The Greenlanders - Jane Smiley [282]
“Indeed, you will make a poor wife.”
“Nay, my betrothed is a great hunter and a bold man. He will have pleasure upon coming home to me, and I will have pleasure arranging his affairs for him.”
“What else is there to know about him?”
“He is a handsome fellow. He is the brother’s son of Margret Asgeirsdottir, whom you know.”
“This old woman who speaks little?”
“She speaks when she has something of worth to say, or someone of worth to say it to.”
“You are marrying the brother’s son of a servingmaid?”
Now Sigrid colored, and fell silent, and Snorri could see that she was annoyed with him. She said, “Strangers bring news from afar, but they know nothing of the news at home. You have been to Vatna Hverfi district, so you must know that it is the richest of all the districts, and my Kollgrim has possession of one of the greatest steadings there, and his sister is married to the man with the greatest steading and the most other holdings. Margret Asgeirsdottir’s tale is her own, and you would be a lucky man if she told it to you, for she has never told it to anyone.” She paused, and then said, “She goes as a servingmaid of her own accord, but my father and mother consider her a guest, and the weaving she does for us in the nature of gifts to us.”
Snorri smiled teasingly, and said, “There is no place for anger in a good wife.”
“Then indeed, there is no place for honor or virtue, it seems to me. I am tired of this talk, and have many things to do.” And so she got up, but the next day she came back, for Snorri was not an ill-tempered man, and his teasing was pleasant to her. After this talk, though, Snorri endeavored to have talk with Margret Asgeirsdottir, but she had nothing to say to him, no matter what he might say to her.
Another one who liked to talk to Sigrid Bjornsdottir was Thorstein Olafsson, and whenever he came over from Gardar, he made it a point to waylay her and amuse her with new verses that he had made, and it happened that one day when he appeared on skis with some other folk from Gardar, she went up to him and said as follows:
Folk who pay for meat with song
Must chew for a moment, and sing all evening long.
Thorstein was much pleased with this, and said as follows:
But they may look while they sing
Across the room, at smiles blossoming.
From time to time Kollgrim came to Solar Fell on his skis, bringing game for meat or furs, and he, too, was much drawn to the Icelanders. Although he said little to them, he watched them so that he made them uncomfortable. One day Snorri said to Sigrid, “Your betrothed has more eyes than tongue.”
“That is a virtue in most folk, to look about but to keep foolishness to oneself. You may see the results of his ways in the furs he brings me and the broth you are supping so eagerly.”
“This fellow seems to me the perfect Greenlander, half man and half bear.”
“I see nothing of that in him.”
“He looks at folk as if he were about to eat them up.”
“And others look at folk as if they wished them to do their business for them. My Kollgrim will eat no one up, but other folk will succeed in having their work done for them.”
“This sharpness ill behooves a good wife.”
“As you have not seen your own wife in five winters, it may be that you have forgotten what behooves a good wife. But surely she has not, as she has carried on your business without you.” And so their conversations went on, and Snorri spoke highly of Sigrid to Bjorn Bollason, but never to Sigrid herself, and Sigrid went to Snorri’s bedcloset every day, but only as if she could not avoid it. Even so, the Icelanders continued to make little of Kollgrim, and said among themselves that the merry maiden was thrown away on such a sour fellow. And seeing Kollgrim, and his quiet ways, Thorstein Olafsson felt emboldened to talk with Sigrid more and more and beguile her with rhymes, many of which were about herself, and all of which made her laugh.
It was also the case that Kollgrim befriended his father’s sister, and sometimes sat near her while she was weaving and spun bits