two, and the hall was dead quiet. Not that Leif was a shouter; in fact, sometimes you had a problem hearing what he said, because he spoke very soft; mumbled sometimes, so the words sort of strained out through his moustache, like draining the wort off the mash when you’re brewing.
‘I’ll be straight with you,’ he said. ‘Assuming we get there in one piece, we’ll be stopping a while. Maybe a year, maybe two - longer than that, even. We’ll be building houses, fishing, hunting, maybe planting some grain to find out if it’ll grow So, anybody thinking of coming along but who doesn’t want to be away that long, forget it, we’ll have to make do without you.
He stopped again, and this time there was a soft buzz going round the hall as what he’d been saying began sinking in. A lot of the men who’d been with Bjarni weren’t likely to go; I knew that, either they’d told me straight out or I’d heard from someone else that they’d had it with sailing after what had happened that time. You could see their point. After all, we’d been blown right off course and fetched up God knew where. It was pure chance that we stumbled across the islands, and an even bigger one that we’d got that fine wind that blew us straight back there. Far more likely that we’d have come to harm, and either died or ended up wandering around through the fog and the ice for months, drinking rainwater and eating seagulls.
To start with, I was one of them. Now I’d enjoyed my time on the Norway run, don’t get me wrong. But the sea-road between Iceland and Norway’s pretty well known, though even so it only takes one bastard of a storm and you’re way out and completely lost. Ships go down every year and men die. I wasn’t having the best fun ever carrying hay and mending rails in Greenland, but it was a life, I could put up with it. I didn’t really want to go to sea again.
And then - it was all in the few heartbeats after Leif stopped talking - then I remembered Kari telling me he felt exactly the same way Fuck seafaring, he’d said to me, more than once. Fuck being cramped up and wet through. It’s just about all right when you’re a kid and you want to go to new places and see new things, but a man in his thirties wants to be settling down and doing some proper work.
There’s only been a few times these sixty-odd years that I’ve agreed with Kari Sighvatson, but that was one of them -which meant, I realised, that Kari wouldn’t be going. And if Kari wasn’t going, then I was.
Sounds like a really stupid reason, doesn’t it? But think about it. You’ve known him, what, a few weeks? I’d been putting up with him, the endless chattering, always saying the wrong bloody thing, getting to me like a dry boot chafing your heel, for nigh on thirty years. He spoiled my life for me, and that’s no exaggeration. Listen: a few years ago I was at some scraggy little Greek monastery somewhere, and they had a book. Bloody proud of it they were; it had pictures, and every page was written on both sides - psalms, I think it was, or something of the sort. But at some point some fool had spilt wine on it, and there was this dark blue stain. You’d turn the pages, and each one you came to would have the same-shaped blue mark on it, blotting out the words and muddying the pictures and spoiling the whole thing. They’d come to put up with it, because it was their book, and most of the time they hardly noticed, but it was always there, and try as they might, they couldn’t ever look at it without hating the clumsy bastard who ruined it. Same with me. Every day of my life was a stained page with Kari all over it. So, I said to myself, if Kari’s not going on the trip, Leif Eirikson can count me in.
And then I thought - it was still only a half-dozen heartbeats since he’d finished his little speech - if I stick my hand up right now and say I’m going, what’s the betting that Kari’ll do exactly the same? Perfectly capable of
‘I’ll be straight with you,’ he said. ‘Assuming we get there in one piece, we’ll be stopping a while. Maybe a year, maybe two - longer than that, even. We’ll be building houses, fishing, hunting, maybe planting some grain to find out if it’ll grow So, anybody thinking of coming along but who doesn’t want to be away that long, forget it, we’ll have to make do without you.
He stopped again, and this time there was a soft buzz going round the hall as what he’d been saying began sinking in. A lot of the men who’d been with Bjarni weren’t likely to go; I knew that, either they’d told me straight out or I’d heard from someone else that they’d had it with sailing after what had happened that time. You could see their point. After all, we’d been blown right off course and fetched up God knew where. It was pure chance that we stumbled across the islands, and an even bigger one that we’d got that fine wind that blew us straight back there. Far more likely that we’d have come to harm, and either died or ended up wandering around through the fog and the ice for months, drinking rainwater and eating seagulls.
To start with, I was one of them. Now I’d enjoyed my time on the Norway run, don’t get me wrong. But the sea-road between Iceland and Norway’s pretty well known, though even so it only takes one bastard of a storm and you’re way out and completely lost. Ships go down every year and men die. I wasn’t having the best fun ever carrying hay and mending rails in Greenland, but it was a life, I could put up with it. I didn’t really want to go to sea again.
And then - it was all in the few heartbeats after Leif stopped talking - then I remembered Kari telling me he felt exactly the same way Fuck seafaring, he’d said to me, more than once. Fuck being cramped up and wet through. It’s just about all right when you’re a kid and you want to go to new places and see new things, but a man in his thirties wants to be settling down and doing some proper work.
There’s only been a few times these sixty-odd years that I’ve agreed with Kari Sighvatson, but that was one of them -which meant, I realised, that Kari wouldn’t be going. And if Kari wasn’t going, then I was.
Sounds like a really stupid reason, doesn’t it? But think about it. You’ve known him, what, a few weeks? I’d been putting up with him, the endless chattering, always saying the wrong bloody thing, getting to me like a dry boot chafing your heel, for nigh on thirty years. He spoiled my life for me, and that’s no exaggeration. Listen: a few years ago I was at some scraggy little Greek monastery somewhere, and they had a book. Bloody proud of it they were; it had pictures, and every page was written on both sides - psalms, I think it was, or something of the sort. But at some point some fool had spilt wine on it, and there was this dark blue stain. You’d turn the pages, and each one you came to would have the same-shaped blue mark on it, blotting out the words and muddying the pictures and spoiling the whole thing. They’d come to put up with it, because it was their book, and most of the time they hardly noticed, but it was always there, and try as they might, they couldn’t ever look at it without hating the clumsy bastard who ruined it. Same with me. Every day of my life was a stained page with Kari all over it. So, I said to myself, if Kari’s not going on the trip, Leif Eirikson can count me in.
And then I thought - it was still only a half-dozen heartbeats since he’d finished his little speech - if I stick my hand up right now and say I’m going, what’s the betting that Kari’ll do exactly the same? Perfectly capable of
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