Margit Sandemo - The Ice People 28 - Ice and Fire

She heard the crunch of footsteps on the gravel path next to her. She turned her head and gasped at the sight of the tall figure she saw there.

“St George! Thank you for hearing me in my time of need! I need someone to talk to right now.”

“St George?” the figure repeated. He was very tall and looked frightening with his dark hair, closed face and black clothes.

“Yes, I ...” Oh no, had she managed to make a fool of herself again?

“I’m usually known as Viljar of the Ice People.”

“Yes, of course, forgive me,” she muttered, terrified. “I confused you with someone else.”

“With a saint? You are the sister of young Mrs Signe, are you not?”

“Yes,” she got up and curtsied. “Belinda.”

He nodded. “You were talking to that grave, I noticed. Is this the only place you come to when you are here?”

“Yes. And not only here, in the whole world. I miss my sister terribly. And right now everything’s so complicated. It’s hard to know how she would have liked me to handle it.”

The awe-inspiring figure sat down on the cemetery wall. “What is it that’s so complicated?”

“Everything. I wanted so badly to come here and take care of Signe’s little daughter, and that part is going very well and it seems that Lovise likes me. It’s ... everything else.”

He gestured for her to go and sit next to him. She thanked him for his kindness and sat down.

“Do you also have a dear friend to visit here?” she asked shyly.

“No, not exactly. But I like coming here. It makes me feel as though I’m in contact with my many ancestors who are at rest here.”

“How wonderful,” Belinda whispered, dreamily. “I feel that way, too. With Signe, I mean.”

The man of the Ice People studied her searchingly in the semi-darkness. “Tell me what it is that is so difficult at Elistrand.”

She sighed. “I’m useless. So hopeless. I run around and work so hard but I always end up doing the wrong thing. I can’t blame Mrs Tilda for getting annoyed with me. They are very kind to let me stay there, and I constantly make such a mess of things.

“Didn’t you say it was going well with the child?”

“Yes, but ...”

“And you are her nanny, aren’t you?”

“Yes, but it’s little wonder that Mrs Tilda needs some help around the house, so I am also her chambermaid.”

“No! Really? But that doesn’t make any sense at all.”

“It doesn’t?”

“No. And why are you speaking in that strange way?”

“What do you mean?”

“Your voice doesn’t sound genuine.”

Belinda became perplexed. “But that’s the way Signe spoke!”

The stern expression on his face softened a little as he grew more sympathetic. “So you thought that if you did everything in the same way as her everyone would love you?”

“Yes, because everyone loved Signe. And I do everything just as she would have done it, and I think like her, but no matter how hard I try it just doesn’t seem to work.”

“No, of course it doesn’t! You shouldn’t be living someone else’s life. You are you. Now I don’t know you, but everybody has something unique and valuable to offer. And that goes for you, too. And it is the finest thing about a person. You shouldn’t just throw it away like that.”

“Yes, but I think it’s so sad that a fine person like Signe should have had to leave the world like that. No, I can’t explain it. I’m a little stupid, you see.”

“I think I know what you mean. And you are absolutely right, you should take the best qualities of a deceased person and pass them on. It’s just that what you’ve taken wasn’t the best of what Signe had to offer. Her voice becomes empty in you. It’s the things that were best about her that you should keep alive. Not her mannerisms and gestures.”

Belinda let out a sob. “I feel so sorry for her. She’s lying there in her cold grave – so young!”

His voice was dry and matter-of-fact. “Signe was fortunate enough to lead a full life. She was loved by everyone and never encountered any hardships. It can often be good to overcome adversity. Those who have a more favourable destiny sometimes have greater difficulty getting through hard times.”

“Oh, but there is something you don’t know, Sir. I found her diary today. And she was very miserable during her last days.”

“Oh?”

“Yes, she wrote that her husband, Herbert Abrahamsen, embraced other women and gave them cakes and things.”

“Cakes?”

“Yes, that’s what it said. A strange woman asked Signe whether she knew how many other woman had exchanged pleasures with him.”

At first Viljar stared at her in disbelief. Then he had to turn his head away for a second. “Yes, you may be right that Signe was unhappy. She probably had problems with her mother-in-law, too?”

“Oh yes. At first I couldn’t grasp what she meant, because she wrote about dragons and things like that, which made me think of real dragons and St George and everything, but then I understood that it was ... yes, you-know-who.”

“What did you do with the diary?”

“I put it back where I found it. In a secret drawer. Unfortunately, I didn’t get a chance to read the last two pages.”

He remained silent for a moment. His black hair fluttered in the wind. “Are you cold?”

“No, not at all, but you are so kind to ask.”

Viljar sighed at such humility. “You shouldn’t show that diary to anyone.”

“No, of course not! Or they may be angry with Signe for writing such things!”

“Signe will be fine,” he murmured. “But what about you? Are they kind to you?”

“Oh, yes, they’re all very kind, it’s just that I do so many stupid things. But I’ve become so confused now.”

“What do you mean?”

“I just don’t know how Signe would have felt. About her husband, that is. He ... he ...”

“Yes?”

“He ... seems to like touching me. Grabbing me. And even though I don’t want to hurt Signe I still don’t like it. I mean, he was Signe’s husband and it’s so horrible that I run away every time I see him approaching me. Because I don’t like it and at the same time I can’t help thinking that Signe wouldn’t have liked his touching me either, or ... No, I can’t make head or tail of it.”

“You must follow your inner voice, Belinda, which sounds very sensible to me. You must run, dear child, as far away as possible!”

Belinda brightened up. “Do you mean that? Oh, that’s good! That’s just what I thought, because it doesn’t seem that Signe liked him embracing other women and that sort of thing.”

“And that sort of thing” was what Belinda said when she lacked the vocabulary for something.

It had grown darker now, but she could still make out Viljar’s features in the dusk. They were sharp and cold but she wasn’t afraid. How strange, she thought, Herbert Abrahamsen has much softer features but they frighten me. (Forgive me, Signe!)

“But what about you?” she asked childishly. “They say you’re a little strange but you don’t seem so at all.”

He looked at her with a small smile. “I ... am ... a little ... different. A bit of an outsider. Just like you.”

She felt practically euphoric when she heard him comparing himself with her. Her whole face lit up with a blissful smile.

“In what way are you an outsider?” she asked.

Viljar of the Ice People looked across the darkened plain.

“I don’t belong,” he said. “I don’t feel at home at Graastensholm. And not at Linden Avenue, either. I feel much more at home with Tengel the Good and his Silje.”

“Who are they?”

Her naive voice wakened him from the thoughts in which he had become absorbed. “Oh, they died a long time ago. They are resting over there in that grave with the big headstone.”