Sigrid doesn't know what to do

“Oh,” Hilda groaned. “Send her up, I suppose. Some people simply can’t appreciate what I suffer, and they will come to bother me.”

Hilda truly was suffering – she expected her baby to come in a matter of a week or two, and it seemed to her to have the size of a two-​​year-​​old already within her. Furthermore the summer had been excruciatingly hot, which only made things harder to bear.

This afternoon, however, there had been a thunderstorm that had left the air cool and sweet with the odor of wet barley half-​​threshed in the fields, and it was probably this relief from the heat that had Hilda feeling gracious enough to receive Sigrid.

“I don’t know what she can want,” she sighed to Eirik’s dog, who clung forlornly to her side now that Eirik was gone across the sea. “Your master is never coming back. I hope she doesn’t think I can do anything about it. And I hope she isn’t merely come to grouse. As if I had no problems to speak of! Look at me, Kottr!” she said, waving a hand at her enormous belly.

The dog thumped his tail a few times upon hearing his name, and then sighed.

She was now too close to her confinement to get out of the house, and there was some comfort to her in this, for it meant that she had not had to face Sigrid in the wake of Eirik’s departure. She had already grown uncomfortable enough with inviting her to “sew”.

She had begun to regret having ever hinted to Eirik that things had gone farther than they truly had with Estrid and Brede. She had done so partly out of pique with Estrid, who apparently thought herself too ladylike for such proceedings, which implied a criticism of Hilda herself. And she had also done it simply for the fun of helping Eirik punish Brede for the very crimes she was helping Brede commit.

However, she certainly would not have done it if she had believed that Sigrid would allow Eirik to go as far as she had said Brede had. She had thought Sigrid too demure and childish for that. But what bothered her now was that she had the nagging feeling that Sigrid had not allowed him – not exactly. Here too she would not have said what she had to Eirik if she had thought Eirik capable of such a thing.

On the other hand, Sigrid had continued coming to her house to “sew” thereafter, and so Hilda had convinced herself that nothing so grave must have happened after all, or else that Sigrid must have wanted it while perhaps pretending not to. Still, Hilda no longer allowed her tall cousin to lounge next to her in her bed when she went upstairs to rest.

On the whole, although she would miss both of her cousins and would need to find some other source of amusement after her next baby came and she could get about again, she was not entirely sorry that they were gone. Arranging meetings between Brede and Estrid all while arranging meetings between Eirik and Sigrid had proven to be an exhausting enterprise, and she had long since wrung all of the fun out of it.

Brede had had sense enough to leave her alone afterwards, but the baleful look on Sigrid’s face when she came into the room told her that his sister was not so wise. What did she expect her to do? Write to her father and beg him to send Eirik back to them? She had already tried asking her father to bring Sigefrith and her home again, and her father had curtly refused, and her mother had slipped in a Bible verse or two for added chastisement. She would certainly not go begging to them now for sniveling little Sigrid’s sake.

“Oh!” Sigrid gasped as Kottr jumped up and ran eagerly to her, licking her hand but peering behind her all the while in the hope that his master would be close behind. “Poor Kottr!” she wailed.

Lady Hilda turned to lay her sewing aside, and took advantage of the position to roll her eyes.

“Won’t you sit down, Sigi?” she sighed wearily, laying her arms across her belly to hint at just how great an indulgence was her consenting to receive a visitor.

Sigrid did not seem to notice. “Oh, Hilda,” she said plaintively. “I don’t know what to do. I don’t know whom to see besides you.”

“Well, dear,” she said sympathetically, “there’s nothing to be done. I’m sorry for you, though.”

“But… you don’t understand. He said… he said he would marry me,” Sigrid murmured, her lower lip trembling. Hilda thought Sigrid’s lips too fat, although Eirik had admitted that he found that one of her more attractive features – or perhaps that was why.

“Now, Sigrid, I suppose I should have warned you, but you know, sometimes men will be in a state where they may say just about anything, and not even be aware of it. He may not even remember.”

“Oh, but he does, I’m certain he does! He said he would! And… and he must!”

“There, there,” Hilda said, patting her hand awkwardly. “You may think so now, but such things happen more often than you think, even in noble families. I’m certain you will find a very nice husband, and if you are careful and clever, he will not even guess. My maid will explain what you might do.”

“But Hilda, you don’t understand!” she sobbed.

“No, dear, I don’t,” Hilda said, but she felt herself growing pale, for she thought she was in fact beginning to understand. “You don’t mean…?”

“What shall I do?” the girl sobbed.

“We shall ask my husband,” Hilda murmured, beginning to fumble about in preparation for the daunting task of rising to her feet. This was far too much for her to handle.

“Not a man!”

“Of course a man,” she snapped. “It’s a man’s problem. All the women can do for you is help you with the baby. The men will have to handle the rest of it. Anyway, my husband won’t think badly of you. He did the same thing to me.”

“But he will tell the King!”

“Someone will have to. Would you rather do it yourself?”

“And they will tell my brother!”

Hilda clenched her teeth and heaved herself up off the bench. “The whole world will know of it soon enough, dear. Come now, let’s go see Sigefrith. You know, with the baby due, I mustn’t be excited.” Certainly, there was some comfort to her in this.