between two millstones, they couldn’t remember a thing about what Art had been saying to his factors.’
‘That was when you had ravens not starlings.’
‘Oh starlings would have been worse, especially if they were Cockney ones like the pair that plague me these days. Now: Badon Hill. It was a nasty affair. Two weeks with a few thousand boisterous warriors, lots of food, plenty of booze, and no sanitation. It got so bad the decision was made to fight our way out of there before we passed out from the stench. Many got killed, but that is the way of things, and there were many for my Wælcyrie to bring as new recruits for Walhalla. Having made sure that the other Ge-men were shattered and disorganised, Cerdic was able to demand that he got his right of way for his ships, and some new trading posts thrown in too.’
‘He was very clever.’
‘Clever, cunning, crafty, canny, careful Cerdic. The Brits felt they had got good value for their money as they got forty years of peace. They also had a new hero – Arthur.’ Grimm let the latest empty can drop to his feet and started drinking from its replacement.
‘And after Badon Hill?’ Jamie prompted, surprised that his father had not yet returned, but knowing that time spent with Grimm was time that never seemed to end.
After a can-emptying guzzle followed by a few good fume-laden belches, the old man dumped yet another emptied can. ‘Oh I had to bide my time after Badon Hill and lay careful plans so that, when the next opportunity came along, my Ge-men would ensure that the only parts of the island the Wealas had left for themselves were the hard wet nasty places on the edge. I am sure it was Cerdic having Wealas blood that stopped me seeing just what he was up to. Fortunately I retained some influence with him and I was able to make sure that his sons married only my descendants: that way I was able to better guess what they were up to and to influence their decisions. Mixed blood: it’s a problem. Just look at the English today. First my constantly drunk and excessively violent Franks marry Gauls and turn into the effeminate French. Then my beloved, mead-sodden Norse marry Frenchies and become boorish Normans, and then they intermarry with my lovely English: so sad, so very sad.’ Grimm wiped what may have been a tear from the puckered empty socket where his left eye should have been.
Jamie looked, and watched his father who seemed to have finished his chat with the riders and was merely looking at some of the bikes with their sponsor be-badged covers. ‘So why is it that what actually happened is so different from the tales told about Arthur in later days?’ he asked the old man, aware that time was, in fact, actually running out.
‘Where were the chivalrous knights in armour on their stomping steamy steeds? If you mean the Ge-man mercenaries in their boiled leather and rusty maille riding nasty knobbly nags then yes they were there, for I have told you so. And the steeds? Charging into the ranks of the enemy? Oh do grow up. Horses are for riding to and from a fight. No one in their right mind uses them in a battle. Fine if you want to run down a broken enemy or pick off stragglers from a raiding party, but against a shield-wall? Ask the Normans in 1066 about that after the battle at Senlac they had enough dead horses to feed the army for a month. It is even worse if the shield-wall has plenty of archers behind it. Only a fool would send massed horsemen against well dug in and disciplined warriors on foot. Excalibur? Do you mean Caliburn? The sword Cerdic owned? Hmm? A rather nice blade that. Cynric saw it being thrown into a pond by a Wealas after he and the boys had killed the Brit prince Natanleod; I think it may have been Natanleod’s as it had lots of gold and jewels on the hilt. They did that you know, the Wealas; threw swords into ponds and rivers. I keep telling you that they are a strange people. Did Arthur have it thrown back into the lake as he lay dying? Don’t be stupid. Cerdic was one of mine and my kin would never waste a good blade. Cynric had it on his father’s death and his son after him and his son after him. Last time I saw it, it was being given to Edgar after the death of his father, Ælfred, England’s darling. I lost track of it after that, no doubt it is lying buried in some field after being buried in some Viking’s guts.’
‘What about some of the characters you have not mentioned, like Mordred? Morgan? Merlin?’
‘Never heard of them: they never existed. No, don’t argue with me, for I was there and you weren’t.’
Jamie went to say something.
Grimm held out his left hand, which still had some of the hamburger bits attached to it as well as a now-squeezed Mars Bar: ‘Stop it: Mordred, Morgan, Merlin must be the figments of some second rate tale-tellers who stuck them in as padding to stretch out a tale that didn’t fit the pattern their audience of fat flatulent French and nasty noisome Normans expected. They may have been willing to tell lies, but I’m not. I have told you what is true, or as true as an old man’s memory allows, for although I was then a young man, I am now an old man.’
A starling flew in and sat on Grimm’s left shoulder. ‘Kwik, Gov, ver’s a Rozzer on ’is way,’ it squawked.
Another flew in and sat on Grimm’s right shoulder. ‘’Tis true, yer worship, ver Law iz on its way ’ere.’
Jamie shook his head and pointed. ‘That was what I intended to tell you, Grimm, not question you about your tale.’
Grimm turned and looked where Jamie was pointing. There, through a thinning crowd, came a policeman with a sharp-faced woman and a worried-looking man at his side.
The woman, in turn, pointed. ‘That’s him, Constable; him what stole our quality beer.’
Grimm started to mutter. ‘“Quality beer” my ...’
‘Just go, Grimm.’
‘Right young Leofwine, must be off, other young boys to offer information and advice to.’ Grimm turned and, for an old man, made good speed away from his pursuers, the remaining lager cans clanking together as he went. The two starlings, Huggin and Munnin, left his shoulders and took to dive-bombing the policeman. From somewhere unknown, for dogs are banned from speedway tracks, two sleek grey wolflike hounds appeared and grabbed onto the policeman’s hi-vis jacket, impeding his progress.
Jamie’s dad pushed through the group of people laughing at the law’s difficult pursuit. ‘Who was that? Not Uncle Albert?’
‘Or was it Grimm? It is funny, for when he used to tell me tales when I was younger, he always gave the tale a moral.’
‘A shame he didn’t this time.’ Mr White ran nicotine stained fingers through his thinning hair.
‘I think,’ said Jamie, ‘I think that I can come up with a moral of my own, dad.’
‘And that is, son?’
‘Names do not matter; it is your deeds that count.’
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