The Celtic Riddle

by Lyn Hamilton

  “I’m sure you’ll both be fine,” I said. “And if you need any more information at all, please write or call me,” I said, handing them each a business card. “I have e-mail, too.”

  They both smiled, Eithne wiping away her tears. They had lovely eyes, and friendly smiles. “Thank you. You may very well hear from us,” Fionuala said.

  It occurred to me with some surprise, as I watched the two of them walk arm in arm down the street, that I wouldn’t mind if I did.

  Chapter Fifteen

  HE WHO DESCRIBES THE MOON’S ADVANCE

  “I want to know about the stolen child, the real one, I mean,” I said to Malachy. “That’s just one of Denny’s stories,” he replied. “You shouldn’t pay much heed to them. He’s not quite right in the head, you know, although I am still proud to call him my friend. He thinks he was there, way back then, when all the battles were fought. The magic ones, between the Tuatha dé Danaan and the Fir Bolg and the Fomorians. As far back as that.”

  “Then I want to know all about the Byrne family,” I said. “Where they came from, what they did before they got here, everything. There must be someone who would know.”

  “Kitty McCarthy,” he said. “Although she’s getting on a bit. She was with them when they came here, many years ago. The housekeeper and nanny for the children. Denny’s sister.”

  “Where do I find her?”

  “The pub,” he replied.

  “She lives in a pub?” I said.

  “Not in a pub,” he said, laughing. “Over a pub. Over the Boar’s Arms and Brigid’s place. The tearoom. Brigid’s Kitty’s stepdaughter, Denny’s niece.”

  I made my way along the main street, and into the door that separated the bar and the tearoom, and then quickly up the stairs. I knocked on the door where I had first met Kitty McCarthy. Brigid answered.

  “I’d like to talk to your mother,” I said to her.

  “Whatever for?” she asked, perplexed.

  “About the Byrne family,” I replied.

  “She’ll not want to be talking about that,” Brigid replied.

  “People are dying, Brigid.”

  “I’ve noticed,” she said tartly. “People who worked there, too. So my mother won’t be talking to you, or anybody else on that subject.”

  “Who is it, dear?” a quavering voice inquired.

  “Nobody, Mother,” she called back in to the room.

  “It’s me, Mrs. McCarthy, Lara. The person who was here for Eamon Byrne’s clue.” Brigid glared at me. “I want to talk to you about the Byrne family.”

  “Come in, then,” Kitty replied. “I like to have visitors.”

  “Mother!” Brigid exclaimed. “We decided you wouldn’t speak to anyone about the Byrne family. It’s dangerous, remember.”

  “I’m practically dead already, in case you hadn’t noticed, Brigid, so let the young lady in,” Kitty said. She had a tone to be reckoned with. I expect she used it to good effect with the Byrne girls.

  “Thank you,” I said to Kitty, as she gestured to a seat on the sofa next to her chair. Brigid sat across from us, her face rigid with anxiety.

  “I’m sorry,” I said to Brigid, “but there are too many people dying. I feel that if I could just understand what is happening to this family, if the police knew, then maybe the killing would stop.”

  “What do you want to know?” Kitty asked, her hands trembling as she held the blanket around her, but her eyes still bright and intelligent.

  “I want you to start at the beginning, when you first met the Byrne family, and I want to know why Deirdre thought the family cursed.”

  “All right,” she said. “From the beginning. I was housekeeper to Eamon Byrne’s father, Michael, known as Mick. Mick was a widower, his wife had died when the children were young, and he needed someone like me to look after his home.”

  “Was it around here?”

  “Oh, no, farther north, near Galway. The children were almost grown up when I went there. Eamon was in his early twenties, and Rose, the daughter, was about eighteen.”

  “Rose Cottage!” I exclaimed. “I’ve always wondered why it would be called Rose Cottage when there aren’t any roses around.”

  The old woman nodded. “Rose Cottage was named for her. Eamon doted on his little sister.”

  “Where is she now?”

  “Dead. Long gone and buried,” she said sadly, shaking her head.

  “Go on,” I said.

  “There was very bad blood between Mick Byrne, and another man by the name of Mac Roth, Oengus Mac Roth, a landowner up farther north, by Sligo. Had been for years, generations even. We Irish can hold a grudge for a very long time. I’m not even sure what was at the basis of it. Sometimes, it doesn’t matter what started it really. It just takes on a life of its own. Even those involved can’t recall why it all began. Probably an argument over some sheep or something like that, way back many years, or generations, before. Perhaps it was over a dun cow.”

  She hesitated for a moment, and then laughed a little. “That was by way of a little joke. There’s a very ancient tale in Ireland called the Tain bo Culainge, The Cattle Raid of Cooley. It tells the story of a huge war between the forces of Connacht, led by Queen Maeve and her king Ailill, and the forces of Ulster, with their hero Cuchulainn. It all started with a disagreement over a dun cow. But you understand what I mean, don’t you? In any event, the two men were rivals, and their families were too, although as far as I know, they never had a chance to meet. At least not right away.”

  The old woman coughed a little, and her daughter brought her some tea. “Here, Mother,” she said. “You mustn’t talk too much.” I thought she had tears in her eyes.

  “I want to talk, dear,” she said, waving her away. “I’ve been wanting to talk about this for years. I promised Eamon Byrne I never would, but I don’t suppose it matters much anymore.

  “Mick Byrne had big plans for his son and daughter. Eamon was already working with him in the family business—peat, I think it was at the time. Rose, he planned to marry to a widower in the area, a middle-aged man by the name of MacCallum, who had great landholdings near those of Mick Byrne.”

  “A strategic alliance, was it?” I asked.

  “I suppose you could call it that,” Kitty replied. “Between them, the two families would control much of the land in the area.” She paused for a moment, taking a sip of tea before proceeding. “But Rose loved another, a young man she’d met at a dance. And his name was ...” she started to choke a little.

  “Mac Roth,” I said taking the teacup from her and trying to steady her hand. “Don’t tell me it was Mac Roth.”

  She nodded. “Owen Mac Roth. Son of her father’s sworn enemy. She didn’t tell anyone about it, except I think for me. She was so happy with her young man, and he was a looker, eyes so blue you could see the sea in them, a very lovely young man. And she was a beauty, too, let me tell you. But it wasn’t to be.

  “Eamon found out about Rose’s lover, told his father, and Mick forbade her to see Owen ever again. But she did, and ...” here the old woman paused and wiped a tear from her eye, “and with my help. She was so much in love, you see, and begged me to help her. I never could really say no to her, nor Eamon either for that matter. But Eamon found out again, and told his father, and this time, Rose was sent away to Dublin. I wasn’t told exactly where: I suppose they thought I might tell Owen, and perhaps I might. The terrible thing was, Rose was pregnant with Owen’s child. She was sent away to have the baby—the family said she was finishing her schooling in Dublin. And she was forced to give up the child the minute it was born. She told me she wasn’t even allowed to hold it, not once, not even for a minute. She was told her baby was sick and had died, but she never believed it. It had all been arranged by Mick.”

  “The lost child,” I said. “So the Byrnes and the Mac Roths were the local equivalent of the Montagues and the Capulets, were they? Did it end just as badly?”

  She smiled slightly. “I suppos
e you could put it that way, like Romeo and Juliet, but this is Ireland, not Verona. This is more like the old tale of Deirdriu and Naisiu. You don’t know the Tain, but do you know the story of Deirdriu?”

  “Deirdre of the Sorrows,” I replied. “Yes, that one I do. Deirdriu was to marry an old man, a king, I think, I can’t remember his name ...”

  “Conchobar,” Kitty said.

  “Conchobar. But she loved a strapping young man by the name of Naisiu. They ran away together, but Conchobar and his men tracked them down, and Naisiu was killed, I think. Is that what happened to Owen?”

  “Go on,” she said, “with the story.”

  “Deirdre was being given to someone else by Conchobar, and she was on a wagon or something, I can’t quite recall all the details, but she dashed her head against a rock and died rather than be with either of these two awful men. Did I get it right?”

  “More or less,” she replied. “Well, Mick Byrne insisted the wedding between Rose and MacCallum go ahead, and that nothing ever be said about the baby—MacCallum was never to know. Eamon was supposed to be driving Rose over to see MacCallum the night before the wedding. He called her to come out of her room, but there was no reply.” Kitty stopped for a moment, and tears started to pour down her cheeks. “Eamon went in after her, but she was dead when he found her. She’d hanged herself.” Kitty crossed herself.

  “She killed herself rather than marry MacCallum!” I exclaimed.

  “She was very depressed, over the loss of her child, and all. Owen, I thought he would die with sorrow. I told him about the baby. I don’t know whether I should have or not, but I did. He became a wild man. He looked everywhere for that child, his and Rose’s, but he couldn’t find a trace. It was very difficult in those days, to track down a child put up for adoption. More difficult than now, and Mick had seen to it there would be no evidence of the child. Owen took to drinking, lost his job.”

  “Where is he now?”

  “I don’t know. I moved away. For all I know he’s still looking for his child.”

  “And Eamon? What did he do after all this?”

  “He disappeared for about a year, ran away to sea. He came to hate his father, almost as much as he hated himself. I thought I’d never see him again, but after Mick died, shortly after that, a bitter man, Eamon came back, married Margaret, who’d been his sweetheart before all this happened, and set up here in the Dingle. He asked me to come and look after his household, and I did. Denny joined me a few years later. I met Brigid’s father here, and little Brigid, long after I thought I could be so happy, and have made this place my home. I felt sorry for Eamon, you know, and he wasn’t a bad man. I liked looking after his daughters, even though I couldn’t see what he’d found to like in Margaret, and sometimes late in the evening, when his wife had retired, he’d ask me to sit by the fire in his room, the red one, and he’d talk to me about Rose. He had loved her, you know. And in his own way he had tried to do the best for her. When his mother was dying—he was just a little tyke and Rose just a toddler—she made him promise he’d take care of his little sister, never do anything to hurt her. And I suppose he tried. I think he thought he had broken a sacred promise to his mother.” She paused for a moment. “Do you know what a geis is?” The word sounded like gaysh. I shook my head.

  “It is sort of like a tabu. In the old stories, people are held to a geis: there is something they mustn’t do, or perhaps something they must do without fail, an obligation if you see what I mean, and if they did it, or forgot to, as the case may be, broke the geis, that is, it usually meant their death. Eamon Byrne thought he had broken a geis, in hurting his sister. He was good to us, though, wasn’t he, Brigid? He gave us the money for Brigid to start up the tearoom, and my son-in-law the pub.” Brigid nodded. “And he did try to look for Rose’s baby. I know he did. But the authorities said that there was no way to do this, that he wasn’t the father, and in any event, the name would be revealed only if the child wished it. Died in his prime, did Eamon. He can’t have been sixty. And I know he would have wished to find the child before he died.

  “Strange, though,” she went on. “About Deirdriu and Naisiu, I mean. In this story, the tragic one was Rose. It’s Owen’s sister who’s called Deirdre.”

  I could see Kitty was tiring, and Brigid was begging me with her eyes to go. “I’ll leave,” I said, “And thank you.”

  “Thank you for listening,” she said. “I feel better for telling you.”

  As I turned to go, I asked one more question. “The baby,” I said. “Was it?”

  “A little boy,” Kitty said. “Rose said it was a beautiful, healthy little boy.”

  Maybe it was a coincidence, maybe it wasn’t. There must be at least a million Deirdres in Ireland, and Deirdre had had a rather spinsterish way about her, the look of a woman never married, but one can never assume too much. “Was Deirdre Flood ever married, do you know?” I asked Rob.

  “I believe she was,” he replied.

  “And do you know her maiden name?”

  “I think I saw it on the file, but I don’t think I can recall it. Why?”

  “I don’t suppose it was Mac Roth. Deirdre Mac Roth.”

  “I think perhaps it was.”

  So Deirdre Flood was the hidden Mac Roth in the Byrne household, the poison asp in the fruit basket, the bald face of revenge behind the mask of servitude.

  “How ever would you know that?” Rob said, watching my face.

  I told him. “So you’re saying you think this blood feud is still going on, and that a Mac Roth, Deirdre, insinuated herself into the Byrne household ... to do what?” Rob said. “She had ample opportunity, surely, over the five years she’s been there, to do whatever she wanted. Are you saying she murdered Michael? Why?”

  “I don’t know what I’m saying,” I replied. “Probably not that she killed Michael. Is there any indication she killed herself?”

  “No. It looks as if she was strangled first, then thrown into the sea. The autopsy will tell us for sure. It’s nigh on impossible to strangle yourself, and while she could have thrown herself over a cliff, she could hardly have done both. My guess is she was strangled first. There’ll likely be no water in the lungs.”

  “Well, what if it was Owen? What if he’s given up looking for the child and has turned his attention to taking revenge on the Byrne family?”

  “And to exact this revenge, he kills the hired help? One of whom is his sister, I might add? Are you trying to say that having to do your own housework is punishment enough? Surely not!”

  I glared at him. These policemen with their gallows humor. “I’d still like to know where Owen Mac Roth has been for the last thirty-five years,” I muttered.

  Rob just looked at me. “I’ll check it out,” he said at last.

  “Please do,” I said. I didn’t care how ridiculous it sounded. My money was on Owen Mac Roth.

  Chapter Sixteen

  THE PLACE WHERE THE SUN SETS

  “ABOUT Owen Mac Roth,” Rob said the next day. “He spent twenty-five of the last thirty years in jail. Joined the IRA and bombed somebody, got caught, and got a life sentence.”

  “But he’s out now, right?” I said.

  “He got out,” Rob agreed. “Five years ago. And promptly got himself killed in a drunken barroom brawl. Artery cut by a broken whiskey bottle. Bled to death before the paramedics could get to him. I’d say we could cross Owen Mac Roth off our list of suspects now, couldn’t we? Any other theories you’d like to explore?” I was finding his tone irritating, and was about to say so.

  “It was a good idea, though,” he added. “And worth checking into. Maybe you should have gone to police academy instead of taking up such a risky profession as retail,” he smiled. That’s the thing about Rob: Just when I’m about to claw his eyes out, he says something funny and nice.

  So much, though, for my theory about Owen Mac Roth. I thought about it for some time. The point was, while I had come away that first day at Second Chan
ce with a very poor opinion of the Byrne family, I was no longer sure I’d been right. Eithne Byrne was a very nice person; Fionuala and Breeta were too, despite appearances to the contrary. And Eamon Byrne had been a very sick man. Once long ago, he had made a mistake. A very bad mistake, no doubt about it, with tragic consequences, but a mistake nevertheless. And now the family was paying for it. I didn’t believe in curses, or broken geise, any more than I believed in the fairies. Instead, I was sure that some malignant force was pulling the strings off stage, bringing the family to ruin. I just didn’t know who this malignant force might be yet. It wasn’t Owen Mac Roth. That much was certain. And it could hardly be Deirdre, although somehow she had to be part of it. So whom did that leave?

  When I thought about it, there was something patently wrong with Deirdre that went beyond the fact that she was a Mac Roth. She wasn’t a maid, either. Eithne and Fionuala had laughed about how she kept spilling everything and breaking their mother’s ornaments. I’d thought at the time she might be either paying Margaret back for her ill humor, or was just nervous in her presence, something it was easy enough to understand. But Rob had said she’d worked for years in a dry cleaning establishment. Bent on revenge, perhaps, she’d infiltrated Second Chance. But how had she managed to snag the position with absolutely no qualifications that I could see?

  I picked up the telephone and called Second Chance. Anticipating Margaret, I was relieved when Eithne answered.

  “I’m sorry to be a pest, Eithne, but I have a couple more questions. Do you mind?”

  “Not at all,” she replied. I’d been afraid when the sherry wore off, she’d regret her candor, but she still sounded very nice and friendly.