«That’s a pity,» I remarked, «for everyone on Iceland does, unless he be outlawed.»
He flushed at my tone. «I can do enough else,» he answered. «Give me some tools and I’ll show you metalwork well done.»
That brightened me, for truth to tell, none of our household was a very gifted smith. «That’s an honorable trade,» I said, «and you can be of great help. I have a broken sword and several bent spearheads to be mended, and it were no bad idea to shoe all the horses.» His admission that he did know how to put on a shoe was not very dampening to me then.
We had returned home as we talked, and Thorgunna came angrily forward. «That’s no way to treat a guest, father!» she said. «Making him work like a carle, indeed!»
Gerald smiled. «I’ll be glad to work,» he said. «I need a… a stake… something to start me afresh. Also, I want to repay a little of your kindness.»
That made me mild toward him, and I said it was not his fault they had different customs in the United States. On the morrow he could begin work in the smithy, and I would pay him, yet he would be treated as an equal, since craftsmen are valued. This earned him black looks from the housefolk.
That evening he entertained us well with stories of his home; true or not, they made good listening. However, he had no real polish, being unable to compose even two lines of verse. They must be a raw and backward lot in the United States. He said his task in the army had been to keep order among the troops. Helgi said this was unheard-of, and he must be a brave man who would offend so many men, but Gerald said folk obeyed him out of fear of the king. When he added that the term of a levy in the United States was two years, and that men could be called to war even in harvest time, I said he was well out of a country with so ruthless and powerful a king.
«No,» he answered wistfully, «we are a free folk, who say what we please.»
«But it seems you may not do as you please,» said Helgi.
«Well,» he said, «we may not murder a man just because he offends us.»
«Not even if he has slain your own kin?» asked Helgi.
«No. It is for the… the king to take vengeance on behalf of us all.»
I chuckled. «Your yarns are good,» I said, «but there you’ve hit a snag. How could the king even keep track of all the murders, let alone avenge them? Why, the man wouldn’t even have time to beget an heir!»
He could say no more for all the laughter that followed.
The next day Gerald went to the smithy, with a thrall to pump the bellows for him. I was gone that day and night, down to Reykjavik to dicker with Hjalmar Broadnose about some sheep. I invited him back for an overnight stay, and we rode into the garth with his son Ketill, a red-haired sulky youth of twenty winters who had been refused by Thorgunna.
I found Gerald sitting gloomily on a bench in the hall. He wore the clothes I had given him, his own having been spoiled by ash and sparks—what had he awaited, the fool? He was talking in a low voice with my daughter.
«Well,» I said as I entered, «how went it?»
My man Grim snickered. «He has ruined two spearheads, but we put out the fire he started ere the whole smithy burned.»
«How’s this?» I cried. «I thought you said you were a smith.»
Gerald stood up, defiantly. «I worked with other tools, and better ones, at home,» he replied. «You do it differently here.»
It seemed he had built up the fire too hot; his hammer had struck everywhere but the place it should; he had wrecked the temper of the steel through not knowing when to quench it. Smithcraft takes years to learn, of course, but he should have admitted he was not even an apprentice.
«Well,» I snapped, «what can you do, then, to earn your bread?» It irked me to be made a fool of before Hjalmar and Ketill, whom I had told about the stranger.
«Odin alone knows,» said Grim. «I took him with me to ride after your goats, and never have I seen a worse horseman. I asked him if he could even spin or weave, and he said no.»
«That was no question to ask a man!» flared Thorgunna. «He should have slain you for it!»
«He should indeed,» laughed Grim. «But let me carry on the tale. I thought we would also repair your bridge over the foss. Well, he can just barely handle a saw, but he nearly took his own foot off with the adz.»
«We don’t use those tools, I tell you!» Gerald doubled his fists and looked close to tears.
I motioned my guests to sit down. «I don’t suppose you can butcher a hog or smoke it either,» I said.
«No.» I could scarce hear him.
«Well, then, man… what can you do?»
«I—» He could get no words out.
«You were a warrior,» said Thorgunna.
«Yes—that I was!» he said, his face kindling.
«Small use in Iceland when you have no other skills,» I grumbled, «but perhaps, if you can get passage to the eastlands, some king will take you in his guard.» Myself I doubted it, for a guardsman needs manners that will do credit to his master; but I had not the heart to say so.
Ketill Hjalmarsson had plainly not liked the way Thorgunna stood close to Gerald and spoke for him. Now he sneered and said: «I might even doubt your skill in fighting.»
«That I have been trained for,» said Gerald grimly.
«Will you wrestle with me, then?» asked Ketill.
«Gladly!» spat Gerald.
Priest, what is a man to think? As I grow older, I find life to be less and less the good-and-evil, black-and-white thing you say it is; we are all of us some hue of gray. This useless fellow, this spiritless lout who could even be asked if he did women’s work and not lift ax, went out in the yard with Ketill Hjalmarsson and threw him three times running. There was some trick he had of grabbing the clothes as Ketill charged… I called a stop when the youth was nearing murderous rage, praised them both, and filled the beer-horns. But Ketill brooded sullenly on the bench all evening.
Gerald said something about making a gun like his own. It would have to be bigger, a cannon he called it, and could sink ships and scatter armies. He would need the help of smiths and also various stuffs. Charcoal was easy, and sulfur could be found in the volcano country, I suppose, but what is this saltpeter?
Also, being suspicious by now, I questioned him closely as to how he would make such a thing. Did he know just how to mix the powder? No, he admitted. What size would the gun have to be? When he told me—at least as long as a man—I laughed and asked him how a piece that size could be cast or bored, even if we could scrape together that much iron. This he did not know either.
«You haven’t the tools to make the tools to make the tools,» he said. I don’t know what he meant by that. «God help me I can’t run through a thousand years of history all by myself.»
He took out the last of his little smoke sticks and lit it. Helgi had tried a puff earlier and gotten sick, though he remained a friend of Gerald’s. Now my son proposed to take a boat in the morning and go up to Ice Fjord, where I had some money outstanding I wanted to collect. Hjalmar and Ketill said they would come along for the trip, and Thorgunna pleaded so hard that I let her come along too.
«An ill thing,» muttered Sigurd. «All men know the landtrolls like not a woman aboard a ship. It’s unlucky.»
«How did your father ever bring women to this island?» I grinned.
Now I wish I had listened to him. He was not a clever man, but he often knew whereof he spoke.
At this time I owned a half share in a ship that went to Norway, bartering wadmal for timber. It was a profitable business until she ran afoul of vikings during the disorders while Olaf Tryggvason was overthrowing Jarl Haakon there. Some men will do anything to make a living—thieves, cutthroats, they ought to be hanged, the worthless robbers pouncing on honest merchantmen. Had they any courage or honesty they would go to Ireland, which is full of plunder.