Modern Icelandic Plays | Page 4

spider hanging down from the beam? I mean to

shoot and break her thread.
Oddny.
You are always up to some tomfoolery.
Gudfinna.
Leave the poor creature in peace! It has done you no harm.
The Boy (laughing).
Do you think she'd break her legs if she should happen to fall down on
the floor?
Gudfinna.
I won't have it! Destroying a spider's web is sure to bring bad luck, and
you'll end by tearing the window-pane with your dart.
The Boy.
Kari has told me of a man who broke a bow-string with one shot, and
that from way off. (Shoots.)
Gudfinna.
If you don't stop, you shall wear your shoes with the holes in them.
The Boy (pulling the dart out of the beam).
Would you rather have me shoot your ear-locks?
Gudfinna.
Are you crazy, lad? You might hit my eyes.
The Boy.

I must have some kind of fun. I think I'll have a shot at Oddny's plaits.
Oddny.
If you dare!
The Boy (laughing).
If I have bad luck, you will look at Kari with only one eye.
Oddny.
You need a good spanking.
Gudfinna.
Kari ought not to have given you that dart.
The Boy (going to the spider, makes a fanning motion with his hand).
Up, old spinning-woman, if you bode good! Down, if you bode ill! Up,
if you bode good! Down, if you bode ill!
Gudfinna.
You are awfully hard on your shoes, worse than a grown man. I hope
you don't walk on the sharpest stones just for fun?
Oddny.
Of course he does!
The Boy.
The sheep were so restless to-day. Some of them came near slipping
away from me.
Oddny.

If they had, you wouldn't be riding such a high horse now!
Gudfinna.
Have they been bad to you, laddie? Do you never feel timid when you
are alone so much?
The Boy.
Sometimes I keep thinking what I should do if a mad bull came tearing
down the mountains.
Gudfinna.
Don't speak of them! They are the worst monsters in the world-- except,
perhaps, the skoffin.
The Boy.
What is a skoffin?
Gudfinna.
Don't you know that? When a rooster gets to be very old, he lays an egg,
and if that's hatched, it becomes a skoffin. It kills a man by just looking
at him, and the only thing that can slay it is a church-blessed silver
bullet. Indeed, there are many things you have to be careful of, my
child. Are you not afraid of the outlaws? They're not good, those
fellows; they go about in skins with the wool on them and carry long
sticks with ice-spurs, and that at midsummer. Have you ever seen
anything of them?
The Boy.
No, but yesterday I pretty near got scared. There came a man with a big
bag under his arm. I didn't know him at first, but it was only Arnes.
Gudfinna.

And what did he want of you?
The Boy.
He asked me to show him the way to a spring. He was thirsty.
Gudfinna.
You had better not have too much talk with him. (Hands him the shoes.)
There! Now they will last till to-morrow anyway. (Kneels down, pulls
out a box, and examines its contents.)
Enter Halla from her chamber.
Halla.
It is time for the sheep to be milked.
The Boy.
I am going now to drive them home. I was waiting for my shoes.
Halla.
Have you seen anything of the cows to-day?
The Boy.
No. (To Oddny.) When I get rich I'll give you a cow's tail to tie up your
plaits with.
Oddny.
Hold your tongue!
[Exit the Boy.
Halla (smiling).

I heard him teasing you a while ago.
Oddny.
He's forever pestering me about Kari-- as if I cared!
Halla (with a little laugh).
Well, Sigrid doesn't take such good care of Magnus's clothes as you of
Kari's. [Exit.
Oddny (is silent for a moment and looks at the door).
If I were a widow and owned a farm, the men would be noticing me too,
even if I had been nothing but a poor orphan servant girl before I
married-- like some others.
Gudfinna (rising, a pair of stockings in her hand).
What are you talking about? (Pushes the box under the bed.)
Oddny.
Do you know who was Halla's father?
Gudfinna.
That is what no one seems to know. Some would have it that he was a
parson. (She darns the stockings.)
Oddny.
Yes, or a vagabond. There were also some ugly whispers about a stain
on her birth.
Gudfinna.
You'd better bridle your tongue!

Oddny.
I am not so dull as you imagine. When Halla thinks no one is looking,
she doesn't take her eyes from Kari. And she has made him overseer;
that seems queer to others besides me.