Absolution by Murder

by Peter Tremayne

  ‘Did Athelnoth write this as well?’ The monk suddenly snapped his fingers. ‘You have implied that Étain’s death had nothing to do with the plot to overthrow Oswy. That Taran and Wulfric had nothing to do with her death. I have it! Athelnoth killed Etain after all. But he was caught up in the matter of the king’s assassination, revealing it to Oswy, and was killed by Wulfric or Alhfrith. His slaughter was merely a matter of coincidence.’

  Fidelma smiled softly, shaking her head.

  ‘A good explanation, Eadulf, but not the correct one.’

  ‘Who else had opportunity and motive?’ demanded Eadulf.

  ‘Well, you forget Abbe for one.’

  Eadulf groaned, touching his forehead with the palm of his hand.

  ‘I had forgotten her.’ Then his face lightened. ‘But she would not have the necessary strength to kill any of the victims, would she?’

  ‘I am not saying it is her. But the person we are dealing with is of cunning disposition, a mind whose thinking is like a path through a labyrinth that one tries to follow at one’s peril.’

  Fidelma was quiet for a few minutes as she knelt by the body of Seaxwulf. Finally she stood up.

  ‘Order these men to remove the body to the abbey,’ she instructed. ‘Tell them to take it to Brother Edgar.’

  She turned and began to walk slowly up the path towards the abbey buildings, hands folded in front of her, clasping the brooch and the vellum, her head slightly bent.

  Eadulf quickly issued the orders and followed after her. He waited patiently, watching as she walked deep in thought. Suddenly she turned towards him and he had never seen such a smile of triumph on her face before.

  ‘I think it all fits together now. But first I must visit the librarium and find that copy of the lyric poems of the Hellenistic world that Seaxwulf was reading.’

  Eadulf exhaled helplessly.

  ‘You have lost me. What has the librarium to do with it? What do you mean?’

  Sister Fidelma gave a triumphant laugh.

  ‘I know who our murderer is, that is what I mean.’

  Chapter Nineteen

  Sister Fidelma paused before the door of Abbess Hilda’s chambers, glanced at Brother Eadulf and pulled a face.

  ‘Are you nervous, Fidelma?’ Eadulf whispered in concern.

  ‘Who would not be nervous in such circumstances?’ she replied quietly. ‘We are dealing with someone strong and cunning. And the evidence I have is somewhat circumstantial. There is only one point of weakness, as I have mentioned, by which I hope to draw a response from the killer. If that fails …’ She shrugged. ‘Our murderer may well escape us.’

  ‘I am there to back you.’

  Eadulf’s reassurance was no boast, just a simple and comforting statement.

  For a moment she regarded him with a genuine smile of affection and reached out a hand to touch his. Eadulf placed his hand over Fidelma’s as their gaze held. Then Fidelma lowered her eyes before knocking sharply on the door.

  They were all there as she had requested – Abbess Hilda, Bishop Colman, Oswy the king, Abbess Abbe, Sister Athelswith, Agatho the priest, Sister Gwid and Wighard, secretary to the now dead Archbishop of Canterbury. Oswy was sprawled moodily in the chair before the fire usually reserved for Colman. The bishop himself had taken Hilda’s chair behind her table. The rest of the company were standing around the room.

  They turned with inquisitive looks as Fidelma and Eadulf entered.

  Fidelma inclined her head to the king and looked towards the Abbess Hilda.

  ‘With your permission, Mother Abbess?’

  ‘You may proceed at once, sister. We are anxious enough to hear you and I am sure we will all be relieved when this is over.’

  ‘Very well.’ Fidelma coughed nervously, glanced to Eadulf for support and then began.

  ‘What has dominated our investigation into the death of the Abbess Etain was the thought, which has become a conviction in the minds of many, that the killing was political.’

  Colmán grimaced irritably.

  ‘That was the obvious conclusion.’

  Fidelma was unperturbed.

  ‘You have all assumed that Etain, as chief counsel for the church of Columba, was killed to silence her voice; that the Roman faction realised that she was their most implacable enemy. Is that not so?’

  There was a murmur of assent from those who supported the Columban ranks, but Wighard was shaking his head.

  ‘It is a scurrilous suggestion.’

  Fidelma let her cool gaze fall on the Kentish cenobite.

  ‘But surely an easy mistake to make given the circumstances?’ she parried.

  ‘You admit that it was a mistake?’ Wighard seized eagerly on her phraseology.

  ‘Yes. Abbess Étain was slain for a reason other than that of the religious belief she held.’

  Colmán’s eyes narrowed.

  ‘Are you saying that Athelnoth was the killer after all? That he made improper advances to Étain, was rejected and so slew her? That when he knew he was discovered, he killed himself in remorse?’

  Fidelma smiled softly.

  ‘You race ahead of me, bishop.’

  ‘That was the rumour whispered in the cloisters of this abbey. Started, I suspect, by the Roman faction.’ Colmán’s voice was full of anger.

  The dark-eyed priest Agatho, who had been quiet so far, suddenly broke his silence. He began to sing in a shrill voice:

  ‘Rumour goes forth at once, Rumour and

  No other speedier evil thing exists.’

  He dropped his head and was silent as abruptly as he had begun.

  All eyes were on him in bewilderment.

  Fidelma’s eyes flickered to Eadulf, giving him a warning. Soon now. She would have to display her hand soon. She drew herself up and continued, ignoring Agatho’s interruption.

  ‘You have the right reason, Bishop of Lindisfarne, but the wrong person.’

  Colman snorted in disgust.

  ‘A crime of passion? Pah! I have always argued that male and female should be separated. In Job it is written: “I made a covenant with mine eyes: how then should I look upon a maid?” We should forbid these double houses as did the blessed Finnian of Clonard who refused to look upon any woman.’

  Abbess Abbe was red with indignation.

  ‘If it were left to you, Colman of Lindisfarne, we would live a joyless life. You would probably applaud Enda who, having taken his vows, refused to speak even with his own sister, Faenche, except when a sheet was hung between them!’

  ‘Better a joyless life than a life of debauchery and hedonism,’ responded the bishop hotly.

  Abbe’s colour increased and she seemed to be choking, for she opened her mouth to speak but no words would come. Fidelma interrupted sharply.

  ‘Sisters, brothers, are we not forgetting the purpose of this meeting?’

  Oswy had been smiling bitterly at the arguing of his clerics.

  ‘Yes, Fidelma of Kildare,’ he added in agreement. ‘This begins to sound like the assembly in the sacrarium. Tell us, if you can, why we have seen the death of your abbess, why the death of the Archbishop of Canterbury, why the death of Athelnoth, of Seaxwulf and, indeed, the death of even my own first-born son, Alhfrith. Death hangs around Streoneshalh like a plague. Can this be some ill-omened place?’

  ‘There is nothing ill omened about this matter. And you already have the answer for the death of Alhfrith, Oswy. I know a part of you grieves for a son while a part of you recognises that you have come unscathed from the clutches of a traitorous conspiracy,’ replied Fidelma. ‘And God can answer for the death of Deusdedit of Canterbury, for he died of a plague. But another and a single hand is responsible for the deaths of Étain, of Athelnoth and Seaxwulf.’

  There was an expectant silence in the room.

  Fidelma gazed at them, each in turn. They stood glaring back defiantly.

  ‘Then speak. Tell us whose hand?’

  Fidelma turned back to Oswy, who had spoken
sharply.

  ‘I will speak, but it will be at my own pace and without interruption.’

  Agatho lifted his head and smiled, raising his hand in the sign of the Cross.

  ‘Amen. The truth will out, Deo volente!’

  Abbess Hilda bit her lip.

  ‘Should Sister Athelswith take Brother Agatho to his cubiculum, sister? I fear the strain of recent weeks has made him unwell.’

  ‘Unwell? When a man is unwell his very goodness is ill!’ cried Agatho, suddenly smiling. ‘But the sleep of a sick man has keen eyes.’

  Fidelma hesitated and then shook her head.

  ‘It is best if Agatho hears what we have to say.’

  Abbess Hilda sniffed her disapproval. Fidelma paused a moment and continued.

  ‘Étain told me that she intended to resign from being abbess of Kildare as soon as she returned to Ireland following the end of this synod. Étain was a woman of enormous gifts, as you all know for you invited her here to be chief spokesperson of the church of Colmcille, whom you call Columba. Had she not been of the family of Brigit, she might have attained high position on her own merits. She married young but was widowed and followed her family tradition of becoming a religieuse.

  ‘She excelled in learning and the time came when she was chosen as abbess of Kildare, the abbey founded by her illustrious kinswomen Brigit, the daughter of Dubhtach.’

  ‘We all know of Étain’s reputation and authority,’ snapped Abbess Hilda impatiently.

  Fidelma threw her a withering look. A silence fell.

  ‘I had scarcely arrived at Streoneshalh,’ went on Fidelma after a few seconds, ‘when I met and spoke with Étain and she told me that she had found a man whom she wanted to be with, to be with so strongly that she had decided that she would give up the position of abbess and go with her love into a double house where men and women and their children can dedicate themselves to God’s work.

  ‘At first I stupidly and wrongly assumed that Étain’s new love was in Ireland.’

  ‘It was a natural assumption.’ Eadulf suddenly intervened for the first time. ‘You see, Étain had never left the shores of Ireland.’

  Fidelma cast an appreciative look at Eadulf.

  ‘Brother Eadulf comforts me in my shortcomings,’ she murmured. ‘But one should assume nothing. In fact, Étain had fallen in love with a Saxon and he with her.’

  She had their attention now.

  ‘You see, Étain had met Brother Athelnoth at the abbey of Emly where she instructed in philosophy until last year.’

  ‘Athelnoth had spent six months in the abbey of Emly in the kingdom of Munster in Ireland,’ explained Eadulf.

  Colmán was nodding his head.

  ‘Indeed. That was why I chose Brother Athelnoth to go to Catraeth to meet the abbess and escort her here to Streoneshalh. He knew Étain.’

  ‘Of course he did,’ agreed Fidelma. ‘A fact that he denied after Étain’s murder. Why? Simply because he was aggressively in favour of the rule of Rome and his association with Étain would be counted against him? I think not.’

  ‘Of course, many of the Roman faction were themselves educated or trained in Ireland,’ Oswy pointed out. ‘There are even some Irish brethren here, like Tuda, who side with Rome. No, that is no reason to deny friends among the Columban faction.’

  ‘Athelnoth denied his relationship because he was the man whom Étain was going to marry,’ Fidelma said quietly.

  Abbess Abbe snorted indignantly.

  ‘How could Étain contemplate a relationship with such a man?’ she enquired indignantly.

  Fidelma smiled thinly.

  ‘You who preach that love is God’s greatest gift to humankind ought to be able to answer that, abbess of Coldingham.’

  Abbe brought her chin up, a flush coming to her cheeks.

  ‘Thinking back over Étain’s conversation with me,’ Fidelma went on, ‘I realise now that she had given me all the answers to her subsequent murder. She told me that she loved a stranger. At least, I interpreted her word as “stranger” and took it for a relative term, meaning a man she had not long known, when I should have taken it to be “foreigner”, for we in Ireland use that same word in both meanings. She told me that she had exchanged betrothal gifts with her lover and he with her. I should have remembered before that there is an Eoghanacht custom of exchanging brooches. Eadulf later found Étain’s brooch in a sacculus on the body of Athelnoth.’

  Eadulf nodded eagerly.

  ‘And Athelnoth’s brooch was found with the body of Seaxwulf,’ he added. ‘And on both bodies there were pages of vellum copied from a book of Greek love poems.’

  Oswy was bewildered.

  ‘Are you now saying that Seaxwulf was the culprit?’

  Fidelma shook her head.

  ‘No. The brooch that Athelnoth had was of Irish craftsmanship. Clearly, this was the betrothal gift Abbess Étain had given him. Now Seaxwulf had a brooch of Saxon workmanship. This was the brooch given in reciprocation by Athelnoth. The murderer had taken Athelnoth’s brooch from Abbess Étain’s body together with the poem found subsequently on Seaxwulf.

  ‘Seaxwulf had found it after it had been removed and was going to show it to me when he was murdered. He might have named the killer to me but the killer discovered that he had taken these incriminating things and killed him instead. I came too quickly to the rendezvous with Seaxwulf to allow the killer to recover the brooch and the incriminating piece of vellum with the poem on it.’

  ‘Incriminating?’ demanded Hilda. ‘To whom?’

  Eadulf was looking nervous. So far, the person whom Fidelma had confided to him that she suspected was behaving with nerves of steel. There was no panic on the suspect’s placid but watchful features.

  ‘Let us get this clear,’ interposed Wighard sharply. ‘You are saying that Étain was killed by a jealous lover? Yet you say Athelnoth, who was her real lover, did not kill her. He was killed by the same man who killed Étain? And Seaxwulf was also killed by this same man? Why?’

  Eadulf felt he should make some contribution.

  ‘Athelnoth was killed not only because he was the man whom Étain loved but also because he could point the finger of accusation in the right direction. Seaxwulf learnt who the killer was by discovering the brooch and Greek poem in the murderer’s sacculus. He took them before he realised what they were. When he realised, he asked Fidelma to meet him. That was why he was killed.’

  Oswy sighed in exasperation.

  ‘This seems too complicated. So now you must tell us. Who is the jealous lover of Étain? Name the man!’

  Sister Fidelma smiled wistfully.

  ‘Did I say it was a man?’

  She turned slowly to where Sister Gwid stood silently, her face grey, almost stony. The dark eyes stared back at Fidelma with hatred, the teeth clenched. ‘Sister Gwid, would you like to explain how you came by that tear in your tunica which you have sought to mend? Was it when you hid under Athelnoth’s cot to avoid detection by Sister Athelswith?’

  Before anyone realised what she was doing, Gwid had seized a knife from her robes and thrown it with all her force at Fidelma.

  Everything seemed to happen in slow motion. Fidelma was so surprised by Gwid’s unexpected reaction that she was frozen to the spot. She was aware of a hoarse cry of alarm and then the breath was knocked from her as she was borne to the ground by the weight of a body knocking into her.

  There came a shrill scream.

  The force of the fall caused her to wince in pain on landing on the stone floor and she found herself entangled with a breathless Eadulf, who had flung himself at her to knock her out of the path of the murderous missile. Fidelma peered up, trying to identify the source of the scream.

  It was Agatho, who had been standing just behind her. Gwid’s knife was now embedded in his shoulder with blood pouring across his tunic. He stood staring at the haft in disbelief. Then he began to moan and sob.

  Gwid was running for the door but the giant Oswy w
as there before her. He seized the struggling woman in his arms. Gwid was powerful, so strong that Oswy was beaten back and forced to use his drawn sword to keep the snarling Fury at bay while he called loudly for his guards. It took two of Oswy’s warriors to drag the screaming woman from the room with Oswy’s orders to lock her in a cell and guard it well.

  The king stood for a moment gazing ruefully at the red scratches on his forearms where Gwid had rent his flesh. Then Oswy glanced to where Eadulf was helping Fidelma to her feet.

  ‘This needs a lot of explanation, sister,’ he said. Then, more kindly, ‘Are you hurt?’

  Eadulf had taken charge, fussing a little over Fidelma and pouring her a goblet of wine.

  She turned it away.

  ‘Agatho is the one who is hurt.’

  They turned to him. Sister Athelswith was hurrying forward to staunch the bleeding.

  Agatho was now laughing, in spite of the knife still embedded in his shoulder and the blood soaking his clothes. He was crooning in his shrill voice.

  ‘Who, except the gods, can live time through forever without pain?’

  ‘I will take him to Brother Edgar, our physician,’ Sister Athelswith offered.

  ‘Do so,’ agreed Fidelma with a sad smile. ‘Brother Edgar may well be able to treat the knife wound but I fear there is little he can do to treat this poor man’s mind.’ As the elderly domina escorted Agatho through the door, Fidelma turned back to the others and grimaced.

  ‘I had forgotten how strong and swift Sister Gwid could be,’ she said almost apologetically. ‘I had no idea that she would react with violence.’

  Abbess Abbe looked moodily at her.

  ‘Truly, are you telling us that these horrendous murders were committed solely by Sister Gwid?’

  ‘That is what I am telling you,’ affirmed Fidelma. ‘Sister Gwid has now given you proof of her guilt.’

  ‘Indeed,’ Abbess Hilda agreed, her face still showing the shock of the revelation. ‘But a woman … to be of such strength … !’

  Fidelma glanced at Eadulf and smiled. ‘I will have that wine now.’

  The anxious brother handed her the goblet. She drained it and handed it back.