The beggars behaved peaceably enough. Once the earless man tried to seize hold of Ingrid as she went back and forth to the table, but Bjørn got to his feet at once, barking and growling. Otherwise the group seemed despondent and weary; they had struggled much and gleaned little, they said in reply to the mistress’s questions. Surely things would be better in Nidaros. The old woman was pleased when Kristin gave her a goat horn containing a soothing salve made from the purest lamb oil and the water of an infant. But she declined when Kristin offered to soak her wimple with warm water and give her a clean linen cloth; well, she would agree to accept the cloth.
Nevertheless, Kristin had her young maid, Ingrid, sleep on the side of the bed next to the wall. Several times during the night Bjørn growled, but otherwise everything was quiet. Shortly past midnight the dog ran over to the door and uttered a couple of short barks. Kristin heard horses in the courtyard and realized that Gaute had come home. She guessed that Jofrid must have sent word to him.
The next morning Kristin filled the sacks of the beggars generously, and they hadn’t even passed the manor gate before she saw Jofrid and Gaute heading swiftly toward her house.
Kristin sat down and picked up her spindle. She greeted her children gently as they came in and asked Gaute about the hay. Jofrid sniffed; the guests had left a rank stench behind in the room. But her mother-in-law pretended not to notice. Gaute shifted his feet uneasily and seemed to have trouble telling her what the purpose of their visit might be.
Then Jofrid spoke. “There’s something I think it would be best for us to talk about, Mother. I know that you feel I’m more tight fisted than you deem proper for the mistress of Jørundgaard. I know that’s what you think and that you also think I’m diminishing Gaute’s honor by acting this way. Now I don’t have to tell you I was fearful last night about taking in that lot because I was alone on the estate with my infant and a few charity cases; I saw that you realized this as soon as you had a look at your guests. But I’ve noticed before that you think I’m miserly with food and inhospitable toward the poor.
“That is not so, Mother, but Jørundgaard is no longer a grand estate belonging to a royal retainer and wealthy man as it was in the time of your father and mother. You were the child of a rich man and kept company with rich and powerful kinsmen; you made a wealthy marriage, and your husband took you away to even greater power and splendor than you had grown up with. No one can expect that you in your old age should fully understand how different Gaute’s position is now, having lost his father’s inheritance and sharing half of your father’s wealth with many brothers. But
I
dare not forget that I brought little more to his estate than the child I carried under my bosom and a heavy debt for my friend to bear because I consented to his act of force against my kinsmen. Things may get better with time, but I’m obliged to pray to God that my father might have a long life. We are young, Gaute and I, and don’t know how many children we are destined to have. You
must
believe, mother-in-law, that I have no other thought behind my actions than what is best for my husband and our children.”
“I believe you, Jofrid.” Kristin gazed somberly at the flushed face of her son’s wife. “And I have never meddled in your charge of the household or denied that you’re a capable woman and a good and loyal wife for my son. But you must let me manage my own affairs as I am used to doing. As you say, I’m an old woman and no longer able to learn new ways.”
The young people saw that Kristin had no more to say to them, and a few minutes later they took their leave.
As usual, Kristin had to agree that Jofrid was right—at first. But after she thought it over, it seemed to her . . . No, all the same, there was no use in comparing Gaute’s alms with her father’s. Gifts for the souls of the poor and strangers who had died in the parish, marriage contributions to fatherless maidens, banquets on the feast days of her father’s favorite saints, stipends for sinners and those who were ill who wanted to seek out Saint Olav. Even if Gaute had been much richer than he was, no one would have expected him to pay for such expenses. Gaute gave no more thought to his Creator than was necessary. He was generous and kind-hearted, but Kristin had seen that her father had a reverence for the poor people he helped because Jesus had chosen the lot of a poor man when he assumed human form. And her father had loved hard toil and thought all handwork should be honored because Mary, the Mother of God, chose to do spinning to earn food for her family and herself, even though she was the daughter of rich parents and belonged to the lineage of kings and the foremost priests of the Holy Land.
Two days later, early in the morning, when Jofrid was only half dressed and Gaute was still in bed, Kristin came into their room. She was wearing a robe and cape of gray homespun, with a wide-brimmed black felt hat over her wimple and sturdy shoes on her feet. Gaute turned blood-red when he saw his mother dressed in such attire. Kristin said she wanted to go to Nidaros for the Feast of Saint Olav, and she asked her son to look after her chores while she was gone.
Gaute protested vigorously; she should at least borrow horses and men to escort her and take her maid along. But his words had little authority, as might be expected from a man lying naked in bed before his mother’s eyes. Kristin felt such pity for his bewilderment that she came up with the idea that she had had a dream.
“And I long to see your brothers again—” But then she had to turn away. She had not yet dared express in her heart how much she yearned for and dreaded this reunion with her two oldest sons.
Gaute insisted on accompanying his mother part of the way. While he dressed and had something to eat, Kristin sat laughing and playing with little Erlend; he chattered on, alert and lively with the morning. She kissed Jofrid farewell, and she had never done that before. Out in the courtyard all the servants had gathered; Ingrid had told them that Mistress Kristin was going on a pilgrimage to Nidaros.
Kristin picked up the heavy iron-shod staff, and since she didn’t want to ride, Gaute put her travel bag on his horse’s back and let the animal walk on ahead.
Up on the church hill Kristin turned around and looked down at her estate. How lovely it looked in the dewy, sun-drenched morning. The river shone white. The servants were still standing there; she could make out Jofrid’s light-colored gown and wimple, and the child like a red speck in her arms. Gaute saw that his mother’s face turned pale with emotion.
The road led up through the woods beneath the shadow of Hammer Ridge. Kristin walked as easily as a young maiden. She and her son said very little to each other. After they had walked for two hours, they reached the place where the road turns north under Rost Peak and the whole Dovre countryside stretches below, to the north. Then Kristin said that Gaute should go no farther with her, but first she wanted to sit down and rest for a while.
Beneath them lay the valley with the pale green ribbon of the river cutting through it and the farms like small green patches on the forested slopes. But higher up, the moss-covered heights, brown and lichen-yellow, arched against the gray scree and bare peaks, flecked with snowdrifts. The shadows of the clouds drifted over the valley and plains, but in the north the mountains were so brightly lit; one mountainous shape after another had freed itself from the misty cloak and loomed blue, one beyond the other. And Kristin’s yearning glided north with the cloud clusters to the long road she had before her and raced across the valley, in among the great barricading slopes and the steep, narrow paths through the wilds across the plateaus. A few more days and she would be on her way down through the beautiful green valleys of Trøndelag, following the current of the river toward the great fjord. She shuddered at the memory of the familiar villages along the sea, where she had spent her youth. Erlend’s handsome figure appeared before her eyes, shifting in stance and demeanor, swift and indistinct, as if she were seeing him mirrored in a rippling stream. At last she would reach Feginsbrekka, at the marble cross, and Nidaros would be lying there at the mouth of the river, between the blue fjord and the green Strind: on the shore the magnificent light-colored church with its dizzying towers and golden weather vanes, with the blaze of the evening sun on the rose in the middle of its breast. And deep inside the fjord, beneath the blue peaks of Frosta, lay Tautra, low and dark like the back of a whale, with its church tower like a dorsal fin. Oh, Bjørgulf . . . oh, Naakkve.
But when she looked back over her shoulder, she could still catch a glimpse of her home mountain beneath Høvringen. It lay in shadow, but with an accustomed eye she could see where the pasture path wound through the woods. She knew the gray domes that rose up over the carpet of forest; they surrounded the old meadows belonging to the people of Sil.
The sound of a
lur
echoed from the hills: several shrill tones that died away and then reappeared. It sounded as if children were practicing blowing the horn. A distant clanging of bells, the rush of the river fading lazily away, and the deep sighs of the forest in the quiet, warm day. Kristin’s heart trembled anxiously in the silence.
Homesickness urged her forward; homesickness drew her back toward the village and the manor. Pictures of everyday things teemed before her eyes: She saw herself leaping with the goats along the path through the sparse woods south of their mountain pasture. A cow had strayed into the marsh; the sun was shining brightly. When she paused for a moment to listen, she felt her own sweat stinging her skin. She saw the courtyard back home in swirling snow—a dingy white, stormy day seething toward a wild winter night. She was almost blown back into the entryway when she opened the door; the blizzard took her breath away, but there they came, those two snow-covered bundles, men wearing long fur coats: Ivar and Skule had come home. The tips of their skis sank deep into the great snowdrift that always formed across the courtyard when the wind blew from the northwest. Then there were always huge drifts in two parts of the courtyard. All of a sudden she felt herself longing with love for those two drifts that she and all the manor servants had cursed each winter; she felt as if she were condemned never to see them again.
Feelings of longing seemed to burst from her heart; they ran in all directions, like streams of blood, seeking out paths to all the places in the wide landscape where she had lived, to all her sons roaming through the world, to all her dead lying under the earth. She wondered: Had she turned cowardly? She had never felt this way before.
Then she noticed that Gaute was staring at her. She gave him a fleeting, rueful smile. It was time now for them to say goodbye and for her to continue on.
Gaute called to his horse, which had been grazing across the green hillside. He ran to get him and then came back, and they said farewell. Kristin already had her travel bag over her shoulder and her son was putting his foot into the stirrup when he turned around and took a few steps toward her.
“Mother!” For a moment she looked into the depths of his helpless, shame-filled eyes. “You haven’t been . . . no doubt you haven’t been very pleased the last few years. Mother, Jofrid means well; she has great respect for you. Even so, I should have told her more about the kind of woman you are and have been all your days.”
“Why do you happen to think about this now, my Gaute?” His mother’s voice was gentle and surprised. “I’m quite aware that I’m no longer young, and old people are supposed to be difficult to please; all the same, I haven’t aged so much that I don’t have the wits to understand you or your wife. It would trouble me greatly if Jofrid should think that it has been a thankless struggle, after all she has done to spare me work and worry. Do not think, my son, that I fail to see your wife’s virtues or your own loyal love for your mother. If I haven’t shown it as much as you might have expected, you must have forbearance and remember that’s the way old people are.”
Gaute stared at his mother, open-mouthed. “Mother . . .” Then he burst into tears and leaned against his horse, shaking with sobs.
But Kristin stood her ground; her voice revealed nothing except amazement and maternal kindness.
“My Gaute, you are young, and you’ve been my little lamb all your days, as your father used to say. But you must not carry on like this, son. Now you’re the master back home, and a grown man. If I were setting off for Romaborg or Jorsal, well . . . But it’s unlikely that I will encounter any great dangers on this journey. I will find others to keep me company, you know; if not before, then when I reach Toftar. From there groups of pilgrims leave every morning during this time.”
“Mother, Mother, don’t leave us! Now that we’ve taken all power and authority out of your hands, pushed you aside into a corner . . .”
Kristin shook her head with a little smile. “I’m afraid my children seem to think I have an overbearing desire to take charge.”
Gaute turned to face her. She took one of his hands in hers and placed her other hand on his shoulder as she implored him to believe that she was not ungrateful toward him or Jofrid; she asked God to be with him. Then she turned him toward his horse, and with a laugh she gave him a thump between his shoulders for good luck.
She stood gazing after him until he disappeared beneath the cliff. How handsome he looked riding the big blue-black horse.
She felt so strange. She sensed everything around her with such unusual clarity: the sun-sated air, the hot fragrance of the pine forest, the chittering of tiny sparrows in the grass. At the same time she was looking inside herself, seeing pictures the way someone with a high fever may believe she is peering at inner images. Inside her there was an empty house, completely silent, dimly lit, and with a smell of desolation. The scene shifted: a tidal shore from which the sea had retreated far away; rounded, light-colored stones, heaps of dark, lifeless seaweed, all sorts of flotsam.