“How liked you my kinsman, Munan Baardsön?” asked Erlend laughing slily.
“I looked not much upon him,” said Kristin, “and methought, too, he was not much to look on.”
“Knew you not,” asked Erlend, “that he is her son?”
“Son to Lady Aashild!” said Kristin, in great wonder.
“Aye, her children could not take their mother’s fair looks, though they took all else,” said Erlend.
“I have never known her first husband’s name,” said Kristin.
“They were two brothers who wedded two sisters,” said Erlend. “Baard and Nikulaus Munansön. My father was the elder, my mother was his second wife, but he had no children by his first. Baard, whom Aashild wedded, was not young either, nor, I trow, did they ever live happily together—aye, I was a little child when all this befell, they hid from me as much as they could—But she fled the land with Sir Björn and married him against the will of her kin—when Baard was dead. Then folk would have had the wedding set aside—they made out that Björn had sought her bed while her first husband was still living and that they had plotted together to put away my father’s brother. ’Tis clear they could not bring this home to them, since they had to leave them together in wedlock. But to make amends, they had to forfeit all their estate—Björn had killed their sister’s son too—my mother’s and Aashild’s, I mean—”
Kristin’s heart beat hard. At home her father and mother had kept strict watch that no unclean talk should come to the ears of their children or of young folk—but still things had happened in their own parish and Kristin had heard of them—a man had lived in adultery with a wedded woman. That was whoredom, one of the worst of sins; ’twas said they plotted the husband’s death, and that brought with it outlawry and the Church’s ban. Lavrans had said no woman was bound to stay with her husband, if he had had to do with another’s wife; the state of a child gotten in adultery could never be mended, not even though its father and mother were free to wed afterward. A man might bring into his family and make his heir his child by any wanton or strolling beggar woman, but not the child of his adultery—not if its mother came to be a knight’s lady—She thought of the misliking she had ever felt for Sir Björn with his bleached face and fat, yet shrunken body. She could not think how Lady Aashild could be so good and yielding at all times to the man who had led her away into such shame; how such a gracious woman could have let herself be beguiled by him. He was not even good to her; he let her toil and moil with all the farm work; Björn did naught but drink beer. Yet Aashild was ever mild and gentle when she spoke with her husband. Kristin wondered if her father could know all this, since he had asked Sir Björn to their home. Now she came to think, too, it seemed strange Erlend should think fit to tell such tales of his near kin. But like enough he deemed she knew of it already—
“I would like well,” said Erlend in a while, “to visit her, Moster Aashild, some day—when I journey northwards. Is he comely still, Björn, my kinsman?”
“No,” said Kristin. “He looks like hay that has lain the winter through upon the fields.”