Viking's Sunset Read online

  ‘Aye,’ whispered Thorfinn Thorfinnson, who hadn’t killed a bear, or anything bigger than a small seal, ‘a chieftain of dogs, no doubt!’

  This was meant to be a joke, but Thorfinn forgot himself and said the words in Innuit tongue, and the dogs heard him. When they had finished chasing him, he had no trousers left, and so the Northmen called him Thorfinn Breechless from that day on.

  But Grummoch did not become a chieftain there, for one day, when the snow melted and the ice softened under the warm breath of the new Spring, a great kayak came into the fjord where the cooking-place was. And in it were two Innuit, but of another tribe. They were so thin that it seemed one could see through their skin down to their bones. And they were so weak that they sat in their kayak like dead men until they were lifted out and warmed by the fire in the ice-house.

  And after a few hours, when they had gained strength through whale blubber and hot seals’ liver, they told how they had been caught by the ice when the winter came on, and could not get back to their own cooking-places, and so had turned about and paddled to the south.

  And there, after many many days of paddling, they said, was a great land of rivers and hills and much grass, and such creatures as they had never seen in the Northland, creatures with horns outside their heads and not in their mouths like the walrus.

  And besides, there were men, but different Innuit from themselves, although some of their words were the same. They were red men, who grew feathers out of the tops of their heads, and had long noses and wore few clothes.

  The two brothers from the kayak said that these red men were very big, almost as big as Grummoch, and most redoubtable fighters with their hatchets.

  Gudbrod Gudbrodsson, always looking out to catch someone, said, ‘The best hatchets are those made in Norway, for there we have the true iron which will hold an edge. The things you speak of must be toys, fit only for women to chop the kindling or for small boys to tease each other with.’

  The man from the kayak said, ‘In my boat you will find such axes as the red men use. See for yourselves.’

  The Vikings went out to the kayak, which lay in the fjord, and there, in a deerhide wrapping, they found the hatchets, which were of red metal and very sharp. They were set on painted staves and garnished with many-coloured feathers.

  Grummoch said, ‘These are wonderfully pretty things, but too light for my taste. Yet, if I had a big one like these, there is no knowing what deeds I might perform.’

  Harald said, ‘You do well enough with a stake of whalebone, oath-brother!’

  But Grummoch still said, ‘I would like to meet these red men and bargain with them for an axe or two like these.’

  Thorfinn Thorfinnson said, ‘They might prove to be better bargainers than you, Grummoch Giant, and then where would you be?’

  Grummoch said, ‘Dead and happy, friend!’

  And they could get no more sense out of him. But that night, while the others were admiring the bead necklaces and the copper bracelets that the two brothers had brought back, Grummoch spoke long with Jaga-Kaga, the chieftain of the trolls, urging him to let the Vikings go south and sail Long Snake again, towards this land which the brothers had visited.

  At first the old man shook his head and wept, saying that he loved the Vikings like his own family now that he had got to know them. But in the end, Grummoch prevailed upon him, and he consented to let them go, provided they would come back and stay with him again.

  So the Innuit carried the Vikings southwards on their sledges and there they found Long Snake, just as they had left her, and all their weapons in the little hut they had built.

  And so they set off in the Spring once more, with a wind behind them to fill out their sealskin sail.

  Thorfinn Thorfinnson said, ‘If I go back to the Innuit, may Odin claim my head!’

  Gudbrod Gudbrodsson said, ‘Odin would get small profit out of your head, for it is full of blubber, like your fat stomach!’

  Harald Sigurdson said, ‘Remember the bull I met on the fells above Jagesgard. Remember my famous kicking-toe!’

  Then they were all silent, and did nothing but wave to the weeping Innuit, who stood along the shore nodding their furry heads. Even the dogs seemed sad to see Grummoch and his pack go from the Northland, for they sat in the slushy grass with their noses between their paws, and whined in a way they had never done before.

  10

  Landfall

  Spring was at its full when Long Snake first turned her nose towards new land.

  The Vikings had spoken of hardly anything except axes, beadwork, and helmets of feathers since they had set forth from Greenland. Sometimes, it is true, they had remembered Norway; but most often that memory had been pushed from their minds by some other thought, to do with the land they were to find.

  Harald said to Grummoch, ‘If there is gold in this land, we stand a fair chance of making that fortune which you say few men make.’

  And Grummoch had answered, ‘Gold was buried in the earth and in the streams to tempt mankind; that is my thought. Whoso takes gold must often take death with it. Consider the case of Thorwald Niklasson of Jomsby, who found a whole box of gold in Frankland and got it back to his own fjord, only to have his throat cut by a little man who hid in a tree, waiting for his longship to make landfall.’

  Harald said, ‘Nay, lad, I shall consider the case of Grummoch and of Harald Sigurdson, who are brisk enough fellows not to be caught napping by fellows in trees! Besides, Thorwald Niklasson of Jomsby was a beef-headed fool to take gold from a church of the Frankish Whitechrist, for that was holy gold. And the man who cut his throat was sent by the Frankish priests to impress that point upon him.’

  Grummoch said, ‘It was not the point they impressed upon him, but the edge! And the edge seems to have been very sharp, according to men I know, who saw the situation Thorwald Niklasson was in afterwards.’

  Then they sighted land, great stretches of it, and all green.

  Jamsgar Havvarson said, ‘Hardly ever have my eyes so relished the sight of land, and I am nigh on thirty and have made the sea my trade. But after weeks of sailing – and I grant the winds have been good ones, right from the wide mouth of Freya, bless her! – I am less than anxious to eat another mouthful of raw fish or of blubber, or to drink another cupful of brackish Greenland water or berry beer.’

  Gudbrod Gudbrodsson replied, ‘A true Viking is a beast without a belly. A true Viking can live for weeks on one breath of salt air. A true Viking thinks more of voyaging than of victuals.’

  Then Thorfinn Thorfinnson said, ‘Then a true Viking must be a fool, for there is scarcely anything so desirable as good roast pork and barley bread spread thick with butter, and a flagon of well-fermented beer to wash it down with.’

  Harald broke into this conversation to say, ‘I am a little more than surprised to hear a skald praising so highly the pleasures of eating and drinking. It had been my notion that poets thought only of cloudy heavens where old warriors lay back upon their shields and listened to the Snow Maidens singing endless songs of adventures.’

  Thorfinn said, ‘A poet must live, Harald.’

  Gudbrod said, ‘Why?’

  Then they drove in towards land.

  ‘I name that long stretch Helleland, that other stretch Markland – and the piece that lies far behind it Vinland – for I am certain that grapes grow there, as they do at Miklagard, it looks so sunny and so rich,’ said Harald Sigurdson, pointing.

  ‘And what do you name the boat which is coming towards us over the billows?’ asked Grummoch, taking the axe from his belt.

  Harald gazed towards a long narrow boat, hardly more than a thin shell, with a high prow and high stern. In it five men paddled swiftly and in rhythm. They were bare to the waist and wore feathers in their black hair. They were now little more than two bowshots from Long Snake, for they had moved fast in the trough of the seas and had been hidden for so long.

  Harald said, ‘I name that the boat of welcome,’ bu
t loosened his sword in his belt, all the same.

  Now the canoe came so close that any man on Long Snake could have thrown his helmet into it with little trouble. And the Vikings saw that the men in it were reddish in the colour of their skin – or, perhaps, a little inclined to the hue of copper.

  ‘These are Innuit of a different sort,’ said Gudbrod. ‘Try them in the Innuit tongue, Harald, for I doubt they understand good Norse.’

  Slowly Harald called out, ‘What men are you, friends?’ cupping his hand about his mouth.

  A red man stood up in the narrow boat. His chest was covered with yellow streaks and his arms were heavy with armbands. He carried a long spear in his right hand, at one end of which was a tuft of feathers, dyed red.

  This man threw back his head and in a high nasal voice answered, ‘Beothuk! Beothuk! Ha! Ha! Ha!’

  Then he poised himself and flung the spear. It struck, quivering, in the dragon prow of Long Snake.

  ‘That is a bad omen and a good throw,’ said Grummoch. ‘These Beothuk seem to be less than friendly, Harald.’

  Harald answered, ‘Perhaps they are simple folk, like Lapplanders and English. I will talk to them again.’

  Once more he cupped his hands and said slowly, ‘We are friends from the north.’

  The next spear stuck in the mast of Long Snake, a hand’s breadth from Harald’s head.

  Grummoch said, ‘Aye, simple folk – but good warriors, also like the Lapplanders and the English!’

  Now the canoe circled Long Snake and then set off again for the shore, the red men laughing as they paddled.

  Gudbrod said, ‘It seems to me that if all the men of Markland are of one mind, we shall meet with little to laugh about.’

  But Jamsgar said, ‘Pooh! Look at this spear-point. It is blunted by sticking into our prow. If a piece of oak can ruin a weapon, these cannot be such fearful warriors.’

  Grummoch patted him on the shoulder gently so that Jamsgar almost fell to the deck.

  ‘Your ribs are not of oak, my friend,’ he said. ‘And though this metal may be soft, yet it is hard enough to send you out on the long journey that ends in Valhalla. Bear that in mind.’

  Jamsgar said ruefully, ‘I shall bear in mind that when Grummoch praises a man with his hand, the man is never the same again. I can scarcely lift my arm now.’

  Harald said, ‘All the same, we are hungry and thirsty. We shall run ashore for a while at least, in what we call Markland. Mayhap all will be well, after all.’

  Long Snake headed for a strip of sandy shore. As the Vikings drew closer, they saw that the shore was thick with red men, and that each of them carried a weapon of some sort – hatchet, spear or club.

  Grummoch said to his fellows, ‘Have courage, friends, and put on your helmets with the bull’s horns, for that may impress these folk.’

  Gudbrod said, ‘That is scarcely likely, giant. I can see three of the red men wearing bull’s horns, too. And what’s more, they have eagle’s feathers to go with them! We have not eagle’s feathers!’

  Harald said grimly, sword in hand, ‘I have yet to hear that a bunch of feathers can improve a man’s swordplay or his strength, and these seem to be without swords, and to be smaller men than we are.’

  ‘Hm!’ thought Thorfinn to himself, ‘but there are many more of them.’

  11

  First Meeting

  As Long Snake ran into the shallows, Harald called out to the Vikings, ‘Make no threatening gestures, fellows, but be ready. If they wish for peace, it would ill become such hungry wolves as ourselves to deny it to them. But if they wish for war, then see that each stroke finds its mark, and none of that silly flailing of the axe that Danish men are given to. There are more of them than of us, and every stroke must bite.’

  As they leaped overboard, into the waist-high waters, the air was full of the whirring of arrows, and many of the Vikings feared for their lives. But it was noticed that the feathered shafts stuck into the strakes of Long Snake and hit no one.

  ‘They are simply testing us,’ said Gudbrod Gudbrodsson, who always had an answer for everything.

  Thorfinn Thorfinnson said, ‘Then I come poorly out of the test, for my legs are shaking like those of a beggar stricken with palsy!’

  But Harald and Grummoch merely flung back their matted heads and laughed, as though the flight of arrows was greatly to their taste. Then they turned and went up the beach, side by side, with their men behind them, never once looking back, or showing any fear whatever.

  And when they were within ten paces of the thickly knotted line of red men, they halted.

  There was an old man, heavily laden with feathers and wearing copper bands the length of his two arms, which stuck out from holes in his long skin robe; and it was to this old man that Harald spoke the first words. He used the Innuit tongue, slowly and with care.

  ‘Greetings,’ he said. ‘We are men of peace.’

  For a long while the red man did not reply, but the younger ones behind him whispered and nudged each other. The Vikings saw that every one had an arrow ready on his bowstring.

  Once more Harald said, ‘We are men of peace.’

  Then the old man who wore the red feathers about his head slapped his chest, and said, in a tongue most like that of the Innuit, but different in some of its lilting, ‘We Beothuk are great warriors. Are you great warriors?’

  Harald saw then that this question had placed him in a cleft stick, for if he said that the Northmen were great warriors, then the red men might challenge them to fight without delay; and if he said that the Northmen were not great warriors, then the red men might kill them out of contempt. He thought quickly and then said, ‘Only the Gods can answer that question. We fight other men when they invite us to do so. We sit about the fire with other men when they invite us, and do not fight them. That is all.’

  The red men chattered among themselves, and one great fellow with a barrel chest strutted forward and bowed his plaited head before the man with the feather headdress, speaking to him rapidly with much waving of a great club studded along its edge with shark’s teeth.

  Grummoch whispered, ‘That is the man we have to fear. If he is their champion, I beg you, Harald, to let me meet him. My axe, Death Kiss, is in need of a fleshing.’

  Harald said, ‘It shall be as you say; but we must wait and see.’

  They saw the old chief nod his feathered head. Then the barrel-chested man, who had tribal scars across his broad face, began to address the red men, shouting hoarsely and waving his brawny arms, as though trying to work them to a fury.

  At last he turned round and faced Harald.

  In a high-pitched tone he said, ‘You are dogs. We are men.’

  Throfinn Thorfinnson whispered, ‘I knew that something ill would come from our living so long in the dog-house among the Innuit. Even the red men can smell dog on us now.’

  Gudbrod Gudbrodsson said, ‘Lift up your jerkin and show them that you have not a curly tail, my friend.’

  Thorfinn Thorfinnson whispered, ‘I don’t know about that. There is something shaking behind me, and it is not my sword-sheath.’

  Then Grummoch stepped forward and flung his axe, Death Kiss, high into the blue air, so that it twisted and twirled as it went up and then came down. He caught it easily in his right hand, his lips set grim, his right foot forward, his great weight upon his left.

  ‘Come forth, man,’ he said, ‘and let me show how this dog bites.’

  The red men were silent then, and lowered their bows, as though anxious not to miss what might happen.

  The barrel-chested warrior slapped his thighs, left and right, then began a little jigging dance upon the sand, as though to work up his courage. Then, almost without warning, he gave a high shriek and bounded to the spot where Grummoch waited.

  The Viking stood as still as a stone until the red man’s blow came down, then thrust out his axe-shaft and caught the club so that many of the shark’s teeth broke off and flew into the air. />
  Once again the angry red man struck, and once more the giant thrust out his axe-shaft, warding off the blow.

  Now the red man stood uncertain for a moment, wondering how best to come at Grummoch; and while he stood so, Grummoch suddenly gave a deep bellowing cry, like that of a bull in the last extreme of fury, and leapt forward. The red man held up his already splintered club to stave off the axe-sweep, but Grummoch struck shrewdly that day. One blow he struck, and that blow sheared through the war-club as though it had been made of soft clay. One blow he struck, and that blow came near to shattering the proud chest of the redman warrior.

  Save that, in the last inches, Grummoch turned his axeblade with a quick twist of the hand, so that the weapon struck with its flat and not with its edge.

  The red man gave a groan, the breath knocked quite from him, and fell backwards, ploughing up the sand with the force of his fall, for he was a heavy man, and fell sprawling, his arms and legs spread like those of a star-fish.

  Grummoch stepped forward grimly, as though he might be about to strike down once more at the dazed red man. Both Vikings and red warriors were silent, their faces grim. The old chief bowed down his head, as though he would not be willing to watch his champion shamed so. But no man raised a weapon to hurt Grummoch as he stood above the warrior.

  Then, at the last moment, the giant bent and touched the red man lightly on the forehead with his axe flat, and said for all to hear, ‘The luck was with me. Thus I touch you in sign of axe-friendship now. Rise and be my brother.’

  Thorfinn said quietly, ‘That is easier said than done. The poor fellow’s ribs will be too sore for him to get about unaided for a week, I reckon.’

  And when the red man made an effort to rise, but could not, Grummoch bent again and picked him up as easily as though he were lifting a child, though the red man was bigger than most men of the Northlands.