The Greenlanders - Jane Smiley [75]
In the time since Skuli had moved into the district, Margret had learned to cover her feelings completely, even from the sharp eyes of Birgitta Lavransdottir, so that she felt herself to be two persons as a fur-lined cloak is two cloaks—humble, brownish wadmal on the outside, with a modest hood and simple bone buttons, but thick, glittering white foxskin underneath. Her passion had not faded and could not, she discovered, be sated by Skuli’s presence. It was not diminished by his reverence for appearances (as exemplified by the two horses) nor his carelessness about them (casting her dangerous glances in the presence of Birgitta, or even Olaf). In the year of their liaison, he had grown inordinately proud, Margret thought, and yet his brilliant dress and wild sociability excited her, even as his striking appearance mounted on the gray horse riding into the farmyard filled her with admiration she was hard put to contain.
Olaf was much impressed by the horse, and anxious to make the match with Mikla, but, he said, it would be some time before the mare would come into heat, for she was often later than other horses, and she had only just borne her new foal. About this Skuli was not disappointed, since he would thus get to keep the stallion that much longer, and he intended to do Thorkel the good turn of getting other breeding fees while the animal was in the area. The horse was not turned out with the others, but kept carefully in the horsebyre, and Skuli checked him three times every day for scratches and tiny injuries.
Bit by bit in the course of his year with Margret, Skuli had come to view some things in a different light, and this was especially true since his coming to Vatna Hverfi. For reasons of economy, or simple laziness, Kollbein Sigurdsson neither came to Vatna Hverfi district nor sent messengers to his representative, and for much of the time there was no news at all from Foss and Thjodhilds Stead. Skuli’s tie to Kollbein and through him to the court of the king in Norway seemed to loosen, seemed to lighten, almost to disappear. Now he hardly remembered his dead wife, or even his children, or his land on the hillside near Bergen. His friendship with Margret seemed as much a marriage to him as his doings in the district seemed his business. He took as great an interest in the livestock of some of the farmers as he would have in his own, and was earnest in his advice. In the same way, Thorkel Gellison’s stud horse seemed to him to be his own while it was in his care, and he showed great pride in it.
It seemed to Skuli that this life could last forever, or could shade gently into a similar one that included Margret as his acknowledged spouse, some children by her, ownership of a Vatna Hverfi farmstead, and a race of horses in the byre that were descended from Mikla and the gray stud. From time to time he suggested this to Margret, and she saw that in unguarded moments, he acted as if these impossibilities were already accomplished. Olaf, for example, was so friendly with Skuli that Margret could see that Skuli often forgot that Olaf was her husband. And now they were much thrown together by the planned breeding of the stallion and the mare.
Gunnhild was a strong-minded and active child who consumed all of Birgitta’s attention and most of Svava Vigmundsdottir’s as well, for Svava had returned to Gunnars Stead just before the birth. The two women were much occupied in concocting enticing viands for the child, as well as in following her about and preserving her from danger, for Svava declared that she had never seen a child with such a penchant for things she was not allowed. Also in this year, Easter came early and was followed by the sudden breakup of the ice in the fjord and the early greening of the mountain pastures. Olaf and Gunnar were much pleased by this, and assisted Hrafn and his sons in taking most of the livestock, which now numbered six horses, eighteen cows, and a hundred and five sheep and goats, up into