“Jardtrud Herbrandsdatter has sought you out here, Reverend Father,” replied Kristin. “Ulf Haldorss?n has now been in the service of my husband for thirty-five years; he has always been our loyal friend and helper and a good kinsman. I thought I might be able to help him in some way.”
Jardtrud uttered a low cry of scorn or indignation. Everyone else stared at Kristin: the parishioners with bitterness, the bishop’s party with intent curiosity. Lord Halvard cast a sharp glance around before he said to Kristin, “Are things such that you would venture to defend Ulf Haldorss?n? Surely you must know—” As she attempted to answer, he quickly added, raising one hand, “No one has the right to demand testimony from you in this matter—other than your husband—unless your conscience forces you to speak. Consider it carefully, before you—”
“I was mostly thinking, Lord Bishop, that Ulf let his temper get the better of him, and he took up arms at church; I thought I might aid him in this matter by offering to pay a guarantee. Or,” she said with great effort, “my husband will certainly do all he can to help his friend and kinsman in this case.”
The bishop turned impatiently to those standing nearby, who all seemed to be seized by strong emotions. “That woman doesn’t need to be here. Her spokesman can wait over in the nave. Go over there, all of you, while I speak to the mistress. And send the parishioners outside for the time being, and Jardtrud Herbrandsdatter along with them.”
One of the young priests had been busy laying out the bishop’s vestments. Now he carefully set the miter with the gold cross on top of the spread-out folds of the cope and went over to speak to the people in the nave. The others followed him. The congregation, along with Jardtrud, left the church, and the verger closed the doors.
“You mentioned your husband,” said the bishop, looking at Kristin with the same expression as before. “Is it true that last summer you sought to be reconciled with him?”
“Yes, my Lord.”
“But you were not reconciled?”
“My Lord, forgive me for saying this, but . . . I have no complaints about my husband. I sought you out to speak of this matter regarding Ulf Haldorss?n.”
“Did your husband know you were carrying a child?” asked Lord Halvard. He seemed angered by her objection.
“Yes, my Lord,” she replied in a low voice.
“How did Erlend Nikulauss?n receive the news?” asked the bishop.
Kristin stood twisting a corner of her wimple between her fingers, her eyes on the floor.
“Did he refuse to be reconciled with you when he heard about this?”
“My Lord, forgive me . . .” Kristin had turned bright red. “Whether my husband Erlend acted one way or another toward me . . . if it would help Ulf’s case for him to come here, then I know that Erlend would hasten to his side.”
The bishop frowned as he looked at her. “Do you mean out of friendship for this man, Ulf? Or, now that the matter has come to light, will Erlend after all agree to acknowledge the child you gave birth to this spring?”
Kristin lifted her head and stared at the bishop with wide eyes and parted lips. For the first time she began to understand what his words signified.
Lord Halvard gave her a somber look. “It’s true, mistress, that no one other than your husband has the right to bring charges against you for this. But surely you must realize that he will bring upon both you and himself a great sin if he takes on the paternity of another man’s child in order to protect Ulf. It would be better for all of you, if you have sinned, to confess and repent of this sin.”
The color came and went in Kristin’s face. “Has someone said that my husband wouldn’t . . . that it was not his child?”
The bishop reluctantly replied, “Would you have me believe, Kristin, that you had no idea what people have been saying about you and your overseer?”
“No, I didn’t.” She straightened up, standing with her head tilted back slightly, her face white under the folds of her wimple. “I pray you, my Reverend Lord and Father—if people have been whispering rumors about me behind my back, then ask them to repeat them to my face!”
“No names have been mentioned,” replied the bishop. “That is against the law. But Jardtrud Herbrandsdatter has asked permission to leave her husband and go home with her kinsmen because she accuses him of keeping company with another woman, a married woman, and conceiving a child with her.”
For a moment both of them fell silent. Then Kristin repeated, “My Lord, I beg you to show me such mercy that you would demand these men to speak so that I might hear them, to say that I am supposed to be this woman.”
Bishop Halvard gave her a sharp and piercing look. Then he waved his hand, and the men in the nave approached and stood around his chair. Lord Halvard spoke: “You good men of Sil have come to me today at an inconvenient time, bringing a complaint which by rights should have been presented first to my plenipotentiary. I have acceded to this because I know that you cannot be fully knowledgeable of the law. But now this woman, Mistress Kristin Lavransdatter of J?rundgaard, has come to me with an odd request. She begs me to ask you if you dare say to her face what people have been saying in the parish: that her husband, Erlend Nikulauss?n, is not the father of the child she gave birth to this spring.”
Sira Solmund replied, “It has been said on every estate and in every hovel throughout the countryside that the child was conceived in adultery and with blood guilt, by the mistress and her overseer. And it seems to us hardly credible that she did not know of this rumor herself.”
The bishop was about to speak, but Kristin said, in a loud and firm voice, “So help me Almighty God, the Virgin Mary, Saint Olav, and the archbishop Saint Thomas, I did not know this lie was being said about us.”
“Then it’s hard to understand why you felt such a need to conceal the fact that you were with child,” said the priest. “You hid from everyone and barely came out of your house all winter.”
“It’s been a long time since I had any friends among the farmers of this parish; I’ve had so little to do with anyone here over the past few years. And yet I didn’t know until now that everyone seems to be my foe. But I came to church on every Sabbath,” she said.
“Yes, and you wrapped yourself up in cloaks and dressed so that no one might see you were growing big under your belt.”
“As any woman would do; surely any woman would want to look decent in the company of other people,” replied Kristin curtly.
The priest continued, “If the child was your husband’s, as you say, then surely you wouldn’t have tended to the infant so poorly that you caused him to die of neglect.”
One of the young priests from Hamar quickly stepped forward and caught hold of Kristin. A moment later she stood as she had before, pale and straight-backed. She thanked the priest with a nod of her head.
Sira Solmund vehemently declared, “That’s what the servingwomen at J?rundgaard said. My sister, who has been to the manor, witnessed it herself. The mistress went about with her breasts bursting with milk, so that her clothing was soaked through. But any woman who saw the boy’s body can testify that he died of starvation.”
Bishop Halvard put up his hand. “That’s enough, Sira Solmund. We will keep to the matter at hand, which is whether Jardtrud Herbrandsdatter had any other basis for her claims when she brought her case against her husband than that she had heard rumors, which the mistress here says are lies. And whether Kristin can dispute these rumors. Surely no one would claim that she laid hands on the child . . .”
But Kristin stood there, her face pale, and did not speak.