Only someone who’d seen him sleep would know, she thought.
He turned his head and returned her gaze.
“That was how you looked at me that evening,” she said.
“Not just that evening,” he said.
Oh, yes, she thought. If not, I’d have noticed.
But she said nothing. He’d come at night, it was true, he’d stolen up to her in her loft, that was true too, but he hadn’t done anything; he’d wanted to show her something, a fox earth with three frolicking cubs, and not even there, when he could have — and she’d wanted to as well, oh, how much she’d wanted to — had he done anything that could subsequently be called blameworthy.
She got up.
“I think you’ll have to go now,” she said.
He got up too.
“Will we see each other again?” he asked.
“You can come here tonight, if you want,” she said, lowering her eyes, her face flushed. “I’ll show you something this time.”
She thought about him all day long. When evening arrived, she sat up waiting. She couldn’t settle to anything, and ran constantly out to the doorstep to look down the mountainside, her gaze scanning the edge of the forest, she even sprinted to the top of the adjoining hillock, to look over to the summer farm on the mountainside a mile or two away, in case he knew someone there and was coming from that direction.
She knew almost nothing about him. Only what she’d heard, and what she’d seen the night before.
What had she heard?
His family had originally come from the fjord on the other side of the mountain. They had moved to the valley a few years before she’d been born, and lived in a house down in the village. His father worked as a carpenter. He made everything from cupboards and beds to houses and barns. There were four boys and a girl. The two eldest sons worked with their father. Javan, who was the third, had done so too sometimes, more at his own request than his father’s. Javan wasn’t known for passing up the chance of a party, he’d had several girlfriends, according to the grapevine, but hadn’t become involved with any of them, from which gossip took it that he wasn’t dependable. However, few people disliked him. There was always something going on around him, he liked talking and telling stories, and he did it well. He’d been away from the community during the past few years, but people weren’t quite certain where he’d been or how he’d earned his living, apart from the winters he’d been out fishing near the islands, and the summer he’d traveled the valleys with a packful of goods that he sold for a merchant in Nod. The money he’d made at this bought him a new suit, whereas much of the money he got fishing vanished as soon as it was earned, for when the weather was bad and the boats were tied up in the islands, they played poker, and Javan wasn’t known for his luck at cards.
What had she seen?
His expression at the festival had revealed determination and earnestness. That same determination had brought him up to her at the summer farm, where no one had ventured before. There his look had been different. She had seen helplessness, innocence, sorrow, and joy in it. She was drawn especially by the joy, there wasn’t all that much of it in her own family, but also by his innocence. He was more than ten years older than her, perhaps as much as fifteen, and if he’d seen and experienced a lot, he hadn’t been tainted by it, as far as she could tell. She had also seen that he was thoughtful — who else would have taken her deep into the forest to look at a fox earth?
The thought made her laugh. Then she rose and positioned herself in front of the tiny mirror that hung over the washstand in the far corner of the room. She wanted to see what he saw.
She smiled, first with her lips together, and then parted.
She’d never really liked her teeth, they stuck out a trifle, but at the same time there was something a bit reserved about her smile when she pressed her lips together.
She tilted her head to the side and put her hand to her hair. It was horrible and gray like an old woman’s.
But she had fine eyes. And cheeks. And a fine neck! Her neck was long and slender.
The thought made her happy, and she gave up the game while she was ahead, climbed up to the loft, got into bed, pressed her feet against the ceiling like she’d done when she was a little girl, half laughed, half giggled at herself, tucked an arm behind her head, and closed her eyes in an attempt to sleep, but it was impossible, down she went again, out onto the step, where darkness had fallen, and the bowed half-moon lay taut in the sky above the mountains at the back of the hut. For the first time she felt an autumnal nip in the air. She rubbed her bare arms as she stared down at the edge of the forest far below.
When he came, she was asleep in the chair. She awoke to find him standing in front of her.
“Hello,” he said.
She got up, still befuddled by sleep.
“Hello,” she said.
She looked at him. He was the same. But everything was different. He stirred nothing inside her. At first she thought it was because she wasn’t properly awake yet.
“I’ll just put a jacket on,” she said.
He nodded and went out. She rinsed her face in the basin, dried it without looking at the image of herself in the mirror, laid the jacket across her shoulders, and went out to him.
He smiled at her.
“What I want to show you is up there,” she said, pointing up toward the mountain northeast of the summer farm. “It’s a little way off.”
“That doesn’t matter,” he said.
“We’ll go then,” she said.
Had he noticed anything?
He must have.
She was quite cold inside as they walked across the mountainside. She felt nothing for him. She looked at him furtively as they went, just as she’d done the night before, without anything happening. His face kindled nothing within her.
He took her hand as he’d done the last time, she let him, but at the first small obstacle they came to, she let it go to make a detour, and ensured that she stayed out of reach when they continued on the other side.
They followed the path through the forest, passed the upper side of the long, narrow meadow, and came out at the head of the gorge, where they stood watching the water vapor that drifted between the almost perpendicular rock walls, surrounded by the roar of the falling weight of water, until Anna tapped Javan on the shoulder, their eyes met, and she pointed up through the forest that bordered the rapids.
She walked behind him, he turned out to be nimble-footed, and she was breathless when they got up to the lake half an hour later. Its wide surface reflected the gleam of the sky and made the landscape shimmer dully on either side.
“It’s lovely here,” he said.
“It isn’t far now,” she said. “But we must cross to the other side.”
At the end of the lake was a lip that the water ran over before the falls began. Here it was possible to wade across. It wasn’t more than eighteen inches at its deepest, but the current was strong and the bottom slippery, so it was necessary to tread carefully.
They took off their shoes, Javan rolled up his trousers, Anna lifted her skirt with one hand, and they began to cross, she first, he following. When she’d got half-way, she suddenly lost her balance, not much, but enough for her to stop for a moment to regain it. Javan grabbed her waist with both hands. She turned quickly toward him. She’d expected to find him smiling, but he was looking earnestly at her, and suddenly she felt the same falling sensation in her stomach as when he’d looked at her the first time.
Her relief was so great that she laughed with delight. All that coldness and unexpected loneliness that had troubled her on the way up, all those thoughts about how different he was, evaporated from one moment to the next.