Evil Legacy

by Margit Sandemo

  The winter had been hard on Graastens­holm, Liv told him. The snow had lain heavy on roofs and branches and the winds had howled increasingly, seeking out every nook and cranny that it could penetrate to cause discomfort. All the while, Yrja had tortured herself thinking that somewhere under the snow out there lay the body of a small boy who’d been given no proper grave. Tarald had done his best to push such thoughts out of his mind, said Liv, but nevertheless they would come back from time to time, forcing him to take repeated deep breaths and clear his throat to get his emotions under control. On Christmas Day, Yrja had lit a candle for Mattias and whispered: “Today would have been his tenth birthday.”

  Tarjei could see that Liv and Dag were both stronger emotionally than Tarald and Yrja, but they’d obviously taken events badly, too. It was worse for Liv, who watched anxiously as one of the remaining linden trees at the top of the avenue withered more and more because she knew only too well for whom Tengel had originally planted the individual trees.

  Tarjei noticed that a strange hush had fallen over Linden Avenue and its residents – and it was a deathly hush. Are would wander about aimlessly, unable to concentrate on anything since he’d lost Meta, the one who’d always pushed and bullied him into action. Brand and his wife, Matilda, fared a little better because they had Andreas, now eight years old, to give them joy in their lives. He was a tough little boy; dependable and very easygoing, just like his dad and granddad.

  As Tarjei observed all this first hand, he felt quite helpless. The only person who appeared to be remotely satisfied with his lot was Kolgrim. Of course, he was impatient to get his hands on the hidden secrets of the Ice People, but then one day during the spring of 1635 he stumbled upon something. It wasn’t the treasure he found – but something else that was both intriguing and frightening. Kolgrim had been snooping around in the attics of Graastensholm when, out of sight in a recess, he came across an iron chest. Breaking open the hasp, he found that it contained something that at first glance appeared to him to be meaningless – until he examined it more closely. Indeed, he found it so fascinating that he stayed up in the attic for the rest of the day and went back again the next morning. When at last he came down, he had a sly grin on his face that Liv found quite unnerving. She was reminded of a cat that had just swallowed a large rat.

  And as a result of his discovery, Kolgrim’s search for the treasure now became even more relentless.

  More than two years had passed since Mattias had disappeared. In some ways for Yrja and Tarald, it seemed like twenty years or more, as if they’d been suffering the anguish and inconsolable sense of loss for most of their lives.

  And nobody would ever know how many times Mattias’s parents had wished themselves back to that summer morning when their son had been allowed to go off alone to his unknown fate, how many times they regretted that they’d not done something differently that day to avert the terrible tragedy. Nobody else could possibly understand how often they were living their lives not in the present, but in the happy, carefree days of that summer in 1633 when Mattias was still with them.

  Chapter 3

  On a certain morning in that distant summer of 1633, a young shepherd boy had been sitting on the stony shore of the Skagerrak. His sheep were grazing peacefully on the rough grass beyond the rocky outcrop where he sat high up, keeping a good watch on the flock but also able to see out to the distant, shimmering ocean.

  He’d been trying to fashion a whistle from a little twig but the bark had refused to come away cleanly. The boy persevered, patching it together as he went, but the only sound he could produce from the makeshift whistle was a hoarse hiss. Beside him lay a large heavy stick. It was all he had with which to defend himself and his sheep if wild animals attacked them. Yet he knew only too well that in those peaceful, wide-open spaces near the sea, there was little chance of that happening.

  For some time, he’d been keeping his eye on a dark object that kept disappearing and reappearing in the dazzling sunlight that was reflecting on the surface of the water. It grew larger each time he caught a glimpse of it, and it looked as if it was being carried towards land by the tide. The next time he looked towards the sea, a shaft of sunlight had picked out the object and he could clearly see what it was. A small boat. It was seemingly empty and as it drifted closer, he saw it was a fine little rowing boat.

  By now, he’d forgotten all about the sheep, but they were not likely to come to any harm on those high peaceful slopes. He was wondering if the boat had slipped its moorings and whether its owner was too far away to be found. This young shepherd, who’d been born near the sea, had always wished for a boat of his own, but he knew that it could never be more than a dream. How could he, the most wretched and poorest of the poor, ever hope to own such a thing? But perhaps fate was lending a hand on this beautiful day – and he decided that this boat might be worth taking.

  As he thought these daring thoughts, he realised that the little boat was no longer heading for the shore. It was going to drift past him and onwards to the open water beyond. He cast a quick glance at his sheep. There was nowhere they could go and no possible danger threatened them in broad daylight. His master’s own fishing boat was pulled up not far from him on the shore below and an exciting thought suddenly struck him. Should he borrow it? If he did, nobody would be able to see him. On an impulse, he jumped to his feet and ran helter-skelter down the steep field, heading for the beach below. A few minutes later he was in the fishing boat and pulling hard on the oars, looking over his shoulder now and then to make sure he was headed in the right direction.

  As he got nearer, he turned to look once more and gave a start. There was someone sitting in the boat! At first the shepherd boy was deeply disappointed but then he understood that things weren’t as they should be. The little figure in the boat was sitting straight-backed, gripping the gunwales tightly with both hands and staring at him wide-eyed. There was no sign of any oars.

  The shepherd boy began to row faster, the water swirled around the stern, and then as he approached the other boat, he got up and went to the bow to prevent the two craft from colliding.

  The shepherd saw that the little lad in the small boat was younger than he was but not by much. He had beautiful, auburn hair and wore very fine clothes, although they were a little crumpled. He could see that his eyes were puffy from the tears he’d shed.

  “I’m very glad you came,” said the youngster in the other boat, who spoke in a polite but unsteady voice. “I was beginning to get hungry and thirsty.”

  The shepherd boy took his hand and helped him climb into the fishing boat before tying the smaller boat to its stern.

  “I had some bread and meat,” continued the polite little boy. “I saved Kolgrim’s as long as I could but in the end I just had to eat his food, too. It didn’t taste very nice though because I knew it wasn’t mine.”

  Tears welled up and he wiped them away quickly. Then with a shy smile, he said: “Forgive me, I feel sad because Kolgrim’s gone. We were going to see the fishes dance, you see ... and I saw them, but Kolgrim wasn’t there. I’d gone to sleep in the boat and when I woke up, he wasn’t there. I called and called for him but he never came. Poor Kolgrim!”

  His chin started to tremble again and the older boy didn’t quite know what to believe or what to say. He felt very poor and ignorant in the presence of this noble person, who gazed at him with gentle and trusting eyes.

  “Was it a long time ago?” he asked in his rough peasant voice.

  “It has been night three times since Kolgrim disappeared. Do you think he drowned in the sea?”

  Although his newfound companion thought it likely, he daren’t say so. “No, maybe not. He could have gone ashore and the boat could have drifted away from him.”

  “You think so? I really hope that’s true.”

  “Yes, of course it is because you’d have been woken up by his hollering if he’d fallen in
.”

  “Yes,” the little one answered, with hope and consolation in his voice.

  “What’s your name then?”

  “Mattias, Mattias Meiden. What about you?”

  The shepherd boy smiled. “Nearly the same – my name’s Matts.”

  “That’s funny,” chuckled Mattias. “Look! We’re nearly on the beach.”

  They bumped against a rock with such force that they both lost their balance and fell onto the boards in the bottom of the boat. Both of them burst into fits of laughter simultaneously.

  When he tried to stand up, Mattias found he was exhausted. He didn’t even have the strength to get out of the boat. After three days and nights sitting and lying in the boat, with nothing to drink, his legs wouldn’t carry him at all. He’d been good at bailing out the small amounts of water that seeped into the boat and the bottom boards were almost dry and so were his clothes. The weather had also been exceptionally kind to him – there’d been no rain and almost no wind.

  “The angels have been keeping a watchful eye over you,” said Matts with a laugh as he took the boy’s arm round his neck and helped him out onto dry land.

  He fetched his small sackcloth bag and took out some food. There was only a hard, stale loaf of bread and water from the brook to wash it down but to Mattias it was food fit for a king.

  “Of course you can keep the boat,” he said generously to the shepherd boy. “Kolgrim had found it so nobody owns it.”

  Matts could hardly believe his ears. This young boy had brought good luck with him.

  “But it has no oars,” Mattias said with unintended irony.

  “Not to worry. I’ll make them. I’ll whittle them out of a couple of alder.”

  “Now I’d better get home to my mum,” Mattias said to him with an uncertain glance at the surrounding countryside. “She’s sure to be worried about me and Kolgrim as well. I hope he’s safe at home. I’m frightened for his life!”

  “Where do you live, then?”

  “At Graastensholm.”

  The name meant nothing to Matts.

  “Have you never heard of Graastensholm?” Mattias asked, surprised. “I thought everybody had.”

  “You came from up there,” said Matts, pointing over the headland.

  “Well, I followed the land to get here so I’ll follow the sea to get home,” replied Mattias and they both laughed.

  “Fine,” said Matts. “I’ll show you up to the road.”

  As they walked along, they met Matts’ master, who fell into step with them. Mattias told him what had happened and that the boat was a gift to Matts for saving him from drifting out to sea. The shepherd boy felt grateful that his reward had been confirmed because he feared that otherwise the boat wouldn’t have been his for very long.

  When he’d hear the whole story, the farmer scratched his head. “Graastensholm? No, it wasn’t anywhere near here.”

  When they reached the road, Mattias politely thanked them for helping him and set off, heading northwards as he wondered about the strange dialect the other two had spoken.

  “What a fine little boy he was,” said the farmer. “Dear Lord! It feels as if all is right with the world, as if an angel came down from Heaven to bless us.”

  Mattias was clearly not an angel, but there was something in his eyes and smile that had a beneficial effect on people.

  As Liv had once said to Yrja: “When they see Mattias for the first time, people feel they regain their faith in what’s good.”

  But Matts had made up his mind that Mattias was an angel. Just imagine – a boat of his own! And, what’s more, Mattias had been unharmed by wind and rain for three days.

  Mattias couldn’t have known that the rowing boat had been stolen. Its owner had died just before Kolgrim had found it and at that same moment, the owner’s heirs were bickering over which of them was entitled to inherit the boat. So all in all, the theft had caused no hardship to anyone. Instead, it had solved the question of the inheritance – drastically and decisively.

  After Matts had lovingly decorated the boat, nobody, not even its previous owner, had he still been alive, would have ever recognised it. Neither would he ever have travelled so far south to look for it. So Matts was, without any doubt, the new owner of the little rowing boat.

  ***

  Mattias’s little feet were sore and tired and he was hungry – all he’d eaten were wild raspberries and blackberries that grew along the roadside. He’d been walking all day without seeing any houses or signs of human habitation. He had found a decently sized stick though, which he could use to ward off wild animals.

  As evening drew near, he saw the flickering glow of a campfire through the trees. He made his way to a small clearing where five men were sitting and asked respectfully if he might sit and warm himself for a while.

  He didn’t think these men looked very pleasant. They laughed at him and wondered who this little mite could be.

  But Mattias answered politely as he’d always been taught to, saying that his name was Mattias Meiden, he was eight years old – and he was on his way back to Graastensholm.

  The men made room for him to sit beside them on a log in front of the fire, but like the farmer and Matts, none of them had heard of Graastensholm.

  They were all bearded, dirty and dressed in rags. One of them, who was horribly disfigured and with only one eye, came over and sat down close to Mattias. The man reached out with blackened fingers to pinch the sleeve of Mattias’s velvet coat. When he felt its obvious quality, the man whistled softly through rotted teeth, “Where did you find these clothes?”

  “These clothes are mine,” replied Mattias, surprised by the question. “My Mum and Dad had them made for me.”

  “Mm, I see,” said the man who wasn’t convinced. “What does your dad do then?”

  “Do? My Dad? He does nothing. He just owns Graastensholm. But my granddad is a notary in Akershus – and we’re barons, all three of us. So is my brother, but I don’t know where he is.”

  Once again, tears welled up at the thought of what might have happened to Kolgrim.

  Instinctively, the man had edged away from Mattias a little when he said the word ‘notary.’ But after a pause, he continued questioning Mattias. “Is that so? And what might a boy who lives in Akershus be doing here?”

  Once again, Mattias recounted the whole sorry saga of the boat, the dancing fishes and Kolgrim’s tragic disappearance. At all times he spoke politely and innocently.

  “And where’s the boat then?”

  “I gave it to Matts as a gift.”

  This news seemed to disappoint the men and they looked round at each other with calculating expressions.

  “Well, I reckon he needs a rest,” said another of the men with a wicked grin that he hoped would pass for a friendly smile. “Here, boy, you get your head down. We’ll keep a watch over you.”

  Mattias did as the man said but stopped himself from telling him how hungry he was. It would have been impolite to complain, especially when they’d been kind enough to let him share their fire.

  Within minutes, he was fast asleep, safe in the knowledge that he was on his way to Mum and Dad. The last thing he remembered was the sound of the evening breeze through the leafy branches above his head.

  ***

  Mattias was not fully awake because he felt too exhausted to wake up. But half asleep he could feel that somebody was undressing him. His jacket was being removed quite gently and he felt no sense of danger.‘It’s Mum,’ he thought with a smile. ‘I’m at home with Mum and she’s undressing me because I’ve fallen asleep. She’s putting on my pyjamas – but it doesn’t smell very nice. I’d better sit up ... no, I can’t. I’m too tired.’

  He could hear voices – hoarse, whispering, unfamiliar voices. Maybe Mum had forgotten to close the window because he could feel a draught. The
re was the sound of singing, a mournful song like the hymns they sang in church. No, not a song; it was something else, but he couldn’t quite work out what it was. ‘Maybe I’m just dreaming,’ he thought.

  “We’ll have to kill him!” said one voice. “He saw all our faces in the firelight, didn’t he?”

  ‘Those voices didn’t sound so pleasant now,’ thought Mattias confusedly. ‘Who could that be?’

  “But he’s such a little mite,” said another voice. The others all sounded like Matts. Matts? Who was Matts?

  “You heard him with your own ears, Olaves!” replied the first voice. “His granddad is a notary.”

  “Then we’ll get a reward, won’t we?” said another.

  “Idiot! We can’t go to the notary! Get on with it. A young thing like him only has a thin neck. It’ll be easy to break!”

  “No, wait,” said the voice of the man called Olaves. “Why not sell him to old Nermarken? He’ll pay well!”

  “Nermarken? He’s too far away. You reckon we’ll drag this little mite all that way?”

  “All right,” said Olaves. “Let me finish him off, then! It’s been a while since I wrung a chicken’s neck. I need the practice!”

  This last remark was followed by much laughter. Mattias thought then he must have had a nightmare and wanted so much to wake up and tried his hardest to do so – but no matter how hard he tried, he only fell into a deeper and deeper sleep.

  ***

  It seemed like another age had passed and again Mattias felt he might be dreaming again. The same strange sound of hymns being sung by the wind reached his ears but more quietly now. He could feel that somebody was shaking him very gently and talking to him at the same time.