The man who stood beside him was younger, of slender build and pale of skin. His cheeks and jaw were black with a short, dense beard. Orm studied him for a few moments. Then he said: “From your appearance, a man might suppose that you had been shaven for the priesthood.”
The slender man smiled sadly. “My beard was burned from my face one evening when I was roasting pork in a wind,” he said, “and it has not yet regained its old fullness.”
But it was at the other two beggars that Orm gazed most curiously, for of them he could make nothing. They had the appearance of being brothers, for they were both small and lean, long-eared and large-nosed, and both of them stared at him with wise brown eyes like those of squirrels. Although small, they nevertheless looked to be agile and muscular. They stood with their heads on one side, listening to the baying of the hounds; then, of a sudden, one of them placed a finger in his mouth and emitted a strange whistle, soft and vibrant. Immediately the hounds stopped howling and began to pant, as they did when no strangers were about.
“Are you trolls,” asked Orm, “or merely conjurors?”
“Neither, alas,” replied the man who had whistled, “much as we should like to be either. For we cannot conjure food from anywhere, despite our hunger.”
Orm smiled. “I shall not refuse you food,” he said, “and I do not fear your witchcraft while there is yet daylight; but such beggars as you I have never before set eyes on. No other stranger has succeeded in quieting my hounds; indeed, I sometimes find it difficult to do so myself.”
“We will teach you a way,” said the second of the two small men, “once we have got a good meal in our bellies, and food for two more in our sacks. We are wandering men who serve no master, and we understand hounds better than most men.”
Orm assured them that he would not send them away with empty sacks, and bade them enter.
“You have chosen a good time to arrive,” he said, “for you have come in the midst of a great feast, so that there will be pancakes enough for you all, and perhaps something else besides. It is a pity for my guests that you cannot play as skillfully as you whistle.”
The two small men glanced at each other and winked, but said nothing; and they and their two companions followed Orm into the house.
Orm cried to Ylva: “Here are wayfarers, both large and small, come to crave a plate of your feast-food.”
Ylva looked up from her conversation and nodded, with her thoughts elsewhere; then, as she caught sight of the two small men, her eyes grew large with wonder, and she sprang up from the bench on which she was sitting.
“The Erin Masters!” she cried. “Felimid and Ferdiad! My father’s jesters! Are you still alive? In God’s name, dear friends, what has forced you to turn beggars? Have you grown too old to practice your arts?”
The two small men stared at her in equal astonishment; then they both smiled. They dropped their staffs and beggars’ sacks, took a couple of paces toward Ylva, and then, in the same instant, they both sprang head over heels. One of them remained thus standing on his hands, on which he proceeded to jump to and fro, uttering small joyful cries, while the other tied himself into a ball and rolled toward her feet. Then they both leaped to their feet again and, gravely and expressionlessly, saluted her.
“We have not grown too old,” said one of them, “as you can see for yourself, O fairest of all King Harald’s daughters. For you must know that the years fear such masters as us; though it is a good while since you sat on your father’s knee and saw us frolic for the first time. But we are hungrier now than we were then.”
Many of the guests, both men and women, had come running up in haste to look more closely at these marvelous men who could jump on their hands; but Ylva said that the newcomers were to eat and drink in peace, and that they were to be treated with as much honor as any guest in the church. She conducted them into the house herself and placed before them the best of meat and drink; nor did they need any persuasion before they set to. The twins and Glad Ulf followed them in and sat silently in a corner, in the hope that the two little men might perform further antics; meanwhile Orm explained to his other guests who these two strange beggars were, who had so aroused their wonder.
“They were King Harald’s jesters,” he said, “though now they have no master; they come from Ireland, and are widely famed. I saw them once when I was drinking Christmas with the King; but then they were prinked out with feathers and motley, so that I did not recognize them now. What they can be doing as wandering beggars I do not know, and it puzzles me sadly; but let us sit down to our ale again, and then, in a short while, we will hear their story.”
When all the beggars had eaten their fill, the jesters offered no objection to joining the drinkers, who, after their short rest, had now begun again in earnest. Both their companions, however, sat staring silently at their empty plates. When asked the reason for their melancholy, they replied that they were weary after the hardships of their journey and the good meal that they had just eaten. So Father Willibald led them to his room, that they might rest there undisturbed. Then he took the two jesters aside and sat with them for some time in earnest conversation, which none dared to disturb; for they had been old friends ever since they had first met at King Harald’s court, and were overjoyed to renew their acquaintance after so long an interval of time.
When at last all the guests had taken their places in the church, the two jesters were placed one on either side of Father Willibald. Many questions were asked concerning them, and all were anxious to see them display their skill; but the two jesters sat supping their ale in silence, as though unconscious of the excitement they were causing.
Then Orm said: “It would be ungracious of us to demand that you should show us your skill, for you have a right to be weary after your wanderings, and no guest or stranger who receives hospitality in my house is required to pay for it. But I cannot deny that we should like to take advantage of the fact that two such masters as you have arrived in the midst of my son’s christening feast. For I know that you are both famous men, and I have always heard that no jesters in the world can match those of Ireland.”
“Chieftain,” replied one of the Irishmen, “what you heard was the truth; and I can assure you that even in Ireland there are not two men more famous for their skill than I, Felimid O’Flann, and my brother Ferdiad here, who is as good as I am. My ancestors have been royal jesters ever since our great forefather Flann Long-Ear performed, long ago, before King Conchobar MacNessa of Ulster and the heroes of the Red Branch in the hall of Emain Macha; and it has always been a law in our family that, once we have become proficient in our art and have earned the right to call ourselves master jesters, we display our skill only when commanded to do so by a person of royal blood. And this you must know, that we who jest before kings follow not only the most difficult calling in the world but also that which, more than any other calling, benefits mankind. For when a king is out of humor, and his fighting-men feel the itch of boredom, they are a danger to other men; but when good jesters perform for them, they rock with laughter over their ale and go contented to their beds and let their neighbors and subjects sleep in peace. After priests, therefore, we perform a more useful function than any other sort of men; for priests offer happiness in heaven, through the influence they have with God, while we offer happiness on earth, because of the influence we have on the humors of kings. And since there are many kings in Ireland, the jesters of that land are the best in the world, and are of many different kinds; tumblers, clowns, ventriloquists, imitators of animals, men who contort their bodies, others who contort their faces, sword-swallowers, egg-dancers, and men who snort fire through their nostrils. But the true master jester is not he who can perform one or another of these arts, but he who knows them all. And it is held by wise men in Ireland that the best among us today are almost as good as King Conaire’s three jesters were in ancient times, of whom it was said that no man who saw them could help laughing, even though he might be sitting with his father’s or his mother’s corpse on the table before him.”