Independent People (48 page)

But at this very moment, when the soul was beginning firmly to take root in the conversation, the master of the house stuck his head through the hatchway and looked around the crowded room. It was a scene from which he appeared to derive little pleasure. With one blow he cut the scientific knot that his old friend Olafur of Yztadale had just placed before the assembly:

“I am off to bed now,” he said, “and so are my family. We haven’t the patience to listen to any more of your rubbish about the soul this Christmas. And if in future you need to bawl any more hymns, then may I ask you to go and bawl them elsewhere. I have sent for the authorities. It is they who will find the guilty person and punish him. And when you have gone from here tonight, I hope you will look upon this visit as if it had never been made. Off with the kettle, Sola lass. I don’t know these people, nor did they come to see me.”

He did not acknowledge his best friends that night; he drove them to the door. And they did not recognize their old friend either, or rather the deadly, frozen hatred in the eyes of the man who had entered at the moment when they had lost sight of natural reasoning; and it was he, this man, who seemed suddenly to have understood everything and who now asked for nothing more except the authorities. Shamefaced and fumbling, like pantry-thieves caught red-handed, mumbling, forgetting even their farewells, old friends and new friends alike crept one after another down the stairs and, disbanding on the snowdrift outside, went their different ways. The moon had disappeared; there was no enchantment left, no coffee, no anything.

And, strange though it may seem, this night was rarely heard mentioned in the district afterwards. It fell straightway out of history in the same fashion as the bull reindeer that Gudbjartur Jonsson rode once upon a time over Glacier River on the moors. In the days that followed, when bearded, moss-covered men met by chance at home or out in the open, they cast one another a quick, embarrassed glance, like a boy and a girl who went too far last night but are resolved that it will never happen again. Even many years later this night still lay on the parish like an unhappy stain; it lived on at the bottom of their consciousness like a morbid fancy, heavy with shame and guilt—the livid, flickering shadows, the eyes of legend, the blasphemous singing of hymns, coffee that
never came, the soul; and Bjartur of Summerhouses, who denied his friends when they had forgathered to attack his enemy, Kolumkilli.

W
ITH
this victory of Gudbjartur Jonsson’s there was an end, for the time being at least, of all spectral activity on the moors. As a man cuts down worm-diseased sheep in the spring, so did he cut down both religion and philosophy on the night when he drove the parish to the door and ordered his children to bed. Some folk say that he also hanged the cat. If the ghost thought that Bjartur would lose heart, sell out and seek a new home because of this second disaster to his sheep, then he was due for a disappointment. The devil had had all his trouble for nothing, Bjartur stood firm as a rock. And though he suffered a great loss in the engagement, the crofter learned never to yield an inch of ground. What followed now was merely the aftermath of events that had already taken place.

It was the shortest day. The sky grew overcast during the morning, with low clouds, snow-charged and threatening, hanging half-way up the mountain slopes. No wondrous gleam lit soul or landscape; there was only a little midday no sooner come than gone, yet how much darkness was needed to wrap it round! And the Sheriff was expected soon. The crofter gave no one his orders for today’s work; it was as if he wished to await the decision of the authorities as to who was master here, he or Kolumkilli; but all the same little Gvendur followed him out with the bitch when he went to feed his few remaining sheep. The eldest boy sat by the window, knocking his knees together and staring in silence at an old drawing scratched on the table. He did not speak even when spoken to, let alone think of doing a hand’s turn at the yarn on the spindle, and little Nonni, who sat knitting beside his grandmother, looked at him and, understanding him in the subtle, inexplicable way that reaches farther than words or images, went over to him consolingly.

“Helgi,” he said, “don’t fret about it. The Sheriff can’t do anything with a ghost.”

And when the eldest brother made no reply, little Nonni sat down again beside his grandmother. No story; no hymn; only a trivial mumble that no one understood.

Presently the Bailiff arrived from up-country to meet the
Sheriff from down-country, for a judicial inquiry was to be held. But so far there was no Sheriff to be seen, rather had it begun to snow, and the Bailiff was sullen and abusive and had no time for this sort of nonsense, and it was very doubtful whether that blasted old Sheriff would risk his precious carcass on the moors in this weather, university men crawl back to bed as soon as they see a sprinkling of snow. The Bailiff lay down on the parents’ bed; he was in long snow-stockings and called to Asta Sollilja to pull them off for him. Neither was in a pleasant mood, visitor or crofter—you’re always in some damned mess, said the former to his host as he fished about for his tobacco-box; if it isn’t dying wives and starving sheep, it’s rampant fiends and raging devils; and the crofter replied that as far as death and devils are concerned, mate, I have never asked anyone to come along here and bawl their guts out with prayers and spiritual balderdash in the middle of the night, to the ridicule of God and men and the eternal disgrace of the whole parish. All I ask for is the justice that every free man is entitled to in a free country. Every year the authorities apply to me for taxes, but this is the first time that I apply to the authorities for anything, so I consider that I owe them nothing, and don’t have to put up with any of your lip.

“Look here,” said the Bailiff, adjusting the quid in his mouth with his tongue, “you ought to sell this lousy hole back to me and swindle me a second time.”

But after the emotional turbulence of the past few days Bjartur was determined to meet everything with equanimity. The Bailiff was not to be allowed to nettle him. “Yes, old boy,” he replied compassionately, “you always would have your little joke, wouldn’t you?”

The Bailiff: “I don’t see why you should bother keeping such a paltry venture going any longer now. Your two wives are dead, your sheep dead, your youngsters dead and worse than dead. What the hell’s the sense of it all? And there stands poor Solbjort or whatever you call her, almost a grown woman, heathen, illiterate, and no move made to have her confirmed yet.”

“It’s something fresh,” commented Bjartur, “this desire of yours to have people Christianized. Maybe you feel you’ve arrived at an age when you’d better be prepared for anything.”

“You needn’t worry yourself about that,” replied the Bailiff. I’ve always kept my Christianity before me, and I demand that others also should have the Christianity necessary to bring them within the rule of the law. I’ve always had a picture of Christ
hanging in my room, a picture that was left me by my mother”
(“Yes,
and one of the Russian Czar, too,” interposed Bjartur)—“yes, one of the Russian Czar, and I'll have you know that the Russian Czar is a highly respected sovereign who has always ruled his subjects well, and that they at least aren’t a gang of stubborn heathen who call ghosts and monsters down upon their heads in the way you do.”

“Huh,” snorted Bjartur. “Grettir Asmundarson was never considered much of a religious hero in his day, and yet he was avenged all the way south in Miklagard, and acclaimed as the greatest man Iceland ever had for that very reason.”

But far from deigning to answer such irrelevant nonsense, the Bailiff took the quid out of his mouth and signified his intention of lying down for a while, I'll have more to say to you when I wake up, swung his legs on to the bed, turned his face to the wall.

“Mix up a few dung cakes for the authorities, Sola lass,” said Bjartur as he went out to see to his work; and the snow grew gradually heavier, and day went on passing somehow, anyhow, or nohow, with deepening snow and sleeping Bailiff and Sheriff expected soon.

The most unpleasant feature of mid-winter is not its darkness. More unpleasant still, perhaps, is that it should never grow dark enough for one to forget the endlessness of which it is a symbol; the endlessness that in reality is akin to nothing but justice itself; which fills the world, like justice, and, like justice, is inexorable. Mid-winter and justice are two sisters; one realizes best of all in the spring, when the sun shines, that they were both evil. Today is the shortest day. Perhaps those who manage to survive this day will be safe, let us hope so. Today is also the day of justice, and the little people in the little croft are awaiting the justice that fills the world and is void of understanding. It is the father who has sent for justice. He who makes hay for his sheep has justice on his side, the sheep are the sheep of justice; and though a mother be coffined and children be planted in the churchyard, yet justice is in the sheep and in the sheep alone. Whether it be he who loves dreams and the soul, or he whose hopes are centred on revolt, justice is inimical to both of them, because they had not the wit to conquer; and because justice is stupid in its nature; and evil; nothing so evil; one need only listen to the Bailiff sleeping to realize that, one need only smell the cakes that are being baked for justice and its officers. And the eldest son of Summerhouses closes the door after him.

The Bailiff was still asleep, snoring loudly; one would think this elderly man with the strong, chiselled face had not had a decent sleep for a whole lifetime. Sola girl, haven’t you a bit of brisket for the Bailiffs guts when he wakes up?—For there was no need to be sparing with the meat in Summerhouses this winter, every keg and every case was bursting with this delicacy, which no one would buy because it was dead meat. Dead meat be damned, of course it wasn’t dead meat, there was nothing the matter with the meat, except for the mark that stupidity and superstition had stamped upon it. Anyway, well stuff the authorities and let them decide. Where’s Helgi?

Yes, where was Helgi? Wasn’t he here a few minutes ago? Oh, he won’t be long, it’s his turn to muck out the horse today. No sign of the Bailiff waking; oh well, it’s none of our business, I suppose he can sleep as long as he likes, the old owl. This has finished it good and proper, the Sheriff won’t have laid foot on the heath in this weather, the snow’s coming down thick as soup now and you can’t see your hand in front of your face. If you look out from the drift at the door, you would think the world had disappeared, no vestige of line or colour, no world left, one might be blind or falling into a deep sleep.

Where can the boy have got to? Gvendur, pop down and have a look, sonny. He can hardly have gone out to the stalls. Presently they had all had their fill and Bjartur himself went out to look for the boy. The Bailiff woke up and rose yawning and dishevelled.

“Eh?” said the Bailiff.

“Our Helgi,” said Asta Sollilja. “We don’t know what’s become of him.”

“Helgi?” asked the Bailiff, who knew no one of this name on the croft.

“Yes,” she replied. “My brother Helgi.”

“Oh,” said the Bailiff, bemused with sleep and the search for his tobacco, “my brother Helgi. Listen, pet,” he added, “you should tell Bjartur he ought to sell the croft. You can come along to us whenever you like, you needn’t ask anyone’s permission. You have my mother’s mouth.”

“What?” said the girl.

“You must be fifteen or so by now.”

Yes, she was fifteen just over a month ago.

“Yes, it’s a shame, but what can a fellow do? We ought to have taken you right away. But what was I going to say again, did I see you with a bite of fish there, girlie?”

“No, meat”

“Yes, of course, meat’s the thing in Summerhouses this Christmas.”

“I’ve made you some pancakes,” she said.

“Oh, to blazes with pancakes. My stomach won’t stand that sort of thing any longer now; I’ll champ a bit of meat instead. It’s just like the Sheriff to fool me into coming down here, and lie snoring in bed himself, damn him. I don’t see how I’m going to get very far from here tonight.”

But Asta Sollilja’s ears were far away from the conversation, for she did not understand what could have happened to Helgi. Gripped suddenly by a misgiving that verged almost on terror, she neglected even the Bailiff’s needs and fled down the stairs and outside on to the snowdrift. So the Bailiff was left sitting alone upstairs with the old woman and the youngest brother, to consider his tobacco and stroke himself and scratch himself and yawn. Time passed, and he felt no doubt that he ought to say something.

“Well, well, Bera,” he began, “what have you to say to all this accursed nonsense?”

“What?” she asked.

“Don’t you think that everything’s gone completely crazy in heaven and earth, Bera old girl?”

Though he addressed the old woman in a voice that was very far from being unfriendly, he did not seem to be awaiting her answer with any great interest, for he followed up his question with a succession of tremendous yawns.

“Oh, I don’t suppose I’ve much to think or say at all, except that I always knew this was bound to happen some time. Or worse still. It isn’t by any means God’s angels that swarm around this hut, let me tell you. Never has been. And never will be.”

“No, never has been and won’t ever be,” endorsed the Bailiff, “and have you any objections to having a chimney corner found for you on a nice farm up-country if the Sheriff should ever bestir himself sufficiently to clear Bjartur out of here by order of the law?”

“Oh, I don’t suppose I’ll have much to say against the authorities, whatever they decide to do, and in any case it doesn’t matter very much what happens to me. As the Bailiff knows, poor Ragnar and I lived for forty years in Urtharsel, and nothing happened in all that time. Our neighbours on the moors there were good neighbours. But here it seems as if something always has to be happening all the time. Not that I mean that anything has ever
happened except what Providence has willed; for instance, that I should be allowed to live on, if you can call it life, while my poor daughter is called away from house and home in the first sunshine of the haymaking; not to mention the loss of sheep last spring, and now this latest outbreak of devilry.”