body, even though you mean to insure payment, and even though you
actually do guarantee payment. After all, who among you will be in a
position to guarantee payment if all the flocks die? The cold
weather may not let up until the first of June or even later. In
that case the sheep will all die. It won't go very far, this tiny
haycock, not for so many. It will not, I tell you.

But what are you going to do with the hay? If everyone else loses
his flocks, everyone but you, what enjoyment will there be in owning
it? And what benefit? asked Jon.

That does not concern me! replied the old man. That concerns them.
It was they who decided the size of the flocks they undertook to
feed this winter, not I. Besides, they could have cut as much hay as
I did, even more, for they still have their eyesight. Their failure
is due to their own laziness and bad judgment. That's what ails
them! Ruins them!

But you won't be able to take this great big haystack with you into
the life eternal, said Jon. The time is coming when you will have to
part with it. Then it will be used as the needs require. And what
good will it do you? What are you going to do with it?

I am going to keep it, answered Brandur. I intend to keep it right
here on the knoll, keep it in case the haying should be poor next
summer. There may be a poor growth of grass and a small hay crop;
there may be a volcanic eruption and the ashes may poison the grass,
as they have done in former years. Now, do you understand me?

So saying, Brandur tottered off towards the house to indicate that