Frenchman, messire. I do not understand how you can
have seen my portrait."

The man stood for a moment twiddling the fox-brush. "I am a harper, my
Princess. I have visited the courts of many kings, though never that
of France. I perceive I have been woefully unwise."

This trenched upon insolence--the look of his eyes, indeed, carried it
well past the frontier--but she found the statement interesting.
Straightway she touched the kernel of those fear-blurred legends
whispered about her cradle and now clamant.

"You have, then, seen the King of England?"

"Yes, Highness."

"Is it true that he is an ogre--like Agrapard and Angoulaffre of the
Broken Teeth?"

His gaze widened. "I have heard a deal of scandal concerning the man.
But never that."

Katharine settled back, luxuriously, in the crotch of the apple-tree.
"Tell me about him."

Composedly he sat down upon the grass and began to acquaint her with
his knowledge and opinions concerning Henry, the fifth of that name to
reign in England. Katharine punctuated his discourse with eager
questionings, which are not absolutely to our purpose. In the main
this harper thought the man now buffeting France a just king, and, the
crown laid aside, he had heard Sire Henry to be sufficiently jovial and
even prankish. The harper educed anecdotes. He considered that the
King would manifestly take Rouen, which the insatiable man was now
besieging. Was the King in treaty for the hand of the Infanta of
Aragon? Yes, he undoubtedly was.

Katharine sighed her pity for this ill-starred woman. "And now tell me
about yourself."

He was, it appeared, Alain Maquedonnieux, a harper by vocation, and by
birth a native of Ireland. Beyond the fact that it was a savage
kingdom adjoining Cataia, Katharine knew nothing of Ireland. The
harper assured her of anterior misinformation, since the kings of
England claimed Ireland as an appanage, though the Irish themselves
were of two minds as to the justice of these pretensions; all in all,
he considered that Ireland belonged to Saint Patrick, and that the holy
man had never accredited a vicar.

"Doubtless, by the advice of God," Alain said: "for I have read in
Master Roger de Wendover's Chronicles of how at the dread day of
judgment all the Irish are to muster before the high and pious Patrick,
as their liege lord and father in the spirit, and by him be conducted
into the presence of God; and of how, by virtue of Saint Patrick's
r