Kristin said low:
“We have bound ourselves one to the other with the dearest oaths—and I have heard that in the eyes of God such a pact hallows our coming together as much as if our fathers and mothers had given us one to the other.”
The monk answered sadly:
“I see well, Kristin, someone who knew it not to the full has spoken to you of the canonical law. You could not bind yourself by oath to this man without sinning against your father and mother; them had God set over you before you met him. And is it not sorrow and a shame for his kin too, if they learn that he has lured astray the daughter of a man who has borne his shield with honour at all seasons—betrothed, too, to another? I hear by your words, you deem you have not sinned so greatly—yet dare you not confess this thing to your appointed priest. And if so be you think you are as good as wed to this man, wherefore set you not on your head the linen coif of wedlock, but go still with flowing hair amidst the young maids with whom you can have no great fellowship any more—for now must the chief of your thoughts be with other things than they have in mind?”
“I know not what they have in their minds,” said Kristin wearily. “True it is that all my thoughts are with the man I long for. Were it not for my father and mother, I would gladly bind up my hair this day—little would I care if I were called wanton, if only I might be called his.”
“Know you if this man means so to deal toward you, that you may be called his with honour some day?” asked Brother Edvin.
Then Kristin told of all that had passed between Erlend Nikulaussön and herself. And while she spoke she seemed not even to call to mind that she had ever doubted the outcome of it all.
“See you not, Brother Edvin,” she began again, “we could not help ourselves. God help me, if I were to meet him without here, when I go from you, and should he pray me to go with him, I would go. I wot well, too, I have seen now there be other folk who have sinned as well as we—When I was a girl at home ’twas past my understanding how aught could win such power over the souls of men that they could forget the fear of sin; but so much have I learnt now: if the wrongs men do through lust and anger cannot be atoned for, then must heaven be an empty place. They tell of you, even, that you, too, once struck a man in wrath—”
“ ’Tis true,” said the monk, “God’s mercy alone have I to thank that I am not called manslayer. ’Tis many years agone—I was a young man then, and methought I could not endure the wrong the Bishop would have put upon us poor friars. King Haakon—he was Duke then—had given us the ground for our house, but we were so poor we had to work upon our church ourselves—with some few workmen who gave their help more for heavenly reward than for what we could pay them. Maybe ’twas sinful pride in us beggar monks to wish to build our church so fair and goodly—but we were happy as children in the fields, and sang songs of praise while we hewed and built and toiled. Brother Ranulv—God rest his soul—was masterbuilder—he was a right skilful stonecutter; nay, I trow the man had been granted skill in all knowledge and all arts by God himself. I was a carver of stone panels in those days; I had but just finished one of St. Clara, whom the angels were bearing to the church of St. Francis in the dawn of Christmas day—a most fair panel it had proved, and all of us joyed in it greatly—then the hellish miscreants tore down the walls, and a stone fell and crushed my panels—I struck at a man with my hammer, I could not contain me—
“Aye, now you smile, my Kristin. But see you not, that ’tis not well with you now, since you would rather hear such tales of other folks’ frailties than of the life and deeds of good men, who might serve you as a pattern—?
“ ’Tis no easy matter to give you counsel,” he said, when it was time for her to go. “For were you to do what were most right, you would bring sorrow to your father and mother and shame to all your kin. But you must see to it that you free yourself from the troth you plighted to Simon Andressön—and then must you wait in patience for the lot God may send you, make in your heart what amends you can—and let not this Erlend tempt you to sin again, but pray him lovingly to seek atonement with your kin and with God.
“From your sin I cannot free you,” said Brother Edvin, as they parted, “but pray for you I will with all my might. …”
He laid his thin, old hands upon her head and prayed, in farewell, that God might bless her and give her peace.
VI
Afterward, there was much in what Brother Edvin had said to her that Kristin could not call to mind. But she left him with a mind strangely clear and peaceful.
Hitherto she had striven with a dull, secret fear and tried to brave it out; telling herself she had not sinned so deeply. Now she felt Edvin had shown her plainly and clearly, that she had sinned indeed; such and such was her sin, and she must take it upon her and try to bear it meekly and well. She strove to think of Erlend without impatience—either because he
