Scales of Retribution

by Cora Harrison

  Little Cormac was wide awake. His slate-blue eyes were fixed on the object held in Eileen’s hand. It was a cat, beautifully carved from wood and wearing a leather collar to which was stitched a tiny brass bell. Each time the cat was waved the bell chimed, and the baby’s head followed the delicate clear sound.

  ‘How lovely!’ exclaimed Mara dropping on her knees beside Eileen and holding out her arms for the baby. ‘Where did you get that?’

  ‘Blár O’Connor brought it yesterday afternoon,’ explained Eileen. ‘I was walking down the road to the law school when he came along on his horse. He said that he found it on top of a shelf in his workshop and he guessed that his son had carved it for your baby. Look, it’s a bigger version of the one on the cradle.’

  ‘So it is.’ Mara took the wooden toy and admired it, stroking the sleek back and smiling at the roughness of the tiny whiskers.

  ‘He’s so clever, little Cormac,’ said Eileen proudly. ‘He’s so alert for his age.’ She took the toy back from Mara and set the bell jingling again, and once more the baby’s head moved.

  ‘And to think that he is not two weeks old yet,’ she exclaimed.

  Mara held the baby close, touching the velvet cheek with her lips and rocking him in her arms. Cormac twisted his head towards her and began to cry.

  ‘He’s hungry, better give him back to me.’ Eileen stretched out her arms and Mara reluctantly put the baby back. In any case, it was time for her to return to work.

  The five boys were in their places when she came in, and as soon as she had settled herself in her chair the door opened and Fachtnan, looking a little pale, entered.

  ‘I’m feeling much better,’ he said hastily, ‘so I thought I would come and join you. Are you going to discuss the murder?’

  ‘I think we will.’ Mara immediately abandoned her plans. ‘Aidan, perhaps you can do the writing for us. Take a fresh stick of charcoal.’ She waited until Aidan was standing beside the board, which Cumhal kept well whitewashed, before she went on. ‘Now what’s the first thing to do?’

  ‘List of possible suspects.’ Moylan managed to get this in before any of the others.

  ‘What are the most usual motives for a secret and unlawful killing?’ asked Mara looking around.

  ‘Easy! A wish for gain, anger, fear and revenge.’ They all chimed this in chorus. A lot of the work at the law school was memorizing these wisdom texts, many of which, optimistically, sometimes, began with the word ‘easy’.

  ‘Put in the relations first, Aidan, these will cover the “wish for gain” I would think, wouldn’t you, Brehon?’ Hugh looked at her for approval, and at her nod Aidan began to write on the whitened board in his large, scrawling hand.

  ‘Does Nuala get anything, Brehon?’ Aidan hesitated with charcoal in hand.

  ‘Nothing worth having,’ said Fachtnan firmly.

  ‘What!’ exclaimed Enda. ‘But she is the female heir. She must get the house and enough land to graze seven cows.’

  ‘Apparently, Malachy made a will leaving his new – well, half-new – house to Caireen, and all the possessions in it,’ said Mara, looking thoughtfully at Fachtnan. He flushed and looked away, and she decided not to ask him how he knew. Undoubtedly Nuala, in her honest way, had told him all the facts when she proposed marriage to him. ‘I’m not sure that the will, made by somebody in Galway, is actually valid,’ she continued. ‘And the house is the same house, just extended, and a will made in the kingdom of the Burren should have been made by a lawyer qualified in Brehon law.’

  ‘I’d say that Nuala would be quite happy to leave it as it is,’ said Fachtnan.

  Enda nodded and said, ‘So next we have Oisín. How much clan land does he get, Brehon?’

  ‘Twenty acres of mature oaks,’ said Mara steadily, and forced herself to add, ‘and these would be valuable to him for making casks: something that he has to buy at the moment.’

  ‘Well, I think that Nuala should be on the list if Oisín is on – it would be about the same amount of land.’ Shane was great friends with Oisín and enjoyed many a game of chess with him.

  ‘Well, I agree with Shane,’ said Aidan, and then when Fachtnan said nothing he wrote up Nuala’s name.

  ‘Now,’ continued Aidan, moving to a new part of the board and writing the word ANGER with heavy emphasis, ‘who do we have for here?’

  ‘In this case, I think we should have “Anger” and “Revenge” together,’ said Enda.

  ‘You should have said that first.’ Aidan carefully wiped the word with the damp sponge from the windowsill, patted it dry with a piece of linen from his pouch and then wrote the two words.

  ‘I’m afraid that I would put Nuala on this list, also,’ said Enda with an apologetic glance at Fachtnan.

  ‘And Murrough, because of Rafferty,’ said Moylan hurriedly.

  ‘And Blár O’Connor because of his son,’ said Shane.

  ‘What do you mean by “dispossession” and “greed”?’ Hugh looked puzzled as he read the entry for Nuala.

  Aidan replied briefly, ‘She was kicked out of the house and Malachy was trying to take her farm at Rathborney away from her.’ He then added a few words to Nuala’s entry, wrote the next two names, and stood back to allow everyone to read the board.

  GREED

  Daughter: Nuala – land to graze seven cows

  Wife: Caireen – house

  Stepson: Ronan – physician’s business

  Inheritor of remaining clan land: Oisín – 20 acres of oaks

  ANGER & REVENGE

  Nuala – dispossession, and anger at her father’s greed

  Murrough – poisoning of his dog

  Blár O’Connor – death of his son, Bláreen

  ‘I’ve just thought of something interesting,’ said Enda. ‘I wonder if you would think of it as being a possible motive, Brehon? If Caireen managed to get you to convict someone, say for instance, Nuala, not only would she get her house, and her son get the position of physician in the Burren, but she would also get the fine. And that would be . . .’ he paused and made a quick calculation. ‘I make it forty-two séts doubled for the secrecy – that’s eighty-four – plus another seven for Malachy’s honour price, so that’s ninety-one séts or forty-five and a half ounces of silver. Now gentlemen,’ he looked around at his fellow scholars, ‘and lady,’ he made a courtly bow in Mara’s direction, ‘is, or is not, Caireen a woman who might commit murder for the sake of a house, a position for her darling son, land for seven cows and a nice little fortune of forty-five and a half ounces of silver?’

  ‘She’d look pretty stupid, though, if she were convicted of the murder,’ said Shane bluntly. ‘Then she’d be the one that would have to pay the fine.’

  ‘She is stupid,’ said Enda. His very blue eyes sparkled. ‘But who would the fine go to if she was convicted of the murder?’

  ‘Who do you think?’ Mara watched him with interest.

  ‘Nuala?’ asked Fachtnan hopefully.

  ‘No,’ said Enda. ‘I wouldn’t think so. A daughter can only inherit if the father mentions her in his will – and then only the limited . . . I know,’ he suddenly burst out, ‘of course it goes to the nearest male relation in his clan.’

  ‘So your son-in-law, Oisín, would be the one who would get the forty-five and a half ounces of silver.’ Hugh beamed congratulations at Mara.

  And he is certainly a man who would make very good use of that substantial sum of money, thought Mara. Aloud she said, ‘That’s right,’ in as matter-of-fact a way as she could. It was important that the boys considered all aspects of the case and were not embarrassed about discussing a relative. She looked back at the board and their eyes followed hers.

  ‘So now we have six suspects,’ mused Fachtnan. ‘What about “fear” without “revenge”, Brehon? Have we anyone for that?’

  ‘I don’t think so, do you?’ Mara looked around at her scholars.

  ‘Usually a case of blackmail, isn’t it?’ reflected Moylan. ‘I’ve certainly n
ever picked up a hint of anything like that to do with Malachy; has anyone else?’

  Heads were shaken. Nuala might be one to talk to about this, if she weren’t so prickly and bad-humoured at the moment, thought Mara, but decided not to mention her name. The scholars had enough to exercise their brains for the moment.

  ‘There’s something very interesting about this list,’ she said looking at the board. ‘Can you think what it might be, Fachtnan?’

  ‘No, Brehon.’ He shook his head, looking at her in a bewildered way.

  ‘Well, that was hardly a fair question,’ she said hastily, ‘because I have information that you don’t have. Five of the six people on that board had access to Fachtnan, yesterday afternoon – could have made him very ill, could have tried to poison him, in fact.’

  ‘Caireen and Ronan at Caherconnell,’ said Hugh.

  ‘And Blár O’Connor passed by yesterday afternoon with a rattle for my little son, and Nuala came to talk to Eileen about herbs. Oisín, of course, lives here. The only one that could not have been guilty of trying to poison Fachtnan was Murrough.’ As she spoke she was conscious of a feeling of thankfulness. She was fond of Murrough and they shared a love of the great dogs that he bred.

  Aidan’s jaw dropped. ‘Oh, Brehon, I forgot to tell you,’ he said. ‘Murrough came over yesterday afternoon with a message for you to be careful not to let Bran run free in Croagh South, as the shepherd has laid bait there stuffed with wolfsbane.’

  ‘So each one of our six suspects could also have attempted to murder Fachtnan,’ said Hugh with interest.

  ‘Or at least frighten us off,’ amended Shane.

  Thirteen

  Uraicecht Becc

  (Small Primer)

  The physician has an honour price of seven séts and this does not increase for any reason as a master of the profession has the same honour price as an ordinary physician.

  Before a physician is allowed to practise in a kingdom, he has to have public recognition. This is bestowed by an examination of the training and proficiency by two recognized physicians.

  A fine is extracted if the physician does not cure a curable illness, either through lack of knowledge or malice.

  The sun was still hot by the time for the midsummer supper arrived, but it had moved from the south to the west, and Mara’s garden, bright with lilies, peonies and roses, was now patched with blobs of shade.

  Brigid had laid out the supper on three long linen-draped trestle tables in front of the east-facing Brehon’s house – the food arranged in baskets and platters down the centre. Domhnall and Aislinn were wild with excitement, shrieking to their father as each new item was laid on the tables. Mara, holding Cormac for a few precious minutes before the guests arrived, smiled at their excitement.

  ‘It’s all the colours of the rainbow! Green peas, red strawberries, blueberries!’ Aislinn, like her mother, had a great eye for colour, though Domhnall, who was growing fast and eating hugely, was more excited by the long coils of sausages and the mounds of cakes of all sizes and shapes. They both wandered up and down, waiting impatiently for the guests to come back from the meadows and the rocky fields of the Burren. Eventually they appeared, looking like a flock of white birds in their snowy léinte. As they came nearer, Mara could see something else and she smiled as Aislinn screamed, ‘Look, look Mamó, see what they’re wearing!’

  ‘What a sight!’ murmured Mara to Eileen, as she came over and held out her arms for the baby.

  Each of the boys and girls wore a garland of summer flowers: harebells, ragged robin, pincushion flowers, hawkweeds, foxgloves, orchids and hedge roses were strung together to hang around their necks. The damp meadows as well as the stony grykes had all been robbed to decorate the young revellers. Mairéad O’Lochlainn even wore a crown of tiny butterfly orchids, the snowy-white of the blooms contrasting well with her head of magnificent red curls. As they came down the road, linked arm to arm, they all sang lustily the ancient midsummer bonfire-night song:

  Choose the hazel of the rocks,

  Choose the willow of the stream,

  Choose the alder of the marshes,

  Choose the birch of the waterfall,

  Choose the rowan of the shade,

  Choose the yew of resilience

  Choose the elm of the moorland.

  Almost all the girls and some of the boys bore the flowers of the yarrow plant in their hands, playfully swiping at each other with the stems. Traditionally the yarrow was supposed to protect against illness in the coming year, but it had other uses, too. Mara had no doubt that these stems would be carefully preserved until bonfire time. Elderly country people told their grandchildren that if you saw the face of a loved one as the yarrow flared up in the flames, it would mean that a marriage would take place before midsummer’s day came around again. Touching a loved one beforehand with the stem was supposed to help that process.

  ‘Look, Mamó.’ Domhnall and Aislinn came running over. In the space of a couple of minutes Sorcha, with her clever fingers, had made each a garland and was now busy twisting some long stems of gillyflowers together to make one for little Manus. On an impulse, Mara bent down and picked some soft-stemmed buttercups, piercing them with a fingernail and threading them together to make a small crown for Cormac.

  ‘My little prince,’ she murmured as she handed him over to Eileen, and, accompanied by her two grandchildren, went down the road to greet her guests. Mairéad O’Lochlainn, she noticed, had already whacked Enda three times with her yarrow stem. Young love, she thought tolerantly, and then her eyes went anxiously to Nuala.

  Alone among all the young people, Nuala had not gone to the trouble of making a garland, but had stuck a few of the bright yellow flowers, known as devil’s toenails, among her dark braids. Fachtnan was, rather awkwardly, holding a well-made garland of lady’s bedstraw dangling from one hand, but Nuala was walking fast, well ahead of him. When he saw Nessa, Brigid’s young assistant, he gave it to her with what looked like a sigh of relief. Nessa giggled and turned red, and then caught Brigid’s eye and went back to frying the sausages on top of the small bonfire, safely walled off inside a circular wall of stones that Cumhal had made for outdoor cooking. Nuala glared at Nessa, scowled and then turned her gaze away from the sight of Fachtnan’s garland dangling around the neck of another girl, and looked resolutely across the clints towards the distant bulk of Mullaghmore. Nuala was, obviously, not going to forgive Fachtnan very easily for turning down her offer of marriage.

  Was she truly in love with Fachtnan, wondered Mara, watching the girl’s face with what she hoped was concealed anxiety? She greeted all of her young guests, admired their garlands, directed them to places at table, saw that there was plenty to eat and drink for everyone, but all of the time her mind dwelt on Nuala. What had prompted that sudden suggestion of marriage, she wondered? Was it something that Nuala really wanted, or did she, perhaps, just see it as a way of getting her hands quickly on her property at Rathborney? It had been obvious for a long time that Nuala adored Fachtnan, but it was more like the hero worship of a young girl for an older and very kind boy, than a truly adult love. Even when she treated him at a time when it looked as though Fachtnan’s life might be in danger, there didn’t seem any of the anguish that might have been expected – Nuala had been cool, competent, full of helpful suggestions – she may well have saved his life by her skill, but nothing in her manner showed even affection.

  She turned to Mairéad O’Lochlainn and Enda – well they were both obviously deeply in love with each other. They could hardly have sat much closer and they continually touched, even if it was mock tussles and teasing. Enda would have to get himself a legal position as an aigne before he could afford to marry, but in the meantime they were going to have fun together for perhaps the last evening before Enda returned to his home.

  It was the same with Saoirse O’Brien and the eldest O’Connor boy. There would be nothing to impede that marriage and the betrothal would probably be announced soon,
now that Teige was back from the wars. The sooner, the better, thought Mara, as Saoirse imprinted a passionate kiss on her betrothed’s lips. That would be a very suitable match between the eldest daughter and the eldest son of two neighbouring chieftains, she thought, as she carried down a plate of cakes to where Enda was sitting. She placed herself on the bench beside him and engaged him in conversation about the midsummer customs in Mayo. But her thoughts returned to Nuala; what was she thinking, watching these others? After a few minutes, Mara returned Enda to Mairéad and beckoned to Nuala, who approached slowly and reluctantly.

  ‘Go and have a chat with Cuan,’ she whispered in the girl’s ear. ‘He doesn’t know anyone other than you very well and he looks a bit left out.’ Mara had been very fond of Cuan’s father, and sometimes felt slightly conscience-stricken that she was not doing more to try to free the boy from the constant supervision of his mother.

  A pity that Cuan is not a bit brighter, she thought regretfully. He was a man of property and wealth, with a tower house just beside Nuala’s property at Rathborney, and would make a great match for any girl, but not for Nuala, unfortunately. Nuala was clever and Cuan was not. Nothing is worse than an inequality of mind, she thought, looking back at her first marriage to Dualta, the young law scholar who had attracted her when she was Nuala’s age. Dualta had not been bright enough to qualify as a lawyer, but had been content to live on his wife’s industry, and to allow her to finance his drinking habit at the local alehouses. She smiled slightly to herself when she thought of her divorce, conducted by herself and cleverly based on an obscure point in the Brehon law system. No man can speak of his wife’s lovemaking habits between the sheets, said the law, and that was the law that Dualta had broken, drunkenly boasting of his clever wife. The law case had never been spoken of to Sorcha and Mara hoped that her daughter was unaware of it. Sorcha, gentle and sweet-natured, needed to be protected. Hopefully, Oisín would prove to be a faithful and good husband.