Saint John of Barrow, the fourth, the youngest and the least of the retinue, hitherto unmentioned, a quiet child with two missing front teeth and shocking green eyes, waves the black cloth over his head, back and forth, to signify that they are infected and to approach no closer and the four Gaels start calling to them in at least two different languages: Manx and Gaelic, and possibly there are smattered smidgeons of Catalan amongst their confusion of words.

‘They will not be diverted. They can see we aren’t infected,’ William says.

‘What are they saying?’ de Flunkl asks.

‘The one on the right is questioning the legitimacy of our eldest sons.’

‘Tell them to go back to their mountains, and to take their skinny sheep and phlegmatic wives with them,’ de Flunkl says.

‘My Lord, they have the higher ground.’

‘Translate, miscegenist,’ de Flunkl says and William does so, and one of the Gaels, the eldest, whose vermillion cape is folded in on itself and squirming as though it is alive, talks back in that queer guttural language de Flunkl knows to be mountain Gaelic. It sounds like the sheep the Gaels and peasants live in such close proximity with, and he speculates whether some foul Gaelic crossbreeding accounts for the choking sound of their r’s.

‘He says they have presents for us.’

‘Tell them,’ de Flunkl says, ‘these heathen sons of bitches that marry their own slaves and who, without papal recommendation, propagate with their own nieces, and who have never seen a looking glass save the ones made by the pools of blood their women leave when they menstruate shamelessly in public. Tell these hairy sodomites that give their mothers and sisters control over them with their barbaric courts they can only hold in shanty huts. Tell them that they will have to kill us if they are exacting a toll because this is not their highway, this is not their path, this is not their country, this is not their valley. It is the king’s land, guarded by much deeds, held by esteemed Christian men with mighty forces and many grateful dependents.’

William, looking at his master out of the corner of his eye, translates perhaps eight words from his statement. It seems much too short a translation for de Flunkl’s liking, but nevertheless the man with the crawling, bustling, demonic cape answers.

‘He says they are Christians, and that he was just talking to the king yesterday and that he said it is most definitely their land.’

‘Dubious claimants, I’d say,’ de Flunkl says, looking like he is adding some large figure in his head.

‘I think they have their own ones.’

‘Oh, I see. Tell them if they are Christians they shall render unto Caesar, but also tell them that they’re not. And also say they’ll forfeit their tongues for questioning orders with such speechifying.’