Lavrans sat rocking from side to side on the bench, laughing a little.
“Food there was, be sure—but I had no stomach to it when I was there. I drank a while with Sigurd—but—methought then ’twas as well I should come home at once as wait till tomorrow—”
Astrid came back bearing food and ale; she brought with her, too, a pair of dry shoes for her master.
Lavrans fumbled with his spur-buckles to unloose them; but came near to falling on his face.
“Come hither, Kristin, my girl,” he said, “and help your father. I know you will do it from a loving heart—aye, a loving heart—today.”
Kristin kneeled down to obey. Then he took her head between his two hands and turned her face up:
“One thing I trow you know, my daughter—I wish for naught but your good. Never would I give you sorrow, except I see that thereby I save you from many sorrows to come. You are full young yet, Kristin—’twas but seventeen years old you were this year—three days after Halvard’s Mass—but seventeen years old—”
Kristin had done with her service now. She was a little pale as she rose from her knees and sat down again on her stool by the hearth.
Lavran’s head seemed to grow somewhat clearer as he ate and was filled. He answered his wife’s questions and the servant maid’s about the Haugathing—Aye, ’twas a fair gathering. They had managed to buy corn, and some flour and malt, part at Oslo and part at Tunsberg; the wares were from abroad—they might have been better, but they might have been worse, too. Aye, he had met many, both kinsfolk and friends, and they had sent their greetings home with him—But the answers dropped from him, one by one, as he sat there.
“I spoke with Sir Andres Gudmundsön,” he said, when Astrid was gone out. “Simon marries the young widow at Manvik; he has held his betrothal feast. The wedding will be at Dyfrin at St. Andrew’s Mass. He has chosen for himself this time, has the boy. I held aloof from Sir Andres at Tunsberg, but he sought me out—’twas to tell me he knew for sure that Simon saw Lady Halfrid for the first time this midsummer. He feared that I should think Simon had this rich marriage in mind when he broke with us.” Lavrans paused a little and laughed joylessly. “You understand—that good and worthy man feared much that we should believe such a thing of his son.”
Kristin breathed more freely. She thought it must be this that had troubled her father so sorely. Maybe he had been hoping all this time that it might come to pass after all, her marriage with Simon Andressön. At first she had been in dread lest he had heard some tidings of her doings in the south at Oslo.
She rose up and said good night; but her father bade her stay yet a little.
“I have one more thing to tell,” said Lavrans. “I might have held my peace about it before you—but ’tis better you should know it. This it is, Kristin—the man you have set your heart on, him must you strive to forget.”
Kristin had been standing with arms hanging down and bent head. She looked up now into her father’s face. She moved her lips, but no sound came forth that could be heard.
Lavrans looked away from his daughter’s eyes; he struck out sideways with his hand:
“I wot well you know that never would I set myself against it, could I anyways believe ’twould be for your good.”
“What are the tidings that have been told you on this journey, father?” said Kristin in a clear voice.
“Erlend Nikulaussön and his kinsman, Sir Munan Baardsön, came to me at Tunsberg,” answered Lavrans. “Sir Munan asked for you for Erlend, and I answered him: no.”
Kristin stood a while, breathing heavily.
“Why will you not give me to Erlend Nikulaussön?” she asked.
“I know not how much you know of the man you would have for husband,” said Lavrans. “If you cannot guess the reason for yourself, ’twill be no pleasing thing for you to hear from my lips.”
“Is it because he has been outlawed, and banned by the Church?” asked Kristin as before.
“Know you what was the cause that King Haakon banished his near kinsman from his Court—and how at last he fell under the Church’s ban for defying the Archbishop’s bidding—and that when he fled the land ’twas not alone?”
“Aye,” said Kristin. Her voice grew unsteady: “I know, too, that he was but eighteen years old when he first knew her—his paramour.”
“No older was I when I was wed,” answered Lavrans. “We reckoned, when I was young, that at eighteen years a man was of age to answer for himself, and care for others’ welfare and his own.”
Kristin stood silent.
“You called her his paramour, the woman he has lived with for ten years, and who has borne him children,” said Lavrans after a while. “Little joy would be mine the day I sent my daughter from her home with a husband who had lived openly with a paramour year out year in before ever he was wed. But you know that ’twas not loose life only, ’twas life in adultery.”
Kristin spoke low:
“You judged not so hardly of Lady Aashild and Sir Björn.”
“Yet can I not say I would be fain we should wed into their kindred,” answered Lavrans.
“Father,” said Kristin, “have you been so free from sin all your life, that you can judge Erlend so hardly—?”
“God knows,” said Lavrans sternly, “I judge no man to be a greater sinner before Him than I am myself. But ’tis not just reckoning that I should give away my daughter to any man that pleases to ask for her, only because we all need God’s forgiveness.”
“You know I meant it not so,” said Kristin hotly. “Father—mother—you have been young yourselves—have you not your youth so much in mind that you know ’tis hard to keep oneself from the sin that comes of
