Iceland's Bell (23 page)

The other man had of course never visited Rome, but he had received a letter from the pope, a letter reminding him of his duty to defend with point and edge Iceland’s church and its possessions against the Lutheran kings. And at that time, just as today, very few people gave a second thought to the passage of arms. It was Rome that lay before the eyes of this last remaining Icelander of antiquity, until he was led to the block. Arnas Arnæus said that he had often seen the image of this man as if in a vision, but in Rome he had beheld this presbyter as a kind of lucent mirage, the sort which transforms reality into shadows of doubt. It is night here in Skálholt. He stands vigil with his two sons. They appear older, more infirm than their father the elder, because they are more like average men. Misfortune, however, had made his shoulders so strong that they could never be overburdened, no matter how heavy the load, and his neck so stocky that it would never bend. Now it is morning: the seventh of November. Snow has turned the mountains gray overnight. Rime rests on the grassblades.

“These were the people I saw.”

“And then no one else?” asked Snæfríður.

“Ah, yes,” he said softly, and he looked at her and smiled: “Then the entire world.”

“There is no doubt,” said the bishop’s wife, “that Jón Arason was a great champion, a true Icelander like the men of antiquity, but doesn’t it make your blood run cold to think upon what might have happened if that ribald had won, and with him the popish heretics? May my Redeemer help me.”

“During my stay in Rome the city celebrated a jubilee for all of Christendom,” said Arnas Arnæus. “I was strolling along the river one day. The truth is, I was heavy-hearted, as happens to those who come to realize that a long chapter in their short lives has been squandered in idle labor, in the expenditure of effort and wealth, their health placed in jeopardy, the friendship of good men forfeit due to obstinacy. I was thinking about what sort of excuses I could make to my king and lord for having neglected my duties for too long. There I wandered, filled with misgiving, and before I knew it I met a huge crowd of people inching forward, heading for the bridge over the river. Neither before nor since have I seen such a throng of people: the lanes and highways were so packed that it was difficult to distinguish the bystanders from the procession’s participants, and all of them were singing. I stopped in the midst of a group of Roman citizens to watch the stream pass by. They were pilgrims from different nations, come south to receive absolution for their sins during that special Christian year of grace. Within the throng were gathered a great many smaller groups, each group walking in procession, its members wearing badges emblazoned with the image of its shire’s protective saint, or else carrying either the bones of its district’s steward of God in a little shrine or a replica of its cathedral’s holy statue. The images of Maria were distinctive to each place, for throughout the papal realms there are as many different Marias as there are cities and towns—some are associated with flowers, others with stones, still others with health-giving springs, several with the Virgin’s seat, the particular configuration of the Christ child, or the color of the Virgin’s mantle. It was remarkable to see representatives of so many different shires marching together over one bridge for the sake of their souls. When I was young and walked along Breiðafjörður I never would have thought that such a wide variety of people inhabited the world. Here were folk from the numerous city-states and counties of Italy: Milanese, Napolese and Sicilians, Sardinians, Savoyards, Venetians and Tuscans, along with the Romans themselves; here one could see the peoples of the six Spanish kingdoms: the Castilians, Aragonese, Catalans, Valencians, Majorcans, and Navarrans; gathered here were envoys from the different nations of the Empire, even from the nations that had adopted Luther’s reforms: Bavarians, Germans and Croatians, Franconians, Westphalians, Rhinelanders, Saxons, Burgundians, Franks, Walloons, Austrians, and Styrians. But why am I reeling off the names of all these peoples? And yet, it was so: I watched them all going by, and many more. I saw people from nations I knew nothing about, their countenances, the textures of their clothing, their grimy faces and their eyes filled with passion and tenacity. Most often, however, I found myself thinking about their countless feet, bare or in shoes, most certainly tired, yet somehow lively and hopeful; and the old crusade-dance that resounded through their musica,* whether they struck the strings of the lyre or any other instrument, or blew into their folkish homeland-pipes: ‘Fair are the fields, cloudless God’s sky.’ And suddenly I realized that Guðríður Þorbjarnardóttir was gone. Not a single Icelander remained.”

The bishop’s wife had also laid aside her handiwork; she too was staring at the storyteller.

“Thank God there were no Icelanders present,” she said. “Or perhaps you didn’t find it grievous to think upon all those ignorant heretics whom the pope prevents from hearing the message of Christ, denying them the privilege of salvation through faith?”

“When a man sees so many feet walking by, my lady, he unavoidably asks: ‘Where are you going?’ They march over the Tiber and stop in the square in front of St. Peter’s Basilica, and the moment the pope walks out onto the balcony of his palace,
Te Deum Laudamus
begins while all the bells of Rome ring out. Is it right, is it wrong, my lady? I don’t know. Well-informed auctores* tell us that the wealthy Giovanni de Medici, otherwise known as Leo the Tenth, was a wise aristocrat and student of the Epicurean school, and that it never once occurred to him to believe in the soul even though he sold indulgences for its redemption. Perhaps that’s the very reason he did these things. Sometimes one gets the impression that Martin Luther was a peculiar sort of rustic, trying to dispute the liberty of the soul with such a man.”

“Yes, but, my dear lord Commissarius, isn’t it sinful to think such a thing about our master Luther?” asked the bishop’s wife.

“I don’t know, my lady,” said Arnas Arnæus. “It may very well be. But one thing is certain: those learned and inspired reformatores* were quite suddenly situated far to the north of me. After I had been watching these immense numbers of feet for some time, I suddenly found myself thinking: ‘You will follow this procession wherever it leads.’ Then the only Icelander in the crowd walked over the Tiber River. We took our place before Sancti Petri Basilica and the bells of Rome rang and the pope, wearing his miter and holding his crosier, walked out onto his balcony while we all sang the
Te Deum.
I had been searching for old Icelandic books, and sorrow had gotten the better of me when I was unable to find them. Suddenly I realized that it did not matter at all that I had not found those old books. I had found something in their place. I left Rome the very next day.”

The ladies thanked the assessor cordially for his stories about the chief city of Guðríður Þorbjarnardóttir, Sturla Sighvatsson, and Jón Arason. But since there were visitors awaiting him downstairs, folk who had traveled great distances to meet him, he could not take the time, just now, to describe more cities for them, and the bishop’s wife, who was a fierce Protestant and therefore slightly less than content with the papacy, asked whether the assessor would allow her to choose her city at some later time. He granted them the right to choose any city they liked, at any other time they liked, then bade them farewell and walked to the door.

“Before I forget,” said Snæfríður, springing up from her chair as he opened the door. “I have something to discuss with you, Assessor. In fact I’d almost completely forgotten about it. But I must point out that it has to do with something else.”

“Does it have to do with a book?” he asked, and he turned on the threshold and looked at her in earnest.

“No, a man,” she said.

He said that her fondest wish was most welcome to him.

Then he was gone.

10

He asked her to sit down.

She sat down opposite him, clasped her hands in her lap, and looked at him aloofly; her bearing was restrained.

“I didn’t want to come even though the old man begged me to do so,” she said. “I told the old man that it wasn’t my concern. All the same, I’ve come to you because of him. You mustn’t think that I’ve come for any other reason.”

“Welcome, Snæfríður,” he said for the second or third time.

“Yes,” she said, “I know that you’re an expert in worldly complaisance. But there’s really no avoiding it: this old man whom I don’t know and who doesn’t concern me, it’s as if I’ve always known him and he does concern me. His name is Jón Hreggviðsson.”

“Yes, old Jón Hreggviðsson,” said Arnæus. “It was his mother who had in her keeping the single most precious treasure to be found in all the Nordic lands.”

“Yes,” said Snæfríður. “Her heart—”

“No, some old vellum leaves,” interrupted Arnas Arnæus.

“I beg your pardon.”

“We all owe a great debt of gratitude to Jón Hreggviðsson— because of his mother,” said Arnas Arnæus. “This is why, Snæfríður, when he brought me the ring I gave it back to him, so that he could do himself some good.”

“Oh, enough with your vanity now, after fifteen years,” said Snæfríður. “It’s both ludicrous and embarrassing to recall one’s youth.”

He leaned back against his desk. Behind him were thick books and bundles of papers, some bound and some opened. He was wearing a wide, black dress coat and white gloves. He hooked his index fingers together and spoke again.

“When I left and did not return despite my promised vow, because fate is stronger than a man’s will as it says in the sagas, I consoled myself with the thought that the next time I beheld the fair maiden she would be a different woman: her youth vanished along with her beauty, youth’s innate gift. The ancient philosophers taught that faithlessness in love is the only kind of betrayal that the gods look upon with clemency: ‘Venus hac perjuria ridet.’* Last evening when you walked into the dining room after all these years I saw that there was no need for Lofn* to smile clemently upon me.”

“I beg you, Assessor, enough with your worthless vanity,” she said, as she unclasped her hands and raised them momentarily in defense. “For God’s sake.”

“Just as all men are poets when they are young, but never afterward, so are all fair for a time when young; youth connotes these two things,” he said. “But the gods grant these gifts to some through a special grace that they sustain from the cradle to the grave, regardless of the amount of one’s allotted years.”

“You are without doubt a poet, Assessor,” she said.

“I would like for what I have just said to serve as the preface to all that remains for us to discuss,” said he.

She stared off into the distance as if she had forgotten the purpose of her visit. Her appearance was ruled by a kind of primal, empty calm that had more of a semblance of sky than earth. Finally, however, she looked down at her lap.

“Jón Hreggviðsson,” she said—“the only thing I want to discuss with you is him. They say that an almsgiver is indebted to the beggars he supports. Whatever a man does once endures forever. Now this Jón Hreggviðsson returns after fifteen years and claims his debt.”

“I thought you would have been proud to have saved the head of old Jón Hreggviðsson, who killed the king’s hangman.”

“But my father deserved more from me than to have me spirit away his convicted criminals,” she said. “He has never wanted anything but the best for me. You are a friend of the king, and for his sake, you must be angry with me, since, as you say, he killed a man, he killed the king’s man.”

“There’s no doubt that he did it,” said Arnas Arnæus. “But with regard to our king, we can’t be blamed for helping the man. Nothing was ever proven against him.”

“My father does not pass false judgment,” she said.

“How do you know that?” he said.

“I am a part of him,” she said. “He is in me. I feel as if I myself could have justifiably condemned this criminal. That’s why my conscience reviles me for having set him free.”

“A man’s conscience is an unsteady judge of right and wrong,” he said. “Conscience is only a dog inside us, trained to varying degrees. All it can do is obey its master, the statutes laid down by its environment, and its master can be either fair or foul depending upon circumstance. Sometimes its master is nothing but a rogue. Pay no heed to what your conscience deems its obligation as far as Jón Hreggviðsson’s head is concerned. You are not infallible and consequently neither is your father. Imagine that the court has erred, until it is proven otherwise.”

“If the court did err, and Jón Hreggviðsson is innocent, isn’t justice worth more than one beggar’s head?—even though justice itself has been known to fail now and again.”

“If the court proves a man guilty, he loses his head for it—even if he never committed the crime. It’s a hard lesson; but without it we would not have justice. And this is exactly where the court seems to have erred in Jón Hreggviðsson’s case, and actually in the cases of many other alleged criminals in this country—too many.”

“Perhaps,” she said. “But I’ve never heard anyone express any doubt as to whether Jón Hreggviðsson killed the man. And you yourself admit it. After all, the old man wouldn’t be so worried about the case if he didn’t harbor doubts about his own innocence.”

“It would have been very little problem to arrest Jón Hreggviðsson and behead him—he’s been sitting at home in Rein for between ten and twenty years now, utterly terrified of the authorities. But no one has touched a hair on his head.”

“My father never condemns a man twice for the same crime,” she said. “The old man returned to Iceland with some letters from the king.”

“Unfortunately not letters confirming eternal life,” said Arnas Arnæus, and he smiled.

“Letters of protection.”

“One letter concerned a retrial of his case. But it was never published in court. And the case was never retried.”

“My father never stabs anyone under the table,” she said. “He’s a compassionate man and has even felt sorry for this scoundrel.”

“Is it right to be compassionate?” asked Arnas Arnæus, still smiling.

“I know that I’m foolish,” she said. “I know that I’m so foolish that before you I’m like a little bug that has rolled over on its back and can’t get to its feet to escape.”

“Your lips haven’t changed: two caterpillars,” he said.

“I’m certain that Jón Hreggviðsson killed a man,” she said.

“You sent him to me for safekeeping.”

“That was coquetterie,”* she said. “I was seventeen.”

“He told me that his mother came to see you,” said Arnas Arnæus.

“More of the same,” she said. “I have no heart.”

“May I try to find it?” he said.

“No,” she said.

“But your cheeks are flushed,” he said.

“I know that I’m amusing,” she said. “But it’s unnecessary for you, my lord, to rub it in.”

“Snæfríður,” he said.

“No,” she said. “Please do not speak my name. Just tell me one thing: if this case is pursued any further, will it really matter at all what happens to Jón Hreggviðsson?”

He had stopped smiling, and, assuming an official air, answered slowly and impersonally: “No decisions have been made. A number of old items, however, require attention. The king has ordered that they be taken into account. Jón Hreggviðsson came here the other day and we discussed his case freely for an hour. Things do not bode well in his case. But no matter how it goes for him, I believe that a reexamination of his case will prove beneficial to the countryfolk in Iceland in the future.”

“And if he’s found guilty—after all these years?”

“He cannot be found any more guilty than he was according to the old ruling.”

“And if he’s innocent?”

“Hm. What did Jón Hreggviðsson want from you?”

She ignored the question, but looked straight at the king’s envoy and asked:

“Is the king my father’s enemy?”

“I believe that it is impossible for me to say no,” said Arnæus. “I believe that our Most Gracious Sire the king and my esteemed friend the magistrate are both equally devoted to the cause of justice.”

She had stood up.

“I thank you,” she said. “Your words befit a king’s man: you reveal nothing, and instead concoct enticing stories when necessary, like the ones you told us today about Rome.”

“Snæfríður,” he said as she turned to leave. He was suddenly standing very close to her. “What else could I have done but give Jón Hreggviðsson the ring?”

“Nothing, Assessor,” she said.

“I wasn’t free,” he said. “I was bound by my work. Iceland owned me, the old books that I kept in Copenhagen—their demon was my demon, their Iceland was the only Iceland in existence. If I had come out in the spring on the Bakkaship as I promised I would have sold out Iceland. Every last one of my books, every leaf and every page would have fallen into the hands of the usurers, my creditors. We two would have ended up on some dilapidated estate, two highborn beggars. I would have abandoned myself to drink and would have sold you for brennivín, perhaps even cut off your head—”

She turned completely around and stared at him, then quickly took him by the hand, leaned her face in one swift movement up against his chest, and whispered:

“Árni.”

She said nothing more, and he stroked her fair and magnificent hair once, then let her leave as she had intended.