World Light (52 page)

Oh, how light are your footsteps,
And how long I awaited thee;
There is hail at the window
And a cold wind that whines.
But I know of a bright star,
Of a bright star that shines,
And at last you have come here,
You have come here to me.

These are difficult times, dear,
There is squabbling and strife;
I have nothing to o fer,
Not a thing I can give,
Except my hopes and my life, dear,
Every moment I live:
This one thing you gave me,
That’s my all, dear—my life.

But tonight the winter is over
For every toiling hand,
And the sun will shine tomorrow—
It is their summer sun.
It is our summer sunshine,
It is our life begun;
And for you I shall bear the banner
Of this our future land.

16

Jón
almáttugi
(the Almighty) came from the south originally, and was said to be of good stock, but born out of wedlock. He quickly became highly accomplished in mind and body and could turn his hand to most things, but he was unsettled and thriftless. He was at home in every part of the country, and everywhere he went he did skilled work which few were capable of doing, both out-of-doors and in. He was a smith in wood and iron, he had an intimate understanding of all machinery, he was a fish-breeder, a weaver, a fox-hunter, a midwife, an accordion-player, a vaccinator, a singer, an animalgelder, a fine skier, and a swimmer; he could reckon the calendar on his fingers, he knew Danish and orthography, and could improvise verses. Needless to say, Jón
almáttugi
was enormously popular with the ladies. The years went by, and Jón
almáttugi
went on having the whole of Iceland as his home, and was a welcome visitor all over the country. He would stay for a week in the east and the next week he would be in the west; it was here, there and everywhere as far as he was concerned. In many places Jón
almáttugi
was awaited with longing, and sometimes was seen off with regret.

But one day, when Jón
almáttugi
was well into his thirties, misfortune overtook him in the guise of good fortune. A young and handsome daughter of a pastor in the north brought about Jón
almáttugi’
s downfall. They got married and settled on one of her father’s farms, and rebuilt the farmhouse in their very first year, because the wife had ample means. The farm yielded produce from both land and sea. But it quickly became apparent that the woman loved her husband to excess, and accordingly disliked most people who came near him, but in particular hated all other women. She could not bear to let him out of her sight for even an hour. Jón
almáttugi
was as capable a fisherman as he was at everything else, but the woman became so afraid for her husband that she had hysterics on the beach each morning she thought the weather not good enough for going fishing.

In some seasons his boat caught only half as much fish as others did; indeed, there was many a day of reasonably good weather when she would cosset her healthy husband in bed with egg punch, hot pancakes and pickled lamb’s flank. Often she sat numb-fingered with him as he baited fishing lines on autumn evenings, and in spring when he was out herding his sheep she followed him up to the moors and chased every ewe with him. In summer she forbade all other women to rake behind his scythe. If he had business elsewhere she would accompany him or would soon be on his heels. Should he need visit the outside privy in the middle of the night she would get out of bed with him and stand scantily dressed outside the privy door, even in a storm.

That was how matters now stood for this man who once had owned the whole country and belonged to it. Pale and withdrawn, dull-eyed, not daring to look anyone in the face, Jón
almáttugi
wandered round his house and yard a shadow of his former self, weighed down by the burden of the great and true love this young and wealthy woman bestowed on him.

It is said that one night, as usual, the housewife brought her husband the finest steaks and other delicacies with loving tenderness, and took infinite care as always to serve him to perfection. Jón
almáttugi
ate his meal quietly and without saying much. But when he had finished all the delicacies he took out his razor-sharp clasp knife and cut off his genitals, then handed them on a plate to his wife before staggering off to bed, castrated.

While Ólafur Kárason the poet was preparing to write down the story of this Strange Man, his thoughts kept dwelling on his own problems. The young girl who had handed him the banner of mankind, this strong, noble, burgeoning life which was ready to embrace him with all her richness, occupied his mind throughout these long days as well as the short nights which would soon be ending.

In a poem he had composed subconsciously one night he had said that his life was hers every moment he lived, but as usual what he said as a poet was far removed from his life as a man. The poet’s visions were subject to no fetters; but outwardly the man continued to be a prisoner of the life he had once chosen for himself and called his destiny, continued to sacrifice his life to his loyalty to the partner to whom he had once pledged himself, despite the fact that he had long been a different person to the one who had made the pledge, and she a different woman, the world a different world. This fidelity to those who depend on you, this contradiction of Love’s instability, duplicity, unsociability and dishonesty—perhaps there would be no human society without it.

But sometimes the poet roused himself from his thoughts and asked himself: “Isn’t this fidelity contrary to manliness if one lives for it at the expense of love? Isn’t fidelity first and foremost the characteristic of a dog? Can it be reconciled with the land of the future? This fidelity—isn’t it, along with the pity from which it springs, the very opposite of virtue, a lack of courage to be a real man? But when is a man real, then? To lack courage—isn’t that precisely the same as being a real man? Does one belong to oneself, or does one belong to others? To what extent was Jón
almáttugi
within his rights when he resorted to that despairing operation to spite his wife? Or is the only solution to the problem to drown oneself, as was for a long time the only way out for men who were too much loved by their wives, in accordance with the old fundamental principle that it was best that a man and his manhood went together?”

Out of an innate sense of caution, Ólafur Kárason had tried to keep one loophole open: he had always shrunk from actually marrying her. It was as if he had an obscure hope of being able to escape by flight for as long as he could avoid the public seal of society on his cohabitation with her; but when it came to the point of decision in his mind about flight, he always realized only too well that outward ties were chaff and vanities—the real knot was the one he had tied within himself. To break the outward forms was easy, yes, just child’s play; to disengage himself from the fundamental substance of his life was certainly possible in moments of inspiration but, when the intoxication had worn off, the poet discovered that the reality that mattered was not outside himself. It lay within his own conscience, independent of all outward forms, and nowhere but there.

When he awoke in the morning after troublesome dreams, he looked around in anguish and did not recognize his own senses. He felt they were as utterly alien to him as a hideous world of sorcery, and sometimes he felt that no princess could ever release him from this spell, not even the princess of the future land herself, the girl with the banner, the Living Image of Liberty.

Where, oh, where was that free, mad and villainous poet he had taken leave of on the roadway once, long, long ago?

17

Luckily there are not many who are surprised at being human when they wake up in the morning. Most people simply go about it as if nothing could be more natural, even happily, particularly in times like these when there was plenty of work to be had: the prospect of building a pier, a cod-liver oil refinery, a fish-meal plant—in short, a station costing a hundred thousand, a station costing a million, high wages and an abundance of goods in the shop. And only now, when there was work for all and welcome, and no one had to worry about where the next meal was coming from, and there was plenty of money, the poet realized what sort of place Sviðinsvík-undirÓþveginsenni had been in the years gone by, when there was nothing to do and no one had anything and every meal was a blessing of fortune, and those who wanted to could stay at home and compose poetry and write stories about Strange Men
.
The poet felt that every hour he was away from his writing desk was wasted; but now, after his children were dead, he had no excuse any more for staying at home all the long spring day. But Júel J. Júel seemed to have plenty of money, worse luck, and there was no hope that this tiresome wrangling over work would end in the foreseeable future and poets could turn their minds anew to things that mattered.

One day when the spring was at its brightest, battle was joined once again in Sviðinsvík, this time the election campaign. Two candidates for this distinguished office popped up in the village, and people were rounded up for meetings. Júel brought his motorcar with him, a most magnificent vehicle with a chauffeur, to drive children and old people to and fro about the district as far as the roads permitted. It was also reported on good authority that the airplane that had been promised last year would be coming this summer, if people voted the right way, and the low standard of living of people on this estate would be raised to a higher level at the station owner’s expense. He also donated a thousand krónur to the new church which was to be built here. And now there began in Sviðinsvík a round of parties with cognac, pony excursions and skull-fractures.

But Júel J. Júel’s opponent was also a character, even though he was a more modest one. He was not the man, of course, whom the common people had seen and loved in Örn Úlfar and had been ready to follow to the ends of the earth. Nevertheless, the opponent was said to be the spokesman of the workingman and, furthermore, something which most people found harder to understand, the government candidate. The opponent unfortunately did not have a car, let alone being in a position to make promises about an airplane the way things were in these difficult times; on the other hand he had brought a walking stick. And while Júel made his chauffeur drive children and imbeciles to and fro about the estate, night and day, with frantic hooting and grinding of gears, the opponent, the government and people’s candidate, went from house to house with his walking stick. It was obvious from his demeanor that this walking stick was not just his badge of honor and scepter but also his wealth, and indeed he looked after his stick as if it were the apple of his eye. He carried it carefully in front of himself, and a little to the side, almost upright, and stepped cautiously along as if he were bearing a lighted candle in a slight draft or rather as if he were delivering a magnificent bouquet on some very solemn occasion; in other respects he walked like a man who had lost his toes. The opponent’s solemn, solo progress was bound to earn him respect and confidence. But now it was no wonder that people asked: was the opponent’s walking stick such a treasure that it merited such care, such devoted self-control, such pious and steadfast reverence? There was no easy answer. Perhaps this walking stick was something exceptional in the eyes of God and even in the eyes of the government. But in the eyes of men, this was just an ordinary one-and-a-half-króna stick with a curved handle, and had originally perhaps been painted yellow or even red, maybe with a little tin ferrule at the bottom. But if so, all such superfluous fripperies had rubbed off long ago; the stick had long lost its color, it was worn at the bottom and the handle had become almost straightened by constant use.

Jarþrúður went at once to see the station owner, was given a ride in the car, and used the opportunity to cry a little and say that her house had become a little lopsided during the last storm and could be demolished altogether in the next one. But the station owner had no time to listen to any blethering; he gave her fifty krónur at once and told her to be off. Then she went to the stick-bearer, wept the same tears and repeated the story of the rickety house. The opponent invited her to have a seat and was ready to discuss the matter thoroughly. He said he would think the matter over. He said he would make a mental note of her request. He said he would do everything he could possibly do and everything that could be done as things were in these difficult times. But he said he would need to consult some other more highly placed officials before any final decision could be given. He said he could give an assurance that the government had every intention, if the elections turned out as expected, of increasing the grants to Sviðinsvík for quarry work, so that a new breakwater could be built that would reach even farther out to sea than the existing breakwater. He said that the main thing for the people of Sviðinsvík was to be patient and to work for their objects gradually: in a word, he was determined to take a mental note of it all. And now Good-bye.

The intended could not find enough words of derision for the opponent, for his mental note-taking, for his walking stick and government rock, and prayed to God that the one who suffered defeat in the elections would be him. But Júel Júel, she said—what a glorious and darling man! To think that people existed on earth who carried fifty-krónur notes in thick bundles like Bibles in their pockets, and built churches for a thousand and stations for a million—that was something no one would ever have believed where she had learned her catechism! She looked upon the station owner as yet another proof of the glory of God.

“Jarþrúður dear,” said the poet, very seriously, “I want to warn you that if you vote for Júel in this election, you are voting against me.”

“I know,” said the intended. “It’s just like you to say that one should obey that Skjól fellow who tried to incite the accursed mob to plunder and murder, rather than to obey those in whom God is pleased.”

“Poets and mobs are always friends,” said Ólafur Kárason. “And it’s an old story that when there’s trouble, they are one.”

On a Sunday in June, polling day, the poet was standing with a group of laborers outside the primary school, watching people coming to vote. The clear solstice sky arched over the village by the mirror-smooth sea, and once again there reigned in Nature that mood of delight and tranquility which makes sorrows and cares so improbable in Iceland.

Júel J. Júel’s shining luxury car drove up to the door of the polling station with yet another load of True Icelanders who were to be allowed to rule the country for a while. The car doors opened, the chauffeur called on some of the others to help him unload the car, and some True Icelanders were hauled out from the luxurious comfort of the seats. It was old
uríður of Skálholt with her people. Gísli the landowner was the first to be pulled out. Although this landowner had now been bedridden for many years, he still had enough life left in him to open one eye and wave one fist angrily in the air and shout defiantly: “It’s I who owns the estate!”

Behind the landowner, Jón Einarsson the heathen was carried into the building, slobbering with delight over the sunshine, the car ride, the elections and Christian people in general. “Vavva-vavva,” said the heathen, and laughed. “Vavva-vavva.”

Finally the Creature was hauled out of the station owner’s luxury car, Hólsbúðar-Dísa, who had for long been kept in Jón the Murderer’s bait shed but who had of late been hidden behind a partition in the living room at Skálholt. It was this creature whom Örn Úlfar once, long ago, had regarded as the image of the estate. She, too, had now come here to support the cause of the True Icelanders. She was carried in a sack from the station owner’s luxury car to the polling booth. From out of the sack there peered a demented face without human features, no longer emaciated but shapelessly swollen from dropsy, framed by black hair which once had been wispy but now was matted. The mad, long-frozen eyes stared blankly at the clear sky.

And when these three True Icelanders had been pulled out, who should bring up the rear, dressed to the nines in her Sunday skirt, and a new cardigan under a fichu, combed and washed, with a tassel-cap, ready to take her place in the ranks of the True Icelanders against the unpatriotic? None other than Jarþrúður Jónsdóttir, the poet’s intended. She walked with firm, solemn, determined steps into the polling station, looking neither to left nor to right. A few unpatriotic youngsters greeted the True Icelanders with jeers.

Other spectators joined the crowd from all directions when word went round that the inmates of Skálholt were out for a drive; people crowded round the door of the polling station and waited impatiently to see them emerge again after doing their civic duty. After a moment a commotion was heard from within the building. Suddenly the Creature appeared in the doorway on all fours; in the polling booth she had escaped from the sack and slipped out of people’s grasp. She had eaten both the voting paper and the pencil and was uttering dreadful cries. It took a little time to catch her and cram her back into the sack.

A little later the intended from The Heights came out of the polling booth again, her eyes aglow with that inner peace, that embrace of mercy which characterizes a communicant who has been granted communion on the Day of Resurrection itself. In this state of bliss she went back into the car without seeing anyone. And the honest voters were escorted back home from this luxury car ride which was to last them until the next elections.

When the spectacle was over and the shining vehicle had driven away, Ólafur Kárason came to his senses again. He shook off this appalling sight and was about to take to his heels—he did not know where to, just away, as far, far away as possible. But then a hand was laid on his shoulder, and the young girl was standing by his side again; he met her smile and those warm, bold eyes under the solstice sky.

“Ljósvíkingur,” she said. “Which way are you going?”

And at the same moment he had changed his mind about running away.

“With you,” he replied, and gazed entranced at how well the solstice sky became her.

Then they linked arms and walked away together.