The Son Avenger (42 page)

“That I forgave him long ago,” said Cecilia quickly. “’Tis not that. But can you not understand, brother—if it was gruesome for you and Eldrid to have him before you here neither alive nor dead, then it must have been worse yet for me, when you remember all that happened before his life came to such a close.”

“Do you remember I raised the axe against him?—and God knows ’twas not my fault I did not kill my father. Judge, then,
if it has been a light matter for me to see him in this state for four years—I who remember how he was of old—the noblest man I have set eyes on, the goodliest and the most generous.”

“So you say now, Eirik. I remember naught else but enmity between you—in all the years since you were a little lad, until the day you turned your back on home and took a wife without asking his counsel. Never could you endure to live here with us; as often as you came home you went away again almost at once—and for that you blamed Father; you said he was the most unreasonable of men. And in that I thought you were not so far wrong—unreasonable he often was with you, and hard to live with for all of us. But I tell you—I have forgiven him with all my heart, as a Christian woman should.”

“It is well that you have forgiven him as a Christian woman should”—Eirik could not help smiling faintly—“but do you not think that is little enough between daughter and father?”

All at once Cecilia’s eyes filled with tears. “I
have
been a good, obedient daughter, Eirik. None of you knew Jörund rightly. God rest his soul—but I have wondered many a time that I did not do what Father believed I had done. I think it was no sin in me that I was not minded to stay here and have him before my eyes as he haunted this place like a ghost of all the torment that was worse than being broken on the wheel—when at last it had been given me to share my lot with Aslak and I could say, I too, I am glad to be alive! Above all, since I do not believe Father has longed to see me more than I have longed for him!”

“That you cannot tell! ’Tis true that Father was harsh and silent at times—but judge him by his deeds, Cecilia. I warrant you never saw a man who acted more nobly and as becomes a Christian in all he did. The first to hold out two full hands to the poor, the first to open his door to widows and whosoever craved his protection—methinks your Aslak could bear witness to that: ’twas not so safe then, in the days of old King Haakon’s power, to harbour an outlawed manslayer. You have no right, you and he, to bear a grudge because Father did not give him you as well, as soon as the boy cried for you! Have you heard that Father ever won a penny of goods or a foot of land by dishonest dealing or oppression of an even Christian? Not the veriest scoundrel in the countryside has ever dared to utter a word that could stain Father’s fame or honour. But if any, man or woman, were in such
case that his name and fame were cast as carrion to the birds of prey—then, if Father could say nothing to silence evil tongues, he held his peace. An ill word fell ever to the ground if it came to Father’s door—unless one of us others took it up and flew with it. Have you forgotten that Father was the first man to take up arms and rouse the yeomen to resistance when the Duke’s army scoured the country, and the last to come home to a plundered manor, wounded and unrewarded by his King?

“God help me, Cecilia—I have no right to chide you; you have been a better daughter than I a son—I rendered him naught but disobedience and a fool’s defiance. I had no more wisdom than to be vexed when I thought we were aggrieved by his silence and severity. Though not many times did he chastise me as I deserved—on you he can never have laid a correcting hand. I ought to have known better—”

Eirik raised his left hand a little, looked down at the stump of the little finger.

“I remember when Father had to cut it off. I was so small, I did not see that my life was in danger if it were not taken off at once. When I saw the red-hot iron I was so beside myself with fear that I ran hither and thither about the room, bellowing and kicking in my struggles, so Father had to seize me forcibly. Do you think he tried to soothe me with sweet words? He spoke harshly to me, did Father, but when that was of no use he took the red-hot iron and pressed it into his own flesh to put heart into me.”

The son hid his face in his hands, uttering stifled sobs. But presently he looked up again:

“God forgive us both, sister mine—never did we recognize what a man our father was. But you will find it true, as you grow older: the best inheritance he leaves your sons is the memory of his good name—that is God’s reward to the descendants of an upright man.”

Cecilia sat with bent head; her cheeks had reddened and her expression was unusually mild.

“You are right, brother—Father was more of a man than we guessed. And yet,” she whispered after a moment, “for half his lifetime he bore the guilt of an unshriven slaying—and when he would make amends for it at last, God took judgment into his own hand.”

“We may not inquire into such things,” replied Eirik in an
earnest whisper—“God’s hidden counsels. But never will I believe it fell upon him because Father’s sin was worse than most men’s. Mayhap it was done to show forth an example—the rest of us take so little heed of our misdeeds. And God made choice of father to do full penance, since He knew his heart—stronger and more faithful than we poor wretches who would not be able to swallow one drop of His justice.”

Cecilia said in a low tone: “Aslak has heard something—at home in the Hamar country. There was some talk about Mother, that time she was young, about a clerk or a pupil in the school. He disappeared, and some thought that Father might have had a finger in it—”

“Are you not ashamed?” whispered Eirik indignantly. “Do you and Aslak pay heed to folks’ gossip about your parents—?”

“You yourself have said he was hard on her.”

“I was only a child when she died—what I thought of the things I saw counts for nothing. Perhaps that was what weighed most heavily on him—to endure his marriage with patience. They were so unlike, and she was ailing from her youth. God must judge between the two. Without sin no man goes through life.”

Eirik rose, took a few paces toward the door of the closet, and came back to his sister. “It may be as well that I tell you now—I had meant to announce it to you and Aslak at the funeral ale. When Father is committed to the earth, I shall go back to the convent. So that all he leaves behind him will be yours—except that which Eldrid and I will give for the repose of his soul.”

Cecilia was silent a long while.

“Is Eldrid at one with you in this?” she asked at last, a little incredulously.

“Yes. She goes to Gimsöy. Whether she will take the veil I know not—she knows not yet herself. But she will take the vow of chastity and dwell there.”

“Is it for Father’s soul you do this?” asked his sister again.

“Ay, and for my own.” And for Jörund. And for you and your children. For all of us who are rebellious and defiant, when God lays a heavy burden upon us, and who forget Him wholly or in part when He showers His bounties upon us.—This he left unsaid.

“Have you told him this?”

“No. Father was never a man to care much for words and promises. Time enough for him to see it after he is dead.”

A moment later Cecilia started up—they heard Gunnar screaming outside in the courtyard. His mother hurried out. Eirik went into the closet to the sick man. In the dim light he saw that Olav lay with one eye open—he was hot and his breath was laboured, but Eirik guessed that he was conscious—and wondered whether the old man had heard anything; he looked at him so strangely—

Olav had lain awake and had heard sentence passed on his own life by the mouth of his son. Meanwhile an image hovered before his vision—it was the frenzy of fever, but not so violent that he did not know it for what it was. He saw a cornfield, overgrown with tares and thistles, willow-herb and brambles—the weeds flaunted their red and yellow flowers in the sun, and the corn was so choked by them that none could tell that the ground had been sown. But out in the field there walked owe—sometimes he thought it was his guardian angel, but sometimes it was Eirik—a friend who did not ask whether the dying man had done him wrong, but thought only of gathering up the poor ears of corn that he could save among the thistles. It should not have been so, his life should have been like a cornfield swaying clean and bright and ready for the sickle. But one there was who had been able to find a handful of good corn and would lay it in the balance—

Kolbein came to the door and eagerly announced that now they could see Sira Magne’s roan horse down by the bridge. Eirik lighted the candles, gave one to the boy, and they went out.

The crag that rose behind the line of outhouses seemed to stand out vaster and more immovable now that it was bathed in the late yellow sunlight. The firs shone with their hard red trunks and branches washed light after the winter’s snow, and above was the burning blue vault of heaven. Eirik thought that never before had he seen so plainly how infinitely deep was the ocean of sky, and against this depth the firm rock was more rock and the firs were more intensely firs than he had ever guessed before. The wakeful Eye that watched over all rested upon every single one of the midges that danced before him in the air and knew every pulse-beat in his body. And in the likeness of the bread He came, borne by the priest on the great horse that was now mounting the hill by the barn, to give Himself as food for His own.

The groom who led the horse rang the little silver bell; the house-folk had come out and were kneeling in the yard. Cecilia had her little son in her arms, Aslak and the boys by her side.
Kolbein and Eirik knelt before the door of the house with their candles, whose flames were almost invisible in the sunshine. Eirik knew that the fire that now consumed him was destined to die down, to hide beneath the ashes, to blaze up again in bright flames, but never would it be quenched within him.

At the funeral feast for Olav Audunsson, Eirik announced his and his wife’s determination, and at midsummer he and Eldrid had made division of their estate. He accompanied her to Gimsöy, and thence he went straight to Oslo and resumed the habit of the order in the Minorite convent. The ceremony was a quiet one this time, on a weekday morning during one of the first masses. No others of his family were in church than Aslak Gunnarsson and Cecilia. This time his sister seemed less opposed to her brother’s turning monk.

Aslak and his wife husbanded the Hestvik estate so well that all Olav’s grandchildren were abundantly provided for—Cecilia had three sons and three daughters by her second husband. Of Jörund’s sons, Kolbein and Audun turned out well; Torgils was a wild lad, but he was drowned at an early age.

Eirik always impressed it upon the youths, when they visited him at the convent, that their worldly prosperity was a reward for their grandfather’s pious and manly life, and he could quote many sayings from Scripture to this effect. The boys were fond of him and had great respect for him; they had never known him except as a barefoot friar. And he was a pious friar, diligent in tending the sick, whether in body or soul; book-learning he also acquired with years, and he was the convent’s gardener most of his time. But his nephews knew from what they heard among the neighbours that in his youth Eirik had a name for being somewhat wild. Cecilia never spoke to her children of her brother’s former life.

Olav’s fame among men was not so lustrous as Eirik would fain have made it—all the young folk knew that well. A bold warrior he had been and a good, honest franklin, but odd and unsociable, a joyless companion in a joyful gathering.

The great pestilence came and made riddance in the family, but it was still numerous after the sickness had passed. Its ravages were not so severe in the south as in the north country. In the Minorite convent of Oslo not much more than the half of the brethren
died, but in the house of the order at Nidaros only two monks were left. It was therefore decided that Brother Eirik Olavsson and three young friars from Oslo should be transferred thither. Eirik was then threescore years old, strong and hale, though he had always treated himself with great rigour. But the friars were exposed to violent storms in crossing the mountains, and a few days after he had arrived at his new convent Eirik expired in the arms of his brethren.

Sigrid Undset is a major figure in early twentieth-century literature. A Norwegian born in Denmark in 1881, she worked with the Norwegian underground during the Second World War, fled to Sweden in 1940, and later came to the United States. She is the author of many works of fiction as well as several books for young readers and a number of nonfiction titles. Her novels encompass a variety of settings and time periods, ranging from medieval romances such as the Kristin Lavransdatter trilogy—generally considered to be her masterwork—and The Master of Hestviken tetralogy to modern novels such as
The Winding Road, Ida Elisabeth
, and
The Faithful Wife
. She was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1928. Sigrid Undset died in 1949.

The Master of Hestviken Series

The Axe
The Snake Pit
In the Wilderness
The Son Avenger

Kristin Lavransdatter Trilogy

Kristin Lavransdatter: The Wreath
Kristin Lavransdatter: The Wife
Kristin Lavransdatter: The Cross