When Baldur and Olafson returned, Baldur had a look of satisfaction on his face as though he had found out what he wanted to know.
They rode hard all day and most of the next before they came to the Thorenson farm. As they came over a ridge they could see the farmhouse below them. All that day they had seen no other sign of human habitation. Olafson had said Eric Thorenson was a gloomy man who avoided company.
When they reached the house Mrs Thorenson was already at the door to meet them. She was an enormous woman, at least six foot tall and broad with it. She was clad in harsh black garments and her face was ugly and forbidding. Her jaw was square, her nose hooked and her eyes like two black spiders.
‘My husband is not here,’ she said in a harsh voice.
‘Where is he?’ Baldur dismounted
