I must talk to Fachtnan, thought Mara. Tell him the truth. Tell him that Fiona has no real interest in him. Try to probe, delicately, his feelings for Nuala. He had been fond of her for years. She would play the matchmaker; a dangerous game, perhaps, but she was sure that Nuala and Fachtnan would be happy together.
But when the scholars arrived, there was no sign of Fachtnan. Mara had gone to the gate of Cahermacnaghten to welcome them, had heard their voices calling greetings to some farmer from a long way off. There they were, Moylan and Aidan in the front, then Hugh and Shane, and Fiona riding rather soberly behind them.
‘Where is Fachtnan?’ she asked as they came close and they looked at each other with raised eyebrows.
‘I thought he was here, Brehon,’ said Moylan.
‘Not at Ballinalacken,’ said Aidan. ‘Not unless he’s in the eagle’s nest. Did you know that there’s a golden eagle nesting just above the castle, Brehon?’
‘Shut up,’ muttered Moylan.
‘Oh, I forgot.’ Aidan crimsoned with embarrassment and the two younger boys blushed in sympathy with him. It would be all quite unreal to them that one of their own who had eaten and slept beside them for the last couple of weeks was now lying dead.
‘I’d like you all to leave your horses and ponies here for the moment and go across to the fields and gather some flowers – there are tons of early orchids out and I think it would be nice to put them in the coffin,’ said Mara. Her quick ear had caught the sound of a heavy cart coming trundling up the road. That would be Blár with the coffin. She had not reckoned on Fiona’s presence, thinking that she would have been too upset to come. She did not want the girl to see Eamon, who had loved her, lying dead on the table in her house.
‘Make sure that you get a very big bunch. I’ll call you when Eamon has been coffined and then we’ll walk with the coffin down to the church. Father O’Connor will receive the body and he will be buried tomorrow morning.’
The walk down to Noughaval Church had been a silent affair. The scholars had prayed with sincerity in the church, joining in the priest’s prayers for eternal rest to be granted to the young man whom they had known so well for a short time.
When they emerged from the church Fiona was shivering and the two younger boys looked pale. Mara looked at them with understanding. It was an age when they felt eternal and now they had had a shock when one of their companions had been killed.
‘One thing that we can do for Eamon, now, is to find out who killed him and make that person pay,’ she said, making her voice as matter-of-fact as she could. Beside her, she heard Fiona take in a deep breath, but no more was said until they returned to the law school.
Somehow everything was better then. This was the place where legal questions were debated and the familiarity of the well-worn desks, the wooden press full of law books and scrolls, the board on the wall, regularly whitewashed by Cumhal, with its ledge beneath for the charcoal sticks and the damp sponge – all of these familiar objects seemed to settle the scholars into a steady, though sombre, frame of mind.
‘Nuala feels that Eamon was dead, perhaps for as long as an hour, before his body was hurled over the side of the cliff below the flax garden,’ began Mara and she outlined Nuala’s reasoning to them, watching the heads nod with comprehension. The Cahermacnaghten scholars knew Nuala well and respected her learning.
‘Why did you leave him, Fiona?’ asked Shane curiously.
Fiona hesitated for a moment, colour rushing into her pale face, and then she said uncertainly, ‘He started to . . . I . . .’
‘Anything to do with Heptad forty-seven?’ asked Moylan delicately, assuming the airs of a man of the world, while Aidan blushed for his friend.
‘Heptad forty-seven? What’s that?’ murmured Hugh to Shane, who rapidly licked his finger, looked directly ahead at Mara in an attentive manner while writing RAPE in damp letters on to his desk.
‘Nothing like that,’ assured Fiona with the ghost of a smile.
‘You should read Bretha Nemed toisech, my lad,’ said Moylan to Hugh in an undertone. ‘Essential reading for a boy of your age! Would make your hair stand on end. Full honour price penalty if a woman is kissed against her will! Read Cáin Adomnain, too. Ten ounces of silver for touching . . .’
‘That’s enough, Moylan,’ said Mara, but she was grateful to him for lightening the atmosphere. Fiona was laughing in a natural manner and she began to explain to the boys about Eamon going north and how she turned back and left him.
‘And the deed had definitely been signed by then?’ asked Aidan.
‘Definitely,’ said Fiona. ‘I asked him and he took it out and showed it to me.’
‘Did he unroll it?’ asked Shane sharply and then before Fiona could reply, he said quickly, ‘Think, Fiona, do it step by step. He opened his satchel . . .’
‘He opened his satchel,’ repeated Fiona obediently, ‘and he unrolled it and—’
‘But wasn’t it tied?’ interrupted Shane. ‘Did he untie it, or did he slide it out of the loop?’
‘Yes, you’re right; it was tied.’ Fiona shut her eyes and sucked in her lips with concentration. ‘He slid the tape off it,’ she said suddenly and opened her eyes and blinked at Shane’s air of triumph. ‘Is that important?’ she asked in a puzzled way.
‘Shane found the linen ribbon,’ said Hugh. ‘It was on the path above the flax garden.’
‘The path coming from the north,’ supplemented Aidan.
‘Still tied in a loop,’ said Shane.
‘So,’ said Moylan slowly, ‘the murderer, be it a he, or a she . . .’
‘You needn’t look at me,’ said Fiona tartly. ‘I was nowhere near the flax garden today. In any case, if I went around murdering everyone who tried to kiss me, the place would be littered with dead bodies.’ She looked meaningfully at Moylan, who blushed a bright scarlet.
‘Never mind all that, now,’ said Mara taking pity on him. ‘Shane has uncovered an interesting point. If Eamon definitely had the deed in his satchel when Fiona parted from him, then the deed was either lost or stolen.’
‘Why steal the deed?’ asked Hugh in a puzzled voice.
‘Because now there is no deed! The auction has to be held again.’ Shane sounded triumphant and Mara looked at him with respect. He was only twelve, but with his sharp brain and excellent memory he might be one of her top scholars by the time that he was seventeen or eighteen. ‘This puts Cathal the flax manager as a prime suspect, doesn’t it, Brehon?’
‘May I write on the board, Brehon?’ Hugh looked pleading and Mara nodded. Hugh had excellent handwriting, was a hard-working, well-behaved boy, but he was a problem, nevertheless. His mother had died two years ago of the sweating sickness, and for a while she had thought this might be the problem with his work. But now she was beginning to worry as to whether he had the brains to qualify in five years’ time. And if not, would it be kinder to inform his father, the silversmith, at the end of this year and allow the boy to follow his father’s trade? However, that was a matter which could wait. In the meantime, this murder had to be solved, so she turned her mind back to the problem of Eamon and the missing deed.
‘Put up the headings, Hugh,’ called out Aidan. ‘Reasons to murder . . .’
‘Fear, anger, gain, revenge,’ said Shane.
‘Remember Heptad forty-seven,’ murmured Moylan.
‘That would be covered by “anger”,’ said Shane placidly and Fiona laughed.
‘Or revenge,’ said Hugh wisely. ‘That’s if he managed . . .’
‘Can’t think of anyone for “fear”. That’s usually when someone is being blackmailed. Did Eamon know any terrible secrets?’ asked Aidan.
‘Doubt it,’ said Moylan. ‘He was such a . . . well, I think if he did know any secrets he would not have been able to stop himself from hinting at it. Anyway he hasn’t been here for very long.’
‘But if the deed is missing and the auction has to be held again, then Cathal’s name will have to go next to
“gain”. Does everyone agree?’ Shane looked around at his fellow scholars.
‘I think that if you are being fair you should put my name beside “anger”,’ said Fiona. ‘I was very angry with him.’ Her eyes filled with tears for a moment and the others looked away.
‘And Fachtnan,’ said Hugh innocently. ‘He might have been very angry if he saw you leave with Eamon.’ The other three boys looked at each other uneasily and then surreptitiously at Fiona. Hugh wrote up FACHTNAN beside FIONA and then turned back to look at his fellow scholars.
‘And Owney, Cathal’s son,’ said Moylan hurriedly. ‘He’s supposed to be getting married this summer. Do you remember that girl that he was with last Halloween? The daughter of the woman who sells linen at the fairs, do you remember her? He might not have been able to afford it. Marriage is expensive . . .’ He trailed off, looking uneasily at Fiona who was staring at the desk.
‘Do we know anything much about Eamon’s past life, Brehon?’ asked Shane. ‘I was wondering why he was so anxious to go over to Arra in the middle of the night. He didn’t stop anywhere on the way, did he, Fiona?’
‘No,’ said Fiona, ‘but I think that he went in the middle of the night because he had been drinking and he thought it would be fun to just go – and he persuaded me into it. If I had said no, perhaps he would have waited for the morning. The puzzle is why he didn’t come back with me. He must have had some reason to go north instead of going back across O’Briensbridge. I think that if we knew that, we might find the solution to the problem.’
‘I’ve thought of a reason,’ said Shane suddenly. ‘Eamon was very keen on money. What was it that he said to you, Fiona, about getting a bagful of silver? Perhaps he went north because he decided to go to the flax garden – after all that was where he was found – to go and talk to Cathal . . .’
‘And give him the chance to steal the deed before it was delivered to Muiris.’ Moylan shouted the words in his excitement, but Mara said nothing. She loved to see her scholars’ minds working quickly.
‘For a bag of silver, you can knock me over and take the deed from my bag, Cathal,’ supplemented Aidan.
‘Or Owney,’ said Shane wisely. ‘He’s a great hurler. He’d be strong enough to kill someone. Perhaps he didn’t mean to; perhaps he just knocked him down.’
‘Nuala thinks that Eamon was killed, not by being thrown down the mountainside, but by being hit in the exact, dangerous spot at the base of the throat,’ said Mara.
‘Bretha Déin Chécht, number four,’ exclaimed Shane. ‘The windows to the soul. The thyroid cartilage is one of them.’
‘So someone grabbed Eamon by the throat and squeezed, or punched him right on the thyroid spot, and then threw the body down the mountain,’ said Aidan.
‘Depend on it,’ said Moylan, ‘the secret lies in the flax garden. After all, that’s the only possible reason for Eamon to go north after O’Brien of Arra had signed the deed.’
‘Did he put the ribbon back, Fiona?’ asked Hugh and Mara nodded approval to him. That was a good question.
Fiona shut her eyes, obviously concentrating hard. ‘Yes, he did,’ she said, opening them quite suddenly and fixing their blue light on Hugh, who blinked and blushed. ‘Yes, he did. I’m certain of that. I remember that when he rolled it up it wouldn’t quite slip through again and so he had to untie it and retie it.’
Mara reached into her pouch and took out the pink tape, still tied in a loop, still with the neat bow on top of it. She examined it carefully. ‘I didn’t make that bow,’ she said. ‘I loop it differently, but that doesn’t get us a lot further. Remember that either Eamon or the O’Brien will have undone it before signing and then retied it. Still it’s a valuable point that you made, Hugh, because it might suggest that the murderer of Eamon checked the deed before taking it away. That would explain why the tied loop was found just in the place where Eamon was probably killed.’
‘Perhaps we could hunt through all the belongings of the suspects to see whether we could find the deed,’ suggested Aidan.
Mara’s eyes went to the lengthening shadow of the apple tree outside the window. She could tell the time so accurately by that shadow; for more than thirty years she had watched it from the schoolhouse window. ‘Well, I must be getting back to Ballinalacken – the hunters will have returned,’ she said. ‘What would you boys like to do? I’m going to suggest to Brigid and Cumhal that they stay here. After Mass at Kilfenora cathedral tomorrow at noon, my visitors will go home. Do you want to stay here at Cahermacnaghten or come back to Ballinalacken with me?’
She looked at her scholars and saw signs of doubt on their faces. Fachtnan was not here – he would normally have given the lead. Eventually Moylan said tactfully, ‘You have enough to do without having us to look after, Brehon. Shall we stay here?’
‘Just go and have a word with Brigid about this, will you, and if it is all right by her, then you can stay here tonight.’ She understood. They were tired of the splendours of Ballinalacken castle and wanted to be back with their muddy field, their balls and hurling games, thought Mara. ‘I will see you all at Eamon’s burial service at Noughaval tomorrow,’ she added. Turlough would understand that she would not be able to accompany him to the cathedral tomorrow.
‘I’ve thought of something, Brehon,’ said Moylan tentatively. ‘You’ll be busy tomorrow with your guests and everything, but would you trust us to make a search of the mountain area around the flax garden and see whether we can find the deed? After all, it might have just slipped out and fallen into a hole somewhere.’
‘That would be good,’ said Aidan enthusiastically. ‘We could divide the area between us. Danann could come too; he’d enjoy that.’
‘I’ll have a word with Cumhal and see whether he can spare Danann,’ promised Mara. Better still, perhaps Cumhal might go, also, and keep an eye on all. She did not normally fuss about her scholars, thinking that they needed to gain habits of self-reliance under her care, but now she suddenly felt vulnerable. Would the girl sitting opposite her now be dead if she had accompanied Eamon, or was her mind moving in quite the wrong direction?
Was the murder of the young lawyer the result of anger, rather than of greed? Thoughtfully, she wiped the entries on the board clean with her damp sponge and waited until she heard the boys’ voices talking to Brigid at the door of the kitchen house before turning to her remaining scholar.
Fiona had not followed the boys out but sat and waited demurely to speak until Mara had looked at her. ‘You’d prefer me to go back with you, is that it?’ she asked.
‘That’s it,’ said Mara firmly. ‘I feel worried about you. And I’d like you to promise me that you will not go off with anyone again without asking my permission.’
‘I’m not likely to,’ said Fiona sadly. ‘I’ve learned my lesson, I suppose.’
But what was the lesson? wondered Mara as they both rode in silence across to Ballinalacken Castle.
Not to arise jealousy in the minds of young men. Was that it?
Could the murder of Eamon have been the result of a young man’s anger?
Or was it a matter of retaining a profitable business?
Or could there have been some other motive?
Seven
Bretha Nemed
(Laws for Professional People)
There are three skills that give status to a fili (poet):
The knowledge that lights up the world
The ability to chant in rhyme
To be able to tell the future
The hunting party had brought back immense appetites and very loud voices. Mara sat at the end of the table and watched the face of her husband at the top of the table. He had had a very good day. The sport had been excellent and he had spent the lovely sunny April day out in the fresh air on the stony mountain in the company of his nearest relations, allies and friends. He smiled down at his wife and lifted a glass in salute and Mara lifted her glass in return to him – one of the precious set of glasses that her father,
the first Brehon of the Burren, the first ollamh of the law school of Cahermacnaghten, had brought home from his trip to Rome.
‘Seamus, a poem,’ he called impetuously to the young poet. Mara had placed Seamus MacCraith between Nuala and Fiona and hoped that the three young guests would amuse each other. Seamus would make a possible husband for Nuala, she thought. He was quite a gifted young man and had written some extraordinarily beautiful poetry about Mullaghmore Mountain on the Burren when he had come there on a winter’s afternoon, some months ago. Nuala was so brilliantly intelligent that it would be a pity for her to marry a husband too far beneath her in brains.
However, the morning’s hunt had not inspired him – or else he was too interested in his conversation with Fiona.
‘Not yet, my lord, these matters need time. I have to sow the seed and wait for the flower,’ he called out, his beautiful voice making a song out of the simple sentences.
Ulick Burke eyed him severely. ‘What is it the law says, my boy? My dear Brehon, you will put me right if I err: “There are three things which do not profit the world by anything they do, whatever their fame for wisdom, art, and piety: a grasping miser; an arrogant poet; and a kept priest.” Methinks that such arrogance is unbecoming in such a young man. If the king asks for a poem, then as a good workman you should produce the poem.’
Seamus MacCraith looked at him furiously. ‘I do not claim for myself the status of a workman, my lord; that would be very wrong. I am merely the channel through which the words of God flow in praise of the kingdom that He has created. You know what the great Fithail says: “There are three duties of one who is Fili: to teach their people to live fearless in strength; to teach their people how to avoid the attention of the Mighty Ones and to teach their people the Laws of Nature.”’
Mara looked at Ulick with amusement. How would he answer that?
‘And what about Triad two hundred and forty-eight?’ demanded Fiona with a triumphant glance at Ulick. ‘I don’t suppose that you have heard of that, have you? We at the law school learn all of these.’
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