Margit Sandemo - The Ice People 13 - The Devil´s Footprint

She turned to Andreas. “How many should we reckon on for dinner, Mr Andreas?”

“All those present.”

Elisa counted. “That makes six,” she said, smiling.

“Heavens, Elisa. You’re not very good at counting, are you! Surely we’re no more than five?” Kaleb said.

The girl laughed and it seemed that the whole room was filled with sunshine. “I always count Mr Alv as two, Mr Kaleb, because he has such a hearty appetite.”

“He doesn’t show it,” smiled Andreas, who had a soft spot for his grandson. “But just lay the table for two more – Irmelin and Gabriella are probably on their way.”

When Elisa had left the room, Kaleb said: “So we’ll bide our time until Niklas has received a reply from Villemo and Dominic?”

“Of course,” Mattias said. “And Niklas, you mustn’t forget to emphasize that we’re all united in the wish to see them here – immediately!”

“Yes,” Kaleb said thoughtfully. “I believe it’s urgent now. It’ll be lovely to see them all once more but I’m terribly frightened for them. We’ve been waiting for this all our lives but now I’m scared. I’d no idea that it would turn out to be something so ...”

He shuddered. He was just about to say “deadly” but couldn’t bring himself to say it.

“Our poor children,” Andreas murmured.

None of those present knew what to expect. Which of the Ice People would survive the showdown and which wouldn’t?

Chapter 2

One night in the middle of summer the mysterious creature came to Christiania.

The landlord of an inn insisted that he had caught a glimpse of something that rushed past in the street outside, but when he looked out it had disappeared.

He later explained to the authorities at Akershus Castle that it was something huge. He could tell that because he knew how high above the windowsill a normal passer-by could reach, and for a brief moment this creature had blocked the entire window as it went past. No, he was unable to see what it was as it passed by because the leaded panes were uneven and almost opaque. All he knew was that he was filled with indescribable terror.

Soon everybody realized that what he had said was true. A couple of nights later, a whore was found in the gutter. Her corpse showed no signs of violence – her eyes merely stared up in incredulous horror. Or, to put it more precisely, when she was found, she lay staring towards the main street, which ran well outside her regular haunt. Then the reports began to pour in, each one more colourful than the next, but with one thing in common: they had seen the Devil himself, or at any rate the dead that followed in his tracks. Christiania was in a state of paralysed terror. Whatever it was that moved about among the people at night, the pattern was the same. The stranger was in search of food, and if anyone surprised him they had to die. Very often there were no signs of struggle, no wounds, no marks on the dead bodies. It seemed that they had simply been scared to death. At other times a witness had clearly got too close and then there might be a broken neck or other terrifying signs of violence.

People put out bait and soldiers lay in wait ready to shoot, but the beast always managed to hide whenever danger lurked.

By now there were many who had seen brief glimpses of him in the streets before he ran off. He came out during the night but nobody knew where he hid during the day. It was easy for him to move about in the small, narrow, filthy streets and easy to hide, as quick as lightning, in alleyways and dark corners.

The description of him was always the same: a huge creature covered all over in masses of hair. The few who had caught a glimpse of his face, said that it was pleasant in itself, yet with an expression so terrifying that you didn’t want to see it again. His “armour” seemed to consist of leather, not steel, as the first reports had implied.

The focus of interest was very much on his feet. He seemed to wear something that could be called a shoe or a boot on one foot, but his other foot was wrapped in skin, maybe with birch bark underneath, but this couldn’t be established. This foot was alarmingly short, and the fact that he limped so badly frightened people even more.

Never had people gone to church so often as they did then. All Protestant statutes were forgotten and lots of votive offerings were made in the hope of salvation. The people of Norway were accustomed to plague epidemics and famine, natural disasters and the unjust measures of the ruling powers. But never before had the Devil walked about on earth, reaping victims before their time had come. Could Heaven not see at all what was going on? Couldn’t it see that His Reverence from the underworld was stealing souls before the Lord had even judged them?

The people were seized by fatalistic dejection. What was the point of toiling and trying to live in the spirit of God, hoping at least for a tolerable life in the hereafter, when something like this could happen? The tar burners alone were happy because every house had to receive the sign of the cross, so there was almost a shortage of tar.

What was more frightening than anything else was that so very few of the victims showed any signs of violence. The expressions on the dead faces seemed to show that they had been frightened to death. Or ...

No, people didn’t dare to think about it, and certainly not to say what they thought, which was that maybe the monster was able to kill without touching its victims. Perhaps its yellow, burning eyes had that much power. No, this was inconceivable. Because if that were the case ... Well, then this was the Devil himself they had among them. No earthly being could kill merely with his gaze! A special task force of seasoned volunteer soldiers had been set up with the sole purpose of putting down this monster that was ravaging the town. They were cocksure, convinced of their invincibility, brutal and murderous. They felt that there hadn’t been enough wars during their lives but here was a task that suited them precisely.

If only they could get him within firing range. But he was super-sensitive and could scent danger at a great distance, only to disappear without a trace.

People called him the Beast, but the characteristic tracks in the muddy streets were still dubbed the Devil’s footprints. Everybody knew what was hidden inside the wrappings on his short foot! Most people were convinced that it was the Devil himself that was at large. Or might it be one of his helpers? This was certainly what the soldiers believed, because they probably wouldn’t have dared to take on the Devil himself. However, in order to be on the safe side, they had brought along plenty of silver bullets ...

The Ice People were probably the only ones who weren’t sceptical. But even they were unable to guess where he came from and what it was he wanted.

You would think that such a creature would kill animals and eat them, but this wasn’t the case. He would leave domestic animals in peace. He didn’t even care for the fish in the river. But he loved to eat prepared food such as the hams and dried fish that hung from the ceiling in people’s pantries.

The commander of the appointed troop, Colonel Plucky, thought that it was a pity that the Beast didn’t kill domestic animals. He wouldn’t have hesitated. But the Beast didn’t care for such things in the least. And the colonel’s men could see that traps were of no use. The Beast, whoever he was, was intelligent. He would never allow himself to be caught like that.

Nobody dared to go out at night anymore. The whores and the other shady characters did little business, and soon hardly anybody dared to go out during the day either. A mass exodus from the town began.

Colonel Plucky was growing increasingly impatient. It troubled him that he hadn’t seen the Beast at all. Nor had his men seen so much as the shadow of what everybody was talking about.