But those articles didn't explain the war, the time afterwards when the city lay in ruins, and ghosts stalked you. You took a dead friend to the movies. But when you laughed, she remained silent and reproachful. And she never walked home with you. Your vanished child sat in your lap, her cheek soft against yours, but when you talked to her, she didn't answer. Your dead husband lay next to you in bed, but no matter how much you caressed him, he could not—
Charlotte missed her mother, somebody who shared her memories. Sometimes the old woman worked next to Charlotte for hours in silence. Today she was garrulous.
"It was night, and I was out looking for the northern lights. Suddenly a ball of fire lit up the sky. I thought it was the volcano erupting."
Once when Nonni came to fix the fence he'd told her the same story, a hint of accusation in his tone.
Germans had fired at the fishing boats for target practice, sometimes even wasted torpedoes on them. She knew the rationale. The Grimsby fishing boats had been converted to convoy boats. It was up to the Icelanders to provide the British with cod. The old woman said it often.
The soldiers kept us safe from the Germans.
And added—I didn't mean you, dear.
Giving Birth to Life All Over Again
The sound of the potatoes rattling in the saucepan reverberated on Charlotte's temples. She took the feverfew from her pocket, bit off some leaves, chewed rapidly, anticipating the rush of sesquiterpene lactones entering her bloodstream. She opened the window to let out the steam. Then she heard the cry and saw the boy running toward the house. She pulled open the front door, and her elf child fell into her arms gasping his brother's name.
Tryggvi. Tryggvi.
"He fell on the scythe. Blood."
The old woman began plucking things from her cupboard and placing them in her shawl.
"How?"
"He jumped down from the wall. Didn't see it. The blade— "
She began to run. Henrik was somewhere at her side, reaching for her hand. She clambered over the tussocks, cursing Ragnar for not flattening them. Running and tripping, she had to keep picking up Henrik. At last, she saw them. Ragnar was naked to the waist, his blue-white skin prickled with goose bumps, bending over Tryggvi.
"Breathe easy, boy," he was saying.
Tryggvi's overalls lay between two tussocks in a bloody heap. His mouth was a grimace. Bunched up below the boy's waist was Ragnar's blood-soaked undershirt. Under his head was his work shirt.
She took off her blouse, handed it to Ragnar. He kneaded it into a small tight package. When Ragnar eased the undershirt off the wound, Tryggvi's flesh contracted in the cold air, and the blood oozed upwards, spilling over the edges of the cut. Ragnar laid the folded blouse over the wound, and the boy groaned. Blood seeped quickly into the white cotton. Charlotte put on her sweater and shivered under the scratchy wool.
She looked toward the farmhouse. Where was the old woman?
Ragnar pointed to the blood-soaked undershirt.
"Wash it in the creek."
Charlotte walked quickly to the narrow run of water that divided the field. Henrik clasped her skirt. When she dipped the makeshift bandage into the water, the stream ran red. She tried to remember the thin biology textbook she'd studied in high school. The ragged drawing of a. the liver, b. the stomach, c. the intestines. How deep could a scythe go without killing you? The water, icy clear, hurt her hands when she wrung out the shirt.
At last the old woman appeared in the distance, hobbling along, holding her skirt at her knees. Panting when she joined them, she placed a hand on Ragnar's shoulder, eased herself to the ground, to Tryggvi.
He glanced at her, and his breathing seemed to grow easier.
"How often has the compress filled with blood?" she asked.
Ragnar couldn't remember.
The old woman took a handful of leaves from her pocket, lifted the compress, and dropped the leaves on the wound. Charlotte recognized the dark green lady's mantle, covered with tiny hairs, and the slender leaves of the lion's foot. She placed the compress back on the boy's belly, pressing gently and murmuring, "Mary, holy mother of God. Frigg and Freyja, gods of the earth. Heal this boy."
But Tryggvi only called on his grandmother. Amma.
And Charlotte closed her eyes and prayed to the tiny hairs on the leaves. Stop the bleeding.
When she opened her eyes, she saw that the wadded up blouse on his belly was still white around the edges. She moved next to the boy's head and stroked his hair. Ragnar sat back in the grass, took Henrik between his legs. The little boy held his father's knees.
The old woman recited Tryggvi's favorite poem into his ear—a horse without his rider ran along the beach. Repeating the verse, she lifted the blood-soaked blouse, dropped more leaves on the wound, and replaced the compress. From her bodice, she took a flask, put it to Tryggvi's lips.
"Round-up drink," she said.
Tryggvi raised his head and drank, giggling at the forbidden taste. Ragnar took his mother's shawl and wrapped it around the boy's shoulders. The tightness at the boy's mouth had loosened. At last the old woman touched the boy's forehead and his cheeks, examined the wound again. Blood oozed slowly.
"Bring him home now," she said, pulling herself to her feet.
Ragnar slid his arms under the boy and lifted him easily. Charlotte held his legs. The old woman and Henrik led the way. At the house, the old woman went into Tryggvi's bedroom first to fill his pillowcase with sweet-smelling herbs.
They laid him on the bed. Charlotte sat at the foot of the boy's bed and watched him sleep. She mustn't leave him for a moment. Then he would die. She sat up with a start when the old woman entered Tryggvi's room. Their eyes met. For a long moment, neither looked away. Love grew in their gazing, a look rich with their shared feeling for the boy.
The old woman sat down at the foot of the bed.
"We were talking about fear."
"I remember."
"It came on me—the fear. Did you see it?"
"No."
"Just like when my man was coming in through the surf, off the sea. That's how afraid I was, watching that wound. The blood kept coming and coming. I didn't know if it would stop."
Hadn't she cured dozens of humans, calves, lambs?
Her words were more important than a red wedding dress or a yarrow cure for a fever, this admission of self-doubt, the old woman's gift of herself. Feeling warm, Charlotte undid the top button of her sweater.
Charlotte stroked the sheet next to the boy's shoulder.
A long silence but for the boy's steady breathing.
The old woman cleared her throat. "When you almost lose it, but not quite, it's like giving birth to life all over again."
Alone again with the boy, Charlotte thought of her own mother sitting in her kitchen, obsessed with waiting for a child who no longer existed. She willed her message of life across the Atlantic Ocean.
My real child lives, Mamma. You should see him. A big-toothed boy, half a man now.
Bearing a cup of tea that smelled of flowers and herbs, the old woman entered the room. The cup clicked against the saucer as she set it down on the nightstand.
"If he wakes up—"
But the boy was sleeping comfortably. Entirely relaxed now, free of all his manly posturing, he looked very young. Something rippled up the back of Charlotte's neck. By the time it stung her eyes, she recognized it as gratitude.
He Was My Man
Lichen holiday, the old woman called the camping trip. She would need the ugly, sticky lichens that grew on the distant moor to mend their respiratory and digestive systems all winter long. The best time to pick them was in the early morning when they were soft and wet from the morning dew.
You'll never catch cold, not even when you've been searching for sheep for three days in drenching rain. Keeps your bones from aching in the middle of January.
Charlotte lay on her back, staring at the point where the two sides of the tent met above her head and
listened to the rain drumming the canvas. Henrik was wedged between her and the old woman.
Even after twelve years on the island, Charlotte found it difficult to sleep when daylight lasted all night. This was especially true when she was worrying about her children's safety.
"I don't want Tryggvi to go with Ragnar to the sheep round-up in the fall," she said.
The old woman put her finger to her lips and whispered. "Don't let Henrik hear you. He's already afraid of everything."
"His fear will keep him safe."
The old woman had the covers up to her nose, and her voice sounded as if she were praying in a cave.
My teeth solved my troubles
And tore out his throat
She pulled back the covers.
"No such thing as safe."
The old woman's eyes gleamed with story.
"My son Gunnar wanted to go out with his father. Swan was the boat's name. Thank God Ragnar didn't like boats. He just puttered around the farm. But Gunnar begged and begged. At last his father agreed. I didn't like the way the sea looked that day—almost no gaps between the waves. They could barely launch the boat. But Gunnar was eighteen, a man really. What could I do?"
Charlotte understood. She owed life a certain stance. No more cringing. She touched her eyelids, felt her eyeballs vibrating, enjoyed the sensation of being alive. At Christmas, when they ate sheep's heads, she'd studied the dead eye surrounded by fat. Ragnar plucked the eyes out with his fork, ate them first. She nibbled on the singed skin from around the ears. But she never ate an eye.
Listening now, she could distinguish the old woman's breathing from Henrik's. They all lay here breathing, eyes vibrating. The definitely dead—Gunnar—couldn't do that. Somewhere Lena lay in bed right now, breathing, counting the seconds until her alarm clock rang.
The old woman sat up suddenly.
"It was Gunnar's first time out. I waited for them all night and the next. Bits of their boat washed ashore farther down the coast. Bodies came back, finally—"
The ocean borrowed bodies, then gave them back. During the loan, death marked them.
"You were lucky that his body came back," Charlotte said.
"Lucky?"
"A person isn't completely dead, I mean forever and ever, until you see the body."
Still, when General Eisenhower went into the camps and reported what he saw there, Charlotte knew that he was telling her that Max was dead. She didn't need to see his body. Lena's case was different.
The old woman peered at her. "Don't think about it."
"I want to."
"Why?"
"To keep her alive."
The old woman shook her head, pointed to the sleeping boy. Charlotte read her look.
This is the one who is alive. Forget everything else.
The other truth rose up in her.
"I didn't want a baby."
Henrik was staring at her. Had he only pretended to be asleep? The old woman said nothing as if Charlotte hadn't said what she'd said. Tired of being a terrible mother, she rolled away from him. But he reached for her shoulders.
"Let's start the picking."
"Go outside and pee, boy," the old woman said.
He crawled quickly out of the tent.
"Does Ragnar know?" the old woman asked.
"He doesn't like me to talk about Lena—or Max."
"Use these words on him, 'I have something to tell you.'"
He'd changed the subject to mixing cement for the dung channel in the cowshed.
Don't tell me.
Charlotte eased herself up out of the sleeping bag and found her boots. She pulled on the thick gloves, still warm from cradling her head all night. They hiked through wet moss and dewy heather until their boots were shiny above the ankle line. Henrik ran ahead, and the old woman placed each foot higher and higher on the slope. At last they reached the picking place on the moor. The mountain lichens glistened with slime. The old woman dropped to her knees and pulled the lichens out of the ground and pitched them into her basket, singing:
My teeth solved my troubles
And tore out his throat.
Henrik skipped about. "Don't step on them, boy," she said.
For years, the old woman had fetched lichens here, brewed them to cure Ragnar's first wife's consumption, spoon-fed her lichen milk, thumped her back to bring up the phlegm, watched her die. For a few years after that, she put her faith in other edibles.
Finally, hauling baskets and bags of lichens on her back, the old woman led the way back to the tent.
Troll Games
Tryggvi's wound appeared to have healed. But even if he could run, he didn't. That was for little kids like Henrik, who ran across the field, hay rakes in his arms, the heads banging together. Tryggvi sauntered along, hands in his pockets, chewing a wad of sheep sorrel, sucking in his cheeks at its sourness.
Ragnar had cut the grass that morning and separated it into rows. The family fell into line behind him. The sun was hot on one side of Charlotte's face. Each time they changed rows, the sun switched cheeks to the sound of their rakes scratching the earth's scalp.
By mid-afternoon, they were turning hay on the incline, one foot higher than the other. Panting, the old woman had dropped two rows behind. Charlotte tied her sweater around her waist and wiped the pearls of sweat from her forehead.
"Coffee, Mamma," Ragnar called over his shoulder.
The old woman finished her row and toed the ground to make an indentation. She raised her rake high into the air and plunged the wooden handle into the ground so that it vibrated against the blue of the sky. Henrik threw down his rake and ran ahead to the farmhouse. Ragnar and Charlotte turned the remaining rows without talking.
They drank their coffee in a place sheltered by rocks. The warm sun drew out the sweet, spicy fragrance of thyme. A tiny pink alpine azalea nestled at Charlotte's feet. She imagined invisible creatures hiding at its roots and wondered how she would paint them. Her inner eye would discover the secret, secret even from herself until she painted it.
The old woman stripped to her woolen undershirt and lay on her back in the sunshine. The thin skin of her arms hung from her bones and rested on the earth. Henrik's hard little knees gripped Charlotte's arm, and his gritty hands cupped her ear.
"Come to my killing place," he whispered.
A goblin pair appeared to dance in his eyes. One of the dancers made her think of herself on a good day. She rose to her feet, and followed him to his favorite place, the gray ring of rocks, where he garrisoned his quarrelsome bleached sheep bones.
He wasn't a killer. When her mother wanted to send him toy Prussian soldiers, he'd said no. Instead he collected sheep skeletons in chasms and made them live rich lives. Last year's May blizzard had frozen a family group where it stood in the field. And on a bright July day Henrik found a live sheep lying on its back, its feet up in the air. Crows were pecking at its eyes. He couldn't help the sheep to its feet, so he screamed until the crows flew away.
Give me a gun, Papa. I need to kill all the crows in the world.
But Ragnar had said no, so his hatred of crows and trolls came out in other ways.
One of the rocks was covered with a glossy paste of buttercups. He showed her his executioner's instrument, a small sharp quartz stone, with buttercup petal scraps clinging to the stone. He dragged a finger through the paste, and she saw the blisters the buttercup oil had raised on his hand. The old woman always wore gloves when she mixed crushed petals with butter for her joint salve.
Henrik picked up the rock, crushed the remaining buttercup heads, and added them to the yellow carnage. Charlotte thought his hatred of trolls went back to the day he found her tundra painter book—One of his drawings showed a troll's huge penis ramming into a tiny farmer's wife. Another depicted a thumb-sized fisherman lost in the forest of a troll woman's pubic hair.
He'd thrown the book on the floor, called it "troll games."
Later that same day, fetching the cows, th
ey'd heard the concert of whinnying and snorting, had seen the stallion biting the mare's back. The stallion reared up, splayed its forelegs over the mare's back, and mounted her.
Henrik called that troll games too. In his mind—and she knew his mind—the only way to fight the trolls was by making an alliance with the hidden people, good creatures who wanted to join the human race. The hidden people lived among the flowers, in the fog, behind rocks, in caves.
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