The Greenlanders - Jane Smiley [150]
Now Orm said, “Only I have seen them, and only we have spoken of this. When folk ask, we can tell them that they fell from the rock.” But Sira Pall Hallvardsson looked gloomy, and he shook his head, for indeed, the eye of God sees all, including acts of false mercy. And so these skraeling children, Maria and Josef, were buried a bow shot beyond the homefield wall of Thjodhilds Stead, in sight of the fjord, among some rocks and away from the watercourse that ran down to the steading. Sira Pall Hallvardsson spoke over them, and all of the men were rendered oddly despondent.
Walking back to Orm Guttormsson’s farm, Sira Pall Hallvardsson and Gunnar fell to talking of Gunnhild. “Never in Greenland,” said Pall Hallvardsson, “can there have been many maidens such as Gunnhild, so fair as to take a man’s breath, and yet withal as modest as an alpine blossom and as skillful at her tasks as a maiden twice her age.”
Gunnar smiled a little, thinking of Gunnhild’s quarrels with Helga and Kollgrim, but said only, “Birgitta Lavransdottir has taken her going much to heart, for indeed, we packed her things up and gave to her sisters what she did not need as if she were going to the grave. We must not hide from ourselves the knowledge that we are likely never to see her again.”
“It may be that Bjorn will return, or Einar.”
“Folk say that.”
“Bjorn himself said it. Perhaps he will go to Norway and gain the ear of the king and queen. They would surely let him come back, for it is not every revenue officer and ombudsman who wishes to come here.” And the two men smiled at the memory of Kollbein Sigurdsson.
“Perhaps,” said Gunnar, “but Bjorn himself told me that it is common knowledge among sailing folk that the seas get more treacherous every year. He said that twenty ships used to leave Bergen for Iceland each summer, but now Bergen is much shrunk, and those who send the ships, as folk have said before, are uninterested in Iceland or Greenland, for they are Germans, not Norsemen.”
“It is true that Germans care little for the sea, though they care greatly for trade.”
“Perhaps folk will see what Bjorn carries back from Greenland and long to have it themselves. That has happened before.”
“Perhaps,” said Sira Pall Hallvardsson, “Bjorn will long to have more.”
Now Gunnar cast him a glance. “Did you not see in the last half year of Bjorn’s stay that look of a man who has eaten his fill? Who turns from the table half-disgusted at the dishes still remaining? Birgitta Lavransdottir says that Bjorn is a man with a great appetite for new things, not so much for accustomed things.” He sighed. “Nay, it is best for those such as ourselves, who send our children after what we once wished to have, to make up our minds to give these children up.” Now he spoke in a lower voice. “And even if Bjorn or Einar did return, it is the lives of married women that are the most slippery.”
“Then,” said Sira Pall Hallvardsson, “we must satisfy ourselves with the knowledge of our heavenly meeting.”
“We must, indeed. But it seems to me that this thing is hard for a father to do, and for one reason, that much of what draws me to them is the manner in which the passing days flit across them, so that they are themselves and yet not the same as they were. When we put off our flesh and appear in the raiment of our eternal souls, perhaps we shall long for this earthly quality.”
“It is promised that we shall long for nothing.” And Sira Pall Hallvardsson spoke with such longing that Gunnar glanced at him sharply, and when he came home he declared to Birgitta that Sira Pall Hallvardsson was in love with Gunnhild. But Birgitta was more interested to hear of the skraeling children, and she pondered what Gunnar told her of them for a long time, and then,