Kristin Lavransdatter

by Sigrid Undset

  Ragnfrid was seen so seldom that people soon stopped talking about her altogether. When she first returned home to Gudbrandsdal, many were surprised, since they remembered her from the time when she lived at Sundbu. She had never been beautiful, but in those days she seemed gracious and happy; now she had lost her looks so utterly that one might think she was ten years older than her husband instead of three. People thought she took the deaths of her children unreasonably hard, because in other ways she was far better off than most women—she had great wealth and position and she got on well with her husband, as far as anyone could tell. Lavrans did not take up with other women, he always asked for her advice in all matters, and he never said an unkind word to her, whether he was sober or drunk. And she was not so old that she couldn’t have many more children, if God would grant her that.

  They had some difficulty finding young people to serve at Jørundgaard because the mistress was of such a mournful spirit and because they observed all of the fasts so strictly. But the servants lived well on the manor, and angry or chastising words were seldom heard. Both Lavrans and Ragnfrid took the lead in all work. The master also had a lively spirit in his own way, and he might join in a dance or start up singing when the young people frolicked on the church green on sleepless vigil nights.2 But it was mostly older people who took employment at Jørundgaard; they found it to their liking and stayed for a long time.

  One day when the child Kristin was seven years old, she was going to accompany her father up to their mountain pastures.

  It was a beautiful morning in early summer. Kristin was standing in the loft where they slept in the summertime. She saw the sun shining outside, and she heard her father and his men talking down in the courtyard.3 She was so excited that she couldn’t stand still while her mother dressed her; she jumped and leaped after she was helped into every garment. She had never before been up to the mountains, only across the gorge to Vaage, when she was allowed to go along to visit her mother’s kinsmen at Sundbu, and into the nearby woods with her mother and the servants when they went out to pick berries, which Ragnfrid put in her weak ale. She also made a sour mash out of cowberries and cranberries, which she ate on bread instead of butter during Lent.

  Ragnfrid coiled up Kristin’s long golden hair and fastened it under her old blue cap. Then she kissed her daughter on the cheek, and Kristin ran down to her father. Lavrans was already sitting in the saddle; he lifted her up behind him, where he had folded his cape like a pillow on the horse’s loin. There Kristin was allowed to sit astride and hold on to his belt. Then they called farewell to her mother, but she had come running down from the gallery with Kristin’s hooded cloak; she handed it to Lavrans and told him to take good care of the child.

  The sun was shining but it had rained hard during the night so the streams were splashing and singing everywhere on the hillsides, and wisps of fog drifted below the mountain slopes. But above the crests, white fair-weather clouds climbed into the blue sky, and Lavrans and his men said it was going to be a hot day later on. Lavrans had four men with him, and they were all well armed because at that time there were all kinds of strange people in the mountains—although it seemed unlikely they would encounter any such people because there were so many in their group, and they were only going a short way into the mountains. Kristin liked all of the servants. Three of them were somewhat older men, but the fourth, Arne Gyrdsøn of Finsbrekken, was a half-grown boy and Kristin’s best friend. He rode right behind Lavrans because he was supposed to tell her about everything they saw along the way as they passed.

  They rode between the buildings of Romundgaard and exchanged greetings with Eirik the priest. He was standing outside scolding his daughter4—she ran the house for him—about a skein of newly dyed yarn that she had left hanging outdoors the day before; now it had been ruined by the rain.

  On the hill across from the parsonage stood the church; it was not large but graceful, beautiful, well kept, and freshly tarred. Near the cross outside the cemetery gate, Lavrans and his men removed their hats and bowed their heads. Then Kristin’s father turned around in his saddle, and he and Kristin waved to her mother. They could see her out on the green in front of the farm buildings back home; she waved to them with a corner of her linen veil.

  Kristin was used to playing almost every day up here on the church hill and in the cemetery; but today she was going to travel so far that the child thought the familiar sight of her home and village5 looked completely new and strange. The clusters of buildings at Jørundgaard, in both the inner and outer courtyards, seemed to have grown smaller and grayer down there on the lowlands. The glittering river wound its way past into the distance, and the valley spread out before her, with wide green pastures and marshes at the bottom and farms with fields and meadows up along the hillsides beneath the precipitous gray mountains.

  Kristin knew that Loptsgaard lay far below the place where the mountains joined and closed off the valley. That was where Sigurd and Jon lived, two old men with white beards; they always teased her and played with her whenever they came to Jørundgaard. She liked Jon because he carved the prettiest animals out of wood for her, and he had once given her a gold ring. But the last time he visited them, on Whitsunday, he had brought her a knight that was so beautifully carved and so exquisitely painted that Kristin thought she had never received a more marvelous gift. She insisted on taking the knight to bed with her every single night, but in the morning when she woke up he would be standing on the step in front of the bed where she slept with her parents. Her father told her that the knight got up at the first crow of the cock, but Kristin knew that her mother took him away after she fell asleep. She had heard her mother say that he would be so hard and uncomfortable if they rolled on top of him during the night.

  Kristin was afraid of Sigurd of Loptsgaard, and she didn’t like it when he took her on his knee, because he was in the habit of saying that when she grew up, he would sleep in her arms. He had outlived two wives and said he would no doubt outlive the third as well; so Kristin could be the fourth. But when she started to cry, Lavrans would laugh and say that he didn’t think Margit was about to give up the ghost anytime soon, but if things did go badly and Sigurd came courting, he would be refused—Kristin needn’t worry about that.

  A large boulder lay near the road, about the distance of an arrow shot north of the church, and around it there was a dense grove of birch and aspen. That’s where they played church, and Tomas, the youngest grandson of Eirik the priest, would stand up and say mass like his grandfather, sprinkling holy water and performing baptisms when there was rainwater in the hollows of the rock. But one day the previous fall, things had gone awry. First Tomas had married Kristin and Arne—Arne was still so young that he sometimes stayed behind with the children and played with them when he could. Then Arne caught a piglet that was wandering about and they carried it off to be baptized. Tomas anointed it with mud, dipped it into a hole filled with water and, mimicking his grandfather, said the mass in Latin and scolded them for their scanty offerings. That made the children laugh because they had heard the grown-ups talking about Eirik’s excessive greed. And the more they laughed, the more inventive Tomas became. Then he said that this child had been conceived during Lent, and they would have to atone before the priest and the church for their sin. The older boys laughed so hard that they howled, but Kristin was so filled with shame that she was almost in tears as she stood there with the piglet in her arms. And while this was going on, they were unlucky enough that Eirik himself came riding past, on his way home after visiting a sick parishioner. When he saw what the children were up to, he leaped from his horse and handed the holy vessel abruptly to Bentein, his oldest grandson, who was with him. Bentein almost dropped the silver dove containing the Holy Host on the ground. The priest rushed in among the children and thrashed as many as he could grab. Kristin dropped the piglet, and it ran down the road squealing as it dragged the christening gown behind, making the priest’s horses rear up in terror
. The priest also slapped Kristin, who fell, and then he kicked her so hard that her hip hurt for days afterward. When Lavrans heard of this, he felt that Eirik had been too harsh toward Kristin, since she was so young. He said that he would speak to the priest about it, but Ragnfrid begged him not to do so, because the child had received no more than she deserved by taking part in such a blasphemous game. So Lavrans said nothing more about the matter, but he gave Arne the worst beating he had ever received.

  That’s why, as they rode past the boulder, Arne plucked at Kristin’s sleeve. He didn’t dare say anything because of Lavrans, so he grimaced, smiled, and slapped his backside. But Kristin bowed her head in shame.

  The road headed into dense forest. They rode in the shadow of Hammer Ridge; the valley grew narrow and dark, and the roar of the Laag River was stronger and rougher. When they caught a glimpse of the river, it was flowing icy-green with white froth between steep walls of stone. The mountain was black with forest on both sides of the valley; it was dark and close and rank in the gorge, and the cold wind came in gusts. They rode over the foot-bridge across Rost Creek, and soon they saw the bridge over the river down in the valley. In a pool just below the bridge there lived a river sprite.6 Arne wanted to tell Kristin about it, but Lavrans sternly forbade the boy to speak of such things out there in the forest. And when they reached the bridge, he jumped down from his horse and led it across by the bridle as he held his other arm around the child’s waist.

  On the other side of the river a bridle path led straight up into the heights, so the men got down from their horses and walked, but Lavrans lifted Kristin forward into his saddle so she could hold on to the saddlebow, and then she was allowed to ride Guldsvein alone.

  More gray crests and distant blue peaks striped with snow rose up beyond the mountainsides as they climbed higher, and now Kristin could glimpse through the trees the village north of the gorge. Arne pointed and told her the names of the farms that they could see.

  High up on the grassy slope they came to a small hut. They stopped near the split-rail fence. Lavrans shouted and his voice echoed again and again among the cliffs. Two men came running down from the small patch of pasture. They were the sons of the house. They were skillful tar-burners,7 and Lavrans wanted to hire them to do some tar distilling for him. Their mother followed with a large basin of cold cellar milk, for it was a hot day, as the men had expected it would be.

  “I see you have your daughter with you,” she said after she had greeted them. “I thought I’d have a look at her. You must take off her cap. They say she has such fair hair.”

  Lavrans did as the woman asked, and Kristin’s hair fell over her shoulders all the way to the saddle. It was thick and golden, like ripe wheat.

  Isrid, the woman, touched her hair and said, “Now I see that the rumors did not exaggerate about your little maiden. She’s a lily, and she looks like the child of a knight. Gentle eyes she has as well—she takes after you and not the Gjeslings. May God grant you joy from her, Lavrans Bjørgulfsøn! And look how you ride Guldsvein, sitting as straight as a king’s courtier,” she teased, holding the basin as Kristin drank.

  The child blushed with pleasure, for she knew that her father was considered the most handsome of men far and wide, and he looked like a knight as he stood there among his servants, even though he was dressed more like a peasant, as was his custom at home. He was wearing a short tunic, quite wide, made of green-dyed homespun and open at the neck so his shirt was visible. He had on hose and shoes of undyed leather, and on his head he wore an old-fashioned wide-brimmed woolen hat. His only jewelry was a polished silver buckle on his belt and a little filigree brooch at the neck of his shirt. Part of a gold chain was also visible around his neck. Lavrans always wore this chain, and from it hung a gold cross, set with large rock crystals. The cross could be opened, and inside was a scrap of shroud and hair from the Holy Fru Elin of Skøvde, for the sons of Lagmand traced their lineage from one of the daughters of that blessed woman. Whenever Lavrans was in the forest or at work, he would put the cross inside his shirt against his bare chest, so as not to lose it.

  And yet in his rough homespun clothing he looked more high born than many a knight or king’s retainer dressed in banquet attire. He was a handsome figure, tall, broad-shouldered, and narrow-hipped. His head was small and set attractively on his neck, and he had pleasing, somewhat narrow facial features—suitably full cheeks, a nicely rounded chin, and a well-shaped mouth. His coloring was fair, with a fresh complexion, gray eyes, and thick, straight, silky-gold hair.

  He stood there talking to Isrid about her affairs, and he also asked about Tordis, Isrid’s kinswoman who was looking after Jørundgaard’s mountain pastures that summer. Tordis had recently given birth, and Isrid was waiting for the chance to find safe passage through the forest so she could carry Tordis’s little boy down from the mountains to have him baptized. Lavrans said that she could come along with them; he was going to return the next evening, and it would be safer and more reassuring for her to have so many men to accompany her and the heathen child.

  Isrid thanked him. “If the truth be told, this is exactly what I’ve been waiting for. We all know, we poor folks who live up here in the hills, that you will do us a favor if you can whenever you come this way.” She ran off to gather up her bundle and a cloak.

  The fact of the matter was that Lavrans enjoyed being among these humble people who lived in clearings and on leaseholdings high up at the edge of the village. With them he was always happy and full of banter. He talked to them about the movements of the forest animals, about the reindeer on the high plateaus, and about all the uncanny goings-on that occur in such places. He assisted them in word and deed and offered a helping hand; he saw to their sick cattle, helped them at the forge and with their carpentry work. On occasion he even applied his own powerful strength when they had to break up the worst rocks or roots. That’s why these people always joyfully welcomed Lavrans Bjørgulfsøn and Guldsvein, the huge red stallion he rode. The horse was a beautiful animal with a glossy coat, white mane and tail, and shining eyes—known in the villages for his strength and fierceness. But toward Lavrans he was as gentle as a lamb. And Lavrans often said that he was as fond of the horse as of a younger brother.

  The first thing Lavrans wanted to attend to was the beacon at Heimhaugen. During those difficult times of unrest a hundred years earlier or more, the landowners along the valleys had erected beacons in certain places on the mountainsides, much like the wood stacked in warning bonfires at the ports for warships along the coast. But these beacons in the valleys were not under military authority; the farmer guilds kept them in good repair, and the members took turns taking care of them.

  When they came to the first mountain pasture, Lavrans released all the horses except the pack horse into the fenced meadow, and then they set off on a steep pathway upward. Before long there was a great distance between trees. Huge pines stood dead and white, like bones, next to marshy patches of land—and now Kristin saw bare gray mountain domes appearing in the sky all around. They climbed over long stretches of scree, and in places a creek ran across the path so that her father had to carry her. The wind was brisk and fresh up there, and the heath was black with berries, but Lavrans said that they had no time to stop and pick them. Arne leaped here and there, plucking off berries for her, and telling her which pastures they could see below in the forest—for there was forest over all of Høvringsvang at that time.

  Now they were just below the last bare, rounded crest, and they could see the enormous heap of wood towering against the sky and the caretaker’s hut in the shelter of a sheer cliff.

  As they came over the ridge, the wind rushed toward them and whipped through their clothes—it seemed to Kristin that something alive which dwelled up there had come forward to greet them. The wind gusted and blew as she and Arne walked across the expanse of moss. The children sat down on the very end of a ledge, and Kristin stared with big eyes—never had she imagined that the wor
ld was so huge or so vast.

  There were forest-clad mountain slopes below her in all directions; her valley was no more than a hollow between the enormous mountains, and the neighboring valleys were even smaller hollows; there were many of them, and yet there were fewer valleys than there were mountains. On all sides gray domes, golden-flamed with lichen, loomed above the carpet of forest; and far off in the distance, toward the horizon, stood blue peaks with white glints of snow, seeming to merge with the grayish-blue and dazzling white summer clouds. But to the northeast, close by—just beyond the pasture woods—stood a cluster of magnificent stone-blue mountains with streaks of new snow on their slopes. Kristin guessed that they belonged to the Raanekamp, the Boar Range, which she had heard about, for they truly did look like a group of mighty boars walking away with their backs turned to the village. And yet Arne said that it was half a day’s ride to reach them.

  Kristin had thought that if she came up over the crest of her home mountains, she would be able to look down on another village like their own, with farms and houses, and she had such a strange feeling when she saw what a great distance there was between places where people lived. She saw the little yellow and green flecks on the floor of the valley and the tiny glades with dots of houses in the mountain forests; she started to count them, but by the time she had reached three dozen, she could no longer keep track. And yet the marks of settlement were like nothing in that wilderness.

  She knew that wolves and bears reigned in the forest, and under every rock lived trolls and goblins and elves, and she was suddenly afraid, for no one knew how many there were, but there were certainly many more of them than of Christian people. Then she called loudly for her father, but he didn’t hear her because of the wind—he and his men were rolling great boulders down the rock face to use as supports for the timbers of the beacon.