‘Have you come to any conclusions?’ asked Abbot Segdae eagerly.
‘It is far too early for conclusions,’ Fidelma replied, handing the key of Brother Mochta’s chamber back to Brother Madagan. ‘As soon as I have something positive, I will let you know.’
Abbot Ségdae appeared anxious still. ‘I suppose I was hoping for a miracle. But at least, of the Holy Relics, Ailbe’s crucifix is safely recovered.’
Fidelma laid a reassuring hand on the old man’s arm. She wished she could do something further to enhearten this old friend and supporter of her family.
‘Do not worry unduly, Ségdae. If the matter is capable of resolution, we will resolve it.’
‘Is there anything else that I can do for you before I return to my other duties?’ Brother Madagan inquired.
‘Thank you, but not at this time. Brother Eadulf and I are going to the township and may not be back for a while.’ She hesitated. ‘Oh, you mentioned that the adjoining chambers to Mochta are occupied. Where might their occupants be found?’
Brother Madagan suddenly glanced across Fidelma’s shoulder through the open gates of the abbey. ‘You are in luck, for the two brothers are coming towards the abbey gates now.’
Fidelma and Eadulf turned and saw two religious approaching the gates, one pushing a wheelbarrow full of herbs and other plants which they had obviously been gathering that morning.
As Fidelma and Eadulf walked towards the gates of the abbey to intercept the two religious, Eadulf said quietly, ‘Wouldn’t it have been a kindness to report on our conclusions so far?’
Fidelma arched an eyebrow. ‘Our conclusions? I did not think that we had any conclusions.’
Eadulf made a gesture with his hand as if to express his confusion. ‘I thought that we agreed that Brother Mochta disarrayed his room on purpose to mislead people?’
Fidelma glared at him in reproof. ‘What we discovered remains between ourselves until we can put some logic to it. What is the point of revealing our knowledge, which might then get back to the conspirators —whoever they may be —so that they can hide their tracks? We will say no more of this until the time is right.’
She turned and hailed the two men. ‘Good morning, Brothers. I am Fidelma of Cashel.’
Their greeting showed that they had both heard of her. News of her arrival at the abbey must have spread quickly.
‘I am told that you sleep in the chambers situated on either side of Brother Mochta’s room.’
The elder of the two religious was only a little older than Fidelma while the younger was no more than a teenager, fresh-faced and fair-haired. He seemed hardly beyond the ‘age of choice’. They exchanged nervous glances.
‘Is there news of Brother Mochta?’ the younger one asked. ‘The news of his disappearance and the Holy Relics is all around the abbey.’
‘There is no news, Brother … ?’
‘I am called Daig and this is Brother Bardan who is the apothecary and mortician of our abbey.’ The youth said this with an air of pride as one introducing a more worthy person than himself. He went on eagerly: ‘The entire abbey has been talking of your arrival, lady.’
‘Sister,’ corrected Fidelma gently.
‘How may we help you?’ interrupted the elder Brother in a less eager fashion than his companion.
‘You know that Brother Mochta disappeared from his chamber sometime after Vespers and sometime before dawn on the feastday of Ailbe?’
‘We know as much,’ agreed Brother Bardan. His tone was curt and he seemed to regard Fidelma with a suspicious look. He was a swarthy young man, his hair the colour of a raven’s feathers, with a blue sheen on its blackness. His dark eyes seemed to move quickly, nervously, here and there as if in search of hidden enemies. Although clean-shaven, the shadow of a beard coloured his lower features darkly, contrasting with the fairness of his cheeks.
‘Were you sleeping in your chambers that night? I mean, the night when Mochta disappeared.’
‘We were.’
‘You heard nothing during the night?’
‘I sleep soundly, Sister,’ replied Brother Bardan. ‘I doubt whether anything would awaken me. I heard nothing.’
‘Well, I was disturbed,’ Brother Daig announced.
Fidelma turned towards him. It was not a reply that she had expected. Out of the corner of her eye she noticed Brother Bardán’ s expression crease in anger as he glanced at his companion. His mouth opened and she wondered, for a second, if he was going to rebuke the boy. But he did not.
‘Did you report this disturbance?’ she demanded.
‘Oh, it was not that sort of disturbance,’ the young boy replied.
‘Then what sort was it?’
‘I am a light sleeper and I do remember being awakened in the night by a door being shut. I think the wind must have caught it for no Brother shuts his door in such a fashion. It banged shut.’
‘What happened then?’ asked Fidelma.
‘Nothing,’ admitted Brother Daig. ‘I turned over and went back to sleep.’
Fidelma was disappointed. ‘You could not tell which door had banged shut?’ she pressed the young man.
‘No. But I know this … I’ve heard that there was supposed to have been a fight in Mochta’s room about this time. I say that it is impossible.’
‘Yes?’ Fidelma encouraged the young man.
‘Well, had there been such a fight, then it is obvious that I would have heard it. I would have awakened. Apart from the banging of the door, nothing else disturbed me during that night.’
Brother Bardan smiled sceptically. ‘Come, Daig … young people are known to sleep through great tempests. How can you be so positive that nothing untoward took place in Mochta’s chambers that night? From what we have been told, the evidence shows the opposite.’
‘I would have awakened had there been such a fight,’ Daig replied indignantly. ‘As it was, I was awakened by a slamming door.’
‘Well, I admit that I heard nothing.’ Bardan was dismissive. Fidelma thanked them both and left them at the abbey gates, followed by Eadulf. After a short distance, crossing the square towards the township, she glanced quickly back over her shoulder. She was intrigued to see Brother Bardan, standing where they had left him, apparently arguing with the younger monk. It seemed that Bardan was telling the youth off in no uncertain terms.
‘Well,’ said Eadulf, unaware of the argument as he strode on, ‘doesn’t that prove your point? There was no struggle in Brother Mochta’s room.’
Fidelma turned back to catch up with Eadulf.
‘But where does that take us?’ mused Fidelma as she continued to walk with him, passing the great yew-tree in the square.
‘I don’t understand,’ Eadulf responded.
‘It would only take us somewhere if we knew for certain that Brother Mochta was the same man who was killed in Cashel. But, according to Madagan and the others here, we are describing exactly the same man, yet there is one point of difference that cannot possibly be reconciled.’
Eadulf made a groaning sound and spread his hands eloquently. ‘I know. The tonsure. I have tried many times to see if I can come up with a reasonable explanation for it. I cannot. Brother Mochta was last seen here less than forty-eight hours ago with his head shaved in the manner of the tonsure of St John. The man we thought was Mochta was found in Cashel twenty-four hours ago with the signs of a tonsure of St Peter on his head but with his hair also showing signs of a few weeks of growth on his pate. How can these things be squared?’
‘You have overlooked another point,’ Fidelma observed.
‘What is that?’
‘Aona saw this same man with the same tonsure a week ago at the Well of Ara. Segdae told us that Mochta hardly ever left the abbey. That is another point against the body of the man at Cashel being Mochta.’
Eadulf shook his head in annoyance.
‘I cannot fathom any reasonable explanation for it.’
‘Now do you see that it is a fruitless
exercise to tell Abbot Ségdae of our suspicions? Until we have some answers they must remain suspicions and not conclusions.’
Eadulf was contrite.
They crossed the square to the beginning of the group of houses, barns and other buildings which comprised the township of Imleach. The urban complex had grown up during the last century in the shadow of the abbey and its cathedral seat. Before then it had simply been the gathering place around the sacred tree of the Eóghanacht where kings came to take their oath and be installed in office. The abbey had attracted tradesmen, builders and others so that a township of several hundred people had grown up opposite the abbey walls.
Fidelma paused at the edge of the buildings and gazed round.
‘Where are we going now?’ Eadulf asked.
‘To find a blacksmith, of course,’ she replied shortly. ‘Where else?’
Chapter Ten
There was no need to ask directions to the smithy’s forge for the heavy breath of the bellows and the ring of iron on iron could clearly be heard as Fidelma and Eadulf came to the group of houses which were spaced along a main street within sight of the abbey gates. The forge was stone built with the furnace constructed on large flags. In one of the flagstones there was a small hole through which a pipe directed the air-current from the bellows into the fire.
The wheezy breath of the smith’s apparatus was supplied by an impressive four chamber air pump. Eadulf had heard that such a large bellows existed but had never seen one. He had also heard that it gave a more uniform blast to the furnace than the normal two chamber device. It was obviously much harder to work for they saw the smith, sweating at the fire, assisted by a sturdy bellows blower whose job was to raise and depress end chambers by standing on two short boards and raising one foot at a time in the manner of someone walking slowly and deliberately. The faster he walked the quicker the bellows worked.
The smith was a well built, muscular man in his thirties, wearing leather trousers but no shirt with only a buckskin apron to protect him from the sparks. He was holding a red-hot piece of iron in a tennchair, a pair of tongs. In the other hand he wielded his hammer and turning to a large anvil he smote the iron with a thunderous noise before turning to a water trough called a telchuma and plunging the iron in.
The smith saw them approaching and paused, spitting into the hot coals of his forge so that there was a momentary sizzling sound.
‘Suibne, get me more wood charcoal,’ he ordered his assistant without taking his eyes off them.
The bellows pumper jumped down from the boards and disappeared into a shed.
The smith drew the back of his hand across his face, wiping away the sweat, as they halted before him.
‘What can I do for you?’ he asked, examining them each in turn. ‘Do you seek me out as a smith or do you seek me out as bó-aire of this community?’
The bó-aire was a local magistrate, a chieftain without land whose wealth had been initially judged by the number of cows he owned, hence he was called a ‘cow chief. Small communities, such as a township, were usually ruled by a bó-aire who owed his allegiance to a greater chieftain.
‘I am Fidelma of Cashel,’ Fidelma introduced herself. She was more formal with the man once she heard that he held rank. ‘What is your name?’
The smith straightened perceptibly. Who had not heard of the King’s sister? The chieftain to whom he owed allegiance was Fidelma’s own cousin, Finguine of Cnoc Aine.
‘I am called Nion, lady.’
Fidelma drew out the arrows from her marsupium. The one from the assassin’s quiver and the other, broken one she had taken from Mochta’s chamber.
‘Tell me what you make of these, Nion,’ she asked without explanation.
The smith wiped his hands on his apron and took the arrows from her hands and, holding them up, examined them carefully.
‘I am no fletcher, although I have made arrow heads before now. These are of competent workmanship. The head on this one is made of bronze and constructed, as you see, with a hollow cro …’
‘A what?’ demanded Eadulf, leaning forward.
‘A socket. See there where the wood of the shaft is inserted? These are especially fine for you see that the head is fixed by a tiny metal rivet.’
‘And where would you guess they were made?’ pressed Fidelma.
‘No need to guess,’ replied the smith with a smile. ‘See the flight? That bears the symbol of a fletcher of Cnoc Aine and you are in that territory, as you must know, lady.’
Fidelma smiled thinly. ‘And would you be able to point to such a craftsman, Nion?’
The smith gave an unexpected roar of laughter. ‘See my neighbour there …’ he said, pointing to a carpentry shop nearby. ‘He makes the shafts and constructs the flights, while I make the heads and fix them in place. This arrow is one of a batch I made not above a week ago. I recognise the metalworking. Why do you ask, lady?’ he added, returning the arrows to her.
His assistant returned and emptied a bag of charcoal on the furnace fire, poking it with an iron rod.
‘I would like to know something about the man to whom you sold these arrows.’
At once the smith’s eyes narrowed suspiciously. ‘Why?’
‘If you have nothing to hide, Nion, you will tell me. Remember that you are answering the questions of a dálaigh and I hold you to your position as magistrate of this town.’
Nion stared at her as if trying to gauge her intentions and then shrugged. ‘Then as bó-aire to dálaigh, I will answer. I do not know the man. I merely called him the Saigteóir because he looked and acted like a professional archer. He came to my forge more than a week ago and wanted me to produce two dozen arrows. He paid me well for the task. He collected them a few days later and that is all I know.’
Eadulf was disappointed but Fidelma did not give up.
‘Sometimes memories have to be teased out,’ she observed. ‘You say the man looked like a professional archer. Describe him.’
After some hesitation Nion the smith described the bowman whom Gionga had slain. It was a good description and there was no doubting the identification of the man.
‘You spoke to him. How did he sound?’
The smith rubbed his jaw and then his eyes brightened. ‘He spoke roughly, like any professional soldier but he was not of the warrior caste; not a man born into the nobility of the craft of arms.’
‘Did you not ask what he was doing here?’ intervened Eadulf.
‘No. Nor would I ask him. Better not to ask a warrior why he wants weapons unless he wants to volunteer such information.’
‘I can understand that,’ agreed Fidelma. ‘So he volunteered no information?’
The smith shook his head.
‘Did he have any companion with him?’
‘No.’
‘You seem certain of that. Did he ride a horse?’
‘Oh yes. He rode a chestnut mare. I noticed that for the beast’s rear shoes needed fixing. One had been struck loose by a stone. I sorted out that problem at once.’
‘Could you tell anything from the horse?’ Fidelma knew well enough that a professional smith should tell in what style a horse was shod, sometimes even to identifying the geographical location of the smith who did the work.
‘That it was last shoed in the north was obvious,’ the smith replied at once. ‘I have seen that style before and know it is used by the smiths of Clan Brasil. I could also tell that the animal had seen its best years. It was not the sort of animal that a warrior of status would ride, though it was a war horse.’
‘So what else did you discern?’
‘Nothing. What business was it of mine?’
‘You are the bó-aire,’ Fidelma pointed out. ‘It is your responsibility to be aware of what takes place in your territory. These arrows that you sold to this archer were used in an attempted assassination on my brother, the King, and the Prince of the Uí Fidgente. Have you not heard?’
Nion stared at her without speaking. It was obv
ious that the news shocked him.
‘I had no hand in this affair, lady,’ he said anxiously. ‘I merely made the arrows and sold them. I did not know who the man was …’
Fidelma raised her hand to quiet his outburst.
‘I tell you this only to show that sometimes these matters can be your business, magistrate of Imleach. Bearing this in mind, is there anything else that you should tell me about this archer?’
There was no doubt that Nion was trying his best to think now, and he raised one hand to the back of his head to rub it as an aid to the process.
‘I can add nothing further, lady. But, of course, if he were a stranger in the area, then this archer must have stayed a few days within this vicinity in order to wait for the arrows. Perhaps the inn where he stayed might have further knowledge?’
‘Where would that inn be?’
Nion gestured eloquently. ‘Assuming that he did not seek shelter in the abbey itself, there is only Cred’s inn down the street at the far end of the town. It has a reputation and is not licensed by me. That is the abbot’s wish, incidentally. He has tried to close it down on moral grounds. But it is the only inn within the town. I think this archer must have stayed there. If he did not, then there is no further help that I can offer.’
Fidelma thanked the smith and left him standing, hands on his hips, feet splayed apart, regarding her with a suspicious look as she walked away with Eadulf.
‘If the archer had had his horse shod by a smith in the territory of Clan Brasil,’ volunteered Eadulf reflectively, ‘then perhaps he knew Brother Mochta? Didn’t the abbot say he came from Clan Brasil?’
‘Well spotted, Eadulf. But though Mochta came from Clan Brasil and the archer’s horse was shod there, we have been told that the archer’s accent does not place him as a native from those northern lands.’
Fidelma was silent a minute as she considered the matter. ‘We still have to place Brother Mochta in a relationship with this archer, if, indeed, we can square this mystery of the tonsure.’
Eadulf groaned softly in despair. ‘These links are so obvious but they fall on that one mystery of the tonsure.’
The Monk Who Vanished Page 12