she spoke, the thought came to her strangely that there was some likeness betwixt Lady Aashild and the dwarf-lady — though she knew well all the time they were not really like. But when she had told all, Lady Aashild sat still a while and looked out down the Dale; at length she said:
“You were wise to fly, since you were only a child then. But have you never heard of folk who took the gold the dwarfs offered, and after bound the troll in stone?”
“I have heard such tales,” said Kristin, “but I would never dare to do it. And methinks it is not a fair deed.”
“ ’Tis well when one dares not do what one doth not think a fair deed,” said Lady Aashild, laughing a little. “But it is not so well when one thinks a thing to be no fair deed because one dares not do it.… You have grown much this summer,” the lady said of a sudden. “Do you know yourself, I wonder, that you are like to be fair?”
“Ay,” said Kristin. “They say I am like my father.”
Lady Aashild laughed quietly.
“Ay, ’twould be best for you if you took after Lavrans, both in mind and body, too. Yet ’twould be pity were they to wed you up here in the Dale. Plainness and country ways let no man scorn; but they think themselves, these big folk up here, they are so fine that their like is not to be found in Norway’s land. They wonder much, belike, that I can live and thrive, though they bar their doors against me. But they are lazy and proud and will not learn new ways — and they put the blame on the old strife with the King in Sverre’s days. ’Tis all lies; your mother’s forefather made friends with King Sverre and received gifts from him; but were your mother’s brother to become one of our King’s men and wait upon his Court, he would have to trim himself up both without and within, and that Trond would not be at the pains to do. But you, Kristin, — you should be wedded to a man bred in knightly ways and curteisie —”
Kristin sat looking down into the Formo yard, at Arne’s red back. She scarce knew it herself, but when Lady Aashild talked of the world she had once moved in, Kristin ever thought of the knights and earls in Arne’s likeness. Before, when she was little, she had always seen them in her father’s shape.
“My sister’s son, Erlend Nikulaussön of Husaby, he might have been a fitting bridegroom for you — he has grown comely, has the boy. My sister Magnhild looked in on me last year as she passed through the Dale, and he with her. Ay, ’tis not like you could get him, but I had gladly spread the coverlid over you two in the bridal bed — he is as dark-haired as you are fair, and he has goodly eyes.… But if I know my brother-in-law aright, he has bethought him already for sure of a better match for Erlend than you.”
“Am I not a good match, then?” asked Kristin, wondering. She never thought of being hurt by anything Lady Aashild said, but she felt humbled and sad that the lady should be in some way better than her own folks.
“Ay, you are a good match,” said the other. “Yet you could scarce look to come into my kindred. Your forefather in this land was an outlaw and a stranger, and the Gjeslings have sat and grown moulded on their farms so long that soon they’ll be forgotten outside the Dale. But I and my sister had for husbands the nephews of Queen Margaret Skulesdatter.”
Kristin could not even pluck up heart to say it was not her forefather, but his brother, who had come to the land an outlaw. She sat and gazed at the dark hillsides across the Dale, and she thought of the day many years gone by, when she had been up on the upland wastes and seen how many fells there were ’twixt her own valley and the outer world. Then Lady Aashild said they must go home now, and bade her call on Arne. So Kristin put her hands to her mouth, and hallooed and waved her kerchief, till she saw the red spot in the farm-place move and wave back.
Not long after this Lady Aashild went home; but through the autumn and the first part of the winter she came often to Jörundgaard to spend some days with Ulvhild. The child was taken out of bed in the daytime now, and they tried to get her to stand, but her legs gave way beneath her when she put her feet to the ground. She was fretful, white and weary, and the laced jacket of horse-hide and thin withes which Lady Aashild had made for her plagued her sorely, so that she would rather lie still in her mother’s lap. Ragnfrid had her sick daughter for ever in her arms, so that Tordis had the whole care of the house now; and, at her mother’s bidding, Kristin went with Tordis to learn and to help.
Kristin longed for Lady Aashild between whiles, and sometimes the lady would chat much with her, but at other times the child would wait in vain for a word beyond the other’s greeting when she came and when she went. Lady Aashild sat and talked with the grown-up folk only. That was always the way when she had her husband with her, for it happened now at times that Björn Gunnarsön came with his wife. Lavrans had ridden to Haugen one day in the autumn to take the lady her leech’s fee — it was the very best silver tankard they had in the house, with a plate to match. He had slept there the night, and ever since he praised the farm mightily; it was fair and well ordered, and not so small as folks would have it, he said. And within the house all spoke of well-being, and the customs of the house were seemly, following the ways of great folks’ houses in the South. What he thought of Björn, Lavrans said not, but he welcomed him fairly at all times when he came with his wife to Jörundgaard. But the Lady Aashild Lavrans liked exceeding well, and he said he deemed most of the tales that had been told of her were lies. He said, too, ’twas most sure that twenty years since she could have had small need of witchcraft to bind a man to her — she was near the sixties now, yet she still looked young and had a most fair and winning bearing.
Kristin saw well that her mother liked all this but little. Of Lady Aashild, it is tru
e, Ragnfrid said naught; but once she likened Björn to the yellow, flattened grass one sometimes finds growing under big stones, and Kristin thought this fitted him well. Björn looked strangely faded; he was somewhat fat, pale and sluggish, and a little bald, although he was not much older than Lavrans. Yet one saw he had once been a very comely man. Kristin never came to speech with him — he spoke little, and was wont to sit in the same place where he first settled down, from the time he stepped into the room till he went to bed. He drank hugely, but one marked it but little on him; he ate scarce any food, but gazed now and again at one or another in the room with a fixed, brooding look in his strange, pale eyes.
They had seen naught of their kinsfolk at Sundbu since the mishap befell, though Lavrans had been over at Vaage more times than one. But Sira Eirik came to Jörundgaard as before; and there he often met Lady Aashild, and they were good friends. Folk thought this was good of the priest, for he was himself a very skilful leech. That, too, was doubtless one cause why the folk of the great estates had not sought Lady Aashild’s counsel, at least not openly, as they held the priest to be skilful enough, nor was it easy for them to know how they should bear themselves toward two folks who had been cast off, in a manner, by their own kin and fellows. Sira Eirik said himself they did not graze on one another’s meadows, and as to her witchcraft, he was not her parish priest — it might well be the lady knew more than was good for her soul’s health — yet one must not forget ignorant folk were all too ready to talk of witchcraft as soon as a woman was a bit wiser than her neighbours. Lady Aashild, on her side, praised the priest much, and was diligent at church if it chanced she was at Jörundgaard on a holy day.
Yuletide was sorrowful that year; Ulvhild could not yet put her feet to the ground, and they neither heard nor saw aught of the Sundbu folk. Kristin knew that it was talked of in the parish and that her father took it to heart. But her mother seemed to care naught; and Kristin thought this wrong of her.