I am, Your Excellency, your most humble and obedient servant.
HúNAVATN DISTRICT COMMISSIONER
Bj?rn Bl?ndal
TóTI HAD LEFT KORNSá WITH the full intention of writing to Bl?ndal and reneging on his promise to meet with Agnes. His second conversation with the criminal had been a failure; he hadn’t even led a simple prayer. Yet, the thought that he would necessarily have to explain why he had changed his mind after only two visits filled him with dread and embarrassment, and he left off composing the letter. I will do it tomorrow, he promised himself with each new day at Breidabólstadur, but two weeks had passed, the peasants were readying themselves for the mid-July harvest, and he had not so much as picked up his quill.
One night Tóti was sitting with Reverend Jón, reading in silence, when his father lifted his grizzled head and asked him: ‘Does the murderess pray?’
Tóti hesitated before replying. ‘I’m not sure.’
‘Hmmph,’ Reverend Jón muttered. ‘Make sure.’ He squinted at his son out of gummy eyes until Tóti felt a blush flare over his cheeks and neck. ‘You’re a servant of the Lord. Don’t disgrace yourself, boy,’ he said, before returning to his scripture.
The next morning Tóti rose early to milk Ysa. He pressed his forehead to the cow’s warm flank, and listened to the even rhythm of the milk spurting into the wooden pail. Thoughts of Agnes sitting beside him sprang to his mind. His father knew that he wasn’t visiting Agnes. He would be ashamed to know that his son could not shoulder the responsibility of one woman’s atonement. But what to do with a woman who was not willing to atone? What had Agnes said? She hadn’t met a churchman she cared for. She did not seem to be religious, and that stupid little speech he had composed about spiritual comfort – all those lofty words had fallen flat. What did she want from him, then? Why ask for him, if she didn’t want to talk of God? Of death and heaven and hell, and the word of the Lord? Because he helped her over a river? It was unnerving. Why not enlist a friend or a relative to help her come to terms with her life’s end?
Perhaps she didn’t have a friend left in the world. Perhaps she wanted to talk of other things. Such as crossing the G?ngusk?rd pass in a waterlogged spring. Such as why she had left the Vatnsdalur valley to work further east, or why she doesn’t care for clergymen. Tóti closed his eyes, and felt Ysa shift her warm weight from one side to the other under his forehead, restless. To soothe her he recited Hallgrímur Pétursson: ‘The pathway of Thy Passion to follow I desire, Out of my weakness fashion a character of fire.’ He opened his eyes and recited the last line again.
By the time the pail was full, he had decided to return to Kornsá.
A morning mist lingered in the valley, obscuring Tóti’s view of the mountains as he rode through the ghostly wreaths that hovered over the grass. He shivered from the cold and buried his hands into the warmth of his horse’s mane. Today I will right things with Agnes, he thought.
By the time Tóti slowed his horse to a walk, up past the three strange hills of Thrístapar at the mouth of the valley, towards the green throat of Vatnsdalur, morning sunlight poured out over the cloud. It would be yet another clear day. Soon families and their servants would be dotted along the home fields, scythes in hand, spreading the cut grass out to dry and the smell of mown hay would overwhelm the valley. But now, so early in the morning, Tóti could see only the topmost caps of the mountains, their brown bulk still concealed by the band of slowly shifting fog. He heard a sudden shout and noticed Páll, the Kornsá shepherd boy, driving the sheep along the mountainside, obscured a little by the mist. Tóti urged his horse towards the bank of the river that wound through the valley and passed Kornsá at a distance, continuing on to the bowed croft of Undirfell.