‘My only interest,’ said Mara, in tones that she made sound indifferent and uninterested, ‘is in the death of this German pilgrim. Through long experience, and I have been Brehon – rather like your Sergeant-at-Law in England and Wales – here in the kingdom of the Burren for over twenty-five years now, I’ve found that the more I can learn about the dead person, the easier it is to solve the puzzle of the murder.’
‘Twenty-five years,’ said the prioress with a strained smile. ‘You must have been a very young woman for such an important post.’
‘Yes, I was probably too young,’ admitted Mara. ‘You see, my father had been Brehon before me. I had taken over his school and I suppose that made it easier for me to take over his position.’ She smiled amiably at the prioress. ‘I think I did everything too young. I had a daughter when I was only fifteen years old.’ And then she stopped. If the woman were to imagine that Sorcha was born out of wedlock, then that was all to the good; one confidence might lead to another.
The prioress’s expression was thoughtful. After a few minutes she said abruptly, ‘How did you find out about Grace? Did Bess tell you?’
‘Certainly not Bess, nor Grace either. Though I fancy,’ said Mara cautiously, ‘that she was the one that told Herr Kaufmann.’
‘Stupid girl – trying to make herself important,’ muttered the prioress.
‘And he asked you for money – I saw the coins in his bag.’
The prioress pressed her lips together but said nothing.
‘So you are telling me that he just threatened to reveal the truth about you and then left it at that?’ queried Mara with a lift of an eyebrow, and when the woman just stared straight ahead, she went on smoothly, ‘You can tell the truth to me and it will go no further. We are alone here. Your secret is as sacred to me as if it were told in confession. It will not be betrayed. Grace is a lovely girl and somehow, somewhere, sometime, a man will look beyond the scarred face and will value the spirit inside it. I don’t think that Hans Kaufmann would have been such a man. He was someone who had a mission, he was a fanatic, he was looking for flaws within the Church of Rome, flaws that would give ammunition to his master, Martin Luther.’ She paused and then said very softly, ‘Only one thing interests me in this matter: did you have anything to do with the death of Hans Kaufmann?’
‘Nothing!’ There was a note of sincerity in the woman’s voice which Mara recognized, and she nodded understandingly when the woman said, ‘I thought it was all over and done with. I had given him the money that he demanded, and, to be honest, I thought he had a soft spot for Grace. He sought her out, talked with her and drew her out of herself.’
‘Did you and your sisters go out that evening?’
‘We got caught by the rain,’ said the prioress. ‘We ran back and raced up the back stairs to our rooms. This is a very good inn. There was a bright fire burning in my room and my cloak soon dried in front of it. My sisters, I’m sure, had the same. I saw neither of them until the following morning.’
‘One more question,’ said Mara. She got to her feet. She would stroll out and put the same questions to both Bess and Grace when they returned, but she was conscious that this woman was the leader of the little group and her word would be the most important of all three. ‘One more question,’ she repeated. ‘Did you see Mór, the innkeeper’s daughter, return from the church with her empty baskets?’
The prioress seemed surprised by the question, but she turned it over carefully in her mind. ‘No,’ she said, ‘no, Brehon, no, we definitely did not see her. You see we went for a walk along the bank of the river – quite some distance – then the three of us came back the same way, by the river bank, and we were already soaking wet so we went up the outside stairs to the back gallery and wished each other good night, and each of us went straight into our bedrooms and did not come out again that night. You can ask my two sisters; they will tell you the same story.’
Sixteen
Irish Canon Law
De Canibus: Sinodus Sapientium
(Concerning Dogs: A Synod of Wise Men)
Whatsoever mischief a chained dog is accused of doing in the night that shall not be paid for.
Whatsoever mischief a dog does during the day in his master’s byres or pastures that shall not be paid for.
But if the dog goes beyond the boundaries of his master’s land whatsoever mischief he does must be paid for.
Nechtan and his wife were good hosts. They both seemed genuinely delighted to have the Brehon and the four boys as their guests. After supper they all went up to the big room at the top storey of the castle and found the toys and playthings that the four brothers had enjoyed. There were models of knights on horseback, siege weapons, a splendid castle with moat, a spectacular gate with towers on both sides, and a magnificent portcullis above the entrance; swords and shields, bows and arrows, even a painted target – the bottom of an old barrel – which the brothers had used for practice with throwing knives and arrows.
But Domhnall’s eye was taken by the baskets of costumes for plays, and the other boys, as usual, followed his lead.
‘We used to put on plays for the people of the parish,’ explained Nechtan. ‘Father MacMahon was a young man then, and he was full of zeal that everyone should understand the word of God. So me and my brothers, and my cousins, used to act out Bible stories. I remember them so well,’ he said fondly. ‘Here are the costumes. We would do the creation, and the fall of Lucifer, of course – here’s the flaming sword.’ Nechtan produced a wooden sword carefully painted in reds and blacks and finished off with yellow-edged scarlet-painted leather flames. Cormac gave it a few flourishes, and Mara thought secretly that with his handsome face and red-gold hair, he would make a wonderful angel. There was a devil’s mask there also, made cleverly from leather, with curved horns and lines drawn with gold paint in straight slashes around the eye sockets and fanning out from the curved open mouth, but the angel costumes were spectacular with magnificent wings made from swans’ feathers.
‘And then there was “Cain and Abel”,’ continued Nechtan. ‘And “Noah’s Ark”, of course. That was wonderful when we acted it. We brought all of the animals from the farmyard along to play their parts and you’ve never seen such a mess.’ He laughed heartily at the memory, and Mara thought that she had never seen him look so happy.
‘The costumes should all be here for the different stories,’ he said, rummaging in the baskets. ‘Father MacMahon used to get us to put on these plays for the pilgrims. This was before the inn was built, of course, but we used to act the plays amongst the ruins of the old monastery and the pilgrims used to sit on the stones and in the old blank windows. They would throw coins on to the stage, too, after the play was finished. Father MacMahon told us that the money was intended for the greater honour and glory of the church, but we used to retain some of it for our own uses.’ He chuckled to himself, but Narait, Mara noticed, did not smile at her husband’s boyhood recollections, as would most wives, but looked bored and wearied.
‘I’ve seen the players act those plays in the courtyards of the inns in Galway,’ said Domhnall, glowing with excitement. ‘My father used to rent a place at a window of the inn and we all went. The little ones got tired after a while and my mother took them home. But I stayed to the end,’ he finished, and Mara was sure that he spoke the truth. Domhnall, no matter how young, would always see matters to the end.
‘Which was your favourite, Domhnall,’ she asked.
‘“The Shepherds’ Play”,’ he answered immediately. ‘That has such good jokes in it – I’d like to be the sheep stealer.’
‘Why don’t you put on a play for us all this evening?’ said Mara impulsively. ‘It’s a shame to miss the opportunity of using these splendid costumes. Would you like to stay up here now and practise? Come down when you are ready. You won’t need any play books or anything – choose something simple. You wouldn’t mind, would you, Nechtan?’
‘“Cain and Abel” would be your best c
hance; there are just four parts in that,’ said Nechtan eagerly. ‘Look, the costumes are there, just under the ones for Abraham and Isaac.’
‘I’ll be Cain and you’ll be Abel,’ said Slevin to Domhnall. ‘The other two can be Adam and Eve.’
‘I’m not being Eve,’ said Cormac firmly. ‘Not in a hundred years will I dress up as a woman.’
‘Let’s leave them to it,’ said Mara hastily. Domhnall would work something out to soothe Cormac’s dignity, she knew.
The conversation downstairs flagged a little after the boys had left. Fachtnan had checked the cloaks of both Nechtan and his wife and had found no traces of blood on either, though both had admitted to having been caught in the downpour. Nechtan had been checking that as much turf was moved under shelter as possible, and Narait had suffered a headache brought on by the sweltering heat and had gone for a walk. As soon as she could do so in a natural manner, Mara once again led the conversation around to the events of that evening.
‘You see,’ she said with the frank air of one putting all of her cards on the table, ‘if only you could tell me, Nechtan, that one of your turf barrows was left out after you shut and locked the barn, that would make my task easier. I am persuaded that the murderer must have used something like one of these in order to move the body from the church to the capstone of the old tomb. It would be just about the right size and shape.’
Nechtan shook his head. ‘No, I’m certain of this, Brehon, every one of my barrows was heaped with turf – and the turf was still there on them in the morning.’
‘And the barn was locked, that’s right, is it not?’
‘That’s right.’ There was a slight hesitation in Nechtan’s voice and Mara immediately understood.
‘Don’t tell me,’ she said with a groan. ‘You leave the key up on the eaves, or somewhere like that, and I suppose everyone knows about it?’
‘Under the stone outside the door, actually,’ said Nechtan sheepishly.
Mara thought for a moment. It was still possible for the murderer to have borrowed a turf barrow, even if they were locked up – the key could have been found easily and it would only have taken seconds to have thrown the load on to the floor, and not that long to have loaded it up again.
‘Perhaps,’ she said, ‘it would be possible for me to have a look at your turf barrows while the light is still good enough to see. Will you come too, Narait?’
‘No, I …’ Narait gave a long look at Nechtan, and Mara saw him stare back. He said nothing, though, and did not help his wife in her search for an excuse. ‘I think I’ll go up and see how the boys are getting on,’ she said eventually. ‘They may need some help.’ She got to her feet, looking uncertainly at her husband who had poured himself another cup of wine and did not seem ready to move until it had disappeared down his throat.
‘Of course,’ he said in conversational tones, looking straight at his wife, ‘the German pilgrim was not the first strange death to occur in Kilnaboy Church. There was the case of that woman who stuck a knife into her faithless lover just as he walked into the church. That happened a couple of hundred years ago. There is something about it in the church history. It was the time of the monks and they held a service of cleansing afterwards so as to rid the church of the sin that had been committed.’ The words came out fluently, too fluently, almost as though they had been committed to memory and practised beforehand. Nechtan had been drinking a lot of wine and it seemed to have altered his mood from genial host to a silent man who sat and stared ahead of him.
Mara cast a quick glance at him and then chatted easily with Narait about wolfhounds. A wolf had been sighted and several sheep found dead on the Roughan hillside. Nechtan, according to his wife, wanted to buy a fully grown wolfhound from Murrough who bred the animals, but Narait wanted a puppy. Murrough, she said, had a litter of four six-week-old puppies – two males and two females.
‘Why not get two brothers from that litter and then they would be company for each other at the puppy stage and would make a good pack to hunt wolves when they are a bit older?’ Mara was thinking that Narait, frustrated in her maternal instincts, might find some sort of outlet in mothering a pair of puppies. Nechtan said nothing. Narait glanced uncertainly at him again and Mara decided it was time to separate husband and wife before something was said that might start a quarrel.
‘It’s very kind of you to help the boys with their play. Don’t take any notice if they are all arguing,’ she said to Narait as she rose to her feet and walked decisively towards the door without waiting for Nechtan to lead the way. ‘Domhnall usually manages to sort them out, but there will be all sorts of disagreements first,’ she said over her shoulder.
‘I don’t mind. I like children. What a handsome boy your son is, Brehon.’ Narait’s smile was genuine, but it quickly faded at her husband’s expression as he got slowly to his feet. There was no doubt that this marriage was heading rapidly towards a divorce. A child would have united them, but now they had nothing to talk about, and even disagreed about what dog to get. Mara said nothing while they crossed the yard, but when she and Nechtan were almost at the doors of the barn, she thought that she would try to make him understand his young wife’s loneliness.
‘You would be much better off getting a couple of puppies if you want to keep the wolves away from your land, Nechtan. Murrough’s adult dogs will give their loyalty to him; a puppy that grows up in the house will give its life for you, if necessary.’ She hesitated a minute and then said, ‘And I do think that Narait would find a purpose in life while caring for them – she seems a little depressed.’
‘I’ll think about it. Your advice is always valuable, Brehon.’ His tone was polite, but she sensed little sympathy in him for his wife, and he immediately covered the awkward moment by shouting for one of his men to wheel out the turf barrows and to line them up in front of the barn.
‘I’m looking for traces of blood,’ said Mara bluntly once the barrows were in place, each one resting on its rear props as well as on the two wheels in the front. She addressed her remarks to the two men and the boy who had taken them out of the barn. The turf, she noticed, had still not been thatched, although her own farm manager, Cumhal, had already started on that task back at the farm in Cahermacnaghten. Once they had returned from the bog, Cumhal’s workers had been given a meal, a short break and then had immediately got to work with the already prepared bundles of dried rushes. Still, Nechtan’s farming practices were none of her business, she reminded herself, and asked the men to start searching the barrows.
‘The Brehon thinks that the dead man’s body might have been wheeled from the church on one of our barrows.’ Nechtan’s voice was neutral and she noticed that he did not, himself, take any part in the scrutiny.
‘But I need your young eyes to look at them,’ said Mara with an encouraging smile. ‘What colour would bloodstains be on the wood?’
‘Sort of dark brown,’ said the boy enthusiastically.
‘Brown – of course,’ said Mara thoughtfully. She remembered her daughter Sorcha, who had many more housewifely skills than she, lecturing her on different types of stain and how each should be treated. Of course, blood turned brown after it was shed. She watched while they searched, all of them showing an enthusiasm that probably indicated that if they weren’t doing this they would be undertaking a more unpleasant job. Her mind was not as engaged as theirs, though. A suspicion had occurred to her and she was glad that Nechtan had left her to explore her thoughts in peace.
And to think about blood.
No bloodstains were found, much to their disappointment, but Mara thanked the men profusely for their efforts.
‘It would have been the rain, Brehon, washed everything down,’ said one.
‘Terrible it was,’ said the other, glad to break off work for a chat. ‘I swear to God, I thought the heavens were opening. And there was that strange heat all day. And then the rain came.’
‘I was glad of it myself,’ said the boy. ‘After
the work with the turf I was sweating so much that I went down to the river to have a swim. And then the heavens opened and I was so wet that I didn’t bother jumping in. By then I was cooled off nicely, just went off up the road to my mother’s place.’
‘Did you see anyone by the river?’ asked Mara casually.
‘Saw the three pilgrim ladies coming back from their walk – they were climbing up the steps towards their rooms. Blad was putting his fishing rod into the stable. I heard Mór call out something about the church – don’t know if she was going or coming. They say she brought him his last supper, so as to speak.’
The boy gave a nervous giggle and the older man said warningly, ‘Don’t let Father MacMahon hear you talk like that – sacrilegious, that is.’
‘What do you think happened to the German pilgrim?’ asked Mara, looking from one to the other encouragingly and hoping that Nechtan would keep out of the way for a while. This, she thought, had been an odd investigation; it had been centred on the pilgrims and she had not had the usual contact with the people of the area. The people of the Burren, she thought proudly, generally had a sensible outlook on life; there was, she reasoned, little chance of the involvement in the murder of anyone other than the pilgrims and those closely connected with the church of Kilnaboy and its famous relic. Nevertheless, those living in the neighbourhood must have some ideas about what had happened with this very strange death in their parish. Did they believe, also, that this murder was an act of the avenging God?
‘Don’t put any credit in angels and that like,’ said the boy daringly.
‘I told you to mind your mouth,’ retorted the man.
‘Father MacMahon believes that it was a divine punishment for the German pilgrim’s sin, doesn’t he?’ said Mara lightly, and the older man nodded seriously.
‘It was a judgement on him, Brehon. You can see for yourself. How else did he get from the church to the gabhal if it wasn’t done by the power of God?’
Cross of Vengeance (A Burren Mystery) Page 20