The Greenlanders - Jane Smiley [279]
They came up to the dark bulk of the church in the moonlight, and they dismounted their horses and led them into the church, so that any noises the beasts might make would be muffled by the turfing around those walls. The steading was dark and silent. Kollgrim estimated that it was still some time until dawn, for the days were nearly their shortest now. The men sat down in the snow with their cloaks and furs about them, and they watched for the door of the steading to open. Kollgrim had forbidden any talking at all.
Jon Andres sat cross-legged, warm inside his furs, and set himself to watch the door to the steading. Kollgrim was beside him to the left, and a servingman, Karl, who was especially good with a crossbow, beside him to the right. He looked over the heads of all the men, and back at the door to the steading, and he wondered if Ofeig was indeed inside, or if they were, with great effort, silently waiting out silence while Ofeig slipped away to another steading, to steal more food or kill more sheep. Folk in the district now habitually referred to Ofeig as “that devil,” and more than a few looked to the Icelanders to do something about him, according to the predictions of the fellow Larus. It had been so long since Jon Andres himself had seen Ofeig, that when he heard of the deaths of the fellow Arnkel and his wife Alfdis, he, too, had seen something devilish in it. Now, however, it was not Ofeig’s devilishness that made Jon Andres want to kill him, but the knowledge that Ofeig was a man like any other. If anything had brought this knowledge to Jon Andres, it was the sight of the fellow running and rolling down the long hillside at Mosfell, in clothes that were ill-fitting and too small, boots that were mismatched, a threadbare cloak. And he had Ofeig’s face and hands and manner. He was Ofeig, whatever corruption seethed within.
Now it seemed to Jon Andres that much time had passed since they had sat down, although the sky was no lighter, even to the east, and he was still warm in his furs. He looked over the other men. They sat as if cursed with spells, such spells as the skraelings know, that make a man motionless for days at a seal hole in the ice. Only Kollgrim had changed position, although soundlessly, without even a rustle of clothing. He was looking toward the church, and when Jon Andres followed his gaze, he, too, began to hear an intermittent noise, as if one of the horses had broken loose, and was moving among the others. Kollgrim turned and caught his eye, cocked his head, and shrugged. Jon Andres was relieved. The noise was indeed a small one, and would be doubly muffled to Ofeig’s ears, inside the turves of the priest’s house. Kollgrim turned back to the door of the steading, and watched intently. He had a predator’s concentration, or a skraeling’s. Jon Andres did not know what to make of his wife’s brother, only that Kollgrim had not put aside the enmity between them, except for appearance. He would not, Jon Andres thought, ever put it aside, though he might save Jon Andres’ life, or Jon Andres might save his. It seemed to him that unfriendliness formed the other man’s backbone, unfriendliness and melancholia. And it was also the case that however much Jon Andres disapproved of this trait among the Greenlanders, he loved rather than hated Kollgrim for it. Helga had nothing to say to this. Her devotion to Kollgrim was a habit with her.
But still the darkness did not lighten, and no movement relieved the scene, and now Jon Andres himself felt the spell descend over him, yet he dared not move or change position, for he had not the talent of soundless movement. A strong memory came to him, of Ofeig as a child, when he sometimes came to Ketils