"Has it not?" sniffed the count. "Well, perhaps he has forgotten."

"The baron promised to send the supplies immediately upon his return to Hereford. It has been, as I say, almost a month now, and the need is greater than ever. The people are at the end of their resourcesthey faint with hunger; the children cry. In some settlements, they are already starving. If relief is not forthcoming, they will die."

"In that case," replied the count, picking up a scrap of parchment and holding it at arm's length before his face, "I suggest you take up the matter with the baron himself. It is his affair, not mine."

"But-"

"We are finished here," interrupted Count Falkes. "You may go."

Aghast and confounded, Bishop Asaph stood in silence for a moment. "My lord, do you mean to say that nothing has been sent?"

"Have you taken root?" inquired the count. "The matter is concluded. You are dismissed. Go."

The churchman turned and walked stiffly from the room. By the time he reached the monastery, some semblance of reason had returned, and he had determined that the count was right. The baron had made the promise and must be held to account. Therefore, he would go to the baron and demand a reckoning. If he left at once, he could be in Hereford in four or five days. He would obtain an audience; he would implore; he would plead; he would beg the baron to make good his vow and release the promised food and supplies without delay.

IL took the two aging priests of Llanelli more than a week to reach the Neufmarche stronghold in Hereford. Though Bishop Asaph fervently hoped to travel more swiftly, he could not go faster than doddering Brother Clyro could walk, nor could he bring himself to deny the needy who, upon seeing the passing monks, ran to beg them for prayers and blessings.

Weary and footsore, they reached Hereford toward evening of the eighth day and found their way to the Abbey of Saints James and John, where they took beds for the night. They were led by the porter to the guest lodge and provided with basins of water to wash and later joined the priests for prayers and a simple supper before going to sleep. After prime the next morning, the bishop left his companion at prayer and made his way to the baron's fortress. Set on a bluff overlooking the river Wye, the castle could be seen for miles in every direction: an impressive structure built of stone and enclosed by a deep, steep-sided ditch filled with water diverted from the river.

It was not the first fortress on this site; the previous one had been burned to the ground long ago during a battle with the English. The Ffreinc had rebuilt it, but in stone this time; larger, stronger, bristling with battlements, walls, and towers, it was built to last. Its latest inhabitant had extended the grounds around the stronghold to include common grazing lands, cattle pens, granaries, and barns.

The bishop paused before entering the castle gate. "Great of Might," he murmured, lifting a hand toward heaven, "you know our need. Let relief be swiftly granted. Amen." He then proceeded through the gate, where he was met by a gatekeeper in a short red tunic. "Pax vobiscum," said the bishop.

"God with you," answered the gateman, taking in the bishop's robe and tonsure. "What is your business here, father?"

"I seek audience with Baron Neufmarche, if you please. You may tell him that Bishop Asaph of Elfael is here on a matter of highest importance.

The servant nodded and led the cleric across a wooden bridge over the water ditch, through another gate, and into an inner yard, where he waited while the gatekeeper announced his presence to a page, who conveyed the request for an audience to the baron. While he awaited the baron's summons, Bishop Asaph watched the people around him as they went about their daily affairs. He found himself thinking about what a strange race they were, these Ffreinc, made up of many contradictions. Industrious and resourceful, they typically pursued their interests with firmness of purpose and an admirable ardour. Yet from what he had seen of the marchogi in Elfael, they could just as quickly abandon themselves to dejection and despondency when events betrayed them. Devout, stalwart, and reverent in the best of times, they also seemed inordinately subject to weird caprices and silly superstitions. A handsome people, hale and strong bodied, with long, straight limbs and clear eyes set in broad, open faces-they nevertheless seemed to suffer from a rare abundance of infirmities, maladies, and ailments.

All these things and arrogant, too. They were, the bishop concluded, fiercely ambitious. In appetite for acquisition: insatiable. In intensity for mastery: rapacious. In aspiration for achievement: merciless. In desire for domination: inexorable.

However, and he had always to remember this, they could be fairminded and loyal, and when it suited them, they displayed a laudable sense of justice-at least with their own. The English and Cymry were treated poorly for the most part, it was true; but the capacity for evenhanded tolerance was not entirely lacking. The bishop hoped he would encounter some of this fairness in his dealings with the baron today.

Presently, the page returned to announce that the baron would be pleased to see him at once, and Asaph was brought into a large, stoneflagged anteroom, where he was offered a cup of wine and some bread before making his way into the baron's audience chamber-an enormous oak-panelled room with a narrow arched window of leaded glass that kept out the wind but allowed the light to come streaming through.

"Bishop Asaph!" boomed the baron as the priest was announced. "Pax vobiscum!" He crossed the chamber in long, quick strides and held out his hand in the peculiar greeting of Ffreinc noblemen. "It is good to see you again." The bishop grasped the offered hand somewhat awkwardly. "You should have told me you were coming! I would have had a dinner prepared in your honour. But come! Come, sit with me. I will have some refreshment brought, and we will eat together."

The effusive greeting banished Bishop Asaph's worst fears. "Thank you, Baron Neufmarche, but your servant was kind enough to offer me bread and wine just now. I would not presume to keep you from your affairs a moment longer than necessary."

"So earnest," observed the baron lightly. "It is a most welcome interruption, bishop. You have an advocate in me. I hope you know that."

"You cannot imagine how it gratifies me to hear those words, Baron Neufmarche. You are very kind."

Neufmarche brushed aside the compliment. "It is nothing. However, I can see that you are troubled-and I think it must be something serious indeed to bring you from your beautiful valley." He gestured his guest to a chair beside his own. "Here, my friend; sit down and tell me what is distressing you."

"To be blunt, it is about the food supplies you promised to send."

"Yes? I trust they were put to good use. I assure you, the grain and meat were the finest I could lay hands to at short notice."

"I am certain they were," Bishop Asaph conceded. "But we never received them."

"Nothing? Nothing at all?" wondered the baron. Asaph shook his head slowly. "How is that possible?"

"That is what I have come to discover," replied the bishop, who then told of his conversation with Count Falkes. "In short," concluded the bishop, "the count gave me to know in no uncertain terms that the supplies had never been sent-or, if they had, they never arrived. He suggested I take up the matter with you"-the bishop spread his hands-"so here I am."

"I see," The baron pursed his lips in a frown of vexation and ran a broad hand through his long, dark hair. "This is most disturbing. I made arrangements for the supplies the same day I returned from Elfael, and was glad to do it. Why, the wagoners reported a successful delivery with no difficulties along the way."