Authors: Dorothy Dunnett
The old man got there before him, but even when both of them dug, there was nothing to see, and he had to keep urging the old man
to continue. Then his numbed fingers stubbed against something that could have been a rock or a board or a box, but proved to be a sleeping man’s head, with a half-melted cavity around it. From the drinker’s nose, Nicholas would have guessed it was Sigfús, even without the old man’s surprised croak. They pummelled him like a piece of blue steak all the time they were digging him out, and wrapped him in everything they could find, and started a fire with a door and a section of table. And all the time the old man was perfectly silent, although he still spat now and then.
When they heard the hooves coming back, there was only one hour left of the day, and the brown smoke of Hekla had merged into the violet-blue of the night. Nicholas had expected Glímu-Sveinn. With him were Kathi and Benecke.
Glímu-Sveinn said, ‘You found him.’
The uncle, roused, launched into a mucilaginous monologue. Nicholas let him rant. He felt physically beaten, as might be expected after his recent experience. He felt the sickening lethargy that came with the pendulum. It had almost felled him in Venice, when he had used this power to hunt down his son. This jealous power.
He knew, beyond doubt, that he had been right about Katla. And his ship was there, a few miles off shore, unaware and waiting for him. A pony tossed its head with a chime of its bridle and he received the image, at once, of a bowl, and a carob seed tapping and tapping. Nostradamus had also been right.
Glímu-Sveinn was speaking. Glímu-Sveinn was saying, ‘The
junfrú
has said this has happened before. You are a sorcerer.’
Nicholas got to his feet. It was an effort. He said, ‘My magic is white. My ship carries a priest.’
There was a silence. Then Glímu-Sveinn said, ‘Your spirit tells you that the furnace of Katla is about to burst through her ice? You know how terrible this will be?’
‘Help me to warn them,’ Nicholas said.
Glímu-Sveinn said, ‘The Markarfljót valley will flood with torrents of ice. Scalding water will rush through the rivers, molten rock through the fields. All that lives in the
sandur
will be swept out to sea, and the parboiled bodies of fish and of men will toss through the arks of their houses. Any ships within reach will be swamped.’
‘Help me get there in time,’ Nicholas said, ‘and my ship can save people.’
‘And mine,’ Benecke said. ‘I am coming. So is Katelijne. Sersanders would be with us, but for his injury. He will be taken care of by Glímu-Sveinn’s people; they and Sigfús will see that no harm comes to him now. Are you not proud of us, selfless as we are?’
‘Yes. We need a guide,’ Nicholas said.
‘I will come,’ said Glímu-Sveinn. ‘My uncle will see to the household.’ He looked defiant and uneasy at once. The rest of his family were fishing from Markarfljót. Because a buried man had been found, he was placing his trust in another man’s instincts.
It hurt to smile. Nicholas smiled and said, ‘Let us guide each other.
Ave Maria, gratia plena, Dominus tecum
. Lead me to your bliss.’
Chapter 28
D
URING THE DAYS
of his absence, the caravel of Nicholas de Fleury rocked in the harbour of the Westmann Islands and received, with its fish, those ounces of information which contrived, despite everything, to travel from Hafnarfjördur and Skálholt. As first one day passed, then a second, Father Moriz prevailed upon Crackbene to invite on board Stanislas the lodesman of the
Pruss Maiden
, and share the news with him.
From Nicholas and Paúel themselves, they knew of the
Unicorn’s
insolent expedition, and of Sersanders’s intention to rejoin his own ship with his sister at Hafnarfjördur. They knew Nicholas and Paúel had set out to pursue them.
By the second day after their departure, they were receiving further snippets. Faster than anyone expected, the
Unicorn
had picked up its sulphur and gone, allowing barely enough time for Adorne’s nephew and niece to have joined it.
Later, one of the yoles arrived and delivered a message. Tryggvi and his son had returned, those Icelanders who had escorted Sersanders. Because of a shortage of horses, Sersanders and his sister had been unable to ride on from Skálholt and had thus missed their ship. So far as Tryggvi knew, the pair were at Skálholt still.
‘In the custody of Nicholas and Benecke, by now,’ le Grant said. ‘I’d like to have seen Sersanders’s face when they arrived.’
‘It cannot be easy for his sister,’ said Father Moriz. ‘How strange that Tryggvi was dismissed. And that there should have been no suitable horses.’
‘And that Martin should turn round so quickly. Still,’ said Crackbene. ‘Now de Fleury will bring the young people back. They will start a choir on the way, I shouldn’t wonder.’
John le Grant grunted. He said, ‘You’ve just about got all your fish?’
‘Yes,’ said Crackbene. ‘Stanislas is pleased. We are full, and the
Maiden
is starting to load. If de Fleury comes back by nightfall tomorrow, we could sail the next day, the quicker the better. There’s word of an incoming ship.’
‘Nicholas could come back faster than he went out,’ said John. ‘I don’t know why he went round by sea, when he only had to cut across a few rivers. He might be coming down the Markarfljót by now, if he’s feeling less timid. He might be arriving today.’
They heard the horn from the hill an hour later; followed at once by the watch with the news. ‘A three-masted ship, Master Crackbene. Some distance off, but the fishermen know it. Sir, it’s the English privateer called the
Charity
. And it’s under Jonathan Babbe, with his own special crew of Hull men.’
‘Is it, by God,’ said John le Grant. His freckled skin had turned red.
‘They say he drives every other ship off the grounds. They say he came into this harbour last season, and killed every man who didn’t make way fast enough. They say he landed boats wherever he could, and seized the fish and slaughtered anyone who resisted. They say –’
‘We know,’ Crackbene said. They had discussed this: he had orders to deal with it. Peaceful incoming ships were to be left unmolested. Ships displaying aggression were to be engaged by both the
Pruss Maiden
and the
Svipa
, which would share any booty or prisoners. Crackbene’s eyes were bright with anticipation.
John said, ‘I’ll go and see to the guns. Stanislas will need help with his masts.’
‘I’ve signalled him over,’ said Crackbene. ‘He can pick up his bows and his gunpowder now, and when you’re ready, you can check over his cannon.’
‘You are arming the
Pruss Maiden?’
said Moriz.
‘We’re no match for the
Charity
on our own. So long as de Fleury holds Paúel Benecke hostage, the
Pruss Maiden
will do as she’s told. If Benecke’s dead, we hope no one will find out till later. Meanwhile, let’s climb a hill. I want to look at this fellow Jo Babbe.’
They climbed the hill. The air was searingly cold, but the wind hardly fluttered their cloaks. Over the thick, lazy swell of the sea, the fishing-boats were curvetting towards home. The gulls and seals had all gone. In the silence the surf sighed, and lingered, and whispered. Moriz said quietly, ‘John?’
‘I see it,’ the engineer said. ‘It’s big, but we could take it, the two of us, if we have to. He’s becalmed, I would say. He may not even get here before nightfall. We’ll be in position outside before then.’
‘John,’ said Moriz again. ‘Look at Hekla.’
*
Robin of Berecrofts stood on an opposite height, also looking.
He climbed this cliff every day, frequently soaked by the waterfall which flowed over it. The cliff was part of the long range of mountains which formed the base of the Eyjafjalla glacier, and the waterfall was the meter by which the fishermen of the Markarfljót measured the wind. If the waterfall climbed into the air, they didn’t go out.
From the cliff, he could see across to the Westmanns, and mark the yoles and the dogger as they plied in and out with their catch. He couldn’t see the
Svipa
or the
Pruss Maiden
, but he knew they were there. All the messages Crackbene had received had come from him. It had eased the hurt to his pride to realise how essential was his role by the shore, a link between M. de Fleury and the boats. Only since the smoke from Hekla had thickened, he wished M. de Fleury would hurry.
Wiser now than the men on the ships, he didn’t expect M. de Fleury to lead the way down the vale of the Markarfljót. Every year, in the dark and the snow, the farmers walked two hundred miles to the coast to greet the incoming cod, swarming to fatten and feed before spawning. And bad as that was, the subsequent easing of winter softened the bogs, and brought heavier spates from the glaciers. The safest way, of all the difficult passages, was the one M. de Fleury had already taken, following Kathi and her brother. Mixed with Robin’s anxiety about his employer was a not dissimilar foreboding about Katelijne Sersanders. Even given the easiest route, you couldn’t depend on either of them to keep out of trouble; and neither knew when to stop.
Robin had taken precautions. He had made sure that a boat was set apart to bring them back from the Thjórsá. All the fishermen knew to look out for them. Every traveller who rode in or forded the river was questioned. And just in case something went wrong, he paid a man at Hlídarendi, up the river, to watch out for news from the north. But M. de Fleury would only try to come down by the Markarfljót in an emergency, and the emergency was not likely to be created by Hekla. If there were any danger from Hekla, M. de Fleury would lead them all west, and hope to come back by boat as before. If Hekla exploded, its gas and ashes and lava would destroy anyone on his way south from Skálholt.
In the end, the tales that came from Hlídarendi were not about a band of rash travellers, but about the weather. There had been thunderstorms in the north, and rumours of earth-shocks. Also, as could be seen, the smoke from Hekla had changed. It seemed less than ever likely that M. de Fleury would try to come south the direct way. Time passed, and uneasiness lay over the settlement. Then,
when the fleet came in at dusk, the men splashed ashore shouting news. A privateer had been sighted: the notorious
Charity
, with a reputation for stealing fish and attacking its rivals. Now they had man as well as nature to contend with.
It did not take them long to decide what to do. The fishermen of Markarfljót proceeded to pack up their stocks and abandon the station.
Part of the work was completed that evening, while the Englishmen were too far away to do harm. Robin helped. Already the sheer bulk of the catch was overwhelming; by the end of the season, every man could have his tail-mark on six hundred cod, to pay for all he must buy for a year. To have it seized was to lose life itself. So the fish were packed first, to be rowed up the coast and stowed underground inland, in safety. By the time darkness fell, many of the boats had already gone to the west and some of the huts were half empty. The
Svipa
knew what was happening. It was aware that its lifeline with Robin was lost. If it wanted his news, it would have to send its own skiffs to collect it.
That night, Robin was too tired to sleep. Like the others before him, he had been given a place in the cabin of Tryggvi, and had succeeded in lying alone without offending his daughters – an exercise in tact which his father had taught him some time ago. His father was always gentle with women; even unreasonable women like Kathi.
Thinking of Sersanders and Kathi, he remembered something Tryggvi had happened to say about the Icelanders’ dislike of their foreign tithe-levying bishops. He had heard the same grumbling in Orkney, which led him to wonder whether the Bishop of Skálholt and Bishop Tulloch might not have much in common. It would explain how Sersanders had felt sure of a welcome in Iceland – a welcome spoiled by the Hanse-owned
Pruss Maiden
. Had the
Maiden
not arrived before time, the
Unicorn
might have expected to fish unmolested, and unmolested escape with her sulphur. Martin of the Vatachino was sharp.
He remembered other things Tryggvi had told him about Herra Oddur, the bailiff. Sersanders had wanted to go hunting gyrfalcon. He should have been stopped, Tryggvi had said. It was dangerous. There were bears about. One couldn’t blame Tryggvi for obeying the bailiff and not staying at Skálholt. Fortunately, Robin himself had no conflict of duty to worry him. He would be of little use in a sea fight with the
Charity
. And if – when – M. de Fleury arrived, he would certainly expect his page to be waiting.
Forty miles to the north, in a basalt chapel the size of a hen-coop, the
awaited party lay stricken with sleep, having launched on a journey none of the four would have chosen, however wild some of them were.
Left alone in the last hours of daylight, they had been forced to hurry through rivers and snow, to escape a night in soaked clothes in the open. They had also been forced to hurry by Nicholas who, abetted by Kathi, had transformed his fatigue into an antic simulation of energy which had astonished Glímu-Sveinn and induced the disgusted Danziger to compete, loudly complaining.
Even when tumbling, numbed, into the chapel, they had been given no rest, but had been set to finding writing materials. None was to be had. On their travels over the mainland, they had passed other churches like this, with the bowls of curds set on the altar and the stockfish stacked at the walls, together with the priest-farmer’s boxes of tackle. Sometimes the pastor’s own empty coffin would lie on the steps, prudently completed when wood could be had. Other mortals, with worse luck or less foresight, might be found at the back of the church, neatly stitched into wadmol and patiently awaiting the next season’s timber.
There were no corpses here, which was as well, considering the building was eight feet in width, and only a small man could stand head unbowed. There was no paper either, and the only Gospel the altar produced was a heavy old block made of wood, on which oaths had been sworn long ago, Glímu-Sveinn said, when the real book had been stolen or rotted. In the end, apologetic in their necessity, they added the
Helga Bok
to the fire at which they were drying their clothing, and Nicholas knelt on the floor and scratched a map on the hide of his jacket, reaching from where they now were to the coast, and containing all the detail that Glímu-Sveinn could give him.