Ramborg was sullen and morose and answered her sister curtly. Under no circumstances would she allow her stepdaughter to go to J?rundgaard. “Things at your estate are not such that I would think it advisable to send a young maiden over there.” Kristin replied meekly that Ramborg might be right about that, but she had promised Simon to make the offer.
“If Simon, in his feverish daze, didn’t realize that he was offending me when he made this request of you, then surely you should realize that you offend me by mentioning it,” said Ramborg, and Kristin had to return home without accomplishing her goal.
The next morning promised good weather. But when her sons came in for breakfast, Kristin told them they would have to bring in the hay without her. She had a mind to set off on a journey, and she might be gone several days.
“I’m thinking of going north to Dovre to find your father,” she said. “I intend to ask him to forget the discord that has existed between the two of us, to ask him when he will come home to us.”
Her sons blushed; they didn’t dare look up, but she could tell they were glad. She pulled Munan into her arms and bent her face down to look at him. “You probably don’t even remember your father, do you, little one?”
The boy nodded mutely with sparkling eyes. One by one the other sons cast a glance at their mother. Her face looked younger and more beautiful than they had seen it in many years.
She came out to the courtyard some time later, dressed for travel in her church attire: a black woolen gown trimmed with blue and silver at the neck and sleeves and a black, sleeveless hooded cloak since it was high summer. Naakkve and Gaute had saddled her horse as well as their own; they wanted to go with their mother. She didn’t voice any objections. But she said little to her sons as they rode north across Rost Gorge and up toward Dovre. For the most part she was silent and preoccupied; if she spoke to the young lads, it was about other things, not about where they were going.
When they had gone so far that they could look up the slope and glimpse the rooftops of Haugen against the horizon, she asked the boys to turn back.
“You know full well that your father and I have much to talk about, and we would rather discuss things while we’re alone.”
The brothers nodded; they said goodbye to their mother and turned their horses around.
The wind from the mountains blew cool and fresh against her hot cheeks as she came over the last sharp rise. The sun gilded the small gray buildings, which cast long shadows across the courtyard. The grain was just about to form ears up there; it stood so lovely in the small fields, glistening and swaying in the wind. Tall crimson fireweed in bloom fluttered from all the heaps of stones and up on the crags; here and there the hay had been piled up in stacks. But there wasn’t a trace of life on the farm—not even a dog to greet her or give warning.
Kristin unsaddled her horse and led it over to the water trough. She didn’t want to let it roam loose, so she took it over to the stable. The sun shone through a big hole in the roof; the sod hung in strips between the beams. And there was no sign that a horse had stood there for quite some time. Kristin tended to the animal and then went back out to the courtyard.
She looked in the cowshed. It was dark and desolate; she could tell by the smell that it must have stood empty for a long time.
Several animal hides were stretched out to dry on the wall of the house; a swarm of blue flies buzzed up into the air as she approached. Near the north gable, earth had been piled up and sod spread over it, so the timbers were completely hidden. He must have done that to keep in the heat.
She fully expected the house to be locked, but the door opened when she touched the handle. Erlend hadn’t even latched the door to his dwelling.
An unbearable stench met her as she stepped inside: the rank and pungent smell of hides and a stable. The first feeling that came over her as she stood in his house was a deep remorse and pity. This place seemed to her more like an animal’s lair.
Oh yes, yes, yes, Simon—you were right!
It was a small house, but it had been beautifully and carefully built. The fireplace even had a brick chimney so that it wouldn’t fill the room with smoke, as the hearths did in the high loft room back home. But when she tried to open the damper to air out the foul smell a bit, she saw that the chimney had been closed off with several flat rocks. The glass pane in the window facing the gallery was broken and stuffed with rags. The room had a wooden floor, but it was so filthy that the floorboards were barely visible. There were no cushions on the benches, but weapons, hides, and old clothing were strewn about everywhere. Scraps of food littered the dirty table. And the flies buzzed high and low.