Margit Sandemo - The Ice People 08 - Under Suspicion

Under Suspicion

The Legend of The Ice People 8 - Under Suspicion

© Margit Sandemo 1982

© eBook in English: Jentas A/S, 2017

Series: The Legend of The Ice People

Title: Under Suspicion

Title number: 8

Original title: Bödelns dotter

Translator: Anna Halager

© Translation: Jentas A/S

ISBN: 978-87-7107-342-3

This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, resold, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the publisher’s prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition, including this condition, being imposed on the subsequent purchase.

All contracts and agreements regarding the work, translation, editing, and layout are owned by Jentas A/S.

Acknowledgement

The legend of the Ice People is dedicated with love and gratitude to the memory of my dear late husband Asbjorn Sandemo, who made my life a fairy tale.

Margit Sandemo

The Ice People - Reviews

‘Margit Sandemo is, simply, quite wonderful.’

- The Guardian

‘Full of convincing characters, well estabished in time and place, and enlightening ... will get your eyes popping, and quite possibly groins twitching ... these are graphic novels without pictures ... I want to know what happens next.’

- The Times

‘A mixure of myth and legend interwoven with historical events, this is imaginative creation that involves the reader from the first page to the last.’

- Historical Novels Review

‘Loved by the masses, the prolific Margit Sandemo has written over 172 novels to date and is Scandinavia's most widely read author...’

- Scanorama magazine

The Legend of the Ice People

The legend of the Ice People begins many centuries ago with Tengel the Evil. He was ruthless and greedy, and there was only one way to get everything that he wanted: he had to make a pact with the devil. He travelled far into the wilderness and summoned the devil with a magic potion that he had brewed in a pot. Tengel the Evil gained unlimited wealth and power but in exchange, he cursed his own family. One of his descendants in every generation would serve the Devil with evil deeds. When it was done, Tengel buried the pot. If anyone found it, the curse would be broken.

So the curse was passed down through Tengel’s descendants, the Ice People. One person in every generation was born with yellow cat’s eyes, a sign of the curse, and magical powers which they used to serve the Devil. One day the most powerful of all the cursed Ice People would be born.

This is what the legend says. Nobody knows whether it is true, but in the 16th century, a cursed child of the Ice People was born. He tried to turn evil into good, which is why they called him Tengel the Good. This legend is about his family. Actually, it is mostly about the women in his family – the women who held the fate of the Ice People in their hands.

Chapter 1

The executioner’s assistant had many names: the executioner’s smith, the executioner’s boy, the horse skinner – and the Night Man. No matter what he was called, he was despised by everybody. The executioner himself was at least the object of a certain respect mixed with horror, which was certainly not the case with his assistant, who was the lowest of the low.

He was usually recruited from the vast crowd of condemned criminals, which was why he often didn’t have a tongue or ears, but hands and feet he had because these he would need in for job. He was forced to lead a shady existence and would only venture out at night, otherwise people would throw stones and spit at him. That was probably why he was called the Night Man.

The executioner’s assistant in the parish of Graastensholm was much the same. But this man had been allowed to keep his tongue and ears. It was a choice many of the criminals faced instead of sentencing: become the executioner’s assistant and keep your tongue and ears. He was a stooped, worn out, grumpy man who stumbled around his hut at the edge of the forest, letting his daughter, Hilde, be the target of his resentment.

At some stage during his youth, Joel Night Man had been married. He became a criminal, but when he came face to face with the law, he became horrified and begged that he be spared his punishment. He had to wait in jail until the dubious office of executioner’s assistant became vacant. When he was released after spending a year behind bars, he discovered that his wife had died. His bitterness had just become greater over the years, and turned into an ugly hatred which was directed at his daughter.

Sometimes you would see Hilde, now a young woman, scuttling between the hut and the outhouse by the edge of the forest or when she returned home with freshly picked berries from the forest. However, she would never go near other people and the handful of drinking companions that had previously frequented the Night Man’s house had never seen her. Nobody dropped by anymore because they were fed up with listening to Joel’s bilious remarks. His employers were the only ones who would visit occasionally, and Hilde would hide from them.

It was now a cold and dismal spring day in 1654. Andreas Lind of the Ice People had been ploughing a small patch of soil by the forest above the other fields that belonged to his farm. He had been interested in the small meadow for quite some years and thought that it could be turned into good arable land. There didn’t seem to be many stones and the underwood would be easy to clear. Finally, he had got started on converting it.

Andreas was now twenty-seven and he was still a bachelor. He hadn’t come that far. He had certainly looked at the girls in town but none of them had set his heart ablaze. He much preferred to walk behind his horse, as he did now, with his hands on the plough, watching the good, black top soil turn under his gaze. This would be a fine piece of land in time. He decided it would probably be best if he started off by sowing barley ... a stone hit the ploughshare and he stopped the horse. It wasn’t a very big stone, so he was able to lift it easily to the edge of the field.

Andreas decided to take a break. He climbed to the top of a ridge so that he could look out over the village. He sat down on a boulder with his arms wrapped around his knees.

Linden Avenue looked fine from here. The buildings were well-kept. His Mum and Dad and Granddad still worked on the farm and made it a point of honour to keep everything in the best possible state. Although Linden Avenue was not one of the biggest farms in the parish, it was still regarded as an estate.

Graastensholm looked just as good. Better, of course, because it was grander, but this was only for as long as Tarald and Yrja and Liv were still able to manage it. How things would turn out when young Mattias Meiden took over was difficult to say. Mattias was a physician by profession and could do nothing else. But if he could get a good farmer to manage it all, then it would be all right!

Mattias hadn’t married either and he was now thirty years old. Just thinking of Mattias made Andreas smile. It would be almost wrong of Mattias to marry and belong to one person. He seemed to belong to all of humanity. Marriage might tie him down so that he wouldn’t have the time to care for others.

But these were selfish thoughts on Andreas’ part. After all, Mattias should also have the chance to experience the close love and devotion of a caring relationship, even though it didn’t seem that he missed being married.

Andreas happened to gaze at a small, miserable hovel at the edge of the forest not far from where he sat. He shivered. He knew that this was where the Night Man lived with his daughter. At that moment he caught sight of a woman on her way to the outhouse. Then she was gone. That must be Hilde. Andreas had never seen her close-up. She had always stayed out there, ignored by everybody.