The Greenlanders - Jane Smiley [285]
And so it happened somehow, through the winters, when the priests were snug at Gardar, that some of the Larus Stead neighbors got in the habit of going to Larus Stead at special times, when there would be meat on the table, set at twelve places, and Larus would wear a special robe that one of the women had woven for him, and folk would sit at the table and partake of the dried sealmeat and the broth, and Larus would speak of one of his visions—never more than a part of one really, but each in order, from the first to the last. At another time during the meal, he would speak of the persecutions of the Greenlanders, of his trial and victory at the hands of Bjorn Bollason and Eindridi Andresson, of the taunts of the farmers at the seal hunts, of how he was received in this great steading and that one.
Now when the Easter of 1407 came, and there was a priest in Thjodhilds church, it seemed to some of these folk that they had sinned and betrayed the Lord, for they shifted in their seats and their blood thrilled in their veins during Eindridi Andresson’s service, and some of these folk swore to themselves that they would stay apart from Larus. Others, however, saw the deficiencies in Sira Eindridi’s service, how he mumbled the Latin through not knowing it very well, and how he even skipped bits of the service that they thought they remembered, and how he tried to make up for these things by intoning a long sermon full of dire threats and harsh words. These folk thought fondly of the simple meals at Larus Stead, and the supple way that Larus told his tales, as a grandmother may tell a tale that everyone knows already, in her own voice, but also in the voices of many who have come before. What talent had Larus had for such things when he was a servant at Brattahlid? None to speak of. Was not this itself evidence that the saints and the Lord and the Virgin were indeed talking to him, as he said they were? At any rate, after Easter, some of the women fell away, and did not come back to Larus Stead, but others came as often as they could, and brought other folk, kinfolk and neighbors, with them. It happened that Gudrun, the wife of Ragnleif Isleifsson, and the former wife of Osmund Thordarson, looked in one day, and though she did not stay long, Larus told Ashild that this was a great victory for them, and Ashild agreed.
News of these doings came to Bjorn Bollason, for indeed, Larus Stead was not so far from Solar Fell, and Bjorn Bollason did not know what to think, and he spoke about them to the Icelanders, telling Snorri how Larus had predicted the coming of the ship over and over, although other details of the predictions had been false ones. But still, he had seen the ship, and the women upon it, and Bjorn was perplexed by the mixture of truth and error. And so Snorri sat up in the bedcloset, and put his trencher of meat away from him, and he told Bjorn the following tale:
Once when Snorri was a young man on his uncle’s ship, carrying dried cod to England, it happened that the ship was blown off course in the passage between England and France, and a great storm came up, and they took refuge in a certain town of France that was named Calais, and this was a great shipping town, but also a great warring town, sometimes English and sometimes French, so that the folk there spoke the language of France equally with the language of England. It was not a place such as Snorri cared for—cramped and full of rough folk. Now it happened that although the cargo of the ship had been saved, the ship itself needed some repairs, and so Snorri and his mates stayed in Calais for some weeks, lamenting all the time the passage of good sailing weather and the coming of winter, for they cared little for the idea of staying in Calais until spring.
Now it happened that one day Snorri and another young man were out upon the streets of the town, and they saw folk streaming toward a large square, and so they were taken up in the stream, and soon they came to a place where a scaffolding had been set up, and many folk were milling about