To Lie with Lions - Dorothy Dunnett [191]
‘You would like to follow them?’ the bailiff said. He looked from one visitor to the other, and then glanced to one side at Glímu-Sveinn.
‘They have gone to seek falcons,’ said Glímu-Sveinn. ‘Or so your men tell us. Perhaps we should wait.’
‘It is a fine sport,’ said the bailiff. ‘There are horses. We had some trouble bringing them in, but they are here now. You could eat, and ride out to your prisoners. You will take them to Bergen, for avoiding taxes and trading unlicensed?’
There was a pause. The black-bearded visage of Paúel was grave. The Icelander shuffled. Now, Nicholas thought, one of them will mention that the Hanse captain Paúel is my captive, and the bailiff will have to decide what to do. He waited, his face as solemn as Paúel’s.
Glímu-Sveinn didn’t speak. Paúel Benecke said, ‘When I catch him, Martin will answer in Bergen. The brother and sister are not worth the trouble; we shall take them back to their homes on our ships. As for Síra Nikolás here, I owe him much, which I intend to repay.’
‘I guessed as much,’ Nicholas said.
‘I am sure of it,’ said Paúel Benecke. ‘Meanwhile, Herra Oddur, we should certainly enjoy a hunt for these birds.’
‘I shall send a man with you,’ said the bailiff.
‘I shall go,’ said Glímu-Sveinn. ‘Where were the gyrfalcons last seen? There is no better fellow than Tryggvi to find them.’
‘My own man is as good,’ said the bailiff. ‘Tryggvi and his son had to go home. I have sent Sigfús Helgason with the young man and his sister.’
‘He is a thorough man,’ the Icelander said. He was a man of few words, Glímu-Sveinn.
‘What do you think?’ Benecke said when, leaving Skálholt behind, they set out over the snow on fresh horses. It was an hour before midday.
‘That you’re a lying bastard,’ Nicholas said, ‘and so is he.’ He switched to Icelandic. ‘Glímu-Sveinn? Is Sigfús Helgason good?’
‘He is good for some things,’ said the man. ‘His thirst is best of all.’
Nicholas glanced at him. Loading the ponies at Skálholt, the Icelander had said very little. They had been given all they could carry in the way of food and drink and provender. Fetching it, with the eager help of the boys of the house, Nicholas had noticed the barrels of ale in the barns, the kegs standing stuffed full of moss, the piles of sacks bulging with meal. Some Icelanders, they said, had never tasted a loaf in their lives. The Bishop was rich.
They loaded, too, as was customary, what they must have for survival as well as for sport: tents and staves, rope and fuel, and the inevitable bags with the horse-shoes. There were only nine ponies, and Glímu-Sveinn had elected to send the horse-handler home.
He had kept the dog. In the yard, the dog had behaved as if tied to its master, standing with its eyes on his face, or trotting briefly away, and returning. Nicholas had called out to one of the boys. ‘What do you think? Can dogs foretell a change in the weather?’
The boy had laughed. ‘They won’t go out if there is a storm coming, that’s for sure! They know the signs. Our house ravens as well. And the buntings sense when to come in and lie snug. We had a covey this morning: see there.’
Thinking of it, Nicholas now studied the sky as they rode. It was clear. They traversed the same butter-gold dreamland as before, the Icelander riding in front, and the voluble Paúel at his side. The dog kept the horses in line, swerving and scampering about, now on top, now shoulder-deep in the snow. The way the bailiff had indicated was east. ‘Towards Hruni. That is where Sigfús was proposing to take them. The white gyrfalcons follow the ptarmigan.’
Glímu-Sveinn had grunted. When questioned he had shrugged his wide shoulders. Like most of his race, he was thick-set and long in the trunk, bred from generations of riders and rowers. Ten generations or more. After a while he had observed, ‘There are rivers to cross. But for falcons, it is worth taking trouble.’
Far to the east, the sun gleamed on the glaciers. To the north, across the