The Greenlanders - Jane Smiley [170]
After the servingman departed, with a promise to listen for word of any farms that needed servants during the winter, Margret told Sigurd that she felt uncommonly low, for this was the effect of unexpected company, to leave you more in silence than you had been, and farther from others. Such a thing as this Margret could not remember ever having spoken of to anyone, not even Skuli Gudmundsson, for she had always been of a taciturn bent, so much so that all the folk she had ever known complained of it, but indeed, unlike all the folk she had ever known, Sigurd was nearly as reticent as she was, and so if talk was to be made, she had to help make it.
Also unlike all the folk she had ever known, Sigurd occasionally aroused her to anger, and most often it happened in the same way, that the boy would take a notion to do something and would not be moved from this, no matter what sort of work needed to be begun or finished about the steading. One time, Margret had finished milking the ewes and had set the milk on the shady side of the steading, and was ready to go off with the sheep to their pasture. One of the younger ewes took a fright, for Margret made a noise behind her, and she veered away from where the others were standing, and Margret looked about for Sigurd to herd the beast back in. She saw that the boy had taken to pitching stones into the water and called him over, but indeed, he had no intention of stopping his game, or even acknowledging her shout, but stood there tossing rocks as if entranced. Another instance, later in the summer, took place in the early morning, when the boy would not rise from his bed, but lay there with his eyes open, ignoring her, and on this occasion she gave in to the temptation to strike him, not, after all, when he refused to help her, but when he showed no interest in his morning meat. But indeed, he went his own way even so, as all folk do, whether they are fully grown or not, and Margret resolved upon no more blows.
Shortly after this incident, Quimiak reappeared. He was now a much changed fellow, no longer with anything of a boy about him, and on his upper lip he sported a few long threads of mustache in the skraeling fashion. His furs were very rich. He bounded up the hill as Margret was folding the sheep for the night and without speaking to her, for skraelings do not like to look at or speak to women if they don’t have to, he searched all about the steading, and opened the door of the little house. Margret saw that he was looking for Asta and Bryndis, and she gestured to him that they were dead of sickness. Now he stood there staring at her for a long moment, and it seemed to Margret that he was much disturbed by this news. Just then, Sigurd came from behind the steading.
Now Quimiak smiled broadly, as if surprised, and Margret saw that he had understood the boy to be dead, as well. Sigurd, not being used to visitors, perhaps, or not recognizing the skraeling, ran over to Margret and pressed against her robe. At this, Quimiak stepped up to her and took the boy by the shoulders and pulled him away from her and turned him about, and Margret said, “Indeed, child, you must stand up straight, for this is your father, whom you have seen many times before and should remember.” Quimiak was much pleased with the boy, and pinched his flesh between his forefinger and thumb, then ran his hand down the boy’s side, then put his hand on top of the boy’s head, and regarded how tall Sigurd was. Then he began