The Greenlanders - Jane Smiley [56]
Now Margret looked at Skuli, who laughed heartily in his beard. “Indeed,” he said, “I have heard that from time to time a ghost may come between a gift and its recipient, and so it is considered the better course to place it in the hands of the one you are giving it to.”
Olaf growled, “Anything is possible, but truly I have been looking forward to roast fowl all afternoon.”
Later that evening, Margret went to Skuli, and said that it ill behooved him, especially as one of the ombudsman’s men, to consort with outlawed men and in reply, Skuli went outside and carried in a large sheepskin shirt with attached hood, and declared to Margret that she should admire the thing, poor as it was, for one of the young women at Thjodhilds Stead had sewed it for him, and he expected to be very warm in the winter. At this, Margret reddened and turned away, and what had befallen the three birds on the bench remained a mystery that the Gunnars Stead folk talked about for a day or so afterward.
In this fall, Gunnar and Hrafn counted a hundred and sixty-two sheep and goats, thirty-four cows, and four horses, including Mikla, that now belonged to Gunnars Stead. Also in this fall, Hrafn brought home a new wife from another farmstead in Vatna Hverfi, named Katla. In age, Katla fell somewhere between Birgitta and Margret, but much of the time she spoke nonsense, and so the Gunnars Stead folk considered her silly. She was good-natured, however, and worked well if someone stood near her and helped her keep her mind on her tasks. Now Hrafn came to Gunnar and asked if one of the outbuildings could be put in good order for himself and his new wife. The boys, who were now eleven and nine, would continue to sleep off the cowbyre, as Hrafn had done when married to Maria. Maria had been born at Gunnars Stead in Asgeir Gunnarsson’s time, and had preferred to sleep in the farmstead where she always had slept, but this was not suitable for a stranger, Hrafn explained. Now Olaf and Gunnar went around to all the buildings with Hrafn, trying to choose a large enough one that would take only a little fixing up, for Gunnar did not care to hire anyone to help with this work, although neither he nor Olaf was especially clever at building.
Soon a building was chosen, of about ten ells long and eight ells wide, that had once been used as a storehouse in the time of Gunnar Asgeirsson, the father of Asgeir. The masonry in this building was still in good repair, and turves could be easily cut nearby. In addition, the east wall of this house was built into the side of a hill, so that the only real difficulty would be replacing two rotten beams under the roof. When Olaf stuck his finger into them, the wood crumbled away into powder. Now Gunnar had to bethink himself where he might get two stout beams, and what he would have to pay for them. The next time that Pall Hallvardsson and Skuli were visiting, Gunnar leaned back in his seat after the evening meal and declared, casually, that he was thinking of building, if he could find the wood to build with. Pall Hallvardsson said that he had heard that others were thinking of building, too, not only Kollbein the ombudsman, who was always thinking of something, but a farmer of Eriks Fjord, who wanted to put up a new storehouse, and a farmer near Gardar, who wanted to add two rooms to his house. He didn’t know about the men of Vatna Hverfi or the southern districts, but it was common knowledge that wood was in short supply, and that old houses would have to be taken down before new ones could be put up. Gunnar made no reply to this, and afterwards, they spoke of other things.
Now, whenever Gunnar met another farmer or went to church, he mentioned casually that he was thinking of building, if he could get the wood to build, and one by one he began to hear of who else wanted wood and who had wood to trade, and there were more of the former than there were of the latter. After this, Gunnar and Olaf went around to