I restored the gnupg directory and re-ran the update. Again I got the error:
gpg: error reading key: No public keygpg
I noticed the errors during the install and pamac pop’ed up the errors after… but evidently, this is NOT a real issue. Nothing to be “fixed”, I can install packages without error.
Interesting that the recovery options did not result in a working keyring for me.
Edit: I believe the reason the recovery steps did not work, they are not complete. At least for the steps I reviewed. It appears the best way to fix the keyring is by running:
$ sudo systemctl start pacman-init
The process does not produce output while it runs, just be patient. The output can be reviewed via journalctl.