"What is the story?"
"It is the royal torque of our house," he said. "It was lost when
my kinsman, Dubhtach of the Spearshafts, fell at Howth. In the song
are the names of Danish princes who fell ere it was won from us,
and they are not a few. Now your folk have avenged the loss, and
the luck of the O'Neills has come back. And, faith, it was time it
did, for mighty little luck have we had since it went from us."
Then he bent his knee in princely fashion, and kissed the hand of
the giver, and so set the torque on his neck. It bent easily, and
fastened with hooked ends. Plain enough it was that he felt that he
had recovered a treasure.
"See," said Bertric, "here is wind coming."
There were thunder clouds working up from the north and east, and a
haze was gathering overhead. Soon, in the stillness, the thunder
rumbled across the sea, and the heavy drops of the first rain fell,
bringing with them cold draughts of wind, which filled the sail for
a moment, uselessly, and were gone.
Then across the northern sea grew and spread a line of white which
swept down on us swiftly, and with a roar the squall, which came
before the wall of rain, was on us. Something lifted forward and
fled downwind like a broken-winged red and white bird.
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