Chapter IV: Cormac Will Not Budge

In the morning Cormac went out of the house to the water-trough, and dipped his head half a dozen times; and that was the best of his washing. Then he goes back into the hall and finds it empty, but voices of women come upon him from beyond the curtains, and one of them is Stangerd’s. Straight as a hawk he goes thither, and finds the women’s room, and Stangerd there in her shift and petticoat, combing her long, yellow hair. He had never seen such hair in his life; it was gold in colour, and reached below her knees. Her arms and shoulders were very white, but her neck was burning, and so was her face. He stood looking at her in the doorway. The girl whom he had seen overnight was with her--a pale, slim girl, with light grey eyes and a laughing mouth. Stangerd went on with her affair, but this girl, called Herdis, nudged her, and whispered:

“Here is the fine stranger from the shore.”

But Stangerd’s head was sideways to him, and her face averted.

Cormac said to her, “Will you lend me the comb?”

She looked up then, tossing her hair in a wave behind her. She looked very boldly, but her colour was high. She held him out the comb without saying anything, and began to rope her hair, that she might coil and pin it with a pin.

While Cormac was combing his hair, the girl Herdis stood between them, and said to him, “What do you think of her hair?”

Cormac said, “It is like the silk which the worms make, when it is fresh carded.”

“What hair were that for a man’s wife to have!” said Herdis. “And her eyes--what say you?”

Cormac said, “They are like the sea when the sun is behind you as you stand wondering at it. They are bluer than the sky when you stand in a narrow valley and look up.”

Stangerd had a rope of her hair in her mouth, and was pinning a coil. She looked from Herdis to Cormac without fear or confusion. Then she took the hair from her mouth and said: “Have you not done valuing me?”

Herdis laughed. “My dear, we have not yet cast up the figures, nor even set them all.” Then to Cormac she said:

“Do you set a price upon her?”

Cormac, looking at Stangerd, said:

“For all that body’s loveliness
I would give Iceland, and no less,
And all the lands that lie between
The land where the sun is never seen
And the roaring Western main;
And even so I should be fain
To search the world for more to give--
Yet search I must if I would live!”

Stangerd liked this song, and was more gentle in her ways. She looked at Cormac with interest.

“You are a skald,” she said. “I knew that yesterday. I heard you singing in the hall.”

“I sing when the words and music come to me,” said Cormac. “Last night there was no trouble about it. I felt very greatly, and so sang greatly.”

“I heard you,” she said, “but not the words. What did you sing about?”

“My dear,” said Herdis, “can you ask him that?”

“Why not,” said Stangerd, “since I wish to know?”

“He sang about you,” said Herdis.

Stangerd asked him fairly: “Is this true?”

“It is not true,” Cormac said, “in the way she means it. Your name did not come into the song I sang. But the summertime came into it, and the yellowing of the corn-acres, and the stillness of the heat on summer mornings, and the hush of the noons, and the gentleness of the evenings; and the rising of the harvest moon, full and hot, and the brown intake she makes about her in the sky. All these things were in the song--but your name was not in it at all.”

Herdis took Stangerd’s arm, and the pair of them stood together before Cormac.

Stangerd asked him if he was going away that morning.

“How do I know?” he said. “It may be that I shall be here talking to you. It does not rest with me.”

Stangerd smiled. “Does it rest with me?”

“Yes,” said Cormac, “and with no other.”

“Here is one coming,” Stangerd said, “who may wish to have a word in it.”

Toste came into the room.

“It is time we were away, Cormac,” said he. “We have many a fell to beat over.”

The eyes of Stangerd and Cormac met. Then Cormac said:

“It is written that I stay here this day. You will find me here when you come off the hill.”

“Now where do you get that written?” said Toste with a grin.

Cormac said, “It is written in the heart of Stangerd.”

“No, indeed,” said Stangerd, “I don’t read it there.”

“But he does,” said Herdis, and Toste said:

“A man can read his own runes, but not what is in the heart of a woman. Well, I wish you joy of your day; it will be better than mine.”

So then he went, and Cormac remained all day talking to Stangerd.

* * * * *

In the evening Toste came back for him, and he must go.

Stangerd came to the door of the house with him. She did not wish him to go, but she said nothing about it. They stood together at the door without speaking. Stangerd leaned against the door-post, and Cormac was near her, but not touching her.

When Stangerd was moved her cheek-bones showed and the colour was fierce and high over them, as if she had been burned there. So they showed now. It grew dusk, but still Cormac could see those patches of red in her cheeks.

He said, “It grows late, and I must go after Toste. When shall I see you again?”

She said, “I am always here. You will see me when you come to look for me.”

Cormac said, “That will be very soon, I am thinking.” Then he said, “Good-night, Stangerd,” but did not touch her with his hand.

She said, “Good-night, Cormac,” and stood there a long time after he had gone in the gathering dark.

Herdis came to her bed, and would have got into it, for she wanted to know all about it; but Stangerd pretended she was sleepy, and would not let her in.