Should she go to her father and tell him: ’Twould be best to let be all this weary bustle and let Erlend and her come together quietly without church-wedding or splendid feasts—now that the one thing needful was that she should bear the name of wife before ’twas plain to all men that she bore Erlend’s child under her heart already?
He would be a laughing-stock, Erlend too, as much as she—or even more, for he was no green boy any longer. But it was he who would have this wedding; he had set his heart on seeing her stand as his bride in silk and velvets and tall golden crown—that was his will, and it had been his will, too, to possess her in those sweet secret hours of last spring. She had yielded to him in that. And she must do his will too in this other thing.
But in the end ’twas like he would be forced to see—no one could have it both ways in such things. He had talked so much of the great Yule-tide feast he would hold at Husaby the first year she sat there as mistress of his house—how he would show forth to all his kinsmen and friends and all the folks from far around the fair wife he had won. Kristin smiled scornfully. A seemly thing ’twould be this Yule-tide, such a home-coming feast!
Her time would be at St. Gregory’s Mass or thereabout. Thoughts seemed to swarm and jostle in her mind when she said to herself that at Gregory’s Mass she was to bear a child. There was some fear among the thoughts—she remembered how her mother’s cries had rung all round the farm-place for two whole days, the time that Ulvhild was born. At Ulvsvold two young wives had died in childbirth, one after the other—and Sigurd of Loptsgaard’s first wives too. And her own father’s mother, whose name she bore—
But fear was not uppermost in her mind. She had often thought, when after that first time she saw no sign that she was with child—maybe this was to be their punishment—hers and Erlend’s. She would always be barren. They would wait and wait in vain for what they had feared before, would hope as vainly as of old they had feared needlessly—till at last they would know that one day they should be borne forth from the home of his fathers and be as though they had never been—for his brother was a priest, and the children he had could inherit naught from him. Dumpy Munan and his sons would come in and sit in their seats, and Erlend would be blotted out from the line of his kindred.
She pressed her hand hard to her body. It was there—between the fence and her—between the vat and her. ’Twas between her and all the world—Erlend’s own son. She had made the trial already that she had once heard Lady Aashild speak of; with blood from her right arm and her left. ’Twas a son that was coming to her—whatever fate he was to bring—She remembered her dead little brothers, her parents’ sorrowful faces when they spoke of them; she remembered all the times she had seen them both in despair for Ulvhild’s sake—and the night when Ulvhild died. And she thought of all the sorrow she herself had brought them, of her father’s grief-worn face—and the end was not yet of the sorrows she was to bring on her father and mother.
And yet—and yet. Kristin laid her head on the arm that rested on the fence; the other hand she still held to her body. Even if it brought her new sorrows, even if it led her feet down to death—she would rather die in bearing Erlend a son than that they should both die one day, and leave their houses standing empty, and the corn on their lands should wave for strangers—
She heard a footstep in the room behind her. The ale! thought Kristin—I should have seen to it long ago. She stood up and turned—and Erlend came stooping through the doorway and stepped out into the sunlight—his face shining with gladness.
“Is this where you are?” he asked. “And not a step will you come to meet me, even?” he said; and came and threw his arms about her.
“Dearest; are you come hither?” she said in wonder.