Anna Hansdatter: Hunger In the Dale

After Brother Isaak left Skurdal, Else, the junior milkmaid, visited Anna’s hut, bringing a bunch of large onions from the servants’ garden.

Anna was delighted. “Thank you, dear Else. These look delicious! Please come in.”

“You are welcome, dear.” Entering the hut, she saw Anna’s mother. “Hello, Ingeborg, are you well?” Ingeborg smiled and nodded, but said nothing.

“She does not speak at all any more, just sits and stares at the hearth.” Anna put on the tea-kettle. “She only eats if I feed her, and eats precious little even then.”

“I am sorry,” Else said. And after a polite pause, “I just heard some good news. Mister Skurdal has agreed to hold your wedding at Christmastide.”

“Oh, Else, that is wonderful!” Anna smiled. “Does this mean he is no longer so hateful against Nels?”

“Not entirely. Mister still is full of bitterness, but the monk made him promise to allow the wedding. He said it is the only way that Mister can heal.”

“Thank God for Brother Isaak. If not for him, we would have been evicted by now, or worse,” Anna mused.

“No servant could have stopped Amund taking any horse he wanted. God forgive me for speaking ill of the dead, but … but …” Tears filled Else’s eyes, and she could not continue.

“Dear Else, I know, I know.” Anna reached over to touch her hand.

Else pulled her hand away. “You do not know! No one knows!” She began sobbing hysterically, throwing herself into Anna’s arms, burying her face on the older girl’s breast.

“Oh God, oh dear God,” whispered Anna, rocking the girl gently. “Else, dear, dear Else.” After a long pause, she whispered in her ear, “did he rape you?”

Else’s body was heaving and trembling. Without raising her face, she blurted out, “Last winter. I hadn’t even got my period!”

Anna wept along. Her tears fell into Else’s hair as they held and rocked each other. Ingeborg rocked in her chair and stared at the hearth, smiling blankly.

They wept for many minutes, then looked in each other’s eyes. Anna whispered, “Else, dear Else … no one knows … he raped me, too.”

“Anna! Oh, no! God help us, Anna, we are lost.”

“We will survive, Else. Now we have each other.”

“Does Nels know?”

“Of course not, Nels must never know. No one must know. No one. But you and I, now we share it. We may speak of it freely, but only between the two of us.”

Else nodded. “I have to go back now.”

“No one,” repeated Anna.

(Continued)