After this, the tables were taken away, and folk pushed the benches back, and the Icelanders began their entertainments, and it was the case that the Icelanders had been among the Greenlanders for a year, long enough for some of the Greenlanders, but especially the Solar Fell folk, to learn steps and words to a few of the rhyming songs, and so eight women, including Sigrid Bjornsdottir, and eight men stood up and made the figures while Thorstein Olafsson shouted out the song. And this was a song, an outlandish rhyme about a fellow named Troilus, who was a hero of early times, and his concubine, named Criseda, who sinned and was greatly punished for her sin. Some time passed, through the telling of other, less scandalous tales, and folk were called again into the cathedral for the second service. The first to enter the church discovered Larus the Prophet there, on his face on the stones before the crucifix, and he had to be lifted up and carried out, for he seemed insensible, and after folk spoke among themselves, it was revealed that Larus had not partaken of the feasting, but had spent the entire time at prayer in the cathedral, with Ashild and little Tota nearby. These two fell asleep, and had to be roused for the service.
This service was given by Sira Andres, who was but seventeen winters of age, and although his ways were more congenial than those of his father, he knew even less of the mass, and mumbled a great deal more. He, too, liked to make his sermons on the subject of the wages of sin, but the wages he predicted were less dire than those of Sira Eindridi, and sometimes he got lost in his text, which afforded folk a small degree of relief. This service was shorter than the earlier one, and after it, folk went to their booths and their chambers to sleep.
Now it was the case that Sira Pall Hallvardsson was to say both masses on the second day of the feast, and folk were pleased with this, because he knew all the prayers in the right order, and never mumbled, and the communion he gave was considered to be holier than the communion given by the other two, and so all of the second day there was a great deal of shriving going on, and many folk were in and out of the cathedral all day long. The first of these, who came into the darkened church long before dawn, discovered Larus the Prophet before the Crucifix, and he stayed there all day, prayers on his lips, but he was not shriven.
On this day there was a morning service, followed by a daylight feast, to be followed by an early evening service, and then folk who lived nearby would go off, and in the morning the rest of the folk would go off. It happened before the morning service that the Icelandic woman Steinunn Hrafnsdottir went out of Gardar hall and began wandering about below the buildings, not far from where the boats were drawn up on the strand, and her husband, Thorgrim Solvason, went out after her, and when he caught up with her, they fell into conversation. Thorgrim said, “My Steinunn, your sister requires your presence, for indeed, she needs you to arrange her headdress for her.”
“She has arranged her headdress for many mornings before this one without my help.”
“Even so, she asks after you. And this is true, as well, that it is not seemly for you to walk about like this, for there are many folk at this feast who are unknown to us.”
“You and Thorunn think too ill of these Greenlanders.”
“They are rough folk.”
“Nay, they are ill-looking, and dress oddly, in furs and such, but they are no rougher than any other folk we might know, in Norway or in Iceland.”
“How have you knowledge of this?”
Now she cocked her head and looked him in the eye. “My Thorgrim, I, too, have lived in Greenland for a year, and I, too, have spoken with Bjorn Bollason and his sons and other such folk as are about Solar Fell. May I not make up my own mind on this score?”
“It seems to me that a woman must be guided by her husband and her sister in such things.”
“Thorunn is three winters younger than I am.”
“But she is of a different and more cautious nature. She saw that you slipped out of the service last night and how long you absented yourself.”
“Indeed, the place was very close.”
“If you had found me, I would have taken you out, and we could have strolled about together, as a husband and wife should do.”
“We may do that now, my Thorgrim.” And so they did so, down the hill and back up it, and soon enough it was time for the service, and they went into the cathedral and found places to sit.
Now Sira Pall Hallvardsson began to pray, and then he gave a sermon of thanksgiving for the bounty of the Lord in all things, and these were some of the things he spoke of: the children of the Greenlanders, whose faces shine about every farmstead like purple stonebreak at the feast of St. Jon the Baptist, the houses of the Greenlanders, so thickly turfed that two or three seal oil lamps keep them warm in the winter; the reindeer, who give fur and flesh and bone; the seals, who give fat and fur and flesh; the winter, which gives rest; and the summer, which gives work and sunlight; the yearly round of planting and hunting and milking and harvesting and hunting again, from Yule that reminds men of birth into the world, to Easter, that reminds men of rebirth into Heaven, to the feast of all the saints, which reminds men of how to get from one to the other. And folk were much lulled by this talk, and regretted that it ended quickly, for indeed, Sira Pall Hallvardsson could not stand for a long sermon, and especially two in one day. After the service was over, folk walked out into the light. It had snowed above Gardar in the night, but the south slope of the hillside was warm and pleasant in the morning sun. And now folk talked of the coming winter, and all were sanguine about their stores of food and the health of their flocks, and some folk, who had had to do with the Icelanders, reflected among themselves that these foreign folk would do well to keep their ship in Greenland and take over some of the abandoned farmsteads that lay about in every district. Were conditions not as they had been in the days of Erik the Red, with much good land lying about for the taking? The answer was that conditions were better, for the land was improved already, with houses and byres more suited to the weather than the old sorts that Erik and his fellows had built, with their long halls and greedy great fires. Such was the gist of the Greenlanders’ talk as they went in to the second feast. They were much pleased with themselves.
Toward dusk Sira Pall began upon the second service, and he spoke the prayers in a low sonorous voice that was pleasant to hear. The cathedral was as full of folk as it had been for the first service, for, indeed, even those from the farthest districts were loath to miss any of Sira Pall Hallvardsson’s service, for he was an old man, and who was to say that he would survive the winter? Not everyone did.
It happened as he was finishing the Kyrie that Larus the Prophet spoke up and said in a loud voice, in Norse, “The Lord is with me! Hear me speak!” and a farmer who lived in his district, standing near him, said, “Indeed, Larus, you speak out of turn. Now it is time to hear the priest speak.” Some other men put their hands on Larus’ shoulders, but he shook them off. “Nay,” he cried, “the Word of the True Lord is never out of turn, but calls out from the mouths of babes, or from the wind that howls in the mountains, if it must. Here is what I say to you: Rome has abandoned you! The pope thinks of you not! The archbishop of Nidaros sleeps peacefully every night, untroubled by the knowledge of your longings! Those who guide your souls care not whether you fall into sin daily, or hourly, or moment by moment! They spend not a crown nor do they lift a finger to help you toward your salvation. They think more of their underlinen than they do of your souls! They have forbidden you to save yourselves, and now they refuse to save you! Have you wafers? Have you wine? Do you think that the blood of the Lord was water and His flesh was seaweed? It is not written so. Indeed, Greenlanders, you are cursed, not blessed, however you fill your bellies, because the path to salvation is closed to you. Perhaps the Lord Himself speaks to the archbishop of Nidaros, and bids him in his ear to send the Greenlanders a ship, and some priests that have been duly consecrated, not like these false Greenlanders who call themselves Sira, but have never been ordained, but the archbishop of N
idaros stops his ears. He hears not the word of the Lord, nor does he hear the cries of the Greenlanders for salvation. All these folk that have died here, these wives and husbands and mothers and fathers and brothers and sisters who have died of the vomiting ill and the stomach ill and through mischance and starvation and freezing to death and drowning, think you that they have made their way to Heaven? Think you that they sit at the feet of the Lord, and listen each day to the singing of angels? Nay, ’tis not so. They burn in Hell, for they are unshriven of their sins, they are not in communion with the Lord, they are the abandoned of the earth, and Jesus Himself hears not their cries. This is what I say to you!” And after he had spoken, Larus looked about himself, and the Greenlanders were hard put for words, for no man had the knowledge in him to deny what Larus had said.
Now Sira Pall Hallvardsson resumed the service where he had left off, as if Larus had not spoken, but almost at once, the loud chattering of the Greenlanders interrupted his prayers, so that he had to raise his voice to make himself heard, and now the Greenlanders subsided, and Sira Pall Hallvardsson made his way through the service to the sermon, and then folk sat up and looked at him, for they were curious to see if he would address Larus, and how he would do so. And this is what he said: “It happened one day that the Lord Jesus Christ did go into a town in the east by the name of Bethany, and He spent the night there with some very poor folk, so that when He arose in the morning, He saw that they had but a single loaf of bread among them, although there were seven of them, and so He said that He hungered not, and He bid them farewell, but indeed, He was a man like all men, and He hungered greatly for His morning meat. There was a fig tree by the side of the road, and though it was covered with leaves and blossoms, even so, no man could find a single fig upon it, and with the wrath that comes to all men when they have hungered and been denied, the Lord Jesus Christ, in His manly nature, said to the tree, ‘Ye be cursed henceforward, and neither will ye send forth leaves, nor blossoms, nor fruit ever again,’ and at once the tree withered and died, even before the very eyes of the folk standing about.
“Now these folk marveled among themselves at the tree, and were greatly surprised, but our Lord Jesus Christ thought little of their amazement, and this is what He said to them, and He was greatly wrathful, ‘In sooth, I say to you that if ye have faith and doubt not, ye shall not only do this which is done to the fig tree, but this also: if you say to the mountain that looms above you, blocking the sunlight, Be thou removed and be thou cast into the sea that swirls at the foot of the homefield, this too shall be done. For this is the truth that I say to you, and you must listen with your ears and your heart, whatsoever you shall ask in prayer, believing, you shall receive it, for I am listening to you, and I am the Lord God who is powerful over all.’ ” And now Sira Pall stepped back to the altar, and continued with the service, and gave communion to all who stepped forward to receive it, but even so, men considered that Larus had not been well answered, and they were much cast down. It was the case, after all, that Sira Pall had not dared to gaze up to the mountain and order it into the sea, had he?
Now the winter came on, and the weather was bad from the beginning, warm and rainy, or dry and windy, so that sand came into the byres even after they were closed up with stones, and the turves about the steadings grew sodden with wet, and then crumbled away in the wind, but little snow or still weather came into any district, and it remained this way through Yule. It also happened that not so long after these happenings at Gardar, a child was born to Helga Gunnarsdottir at Ketils Stead, and this child was a girl, who was named Gunnhild, but Helga did not recover from this confinement as quickly as she might have, and was still in her bedcloset at Yule, greatly weakened. It also happened that the child Egil Kollgrimsson suffered a great mischance, for as he was sleeping by the side of his mother in her bedcloset, while Kollgrim was away hunting, Elisabet Thorolfsdottir rolled upon him in her sleep, and smothered him, and he was found lifeless in the morning, and Helga was much cast down by this news, as well.
This was the second winter that the Icelanders stayed at Solar Fell, Thorgrim and Steinunn as well as Snorri and Thorunn and her husband, and in this winter the Icelanders began to talk among themselves of returning to Iceland, but Snorri the shipmaster was disinclined to hurry his decision. Conditions were pleasant enough among the Greenlanders, and conditions in Iceland were unknown, but reputed to be ill. Snorri sought out Bjorn Bollason, but Bjorn Bollason’s eagerness for the company of the Icelanders was unstinting. The ship was not in such good repair, and Snorri was disinclined to make the effort to repair it. In short, the winter weather was not so ill as to drive Snorri away, and so those who were more eager to go, as Thorgrim was, mumbled their discontent into their beards.
Steinunn shared Snorri’s disinclination, and was pleased enough with the way he put Thorgrim and the others off, but she was pleased with little else, and the howling of the dry wind about the corners of the steading grew tedious to her. She could not sit at her weaving or subdue her hands to spinning, but wrung them together repeatedly, so that Thorgrim was always looking at her, as if to probe her temper. Indeed, had he asked her, she would not have known what to say, except that the blackest melancholy was upon her, but a melancholy so irritating that she could neither sit nor sleep nor take pleasure in her meat. It happened that Thorunn grew much annoyed with her, and so enmity between the two sisters was added to the discontent of the Icelanders, and the folk at Solar Fell were somewhat less merry than they had been the previous winter.
Now it happened that Signy, Bjorn’s wife, came to Thorunn one day and said the following, “Thorunn Hrafnsdottir, you have been a good friend to me in your time among the Greenlanders.”
Thorunn smiled. “Whoever is not a good friend to such a generous hostess is ill-mannered indeed, but aside from this, it seems to me that we see alike in some matters, and that our talk has been pleasant to both of us.”
“So it seems to me as well. But now there must be unpleasant talk.” And she fell silent, for, as folk said, Signy of Solar Fell preferred starvation to unpleasant talk.
“You may say what you wish to say to me, my Signy, and it will not diminish our friendship.”
“It is the case in Greenland that winters are very long, and steadings are very close, and folk bump elbows even on the largest holdings, like Solar Fell.”
“This is the case throughout the north.” Thorunn smiled. “Greenlanders think they are alone in their hardships, I have discovered.”
“Perhaps so. I cannot judge this. But it seems to me that the darkness of your sister’s spirits casts itself over all, Icelanders and Greenlanders alike, and Yule is hardly past. Greenlanders do not consider the winter to be over until the cows are carried out of the byre after Easter.”
“It is true that my sister is not of a sanguine nature, and in the past she has been given to these sulks.”
“She, and Thorgrim, too, should he wish, might go to Gardar and stay among the priests. Sira Pall is much loved among the Greenlanders, and Sira Eindridi is a brisk fellow. But indeed, it seems to me that I am being inhospitable, and my own words shame me.”
“Folk who stay with others for over a year must live on other terms than mere hospitality, and it seems to me that such a removal would please her, or if not, please us and do her good.” And now the two women saw that they were agreed on this score, and smiled together and planned how to approach the subject with Thorgrim.
And so it happened that Steinunn Hrafnsdottir was removed to Gardar, and Thorgrim with her, except that after a few days, Thorgrim found the spot gloomy and dull, compared to Solar Fell. All the Icelanders who had been staying there in the previous winter had gone to other steadings, there was little to do, and the cooking was rather ill. After Thorgrim returned to Solar Fell, Steinunn persuaded Sira Eindridi to give her an outside chamber, one not far from the doorway to the homefield and to the cathedral, for Steinunn declared that she wished to go freely to her prayers without d
isturbing the life of the priest’s house, and so she did, and she prayed a great deal, and also walked about a great deal for there was little snow. After this, Sira Eindridi went off to the south with Sira Andres, for the beginning of Lent was near at hand.
And so it happened one day that Steinunn Hrafnsdottir saw Kollgrim Gunnarsson carrying a string of furs down from the hills above Gardar, and after that she began meeting him from time to time, and these meetings left her spirits in a state of peacefulness, more than they were after prayer. And she and he went on like this for a short time, and their meetings were pleasing to both of them, so that they began to be careless about who might see them, for indeed, as Steinunn declared, they exchanged but talk, and the gestures it is proper for a man to show a woman, namely to help her over rocks and rills and up and down hillsides, if she is walking about, or to help her to her feet, if she is sitting and wishes to stand up.
After some days, it seemed to Steinunn Hrafnsdottir that she had conceived a great passion for Kollgrim Gunnarsson that he did not return, though indeed, he sought her out with as much frequency as possible, but even so, his ways were so reserved and self-contained that it seemed to her that he left her presence each time with hardly a regret or a thought of her, while thoughts of him ate her up, and gave her no relief until she saw him again. He was in her mind so constantly that she hardly knew how he looked, but only that he stood over her, and that his presence was as a balm and as a sting at the same time. Now it happened for some two days that she poured herself into her prayers, and went only from her room to the cathedral, where she lay on the stones in front of the crucifix, and begged the Lord for relief from her longings, but indeed, she avoided all the priests, and did not confess her sin, for it was the case that she did not yet wish to give it up, in spite of her prayers. It is truly said that the Lord hears many things that are not meant for His ears.