Independent People (73 page)

“What’s all this you’ve been buying?” inquired Bjartur.

“Oh, nothing very much, really. Nothing worth talking about anyway,” she replied, unwilling to tell him everything at once. Her manner was a trifle self-important, and perhaps just a trifle happy, just a trifle proud underneath; perhaps on her way over the moors she had been looking forward to his questioning her and trying to probe into every detail. But he closed up immediately in
cold reserve and showed no further sign of curiosity. It was not his habit to cross-examine anyone about anything, he himself never permitted anyone to cross-examine him about anything, let her please herself about what she bought. He bundled her purchases into the entrance in silence, then let her mare loose in the marshes and gave it a kick, it was a pitch-dark autumn night. He found a few odd jobs to delay him outside and did not go in again before bedtime. He suspected that the housekeeper, following her usual autumn habit, would offer him a biscuit to eat if he went in before she was in bed, but on this occasion he cared less for biscuits than ever before, being afraid of what they might lead to, maybe hard words on both sides. Yet when at long length he entered with the intention of going to bed, he found that he could not restrain himself from striking a light in the passage and taking a closer look at the stuff she had bought. There was half a sack of wheat flour, a bag of rice, a whole loaf of sugar, and a box fragrant with the odours of colonial goods such as coffee, raisins, and who knows what else—all goods that the burden of debt forbade an independent man to buy in a free country. Prizing open one of the boards in the lid, he peered under. And what was the first thing that met his eyes? It was a roll of delightfully fragrant snuff-tobacco. No wonder he felt like losing his temper, a man who for a whole month past had had nothing but free Wormy to allay, or rather irritate, his craving for tobacco. Too disturbed to pursue his investigations further, he put out the light and went into the room.

The old woman asleep, Gvendur in bed too, his face turned to the wall. Only Brynja was still up, and she was sitting on her bed, still dressed in her best. She had unpacked some cloth to examine and had laid it aside again as if disappointed in it. She gazed down at the hands in her lap and did not look at him. It was only a short while since she had been so proud and so consequential, yet now she said nothing; no delight, no expectant cheerfulness left.

“Do we have to waste all this oil?” grumbled the farmer, screwing down the lamp by more than half.

She made no reply, something most unusual for her, but after a while she gave a slight sniff. He had begun unlacing his shoes. He hoped he would be able to get into bed and pull the clothes over his head before she found an opportunity of offering him a biscuit. He was careful not to look at her, but pondered all the more her behaviour. This sensible, hard-headed woman, who had long outgrown the years of youthful folly and frivolous excitement,
this woman who had scraped and saved all her life long, never wasting a penny, except perhaps on a pound of biscuits once a year—had she taken leave of her senses? Was she sitting there sulking because the eyes had not popped out of his head with admiration when she had brought a horse-load of provisions into his house, his big new house? But she was a fine, dependable woman nevertheless, and rarely given to idle chatter, and he had had no complaints to make against her, except that once, last year it must have been, she had interfered in something that didn’t concern her. And she was a fine figure of a woman, too, wherever one saw her, strong-looking and in good flesh, with the red blood of youth still in her cheeks; actually all she needed was the spectacles to be as imposing in presence as Madam of Myri a few years ago, when she was still at her best. And she was the very soul of cleanliness, never let anyone put anything on unless it had been mended, never allowed dirt to accumulate in the corners, knew how to make the most of the provisions, invested everything she cooked with an appetizing flavour. And she wasn’t the one to spare herself either, or to turn her nose up at anything, for she was ready to carry muck by night or day, if necessary; no, she was most definitely not the type to lie coddling herself in bed, like a bailiff’s daughter with nothing better to do. And she was a woman of substance, with a tidy little sum to her credit in the savings bank, and though her mare was a false stepper, a mare is always a mare nevertheless. And last but not least there was that magnificent bed of hers, the finest piece of furniture in the whole of the crofter’s new house, the range not excepted; it was doubtful whether Madam of Myri herself slept between sheets that were softer.

No, she showed no signs of offering him a biscuit; probably it would never occur to her the way things stood now. For a good while she went on sitting on the bed with her hands in her lap—strange how helpless her hands could look when there was nothing in them—and he remained acutely conscious of her in the twilight of the room, there was a shadow lying across her face. Finally she took the stuff she had been inspecting and, rolling it up into a careless bundle as if it were some worthless rag, stuck it under the lid of her clothes-chest. Then she gave a little sigh. Then she took the counterpane off her bed, folded it with habitual neatness, laid back the red-chequered eiderdown and the snow-white sheet, sat down on the edge of the bed, and began undressing—unfastened her tie, unhooked her jacket, wriggled out of her skirt; and, having carefully folded all her outer clothes, put them, together
with her best petticoat, under the lid of the chest. She was wearing thick, well-made woollen underclothes which she had worked herself, and her figure seemed to grow and burgeon and be set free as she peeled off the close-fitting outer garments; the strong, substantial haunches were so elastic still that it seemed incredible that she could be past the age of child-bearing yet. There dwelt a colossal strength in her knees and thighs, her neck was strong and youthful, her breasts the breasts of a girl, firm and tremulous, resilient, high in front, cupped even. She took her vest off altogether, she was a troll of a woman, but no more of a troll than he, for he too had the shoulders of a giant, a breast that could withstand anything. She put on her night-jacket. Then and not before did she put the light out. Her bed creaked as she lay down.

He found it impossible to get to sleep somehow, and lay twisting and turning from side to side, envying his son, who had been snoring for hours now. Time and time again he gave vent to his feelings in a stream of muttered curses, angry that foolish thoughts should be keeping him awake. The fact was that he was dying for a bit of decent tobacco—that damned Wormy, he thought, damned co-op, damned savings bank, damned house. The smell in this new place was enough to stifle anyone. Yes, if one only had some decent tobacco instead of that damned Wormy. How could he get himself off to sleep? It is an old belief that crafty verse is good for insomnia, but after mumbling through one or two favourite quatrains, he found, on searching his mind for more, that the only examples he could remember were the dirty ones. These uninvited verses stormed his mind in invincible hosts, banishing even the finest masterpieces of complex versification.

All the others were bound to be asleep long ago, and there he still lay tossing and turning, cursing, and with a mind now turgid with obscenity, now obsessed with the longing for tobacco—oh, to hell, I think the best thing, if I want any peace, will be to pop out and cut myself a nice plug from that snuff-tobacco. I can always stuff it in my mouth, for the want of something better.

He pulled up his pants, got out of bed, and put on his shoes, being wary to make as little noise as possible. But the autumn night was as black as pitch and he had to grope his way towards the door. As he was fumbling along, his hand passed over a round knob that he did not recognize at first. He felt at it again, then round about it, and his hand went groping over a face; it must have been the knob on her bed that he had touched at first.

“Who’s that?” was heard whispered in the dark.

“Did I wake you up?” he said, for he had thought she was asleep.

“Is it you?” she whispered in reply, and the bed creaked as if she was moving over and raising her head.

“Huh,” he said, “no.”

He felt his way onward along by the side of the bed till he found the door. The fragrance of expensive colonial goods, delicious to the taste, assailed his nostrils, and he forgot his craving for tobacco and remembered one thing only: that this stranger had bought provisions and brought them into his house as if she thought he was a cur and a slave; luxuries; it was the first time that other people’s bread had been borne into his house.

He walked out into the open air of the night. Flakes of snow were drifting lightly earthward and the air was piercing cold, but he paid no heed to it and made his way down to the foot of the home-field, barefooted in his shoes, and in his underwear. It was a relief to breathe fresh air again after the smells of cement and damp in the house. Probably it was an unhealthy house. What the devil had he been thinking of to go and build a house?

Oh, well, now that he’d had a breath of fresh air he’d probably get some sleep. He went back to the house, groped his way up the five steps and into the entrance, once more to encounter the seductive smell of her expensive groceries, delicious in taste, prodigal in quantity, paid on the nail. But nevertheless it would be the last time that into his house was borne other people’s bread.

He was afoot early next morning, and when he had seen to some of his tasks he came in for his morning drink of water. But what did she do then but pour him out a big cup of coffee, the aromatic vapour from the curving jet filled his senses, neither of his wives had been able to make coffee like Brynja, in his opinion she made the best coffee in the parish, everything she touched in the way of food seemed to acquire an attractive and appetizing flavour of its own. She kept her back turned on him except for the moment or two when she was filling his cup—had she answered when he said good-morning, or had he perhaps not said good-morning? For a while he gazed at the coffee in the cup before him, yes, he had always been particularly fond of coffee. Finally he pushed the cup away without having touched the contents and, rising to his feet, said, without warning:

“Brynhildur, you’ll have to go.”

She looked at him then and said: “Go?” Her face was far from being old. And it wasn’t ugly. There was a young woman in her
face, and this young woman was looking at him, stricken with terror.

“You seem to think—” she said, and said no more.

It was as if this troll-woman had broken into fragments at one blow. Her features dissolved and she hid her eyes in the crook of her elbow in a deep quivering sob, like a little girl; he closed the door after him and went out to his work. All that day her face was swollen with weeping, but she said nothing.

Next day she was gone.

T
HEN,
were Ingolfur Arnarson’s ideals nowhere put into practice? Yes, of course they were. They were put into practice everywhere. In all spheres. The land-development laws had come into force, and men were being rewarded with large sums of money for cultivating extensive tracts of land, yes, quite a few crowns for just a little patch even. Folk received prizes if they built nice stables and hay-barns of concrete, and they were allowed a grant if they wanted to buy costly agricultural machinery such as tractors, ploughs, harrows, mowers, rakes, in fact everything down to sewing-machines. The sewage scheme also was soon in going order; subsidies were granted for the construction of pits and cisterns provided they were substantial enough and sufficiently expensive. The Bank of Iceland opened a department for providing loans for rural house-building. Here the farmers could obtain long-term loans at a low rate of interest and with small capital repayments, but only on condition that good substantial houses were built, the regulations requiring double walls of reinforced concrete, cross-veneer on the panelling, linoleum on the floor, water on tap, sewers, central heating, and electricity if at all possible. Only really first-class houses could be considered, experience having shown that cheap, jerry-built houses were a risky proposition. Laws were also passed dealing with the systematic scaling-down of all large agricultural debts, so there was much rejoicing among those farmers whose property had been colossal enough for them to accumulate colossal debts upon it. And the co-operative society flourished, brotherhood’s own commercial enterprise, into which no middleman or other sneak-thief might ever penetrate to batten on the small producer’s just profits. If the times were prosperous they credited the farmer not only with the value
of the produce he had sold them, but also with a bonus, which might be anything from a few crowns upwards, depending on the amount he had had for sale. The Bailiff of Myri’s bonus ran into thousands. He won large cultivation prizes, for he brought extensive tracts of land under the plough and built most impressive stables. He also received a grant from the Implements Fund for the purchase of a tractor, modern ploughs, modern harrows, a modern mowing-machine, a modern raking-machine, and other valuable agricultural requisites, even a sewing-machine. A subsidy from the Sewage Fund was also granted him, and with its aid he built one of the finest manure-cisterns in the district. No sooner was this completed than it was discovered that the house was rotting away from beneath his feet, so he raised a big loan in the Rural Building Loans Department of the Bank of Iceland, and built, in accordance with that department’s regulations, a fine first-class house, with a cellar, two floors, and a third of attics, all of reinforced concrete with double walls, veneered panelling, linoleum on the floors, a bathroom for Madam, central heating, hot and cold water, electric light. Such men are the flower of the nation. Men such as the Bailiff and the speculator who had saved the Fell King by buying his property. Speculator? It wasn’t true he was a speculator, he was simply a modern financier who had decided to take up farming as a hobby. The Fell King had only himself to blame if he had lost all he possessed, anyway, because he had always been a duffer at farming and had never been able to keep within reasonable bounds, in spite of all his talk about the golden mean. He had never been a financier either, and now in his old age he was forced to work as a warehouse drudge down in the town, dependent for his existence on the charity of his son-in-law. No, the new man on the Fell King’s croft was certainly no speculator, he had hardly been in the district a month before he was elected to the parish council, he received forthwith a grant for the purchase of modern agricultural implements, he built fine stables and was awarded a prize, he was given a sewage grant, he was given a big bonus on his produce, he fitted out the Fell King’s house with electric light; the World War had not been fought in vain as far as he was concerned.