Kristin wondered what could have been the reason for Erlend’s brother to speak of this, but she brushed aside the nagging fear that it might have been about Erlend and someone else. And she sought solace in his words.
They sat next to each other on the chest. Erlend put his arm around Kristin, and now she felt warm and secure—at his side was the only place she would ever feel safe and protected again.
From time to time Erlend would say a great deal, speaking elat edly. Then he would fall silent for long periods, simply caressing her. Without knowing it, Kristin was gathering up from all he said every little thing that might make him more attractive and dear to her, and that would lessen his blame in all she knew about him that was not good.
Erlend’s father, Sir Nikulaus, was so old when his children were born that he had neither the patience nor the ability to raise them himself. Both sons had grown up in the home of Sir Baard Peters?n of Hestn?s. Erlend had no siblings other than his brother Gunnulv, who was one year younger and a priest at Christ Church. “I love him more dearly than anyone, except for you.”
Kristin asked Erlend whether Gunnulv looked like him, but he laughed and said they were quite different in both temperament and appearance. Gunnulv was abroad, studying. This was the third year he had been gone, but twice he had sent letters home; the last one arrived the year before, when he was about to leave Sancta Genoveva in Paris and head for Rome. “Gunnulv will be happy when he comes home and finds me married,” said Erlend.
Then he talked about the vast inheritance he had acquired from his parents. Kristin realized that he hardly knew himself how his affairs now stood. She was quite familiar with her father’s land dealings, but Erlend’s dealings had been of the opposite kind. He had sold and scattered, mortgaged and squandered his property, especially during the past few years as he had tried to separate from his mistress, thinking that with time his wild life would be forgotten and his kinsmen would take him back. He had believed that in the end he would be named sheriff of half of Orkd?la county, just as his father had been.
“But now I have no idea how things will finally go,” he said. “Maybe I’ll end up on a farm on some scruffy slope like Bj?rn Gunnars?n, and I’ll have to carry out the dung on my back the way slaves used to do in the past because I own no horses.”
“God help you,” said Kristin, laughing. “Then I’d better come with you. I think I know more about peasant ways than you do.”
“But I don’t imagine that you’ve ever carried a dung basket,” he said, laughing too.
“No, but I’ve seen how they spread out the muck, and I’ve sown grain almost every year back home. My father usually plows the closest fields himself, and then he lets me sow the first section because I’ll bring him luck . . .” The memory painfully pierced her heart, and she said hastily, “And you’ll need a woman to bake and brew the weak ale and wash out your only shirt and do the milking. You’ll have to lease a cow or two from the nearest wealthy farmer.”
“Oh, thank God I can hear you laugh a little once again,” said Erlend, taking her onto his lap so that she lay in his arms like a child.
During the six nights before Aasmund Bj?rgulfs?n returned home, Erlend came up to the loft to be with Kristin each evening.
On the last night he seemed just as unhappy as she was; he said many times that they would not be parted from each other a day longer than was necessary.
Finally he said in a subdued voice, “If things should go so badly that I cannot return here to Oslo before winter—and you happen to be in need of a friend’s help—then you can safely turn to Sira Jon here at Gerdarud; we’ve been friends since childhood. And Munan Baards?n you can also trust.”
Kristin could only nod. She realized that he was talking about the same thing that had been on her mind every single day, but Erlend didn’t mention it again. Then she was silent too, not wanting to show him how sick at heart she felt.
The other times he had left her as the hour grew late, but on this last night he pleaded earnestly to be allowed to lie down and sleep with her for a while.
Kristin was afraid, but Erlend said defiantly, “You should realize that if I’m discovered here in your chamber, I know how to defend myself.”
She wanted so badly to keep him with her a little longer, and she was incapable of refusing him anything.
But she was worried that they might sleep too long. So for most of the night she sat up, leaning against the headboard, dozing a little now and then, not always conscious of when he was actually caressing her and when she had simply dreamed it. She kept one hand on his chest, where she could feel the beat of his heart, and turned her face toward the window so she could watch for the dawn outside.