Out in the moonlit yard were three young men holding four horses white with rime. A man that stood before her in the porch cried out joyfully:
“Moster Aashild! come you yourself to open to us? Nay, then must I say Ben trouvè!”
“Sister’s son, is it you indeed? Then the same say I to you! Go into the room, while I show your men the stable.”
“Are you all alone on the farm?” asked Erlend. He followed her while she showed the men where to go.
“Aye; Sir Björn and our man are gone into the hills with the sleigh—they are to see and bring home some fodder we have stacked up there,” said Lady Aashild. “And serving-woman I have none,” she said, laughing.
A little while after, the four young men were sitting on the outer bench with their backs to the board, looking at the old lady, as, busily but quietly, she went about making ready their supper. She laid a cloth on the board, and set on it a lighted candle; then brought forth butter, cheese, a bear-ham and a high pile of thin slices of fine bread. She fetched ale and mead up from the cellar below the room, and then poured out the porridge into a dish of fine wood, and bade them sit in to the board and fall to.
“ ’Tis but little for you young folk,” she said, laughing. “I must boil another pot of porridge. Tomorrow you shall fare better—but I shut up the kitchen-house in the winter, save when I bake or brew. We are few folks on the farm, and I begin to grow old, kinsman.”
Erlend laughed and shook his head. He had marked that his men behaved before the old woman seemly and modestly as he had scarce ever seen them bear themselves before.
“You are a strange woman, Moster. Mother was ten years younger than you, and she looked older when last we were in your house than you look today.”
“Aye, Magnhild’s youth left her full early,” said Lady Aashild softly. “Where are you come from, now?” she asked after a while.
“I have been for a season at a farmstead up north in Lesja,” said Erlend, “I had hired me lodging there. I know not if you can guess what errand has brought me to this countryside?”
“You would ask: know I that you have had suit made to Lavrans Björgulfsön of Jörundgaard for his daughter?”
“Aye,” said Erlend. “I made suit for her in seemly and honourable wise, and Lavrans Björgulfsön answered with a churlish: no. Now see I no better way, since Kristin and I will not be forced apart, than that I bear her off by the strong hand. I have—I have had a spy in this countryside, and I know that her mother was to be at Sundbu at Clementsmass and for a while after, and Lavrans is gone to Romsdal with the other men to fetch across the winter stores to Sil.”
Lady Aashild sat silent a while.
“That counsel, Erlend, you had best let be,” said she. “I deem not either that the maid will go with you willingly; and I trow you would not use force?”
“Aye, but she will. We have spoken of it many times—she has prayed me herself many times to bear her away.”
“Kristin has—?” said Lady Aashild. Then she laughed. “None the less I would not have you make too sure that the maid will follow when you come to take her at her word.”
“Aye, but she will,” said Erlend. “And, Moster, my thought was this: that you send word to Jörundgaard and bid Kristin come and be your guest—a week or so, while her father and mother are from home. Then could we be at Hamar before any knew she was gone,” he added.
Lady Aashild answered, still smiling:
“And had you thought as well what we should answer, Sir Björn and I, when Lavrans comes and calls us to account for his daughter.”
“Aye,” said Erlend. “We were four well-armed men and the maid was willing.”
“I will not help you in this,” said the lady hotly. “Lavrans has been a trusty man to us for many a year—he and his wife are honourable folk, and I will not be art or part in deceiving them or beshaming their child. Leave the maid in peace, Erlend. ’Twill soon be high time, too, that your kin should hear of other deeds of yours than running in and out of the land with stolen women.”
“I must speak with you alone, lady,” said Erlend, shortly.
Lady Aashild took a candle, led him to the closet, and shut the door behind them. She sat herself down on a corn-bin: Erlend stood with his hands thrust into his belt, looking down at her.
“You may say this, too, to Lavrans Björgulfsön: that Sira Jon of Gerdarud joined us in wedlock ere we went on our way to Lady Ingebjörg Haakonsdatter in Sweden.”
“Say you so?” said Lady Aashild. “Are you well assured that Lady Ingebjörg will welcome you, when you are come thither?”
“I spoke with her at Tunsberg,” said Erlend. “She greeted me as her dear kinsman, and thanked me when I proffered her my service either here or in Sweden. And Munan hath promised me letters to her.”
“And know you not,” said Aashild, “that even should you find a priest that will wed you, yet will Kristin have cast away all right to the heritage of her father’s lands and goods? Nor can her children be your lawful heirs. Much I doubt if she will be counted as your lawfully wedded wife.”
“Not in this land, maybe. ’Tis therefore we fly to Sweden. Her forefather, Laurentius Lagmand, was never wed to the Lady Bengta in any other sort—they could never win her brother’s consent. Yet was she counted as a wedded lady—”
“There were no children,” said Aashild. “Think you
