The Snake Pit

by Sigrid Undset

  He knelt beside her bed, laid the palms of his hands under her shoulders, then under her back, and then he held her heels in the hollows of his hands for a while. In his heart he expected with a kind of morbid horror that she would get bed-sores there. It was like the last glowing ember of all he had once felt for her body-he thought he could not bear to see the skin broken and the sores eating into Ingunn’s flesh while she yet lived. Never had it been so hard for him to endure the sight and smell of wounds and impurities—though he was ashamed of this weakness. But he prayed desperately to God that at least it might not come to this—he asked it as much for his own sake as for hers.

  He was away tending the fire.

  “Are you thirsty, Ingunn?—Shall I take you in my arms, Ingunn?”

  Olav wrapped the bedclothes about her and lifted her up in his arms. He sat with her on the settle before the fire. Carefully he bent the lifeless legs, laid down pillows under her feet on the bench, supporting her hips and back on his thighs, as he laid her head to rest on his shoulder.

  “Is that better?”

  Sometimes she fell asleep when she lay thus in his arms. And Olav sat by the hour holding her, till he was chilled through about the shoulders, stiff in all his limbs. She woke if he made the slightest movement. Then she extricated a hand from the bedclothes and passed it over his face.

  “Now I am much better. Carry me back to bed now, Olav, and go and lie down—you must be tired.”

  “I am become a heavy burden for you, Olav,” she said one night. “But bear with me a little—’twill not last longer than this winter.”

  He did not deny it. He had thought the same himself. When spring came, it would take her with it. And now at last he was ready to submit to it.

  But as winter drew to a close, she seemed rather to be slightly on the mend. In any case she revived sufficiently to ask how things were going on the farm and in the fishery. She listened for the cow-bells morning and evening, mentioned her cows by name, and said one day that when spring was fully come they must carry her out of doors, that she might see her cattle once more.

  Cecilia was now a very pretty child, and big for her age; Ingunn had great comfort of her in the daytime, but then she had to have Liv in with her. At night she slept with her foster-mother in another house—Ingunn could no longer bear the big, heavy child in bed with her: Cecilia rolled over on her mother in her sleep, and when she was awake she stumped about the bed and fell heavily over her palsied body.

  Olav had so little liking for Liv that he avoided the room while the maid was there. He knew too that she stole in a small way, and he had more than a suspicion that she was too good friends with Anki and thus taught the man to pilfer and lie—Arnketil’s word had always been untrustworthy, but till now it had mostly been because he had no better wit. What they stole was no great matter, but he did not like having dishonest folk in his house. And now there was such disorder in the household in many ways—he himself was so tired every day that he could not accomplish all he ought, and downhill is an easy road.

  So now he did not see much of Cecilia in the daytime. But by degrees it had come to this, that his affection for his daughter was mingled with a profound soreness—it pained him sharply when he recalled that blue, damp night of spring when he came home and found her in the cradle. The first time they laid her in his arm he had believed so surely that she betokened a turn in their fortunes, that Cecilia came into the world bringing their happiness with her.

  He loved this little daughter, but his affection was, at it were, spread within him, it lay at the bottom of his heart, shy and mute. In the first days of her life her father had often stopped before her cradle and touched her with a couple of fingers, playfully and caressingly—full of quiet joy and wonder when he got her to smile. And he had lifted her up and held her to him a moment, in his clumsy, unpractised way: Cecilia, Cecilia—Now he usually stopped at a little distance when he saw her being carried from house to house; he smiled at his daughter and beckoned; she never took the smallest notice. The very fact that she was so pretty, and that he recognized in her the fair complexion of his own race, seemed only to increase the father’s melancholy.

  Not much was seen of Eirik now. The nine-year-old boy instinctively kept away from the grown people, whom he saw to be always heavy at heart. He found enough to do about the manor and only came into the hall to eat and sleep.

  Olav had to go in to Oslo for the Holy Cross fair8 in the spring. There he received a message asking him to go to the convent of the preaching friars.

  The Prior had news for him that his friend Arnvid Finnsson had died during the winter. In the middle of last summer he had adopted the professed habit among the friars at Hamar. But by the second week of Lent he died suddenly—none could say of what. As they went to morning mass, the monk who walked beside him saw that Brother Arnvid turned pale and faltered, but on his asking in a whisper if he were sick, Arnvid shook his head. But when they knelt at Verbum caro factum est, his neighbour saw that Brother Arnvid was not able to rise to his feet again, and when the mass was at an end he lay in a swoon. Then they carried him into the dormitory and laid him on his couch; he moaned a little now and again, but was unconscious. In the middle of the day, however, he came to and asked in a low voice for the last office. As soon as he had received the sacraments he fell asleep, and when the monks came from vespers he was dead, so calmly that the friar who sat with him could not say when he ceased to breathe.

  The Prior told him also that before Arnvid entered the convent he had disposed of a great part of his treasure to kinsmen and friends, and he had bidden his sons send these two drink-horns to Olav Audunsson. But the Arnvidssons were so unlike other men that they would never leave their home parish, and only when they went down to Hamar for their father’s burial had Magnus brought the horns to the convent; and Father Bjarne had been unwilling to send these rare treasures south until he could place them in the hands of one of his own order.

  Olav knew the horns well from Miklebö. They were small, but very costly: two griffin’s claws mounted in silver and gilt. Olav and his friend had used them on the evenings of high festivals, when they drank mead or wine—they only held drink for one man.

  The news of Arnvid’s death shook Olav to the heart. He could not bear to stay in town among the other men, but sailed out to Hestviken the same evening.

  There had been times when he thought of his friend and recalled their last talk together, and it pained him that he had stripped himself so bare to the other. He regretted this weakness so, that at times he had doubtless thought it would be easier for him if he heard that Arnvid was no more.—And then he felt all at once that this was the last stroke, and now he was no longer capable of fighting against his own heart—now that he knew that not a single one shared his secret: alone he would not be able to keep it any longer.

  And for the first time he saw the true nature of this friendship. It was he who had taken advantage of the other—and Arnvid had allowed him to do so. He had lied to his friend, and his friend had seen through his untruthfulness; not only the first time, but always he had told Arnvid what suited himself—even to their last meeting; and Arnvid had accepted it and held his peace. It was always he who had sought support, and Arnvid had supported him—as Arnvid had given to all, whatever was asked of him. And the reward they had given him was to scourge him—he had found such reward as awaits the man who has courage to follow Christ’s example. And nevertheless Arnvid had blamed himself and thought himself an unfaithful follower, whenever he was unable to see his path clearly and whenever his heart was full of bitterness and contempt for men’s baseness—as must at times befall a sinful man, when he ventures to follow where God went before.

  Olav stayed at home during the spring sowing, even more silent than usual.

  But one morning, when he had set his folk to work, he walked back to the houses alone.

  The sunshine flooded the room through the open smoke-vent, the light fell upon the fireless
hearth, upon the clay floor, and touched Ingunn’s bed. Both the children were with her: Eirik lay with his dark, curly head in his mother’s arm and his long legs hanging over the edge of the bed. Cecilia crawled about, climbing up the bedpost and dropping down with a thump and a little scream of joy upon the lifeless form under the clothes. The little maid had nothing on but a flame-coloured woollen shift; her skin was pink and white and her hair had grown so that it fell in bright, flaxen ringlets about her face and neck. Her bright eyes were so blue in the whites that they seemed blue all over, and this gave the charming little face a strangely wide-awake look, like that of an animal.

  “Your mother cannot bear you to weigh so heavily upon her, Eirik.” Olav took Cecilia and seated himself on the edge of the bed with the girl on his knee. Once he clasped his daughter impetuously, and the child struggled—she was not used to being with her father. Olav felt how good and firm the little body was between his hands, and the silken hair had a fresh, moist scent.

  As she was not allowed to get at her mother, she wriggled in her father’s arms and tried to reach her brother. Eirik took her, held her under the arms, and tried to make her walk. Cecilia thrust out her round stomach, straddling with her arms and one foot, as she threw her head back and laughed up in her brother’s face. Then she humped herself along with wild little kicks—laughing and shrieking: “Goy, goy, goy”; she curled up all her toes under the sole of her foot, which was quite round—as yet it had scarcely trodden the ground.

  Olav swept his hand over the bed—it was strewn with half-withered flowers, such as bloom between spring and summer: wild vetch, catchflies, buttercups, and great violets. Ingunn gathered them into a bunch:

  “They have long come out, I see.”

  Olav sat looking at the children. They were of rare beauty, the two of hers that had lived. Eirik was a big boy now, tall and slight, with his knife-belt on his slender hips. Olav could see he was handsome: his face had lost its childish roundness, it was narrow and sharp, with a slightly curved nose and a high, arched jaw; he was brown-skinned and black-haired, had golden-yellow eyes. Could his mother help thinking of whom he resembled?

  “Take your sister with you, Eirik, carry her out to Liv. There is a matter your mother and I would speak of.”

  Ingunn raised the bunch of flowers with both hands to her face and drank in with open nostrils the acrid scent of spring.

  “Now, my Ingunn,” said Olav in a clear, calm voice, “you shall soon be released from lying here in torment. I have bespoken a passage for us in a vessel to Nidaros this summer, to St. Olav, so that you may recover the use of your limbs at the shrine of him, the martyr of righteousness.”

  “Olav, Olav, do not think of such a thing. Never could I bear the voyage—I should not come to Nidaros alive.”

  “Oh, but you will.” The man closed his eyes, smiling painfully—his face had gone pale as death. “For now, Ingunn, now I have the courage to do it. When I come thither, to the sanctuary—I will confess my sin. Of my own free will I shall put myself in God’s hands, make amends for my offence toward Him and toward the law and justice of my countrymen.”

  She looked at her husband in dismay; he went on with the same haggard smile:

  “The thing which befell you that time at Miklebö—when you rose from your bed and walked—that must have been a miracle! —Think you not that God can perform another miracle?”

  “Nay, nay!” she cried. “Olav, what are you saying—what is this sin you speak of?”

  “That I slew Teit, what else? Set fire to the hut where the body lay—and never made confession of it. I have been to confession all these years, have been shriven for all else, great and small—received corpus Domini like other Christian men, gone to mass and prayed and pretended, pretended—but now there is an end of it, Ingunn—I will have no more of it. Now I will put my case in the hands of my Creator, and whatsoever He will that I shall suffer, I will thank Him and bless His Name.”

  He saw the look of terror in her face and threw himself down by the bedside with his head in her lap.

  “Ay, Ingunn. But now you shall suffer no more for my sins. If only you will believe, you know that you will be helped.”

  She put her hand under his chin and tried to raise his head. The sun was now shining full upon the bed, upon the crown of his bowed head—she saw that Olav’s hair was quite grizzled. It did not show unless the sun shone straight upon it, as it was so fair in colour.

  “Olav, look at me—in Jesus’ name, have no such thoughts as these. Have I not sins enough myself to atone for? Do you remember”—she forced him to raise his face— “ ‘you are not human,’ you said to me that time—you know what I would have done with Eirik, if you had not prevented me. Should I cast reproach upon God for deeming I was not fit to bear children?—all that winter long I thought of nothing but of stifling the innocent life I felt quickening within me.”

  Olav looked at her in surprise. He had, as it were, never thought she remembered this, much less recalled it as guilt.

  “I may thank God’s mercy and naught else that I have not child murder on my conscience. And no sooner was I saved from that sin than I went about to do a worse one—God stretched out His hand again, when I was already halfway through the gates of hell. I perceived it long ago—I was not allowed to send myself straight to hell; every day I have lived since has been a loan, a respite given me to bethink myself and understand—

  “I do not complain as I lie here—Olav, have you once heard me complain? I know well that God has chastised me, not from un-kindness—He who has twice plucked me out of the fire into which I would have thrown myself—”

  Olav stared at her—a light was kindled far in behind his pupils. Unspeakably dear as she had been to him in all these years, he had never expected much more thought in her than in an animal, a tender young hind or a bird, that can love its mate and offspring, and lament its dead young—easily scared out of its wits, helplessly at the mercy of wounds and pain.—Never had he imagined he could talk to his wife as to another Christian person of that which had been growing in his soul for years.

  “Oh nay, Olav!” She took his hand, drew him down and clasped his head to her bosom. He heard her heart beating violently within the narrow, wasted chest. “Say not such things, my friend! Your sin—’tis white by the side of mine! You must know that they were long for me, these years, and ofttimes heavy—but now it seems to me they were good in spite of all, since I lived with you, and you were always good!”

  He raised his face. “It is true, Ingunn, that we two have had some good here in Hestviken—in that we were always friends. In sickness and in health I have had you with me always, and you have been dearest to me of all human creatures, in that I grew up away from all my kinsmen and friends, and you were the one with whom I consorted most. But then God was so kind to me, in spite of all, that He gave you to me—and I see now that it would have been difficult for me to prosper here, had I dwelt here alone without a single person that I had known from my youth.—You see, then, ’tis for that I can no longer bear to be God’s enemy—of my own will I will no more live apart from Him. Let it cost what it may—

  “I am no poor man either. There too God spared me—He gave success to many of the enterprises I undertook to better our fortunes. I own more now than when we came together. And you know that by our marriage bond half our estate is yours, whatever may befall. You and your children will not be unprovided for.”

  “Speak not so, Olav. It cannot be so grievous a sin that you slew Teit. I have never told you before, I have never made complaint of it to any soul—but he took me by force! I could not bring myself to say it—’twas a thing I could not bear to speak of—” she sobbed aloud—“nor was I myself innocent, I had borne myself so that he must have thought I was not above such things—but I had never thought it would end as it did—and then he forced me. ’Tis true, Olav, I swear—”

  “I know it.” He put out his hand as though to stop her. “He said it himse
lf. And I know that this slaying was a small matter in the beginning—had I declared it at once. But I took the wrong road at the start—and now the guilt has grown, and I see that it will go on and breed new guilt. And now I must turn about, Ingunn—else I shall become the worst of inhuman wretches. It has come to this, that I scarce dare utter three words, for I know that two of them will be untrue.”

  She laid her arm across her face, wailing low.

  “You know,” said Olav, trying to hush her, “’tis not certain either that the Archbishop will demand that I accuse myself before the King’s judges. Haply he will deem it enough that I confess my sin before God. I have heard that men have been given absolution for the gravest of sins without being forced to destroy all their kinsfolk’s honour and welfare—they were made to do such penance as a pilgrimage to Jerusalem—”

  “Nay, nay!” she cried out again. “You would be sent away from us—to the world’s end—”

  “But ’tis not impossible”—he laid his hand on her bosom to quiet her—“that I might come home to you again. And you know you would dwell here and possess Hestviken—”

  “But then it would come out that Eirik is not your son!”

  Olav said quietly: “I have thought of that too, Ingunn—and it held me back, so long as I had no child of my own by you. Whether you might be driven out of Hestviken with your son—by my remote heirs. But now there is Cecilia. You can adopt the boy to full inheritance in your share of the estate—and he has a rich sister beside him—”

  “Olav, do you remember what you said yourself?—that you had made Eirik no more than amends for his father’s death—”

  “I remember. But I see now, Ingunn, that I had no right to do it—give away my daughter’s inheritance as amends to the child of a stranger—”