The Son Avenger by Sigrid Undset Read Free Book Online Page A

with her back to him, and her face turned toward the sea. Her heavy tresses, dark with wet, were spread over the rock to dry. As she lay resting at full length on her side, with one hip raised, there was something about her that stirred Eirik’s senses, so that he came to a standstill, as though he had taken the wrong track.
    In indolent repose the woman lay humming to herself as she gazed into the sunlight over the fiord. Then it struck Eirik who she must be. He came toward her.
    On hearing footsteps on the rock she turned and rose on her knees. Eirik saw that her figure was full in all its outlines, but without firmness, as though overripe for a young maid, and when she rose to her feet, her movements were heavy and lacked elasticity. She flushed deeply as she looked up at him with a hesitating,evasive look of her great dark eyes, while her hands struggled to throw her heavy, dark hair back over her shoulders.
    Eirik went up to her and gave her his hand.
    “Have you come home now, Bothild? Welcome!”
    She did not return the pressure of his hand, but withdrew hers quickly and shyly; she stood with bent head, looking down, and her voice was toneless and veiled.
    Eirik himself felt confused and heavy at heart because he had been so suddenly disquieted at the sight of this girl—her doubtful attitude, her drooping head, and her hushed voice were enough to warn him that the days of their innocent and carefree life together were gone. Bothild’s startled air as she stood with her shoulders rounded, full-bosomed and broad of hip, the strong scent of her hair, wet with sea-water—it seemed as though both his conscience and hers were already darkened.
    They said a few words about her journey and then spoke of the weather, which looked so threatening. Eirik told her he meant to get in what he could of the corn before the storm burst. Bothild whispered yes—if it did not come before, they would have it at night. Now and then there was a faint blink of lightning far to the north, followed by a distant rumble.
    Eirik stole glances at her as they walked side by side toward the manor. She was tall, but did not hold herself erect; her hair was very thick and long, but seemed stiff now from the sea-water. But her face was fair, round, and white, with red roses in her cheeks; she had a broad forehead, smooth and white; black, curved eyebrows; and her dark-blue eyes looked up with a covert, sidelong glance under thick white lashes; her mouth was big, her chin small and round as an apple. Once she smiled at something he said, and then he saw that she had small short teeth with gaps between them, like a child’s milk teeth, and she showed her gums as she smiled—he felt he would like to take and kiss her, but roughly, without kindness.
    He got in all the corn off the “good acre” that afternoon; the storm passed round to the north over the fiord, but did not reach Hestviken. It was already dark outside and distant lightnings flashed in the evening sky; between the claps of thunder the stillness of the fiord seemed uncannily hushed beneath the cliffs in the close evening air of late summer. The men went indoors. Bothild brought in supper, hanging her head, as in all she did. But it waseasy to see that Cecilia was delighted to have her foster-sister back again. This added to the touch of hostility that was part of Eirik’s uneasy feeling toward Bothild; she was not a seemly playmate for his sister, he thought—a woman who excited his desire in this way.
    In the course of the night he was awakened by the crash of thunder; now the rain was pouring down: it drummed dully on the turf of the roof, ran off and splashed on the rocky floor of the yard, streamed over the foliage of the trees. From one corner of the smoke-vent it ran down into the room. The vivid flashes lighted up chinks in the wall at the end of the house; the logs were no longer weather-tight after the long drought. And clap after clap of thunder crashed and rattled right