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The women started off for Winnipeg a few days later, walking through the snow-white woods, over the frozen fields, a good three days' journey. They tied their belongings on to sleds. Each one drew her own sled. This was known as going washing in Winnipeg. Torfi Torfason remained at home one night longer.
So Torfi Torfason has sold his sheep and his cows and his horses, torn himself away from his land, and journeyed to America where the raisins grow all over the place and where a much brighter future awaits us and our children.
After a little while the fisherman gets up again, lights the lantern, and fares forth. But even soft iron can be whetted sharp, and now Torfi Torfason springs out of bed a third time and out into the hall after the fisherman. Either you leave the dog alone or both of us will go, I and the dog, says Torfi Torfason, and it was only a matter of seconds till he laid hands on his master.
A few not very well washed Icelanders, their old hats in their toil-worn hands, stood over the grave and droned sadly. Torfi Torfason had seen to it that every body would get coffee and fritters and Christmas cakes. But when autumn came, the weather grew cold and the snow fell, and then his wife had a new baby who filled the log cabin with fresh crying. This was a Canadian Icelander.
Well, I can't bring myself to chase you away, poor wretch we're all stray dogs in the eyes of the Lord in any case, that's what we all are.... Time passed on and Torfi Torfason fished in the lake and lived in a hut on some outlying island with his boss, a red-bearded man, who made money out of his fishing fleet as well as by selling other fishermen tobacco, liquor, and twine.
'Nevermore. And Torfi Torfason thinks of his ewes and his cows and his horses and all that he has lost. Then all of a sudden a wretched bitch waddled out from the woods into his path. It was a vagrant bitch, as thin as a skeleton, and so big in the belly that she walked with difficulty. Her dugs dragged along the snow, for she was in pup.
For she is our good Mamma, our Mamma, our Mamma. God bless our Mamma and our little brother's Mamma. But the boy still kept on crying. And Torfi Torfason ate his meal like a man who is trying to eat something in a hurry at a concert. The day after, Torfi Torfason started off. A Canadian winter day, blue, vast, and calm, with ravens hovering over the snow-covered woods.
And she had big eyes and stared like a foreigner at the farmer's wife and mooed every time anybody walked past the door. I don't think poor Mulley will be able to feed us all this winter, said Torfi Torfason. Have you thought of anything? asked Torfi Torfason's wife. Nothing unless to go north and fish in the lake. It's said that those who go there often do well for themselves.
But that summer there was an epidemic among the children, and Torfi Torfason lost two of his four, a six-year old girl and a three-year old boy. Their names were Jon and Maria. The neighbours helped him to make a coffin. A clergyman was brought from a distance, and he buried Jon and Maria, and Torfi Torfason paid what was asked.
Oh, it's not much of a sheep country here in the west, said Torfi Torfason. But there's fishing in the lake ... And if you have decided to go south and get yourself a 'job', as they say here, then ... If you write to Iceland, be sure to ask about our old cow Skjalda, how she is getting along. Our old Skjalda. Good old cow. Silence.
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