There was a thump and we both looked down and saw Natan on the ground. He had dragged himself out of the bed with his good arm, but could go no further.
‘Help me lift him,’ I said to Fridrik, setting the candle on the floor, but the boy wouldn’t touch him. I bent down and tried to drag Natan upright, so that he could rest his head against the beam, but he was too heavy, and when I saw the way his skull had swollen, the blood that had poured down his back, I lost all my strength: my limbs turned to water. I cradled his head in my lap and I saw that he would not survive the night.
‘Fridrik,’ Natan was repeating over and over. ‘Fridrik, I will pay you, I will pay you.’
‘He wants to talk to you, Fridrik,’ I said, but Fridrik had turned his face away, and would not look at us. ‘Turn around,’ I screamed. ‘The least you could do is speak to the man you have killed!’
Natan stopped murmuring. I felt his body stiffen, and he looked up at me, his head lolling slightly. ‘Agnes . . .’
‘Yes, it’s me, Agnes. I’m here, Natan. I’m here.’
His mouth gaped open. I thought he was trying to say something, but all that came out was a gargling. I looked up at Fridrik and he was standing there, his face white-pale and his hair in his eyes and red at one side where the blood had burst and hit him. His eyes were wide and scared.
‘Why is he doing that?’ he asked. Natan was choking, blood spilling out onto his chin, onto my skirt.
‘Why is he doing that?!’ Fridrik screamed. ‘Make him stop!’
I reached over and picked the knife up from the floor. ‘Do it then, finish what you’ve begun!’
Fridrik shook his head. His face was ashen and he stared at me in horror.
‘Do it!’ I said. ‘Will you leave him to slowly die?’
Fridrik kept shaking his head. He flinched as a little stream of blood erupted anew from Natan’s head wound. ‘No,’ he said. ‘I can’t. I can’t.’
Natan looked up at me: his teeth were red from blood. His lips moved silently, and I understood what he was trying to say.
The knife went in easily. It pierced Natan’s shirt with neat rips, sounding like an ill-practised kiss – I couldn’t have stopped if I’d wanted to. My fist jerked, until I felt sudden, close warmth over my wrist and realised that his blood covered my hand. The warmth of it was noticeable against the chill of the night. I released the handle, and pushed Natan away from me, looking down at the knife. It stuck out from his belly, and his shirt was dark and wetly puckered around the blade. For a moment we stared at each other. The light from the candle caught the edge of his forehead, his eyelashes, and I was suddenly overwhelmed with gratitude – he regarded me clearly. It seemed like forgiveness.
‘Agnes.’ Fridrik was behind me, his hands on his head, the hammer on the floor. ‘Agnes, you’ve killed him.’
I wanted to cry. I wanted to kneel over his body and wail. But there was no time.
I hated Fridrik. He had crumbled, had shrunk to the floor and begun to sob, heaving huge lungfuls of air in a panic that never seemed to cease. Eventually he got up, his breath shuddering, and pulled the knife out of Natan’s belly.
‘What are you doing?’ I asked him. I did not have the energy to scream.
‘That’s my knife,’ Fridrik said. He wiped it on his trousers and began to walk outside.
‘Wait!’ I called.
Fridrik turned and shrugged.
‘You’ll be hanged for this,’ I croaked. Fridrik paused. I saw his fingers clench around the knife’s sticky handle.
‘If I am hanged,’ he said slowly, sniffing back a breath of snot, ‘you will be burnt alive.’
I looked down and saw the blood on my hands. On my neck, soaking my dress. I saw the candle flame flicker in an unseen draught, and wondered at what the room would look like in the grey light of day.
That’s when I remembered the whale fat that Natan had bought at Hindisvík.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
22nd of December 1829
Promemoria: To Bj?rn Bl?ndal, District Commissioner of Húnavatn
Here I am presenting to Your Honour the following: