CHAPTER I
A grey, dull day—not a glimpse of the sun since morning.
A man came hobbling along the little-used path, a solitary figure under the leaden sky. The clouds hung so low that it seemed as if the heavens had fallen, and were supported only by the mountain peaks on the horizon. A grey, dull day—and the man’s spirit was grey and dull within him. All that the day had given him was a fragment of a song that had sprung into his mind; he hummed it half-consciously as he went along.
“No sun over the sand,
Waste, waste.
No eagle over land,
Dead, dead.”
His voice was deep and hollow-sounding; in its depth a ring of loneliness and unsatisfied longing. There seemed a power of fate and sorrow behind it, as behind the dull roar of the sea. The eternal restlessness of life, and the boundless seeking of the soul quivered in this old man’s voice. Strong, yet soft, its tones had power at times to move those who heard to sadness in themselves.
He felt a peculiar comfort in the sound of his own voice when wandering thus alone; and he was a man who wandered much alone. And for all that he carried no heavy burden, his steps often faltered.
His right leg was crippled, which made journeying none the easier; the stout staff he carried was but a poor substitute for a sound limb.
Despite his infirmity, he tramped the country far and wide. Just now, he was on his way across the chain of hills to the north of Hofsfjordur, known as the Dark Mountains.
He had never been in Hofsfjordur. All the other districts round he had visited many a time in his twenty years of vagabond life, but somehow he had always passed by this. If any asked him why, he might answer that it was because of the bad roads. Yet he was well used to roads that were no better.
However it might be, this time he was on his way. The day was drawing to a close, and he had still far to go. The night would be dark, and hopeless then to find his way; there was nothing for it but to find some sheltered spot where he could rest.
He was thoroughly tired, and his lameness was more marked than usual; his sound leg too was aching from its unfair share of the work. He rocked along uncertainly, like a machine on the verge of breakdown, or a windmill making its last rotations before a calm.
His heavy coat dragged like the wings of a wounded bird. It was a picture well in keeping with the landscape, the man with his long white beard, the tangled grey hair showing below a big soft hat of the indeterminate colour of age. From beneath his bushy brows showed the glimpse of an eye—he had but one—almost unearthly in its intelligence and penetrating glance. His whole appearance, with his beggar’s pouch and limping gait, presented an almost unreal effect, harmonizing to a striking degree with the surroundings. He seemed to be in his element in this waste tract, beneath the low-lying clouds that at times almost enveloped him.
He limped on, a monarch in the realm of mist and solitude.
But there was nothing of power in his thoughts. He simply felt at home here, and in no way disheartened at the prospect of a night in the open.
Again and again he hummed his fragment of a song. It was his way to make up such refrains as he walked, humming them hour after hour to while away the tedium of the road. Also, it was a form of expression, giving relief to his feelings and easing his mind.
At last, after innumerable repetitions of his melancholy chant, he fell silent. Not all at once, but stopping for a little, then taking it up and stopping again, with longer and longer pauses between. And his glance grew dull, his brow wrinkled and furrowed. Night was at hand; he stopped on a sudden as if to make a survey of his surroundings.
“Here am I, a worm in all creation,” he muttered. “And the day has left me up on a desolate hill. Make haste, Eye, and find us a place to rest.”
Gradually the fog lifted, and the sky cleared. The darkness, however, grew more intense, and the contours of the hills were soon almost indistinguishable.
The wanderer glanced around, searching for some corner that might offer some little shelter. Comfort and warmth were not to be expected in these regions. But at length he spied two boulders leaning one against the other. “Like brothers,” he thought to himself, and added aloud:
“Good evening, brothers!”
The sense of loneliness vanished, and his heart was glad; he seemed to feel already a bond of kindliness between him and this his night’s abode. Pleasanter thoughts rose in his mind, and he gripped his faithful staff with a heartiness that might once have been extended to his fellow-men. Now, the staff was almost his only friend. He spoke to it aloud, thanking it for help during the day; he even felt somewhat shamed at not having done so before. He dug and scraped away a heap of moss and little stones, to fill the northern opening between the boulders, making a kind of cave.
This done, he opened his wallet and took out some food, given him earlier in the day by some kindly soul, and ate it, lying in the shelter of his cave. When the meal was finished, he rose to his knees, and hid his face for a moment in his hands, as if silently returning thanks.
Then after some shifting about, he curled himself up in the most convenient position within the cramped space at his disposal. He patted the hard stones, and spoke, half aloud, as his thoughts came.
“Feel strangely happy this evening. Not lonely now, just at home. Nice soft sand here to lie on. And the stones that lie there saying nothing, they are like friends. Battered about, like me, by sun and storms and time. Ay, we’ve much in common, for all they stay still and I’m for ever moving from place to place. Who knows—perhaps this night may be my longest at last. Must come some time—some night be night for ever. If so, ’tis a good place for old bones to rest. Maybe there comes One tonight to take the unrest out of my soul and give me the peace I’ve sought. If so, why, call up all the worms and creeping things that live on flesh, and make a feast of me.”
Drowsiness crept over him; he closed his eyes and prayed:
“Lord, see the end of one more day in Thy service. Lord, may it please Thee soon to lift the burden from my shoulders—the burden of sin. Lord, Thou knowest my heart is full of penitence and distress; Lord, grant me soon Thy peace. Amen!”
He ceased, and lay for a while without opening his eyes. Then, turning over on his side, he huddled himself up for warmth, and resigned himself to what the night might bring—rest, or the fever of sleeplessness.