AASMUND BJÖRGULFSÖN’S church-boat stood in round the point of Hovedö early one Sunday at the end of April, while the bells were ringing in the cloister-church and were answered from across the bay by the chimes of bells from the town, now louder and now fainter as the breeze rose or fell.
Light, fluted clouds were floating over the high, pale-blue heavens, and the sun was glittering on the dancing ripples of the water. It was quite spring-like along the shores; the fields lay almost bare of snow, and over the leaf-tree thickets the light had a yellow shimmer and the shadows were blue. But in the pine-forests up on the high ridges, which framed in the settled lands of Akersbygd, there were glimpses of snow, and on the far blue fells to the westward, beyond the fjord, there still showed many flashes of white.
Kristin was standing in the bow of the boat with her father, and Gyrid, Aasmund’s wife. She gazed at the town, with all the light-hued churches and stone buildings that rose above the swarm of grey-brown wooden houses and bare tree-tops. The wind ruffled the skirts of her cloak and snatched at her hair beneath her hood.
They had left the cattle out at Skog the day before, and a great longing had come on her to be at Jörundgaard. It would be a long time still before they could let the cattle out there—she longed with tender pity for the lean, winter-worn cows in the dark byres; they would have to wait and suffer a long while yet. Her mother, Ulvhild, who had slept in her arms each night all these years, little Ramborg—she yearned so much for them; she longed for all the folk at home, and the horses and the dogs, for Kortelin, whom Ulvhild was to have while she was gone, and for her father’s hawks as they sat there on their perches with their hoods over their heads. She saw the horse-hide gloves that hung beside them to wear when you took them on to your wrist, and the ivory staves to scratch them with.
It was as if all the woe of the last winter had gone far away from her and she only saw her home as it used to be. They had told her, too, that none thought ill of her in the parish—Sira Eirik did not believe that story; he was angry and grieved at what Bentein had done. Bentein had fled from Hamar; ’twas said he had gone to Sweden. So things were not so bad between them and their neighbour as she had feared.
On the journey down to Oslo they had stayed as guests at Simon’s home, and she had come to know his mother and sisters—Sir Andres was in Sweden still. She had not felt at ease there, and her dislike of the Dyfrin folk was all the stronger that she could think of no good ground for it. All the way thither, she had said to herself that they had no cause to be proud or to think themselves better than her kin—no man knew aught of Reidar Darre, the Birch-leg, before King Sverre got him the widow of the Dyfrin Baron to wife. But lo! they were not proud at all; and when Simon himself spoke one night of his forefather: “I have found out now for sure—he was a comb-maker—so ’tis as though you were to come into a kingly stock—almost, Kristin,” said he. “Take heed to your tongue, boy,” said his mother but they all laughed together. It vexed her strangely when she thought of her father; he laughed much, if Simon gave him the least cause—a thought came to her dimly that maybe her father would gladly have had more laughter in his life—But ’twas not to her mind that he should like Simon so much.
They had all been at Skog over Easter. She had found that her uncle was a hard master to his farmers and serving-folk—she had met one and another who asked after her mother and spoke lovingly of Lavrans: they had better times when he lived here. Aasmund’s mother, Lavrans’ step-mother, lived on the manor in a house by herself; she was not so very old, but sickly and failing. Lavrans had but seldom spoken of her at home. Once when Kristin asked him if he had had a hard step-mother, her father answered: “She never did much to me of either good or ill.”
Kristin felt for her father’s hand, and he pressed hers:
“You will be happy soon enough, my daughter, with the good Sisters—you will have other things to think of besides longing to be home with us—”
They sailed so near by the town that the smell of tar and salt fish was borne out to them from the wharves. Gyrid named all the churches, the traders’ quarters and the open places which ran up from the water’s edge—Kristin remembered nothing from the time she was here before but the great heavy towers of St. Halvard’s church. They sailed westward past the whole town and laid to at the convent pier.
Kristin walked between her father and her uncle through a cluster of warehouses, and came out upon a road which led up through the fields. Simon came after, leading Gyrid by the hand. The serving-folk stayed behind to help some men from the convent load the baggage upon a cart.
Nonneseter and the whole Leiran quarter lay within the boundaries of the town grazing-grounds, but there were but a few clusters of houses here and there along the roadside. The larks were trilling over their heads in the pale-blue sky, and the small yellow flowers of the coltsfoot were thickly sprinkled over the wan clay slopes, but along by the fences the roots of the grass were green.
When they were through the gate and were come into the cloister, all the nuns came marching two by two towards them from the church, while song and music streamed out after them through the open door.
Ill at ease, Kristin watched the many black-robed women with white linen wimples about their faces. She curtsied low, and the men bowed with their hats held close to their breasts. After the nuns came a flock of young maidens—some of them but children—in gowns of undyed wadmal, their waists bound with belts of twined black and white, and their hair braided tightly back from their faces with cords of the same black and white. Without thinking, Kristin put on a bold and forward look as the young maids passed, for she felt bashful, and was afraid they must think she looked countrified and foolish.
The convent was so glorious that she was quite overcome. All the buildings round the inner court were of grey stone; on the north side the main-wall of the church stood up high above the other houses; it had two tiers of roofs and towers at the west end. The court itself was laid with stone flags, and round the whole there ran a covered way whose roof was borne on pillars fairly wrought. In the midst of the court stood a stone statue of the Mater Misericordiæ, spreading her cloak over some kneeling figures.
Then a lay-sister came and prayed them to go with her to the Abbess’ parlour. The Lady Groa Guttormsdatter was a tall and stoutly-made old woman—she would have been comely had she not had so many hairs about her mouth. Her voice was deep like a man’s. But her bearing was gentle and kindly—she called to mind that she had known Lavrans’ father and mother, and asked after his wife and his other children. Last she spoke to Kristin in friendly wise:
“I have heard good report of you, and you look to be wise and well nurtured—sure I am you will give us no cause for miscontent. I have heard that you are plighted to this good and well-born man, Simon Andressön, whom I see here—it seems to us that ’twas wise counsel of your father and your husband to be, to grant you leave to live here awhile in the Virgin Mary’s house, that you may learn to obey and serve before you are called to rule and to command. Now would I have you lay to heart this counsel: that you learn to find joy in prayer and the worship of God, that you may use yourself in all your doings to remember your Creator, God’s gentle Mother, and all the Saints who have given us the best patterns of strength, uprightness, faithfulness and all the virtues you must show forth in guiding your people and your goods and nurturing your children. And you will learn in this house, too, to take good heed of time, for here every hour has its use and its task also. Many young maids and women love all too well to lie abed late of a morning, and sit long at table of an evening in idle talk—yet look not you as you were one of these. Yet may you learn much in the year you are here that may profit you both here on earth and in our heavenly home.”
Kristin curtsied and kissed her hand. After that Lady Groa bade Kristin go with a monstrously fat old nun, whom she called Sister Potentia, over to the nuns’ refectory. The men and Gyrid she asked to dine with her in another house.
The refectory was a great and fair room with a stone floor and pointed windows with glass panes. There was a doorway into another room, where, Kristin could see, there must be glass windows too, for the sun shone in.
The Sisters were already seated at the table waiting for their food—the elder nuns upon a cushioned stone-bench along the wall under the windows; the younger Sisters and the bareheaded maidens in light-hued wadmal dresses sat upon a wooden bench on the outer side of the board. In the next room a board was laid too; this was for the commoners and the lay-servants; there were a few old men amongst them. These folk did not wear the convent habit, but were none the less clad soberly in dark raiment.
Sister Potentia showed Kristin to a seat on the outer bench, but went and placed herself near to the Abbess’ high-seat at the end of the board—the high-seat was empty to-day.
All rose, both in this room and in the side room, while the Sisters said grace. After that a fair, young nun went and stood at a lectern placed in the doorway between the two chambers. And while the lay-sisters in the greater room, and two of the youngest nuns in the side room, bore in food and drink, the nun read in a high and sweet voice, and without stopping or tripping at a single word, the story of St. Theodora and St. Didymus.
At first Kristin was thinking most of minding her table-manners, for she saw all the Sisters and the young maids bore them as seemly and ate as nicely as though they had been sitting at the finest feast. There was abundance of the best food and drink, but all helped themselves modestly, and dipped but the very tips of their fingers into the dishes; no one spilled the broth either upon the cloths or upon their garments, and all cut up the meat so small that they did not soil their mouths, and ate with so much care that not a sound was to be heard.
Kristin grew hot with fear that she might not seem as well-behaved as the others; she was feeling ill at ease, too, in her bright dress in the midst of all these women in black and white—she fancied that they were all looking at her. So when she had to eat a fat piece of breast of mutton, and was holding it by the bone with two fingers, while cutting morsels off with her right hand, and taking care to handle the knife lightly and neatly—suddenly the whole slipped from her fingers; her slice of bread and the meat flew on to the cloth, and the knife fell clattering on the stone flags.
The noise sounded fearfully in the quiet room. Kristin flushed red as fire and would have bent to pick up the knife, but a lay-sister came noiselessly in her sandals and gathered up the things.
But Kristin could eat no more. She found, too, that she had cut one of her fingers, and she was afraid of bleeding upon the cloth; so she sat with her hand wrapped in a corner of her skirt, and thought of how she was staining the goodly light-blue dress she had gotten for the journey to Oslo—and she did not dare to raise her eyes from her lap.
Howbeit, in a little she began to listen more to what the nun was reading. When the ruler found he could not shake the steadfastness of the maid, Theodora—she would neither make offerings to the false gods nor let herself be given in marriage—he bade them lead her to a brothel. Yet while on the way thither he exhorted her to think of her free born kindred and her honoured father and mother, upon whom everlasting shame must now be brought, and gave his word she should be let live in peace and stay a maid, if she would but join the service of a heathen goddess, whom they called Diana.
Theodora answered fearlessly: “Chastity is like a lamp, but love of God is the flame; were I to serve the devilwoman whom you call Diana, my chastity were no more worth than a rusty lamp without flame or oil. Thou callest me freeborn, but we are all born bondsmen, since our first parents sold us to the devil; Christ has bought me free, and I am bound to serve him, so that I cannot wed me with his foes. He will guard his dove; but should he even suffer you to break my body, that is the temple of his Holy Spirit, it shall not be counted to me for shame if so be that I consent not to betray what is His into the hands of his enemies.”
Kristin’s heart began to throb, for this in some way reminded her of her meeting with Bentein—she was smitten by the thought that this perhaps was her sin—she had not for a moment thought of God nor prayed for His help. And now Sister Cecilia read further of St. Didymus. He was a Christian knight, but heretofore he had kept his faith hidden from all save a few friends. He went now to the house where the maid was; he gave money to the woman who owned the house, and thus was the first to be let in to Theodora. She fled into a corner like a frightened hare, but Didymus hailed her as his sister and as his Lord’s bride and said he was come to save her. Then he spake with her a while, saying: was it not meet that a brother should wage his life for his sister’s honour? And at last she did as he bade her, changed clothes with him, and let herself be clad in Didymus’ coat of mail; he pulled the hat down over her eyes and drew the cape up about her chin, and bade her go out with her face hidden, like a youth who is abashed at having been in such a place.
Kristin thought of Arne, and was scarce able to hold back her tears. She gazed straight before her with wet eyes while the nun was reading to the end—how Didymus was led to the place of execution, and how Theodora came hastening down from the mountains, cast herself at the headsman’s feet and begged that she might die in his stead. And now the holy man and maid strove together who should first win the crown; and both were beheaded on the one day. This was the eight and twentieth day of April in the year 304 after the birth of Christ, in Antioch, as was written by St. Ambrosius.
When they rose from the table, Sister Potentia came and patted Kristin kindly on the cheek: “Aye, you are longing for your mother, I can well believe.” And on that Kristin’s tears began to fall. But the nun made as though she did not see them, and led Kristin to the hostel where she was to dwell.
It was in one of the stone houses by the cloisters; a goodly room with glass windows and a big fireplace in the short wall at the far end. Along one main-wall stood six bedsteads, and along the other all the maidens’ chests.
Kristin wished they would let her sleep with one of the little girls, but Sister Potentia called a fat, fair-haired, grown maiden: “Here is Ingebjörg Filippusdatter, who is to be your bed-fellow—you must see now and learn to know each other.” And with that she went out.
Ingebjörg took Kristin at once by the hand and began to talk. She was not very tall, and was much too fat, above all in her face—her cheeks were so plump that her eyes looked quite small. But her skin was clear, red and white, and her hair was yellow as gold, and so curly that her thick plaits twisted and twined together like strands of rope, and small locks kept ever slipping from under her snood.
She began straightway to question Kristin about many things, but never waited for an answer; instead she talked about herself, reckoned out the whole of her kindred in all its branches—they were naught but fine and exceeding rich folk. She was betrothed, too, to a rich and mighty man, Einar Einarssön of Aganæs—but he was far too old, and twice widowed; this was her greatest sorrow, she said. Yet could Kristin not mark that she took it much to heart. Then she talked a little of Simon Darre—’twas a marvel how closely she had looked him over in the short moment when they were passing in the cloisters. After that she had a mind to look into Kristin’s chest—but first she opened her own and brought forth all her clothes. While they were ransacking their chests, Sister Cecilia came in—she rebuked them and said that this was no seemly Sunday pastime. This made Kristin unhappy again—she had never been taken to task by any but her mother, and that was not the same as being chid by a stranger.
Ingebjörg was not abashed.—After they were come to bed in the evening, she lay chattering until Kristin fell asleep. Two elder lay-sisters slept in a corner of the room; they were to see that the maidens did not take their shifts off at night—for it was against the rules for the girls to undress entirely—and to see that they were up in time for matins in the church. But else they did not trouble themselves to keep order in the hostel, and made as though they marked it not when the maids were lying talking, or eating the dainties which they had hidden in their chests.
When Kristin was awakened next morning, Ingebjörg was in the midst of a long tale already, so that Kristin almost wondered whether the other had been talking the whole night through.