The House by the Fjord by Rosalind Laker

Author:Rosalind Laker [Rosalind Laker]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Severn House Publishers
Published: 2011-01-01T05:00:00+00:00

Thirteen

Anna decided that now everything had settled down it was the ideal time for a second attempt to start reading Ingrid Harvik’s journal. She would not be disturbed by any casual callers today or by a frantic Sally, now far away in Canada and enjoying all the advantages that she had missed so much in Gardermoen. As yet there was no sign of Arvid joining her, and Anna had become even more convinced that, if it were not for his son, it was unlikely that he would ever go.

She crossed the room to take the journal from the rosemaling cupboard, which had seemed to her to be the most appropriate place in which to store this aged testimonial. Then, as before, until Sally had burst in on her, she settled back in her chair against the cushion, aware of a certain excitement in her veins, and began to read:

July 17, 1878

Today, at the age of sixteen, I am free for the first time in my life. Just ten minutes ago I parted the lace curtains at the window, holding them aside with myself silhouetted against the evening light. From there I watched the last of the mourners depart. Then I laughed, hysterically perhaps, but freedom is intoxicating when it has never been experienced before.

I was fifteen when my widowed father, although he was a cleric, virtually sold me as a bride to Erik Berdal, a brute of a man and a childless widower, who had buried two barren wives and thought to have a son by a third, hoping for better results from a younger one. My father was not a heartless man, but his weakness was gambling, and on the day of the wedding Berdal settled his debts for him, which saved my parent’s livelihood and rescued him from bankruptcy. If it had not been to prevent my father from falling into disgrace, I would have run from the church before taking the vows, but I had to accept my fate. Sadly my father is no longer here to start a new life with me, for the winter sickness took him six months ago.

Berdal has bequeathed nothing to me and neither did I expect anything from his will, which was read out by the lawyer today after the funeral. In the end he hated me for failing to become pregnant, not knowing I took every precaution against it that was known to me, and the fact that my chilly gaze unmanned him at times. So all he owned has been left to his mistress, including this house. She was scuttling all over it today after the reading of the will and wants me out by the end of the week, but I would never wish to stay where I have known only beatings and cruelty. I’m leaving early tomorrow morning for the house in the mountains that my late grandmother left me in her testimonial. It was where she spent her childhood, and although I have never seen it, I feel drawn to it as if it has long been beckoning to me.

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