“Food there was, be sure—but I had no stomach for it when I was there. I drank a while with Sigurd—but—methought then ’twas as well I should come home at once as wait till to-morrow—”
Astrid came back bearing food and ale; she brought with her, too, a pair of dry shoes for her master.
Lavrans fumbled with his spur-buckles to unloosen them; but came near to falling on his face.
“Come hither, Kristin, my girl,” he said, “and help your father. I know you will do it from a loving heart—aye, a loving heart—to-day.”
Kristin kneeled down to obey. Then he took her head between his two hands and turned her face up:
“One thing I trow you know, my daughter—I wish for naught but your good. Never would I give you sorrow, except I see that thereby I save you from many sorrows to come. You are full young yet, Kristin—’twas but seventeen years old you were this year—three days after Halvard’s Mass—but seventeen years old—”
Kristin had done with her service now. She was a little pale as she rose from her knees and sat down again on her stool by the hearth.
Lavran’s head seemed to grow somewhat clearer as he ate and was filled. He answered his wife’s questions and the servant maid’s about the Haugathing—Aye, ’twas a fair gathering. They had managed to buy corn, and some flour and malt, part at Oslo and part at Tunsberg; the wares were from abroad—they might have been better, but they might have been worse too. Aye, he had met many, both kinsfolk and friends, and they had sent their greetings home with him—But the answers dropped from him, one by one, as he sat there.
“I spoke with Sir Andres Gudmundsön,” he said, when Astrid was gone out. “Simon marries the young widow at Manvik; he has held his betrothal feast. The wedding will be at Dyfrin at St. Andrew’s Mass. He has chosen for himself this time, has the boy. I held aloof from Sir Andres at Tunsberg, but he sought me out—’twas to tell me he knew for sure that Simon saw Lady Halfrid for the first time this mid-summer. He feared that I should think Simon had this rich marriage in mind when he broke with us.” Lavrans paused a little and laughed joylessly. “You understand—that good and worthy man feared much that we should believe such a thing of his son.”
Kristin breathed more freely. She thought it must be this that had troubled her father so sorely. Maybe he had been hoping all this time that it might come to pass after all, her marriage with Simon Andressön. At first she had been in dread lest he had heard some tidings of her doings in the south at Oslo.