He had been pleased that there had been so little grumbling from the much put-upon folk of Leeds, relieved that his high-spirited command had precipitated but little trouble during their week of residence, and most gratified that Andrew Elliot had so well controlled his heterogeneous pack of border thieves and reavers that not one hanging had been necessary and only a bare half-dozen floggings.
Although it still grated hard on his twentieth-century sensibilities to order hangings and floggings, although he still threw up his last meal in the privacy of his tent or quarters each time he returned from his expected supervisory presence while a malefactor’s back was publicly shredded to a soggy red pulp under the bite of the nine braided-leather tails of the whip, still his realistic nature forced him to realize that fear of rope and whip and sword and pistol was all that kept the wild, barbaric border Scots under any sort of discipline . . . or, for that matter, many of his own English and Welsh troopers.
At the rendezvous—the old royal campground, southeast of Manchester—Foster found the Midlands English contingents awaiting him, along with a few early, Northern Welsh . .. and a fresh surprise.
Baron Turlogh de Burgh’s English was flawless and unaccented, and, for all his relaxed manner, flawless too was his courtesy and deportment. With his blue-black, wavy hair, beard, and mustachios and blue-gray eyes, he bore a striking resemblance to his Norman forebears who had, some four hundred years before, hacked out patents of Irish nobility with dripping swords and axes. Mid-thirtyish, de Burgh was widely traveled and fluent in at least a dozen languages.
Like another Baron—Melchoro Salazar, whose ransom had duly arrived at Whyffler Hall in full, in gold and accompanied by a letter of twenty chatty, friendly pages from the nobleman himself—whom Foster well remembered, de Burgh had interspersed and added to his education at several universities during numerous campaigns in large and small wars. Brief as had been their initial conversation, it had been enough to impress Foster that the Norman-Irishman was a seasoned soldier and a born leader, as thoroughly versed in the niceties of European warfare as he, no doubt, was in the fierce, savage, hit-and-run tactics which characterized most of the endless, internecine Irish conflicts.
When once Foster had read through King Arthur’s letter of introduction, as well as the other letter, delivered clandestinely by one of the sovereign’s corps of undercover messengers, he had summoned his principal lieutenants to his pavilion. After a long and sometimes heated discussion, he ordered wine and sent for de Burgh to join them.
Seated directly across the table from the newcomer and flanked by his officers, Foster tapped the two unfolded letters lying on the board before him.
“Baron de Burgh, one of these is familiar to you, of course, since you yourself bore it here from the royal camp on the Thames; the other came to me by way of a secret courier.”
The Irishman smiled lazily. “Kings are the same, mein Herr Markgraf. All over the world, secrets are the very delight of the royal, I’ve found.”
“His Highness has detailed, herein, your very commendable qualifications, as he did also in your letter of introduction. However, the King lias left up to me the question of if and just how you should be employed. Whether I should allow you to summon and land your squadron, simply add you alone to my staff, or send you packing, which last was my first thought, sir.”
There were some assenting grumbles from the Welsh and English officers. None of them had much liking for Irishmen of any description. But the matter had been thoroughly thrashed out; they all respected the Lord Commander of Horse and, barring some untoward happening, would hold their peace.
“You were most sagacious to not try to land your men before my arrival, Baron de Burgh, for all the lands between this place and the sea were ravaged by the Irish so-called Crusaders, not too long a time ago, and you may be assured that your welcomes would have been far from cordial.”
De Burgh sighed, shaking his head of thick, shoulder-length hair. “Mein Herr von Velegrad, although the Crusade was preached the length and breadth of the country, the High King and most of the others ignored it, having their own fish to fry. The unfortunate circumstance to which you allude was entirely the doing of the late and lamented King Eamonn of Lagan. The venture was well underway before the High King had any inkling of it.”