Harold slammed the door, locked it, pocketed the big key, and stalked out to confront this arrogant foreigner. Artisans of precious metals lived and worked under the personal protection of both King and Church and were seldom subjected to such abuse by English nobles. He intended to say a few choice words to this foreign jackanapes, and if the noble fool chose to take offense . . . well, the fine sword Harold had brought with him into this world hung handy on the wall near his desk and he had not forgotten how to use it.
The man who confronted him was as tall as was he, tall indeed for this undernourished time, big and muscular and lithe for all of it. His clothing was all rich silks and dyed doeskins, handsomely tooled leather and gold or silver buckles. The outlines of several large ringstones showed through the soft gray leather of his riding gloves; the hilts of both sword and long dagger were bejeweled gold and so were their cases—and the gold was fine workmanship, the goldsmith Harold noted professionally.
The huge gold-and-amethyst brooch securing the nodding, deep-green ostrich plume to his baggy crushed samite cap was a true work of art, like the several small and single large order pendants hanging from the massy-gold, fiat-linked chain round his neck. The man’s face was masked, but a pair of sea-green eyes and a brick-red beard forked in the Spanish style were visible.
“Does my lord speak English?” snapped Harold. At the stranger’s curt nod, he then demanded, “All right, my lord, what is of such importance that my lord felt compelled to threaten my man with disfigurement did he not fetch me away from my work?”
Chuckling a maddeningly familiar chuckle, the richly garbed man stripped off his gloves, then unfastened his mask. It dropped to reveal the grinning face of Emmett O’Malley. ‘The importance, Harold, is that Fm damned thirsty and the bouchal ne’er even offered me a stoup of ale. Well, man, are ye just going to stand there wi’ y’r mouth open fit to catch flies?”
Over dinner, Emmett talked only of his wife, family, work and the numerous small wars in which he had taken part, related current gossip of King Brien’s court and listened to Harold talk of his own past few years in YorlL After the dinner, over pipes of Spanish tobacco and a dark, sweet wine of Malaga—the wine carefully chilled with ice cut from -the River Swale in winter and stored in sawdust and straw in the spring-house of Harold’s small establishment—O’Malley got down to business.
“Ken, I didna come to England strictly to see you. I be here wi’ a delegation of physickers from Tara; the rest be in Coventry at the summer court. I rode up to see ye and to broach on a matter.”
Harold thought Emmett had changed greatly over the years. He had not aged perceptibly, of course, but his manner now was that of a wealthy nobleman, accustomed to power and to unquestioned obedience to his commands; also, in addition to a honey-thick brogue, he had acquired a bit of longwindedness.
“Ken, be it true that the longevity boosters incorporate a universal and powerful antibiotic? I seem to recall something of the sort frae lang agone, but it wasnae my field and sae much has happened since . . . but ye helped tae master the process, an’ formulated the booster doses we brought wi’ us.”
Harold nodded. “Yes, your memory is accurate, Emmett The combination of drugs in the boosters will ward off any known disease except the common cold. Why?”
“Prince Arthur of Wales be dying, Ken, of some wasting fever. Everything has been tried—pilling, purging, bleeding, decoctions of herbs an’ God alane knows whatall, not tae mention nonstop masses an’ endless chauntings o’er the bouchal—but I think me hell nae last oot the moon. Vr King Henry sent tae my ain King hoping, I suppose, that a physician of Tara might be more learned, but they all hae told me privily that nane of them can do aught what hasnae already been done.”
The Irish nobleman puffed his claypipe back to life, then took a long pull at his wine goblet. “Had I brought any of my ain boosters wi’ me, I’d hae tried ane or twa on Arthur me ainsel’ but they all be carefully hid in the false bottom of a small casket an’ in the care of the good fithers at Fora, so I thought of ye and saddlepounded me poor arse up here. Ye may say all ye wish about the endless wars of Sweet Ireland, but for a’ that, our roads at least are good an’ well tended. Fd ne’er before heerd of mudholes in the heat of a dry summer, Ken, not till I rid the track frae Coventry tae York, I hadnae!”
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