“But now do I scarce know what the end will be,” said he. “Maybe I shall sit at last on a mountain croft like Björn Gunnarsön, and bear out the dung on my back as did the thralls of old, because I have no horse.”
“God help you,” said Kristin, laughing. “Then I must come to you for sure—I trow I know more of farm work and country ways than you.”
“I can scarce think you have borne out the dung-basket,” said he, laughing too.
“No; but I have seen how they spread the dung out—and sown corn have I, well nigh every year at home. ’Twas my father’s wont to plough himself the fields nearest the farm, and he let me sow the first piece that I might bring good fortune—” the thought sent a pang through her heart, so she said quickly: “And a woman you must have to bake, and brew the small beer, and wash your one shirt, and milk—and you must hire a cow or two from the rich farmer near by—”
“Oh, God be thanked that I hear you laugh a little once more!” said Erlend and caught her up so that she lay on his arms like a child.
Each of the six nights which passed ere Aasmund Björgulfsön came home, Erlend was in the loft-room with Kristin.
The last night he seemed as unhappy as she; he said many times they must not be parted from one another a day longer than needful. At last he said very low:
“Now should things go so ill that I cannot come back hither to Oslo before winter—and if it so falls out you need help of friends—fear not to turn to Sira Jon here at Gerdarud; we are friends from childhood up; and Munan Baardsön, too, you may safely trust.”
Kristin could only nod. She knew he spoke of what she had thought on each single day; but Erlend said no more of it. So she, too, said naught, and would not show how heavy of heart she was.
On the other nights he had gone from her when the night grew late, but this last evening he begged hard that he might lie and sleep by her an hour. Kristin was fearful, but Erlend said haughtily: “Be sure that were I found here in your bower, I am well able to answer for myself.” She herself, too, was fain to keep him by her yet a little while, and she had not strength enough to deny him aught.
But she feared that they might sleep too long. So most of the night she sat leaning against the head of the bed, dozing a little at times, and scarce knowing herself when he caressed her and when she only dreamed it. Her one hand she held upon his breast, where she could feel the beating of his heart beneath, and her face was turned to the window that she might see the dawn without.
At length she had to wake him. She threw on some clothes and went out with him upon the balcony—he clambered over the railing on the side that faced on to another house near by. Now he was gone from her sight—the corner hid him. Kristin went in again and crept into her bed; and now she quite gave way and fell to weeping for the first time since Erlend had made her all his own.
V
At Nonneseter the days went by as before. Kristin’s time was passed between the dormitory and the church, the weaving-room, the book-hall and the refectory. The nuns and the convent folk gathered in the potherbs and the fruits from the herb-garden and the orchard; Holy Cross Day came in the autumn with its procession, then there was the fast before Michaelmas. Kristin wondered—none seemed to mark any change in her. But she had ever been quiet when amongst strangers, and Ingebjörg Filippusdatter, who was by her night and day, was well able to chatter for them both.
Thus no one marked that her thoughts were far away from all around her. Erlend’s paramour—she said to herself, she was Erlend’s paramour now. It seemed now as though she had dreamed it all—the eve of St. Margaret’s Mass, that hour in the barn, the nights in her bower at Skog—either she had dreamed it, or else all about her now was a dream. But one day she must waken, one day it must all come out. Not for a moment did she think aught else than that she bore Erlend’s child within her.
But what would happen to her when this came to light, she could not well think. Would she be put into the black hole, or be sent home? She saw dim pictures of her father and mother far away. Then she shut her eyes, dizzy and sick, bowed in fancy beneath the coming storm and tried to harden herself to bear it, since she thought it must end by sweeping her forever into Erlend’s arms—the only place where now she felt she had a home.
Thus was there in this strained waiting as much of hope as terror, as much of sweetness as of torment. She was unhappy—but she felt her love for Erlend as it were a flower planted within her—and, spite of her unhappiness, it put forth fresher and richer blooms each day. That last night when he had slept by her side she had felt, as a faint and fleeting bliss, that there awaited her a joy and happiness in
