Writ in Stone

by Cora Harrison

  ‘Who has done this?’ he asked and his voice rang out against the rafters of the roof.

  ‘I shall begin my investigations immediately,’ said Mara, conscious of her naked feet in the thin shoes. ‘But first, could I ask you to get one of your young brothers to take the mac-an-ri, the king’s son, back to his house and perhaps your herbalist would tend to him. The king’s bodyguards and I will go to make sure that the king is in good health and that no assassin has approached him in the night.’

  Turlough, she thought, was in remarkably good health when she saw him last, but a return to the royal lodge would give her an opportunity to get dressed and put on some warm hose and boots.

  ‘And the church?’ The abbot, she was glad to note, had responded meekly to the note of authority in her voice.

  ‘The church must be locked until I have time to look thoroughly around it,’ said Mara, decisively holding her hand out for the large key which the abbot wore around his waist. He gave it to her with less reluctance than she had expected. His brother’s death must have shaken him more than had appeared initially. She waited calmly while the crowd dispersed and then beckoned the bodyguards to go ahead of her. She had perfect confidence in her own ability to preserve an air of dignified solemnity, but Turlough, when faced with the anxious queries from his bodyguards, might not be able to resist sidelong glances at her while he declared that his night’s rest had been unbroken.

  Once everyone had left the chapel, though, she was suddenly seized with a violent attack of shivering. Her feet were cold, but it was not that so much as the sudden realization that this blow was undoubtedly meant to kill Turlough. Everyone, whether noble or humble, lay or monastic, had been gathered in the refectory for supper the night before and everyone would have heard the king’s booming voice, declaring that he, and he alone, would keep the first hour of the vigil in front of the tomb of his great ancestor, Conor Sudaine. Mara’s knees felt weak and she sank down on the low seat beside her. The smell of blood was making her feel sick, but she tried to ignore it. She shut her eyes and tried to concentrate on the scene the night before.

  They had all been there, all the principal members of the O’Brien clan. There was Turlough, of course, in the seat of honour, and she herself on his right-hand side. To his left was Conor, his ailing son, and beside him his wife, Ellice. On the other side of Mara was the abbot, and next to him his brother, the king’s cousin, Mahon O’Brien. Mahon O’Brien’s wife of the first degree sat opposite and also at the table, to the great amusement of Turlough, was a pretty young girl Mahon had introduced as his wife of the second degree. Of course, Brehon law allowed this. A wife of the second degree was a woman who brought no property and was completely under the control of her husband. Banna, who had brought her husband rich land in Galway, was not looking too pleased at the addition of Frann to her family circle. Then there was Teige O’Brien, and his placid plump little wife, Ciara, from Lemeanah Castle on the Burren. Teige was Turlough’s first cousin and a possible choice as the next tánaiste if anything happened to the delicate Conor. There were also the other three taoiseachs on the Burren: Ardal O’Lochlainn, Finn O’Connor, and his wife, Mona, sister to Ciara O’Brien, and Garrett MacNamara.

  Oddly enough, it was Conor, the sickly Conor, who had provoked his father last night. Conor had been ill for a long time, but he had made a great effort to attend the pre-wedding ceremonies, probably, thought Mara, because he knew how heart-sore his father would be at the absence of his other son, the disgraced Murrough. Nevertheless, it may have been some jealousy of Murrough that caused him to make the unfortunate remark.

  ‘People live in the past too much,’ he had declared in his thin, breathless voice. ‘I don’t believe that any man gains a jot of nobility by reason of his ancestors.’ Here he was interrupted by a violent fit of coughing and his dark-haired wife assisted him from the refectory, her sharp-featured face impatient and sulky. Ellice and her father, a younger brother to the Duke of Ormond, had thought to make a good match when she was betrothed to the son of the king of Thomond, but it began to look as if Conor would not live to succeed to his father’s position.

  Turlough had opened his mouth to make an angry retort, but shut it hastily as he saw the red stain spreading across the white linen handkerchief pressed to Conor’s mouth. Gloomily he poured himself some more wine.

  ‘A man’s ancestors are the most important thing to him,’ he said as the door shut behind his sick son. ‘Tell me a man’s breeding and I will tell you what that man is. My ancestors were great men.’ He looked beligerantly around the table and everyone’s eyes fell before his. ‘Conor Sudaine, whose anniversary we will honour tomorrow, was a man who fought until no drop of blood remained in his veins.’ He turned to the abbot. ‘We will have a Mass for him tomorrow?’

  The abbot bowed his head respectfully. ‘At sundown, my lord.’

  ‘I’m not convinced that we do enough to honour him.’ The king was in a quarrelsome mood, thought Mara, anxiously eyeing the low level of the flagon of cheap Spanish wine which the abbot had placed before his most important guest.

  ‘Perhaps some extra prayers,’ she murmured. The weather was stormy and there would be many young brothers at a loose end tomorrow as farm work would be difficult. It wouldn’t do any of them any harm to have an hour of quiet prayer inside the church as a change from the back-breaking toil of digging leeks from the cold wet soil.

  ‘That’s it,’ said Turlough, crashing his fist on the table and making the platters jump. ‘Tomorrow will be a day of continuous prayer, from dawn to dusk, beside the tomb of Conor Sudaine.’ He looked around the refectory where every knife was suspended and every eye turned respectfully towards him before announcing dramatically: ‘I myself will take the first hour of the vigil, after you have celebrated the office of prime. I will be in the church by dawn.’

  ‘I will be happy to accompany you, my lord,’ said the abbot heroically.

  ‘No, no.’ Turlough was in a mood to disagree with everyone. ‘I will be alone. You, my lord abbot, may take the second hour. Fergal, Conall,’ he bellowed over his shoulder, ‘I’ll rouse you at dawn and we’ll go across to the church.’

  ‘Yes, my lord,’ they chorused respectfully. They would know the king well enough not to take it upon themselves to rouse him, thought Mara, guessing that by morning, Turlough would change his mind.

  So what had made the bodyguards go to the church before Turlough, wondered Mara, rising to her feet and walking quietly down the middle aisle of the church. Carefully she locked all of the doors and then stepped outside. The sky was full of menace, with purple-black snow clouds piling up against the white-capped summit of Cappanabhaile Mountain to the west. The four taoiseachs of the Burren stood outside the door to their guest house waiting for her, waiting, like the chieftains from time immemorial, to serve their lord, the king.

  ‘Brehon,’ said Ardal O’Lochlainn, coming forward. ‘This is a terrible thing. What can we do to help?’

  ‘Could it be one of the O’Kelly clan?’ asked Teige O’Brien eagerly. ‘He could have crept in and struck the blow.’

  ‘How would an O’Kelly know that the king meant to be in the church at daybreak?’ objected Garrett MacNamara. His wife was from Galway and she had distant connections with the O’Kelly clan.

  ‘They have spies everywhere,’ said Teige with conviction. ‘Everyone heard the king last night. Everyone knew that he intended to be alone in the church this morning. Perhaps they have a spy among the brothers and he managed to get word out. By the mercy of God, it wasn’t the king, but only Mahon, who was killed.’ Mara had to conceal a smile. There was little love between the cousins, Teige and Mahon. It had been rumoured that Mahon was more favoured than Teige by some of the O’Brien clan, although Teige would be Turlough’s choice for tánaiste, if anything happened to Conor. Teige’s suggestion that an O’Kelly might have come forty miles through a blizzard just because the king might possibly be alone in the church was absurd. It didn’
t surprise her, though; the outsider was always a popular suspect when it came to murder.

  ‘The bodyguards were on duty outside the west door. No one from the outside could have got in. In any case, no one came or went from this abbey last night or this morning,’ said Ardal O’Lochlainn with conviction. ‘You have only to look for yourself, Brehon. I’ve been to the gate and all around the walls. The snow is heaped up and there are no footprints. If an O’Kelly came here last night or in the early morning then he must have flown like a bird.’

  ‘I’ll take your word for it, Ardal,’ said Mara. She smiled at him. He was a handsome figure of a man as he towered above here; his red hair flamed against the whiteness of the snow and his blue eyes were the colour of the sea. A man of honour and principle, she could rely on his testimony; she knew that.

  ‘I must go back to the lodge now,’ she said, ‘but, Ardal, perhaps you could make arrangements for me to talk to any travellers or visitors in the lay dormitory. They may have seen or heard something during the last few hours. Just have a word with the abbot, will you? I’ll be back in a few minutes.’

  As Mara approached the royal lodge she could hear Turlough’s voice coming from the king’s chamber at the front of the building. Probably the two bodyguards were in there with him explaining the events of the morning. That would give her a moment to get changed. She went quietly up the stairs and into her room. Brigid must have been in during her absence. The room was tidied, the bed covers neat and the charcoal brazier in the corner was filling the room with a welcome glow and on top of the iron bars that covered it was an ewer filled with hot water. Quickly Mara washed, then dressed in her warmest wool gown, pulled on thick woollen hose and her fur-lined boots. A tap came to the door and she opened it.

  ‘I brought you some breakfast. Sit down and eat it now, everything else can wait.’ Brigid had been a servant to Mara’s father and she had brought up his daughter after the death of his wife. Sometimes Mara felt irked by her unceasing vigilance, but this morning it was comforting to be mothered.

  There was a large round griddlecake still steaming from the hot plate and a wooden cup of hot spiced ale. Mara drank it gratefully, only now fully realizing how cold she had been.

  ‘So it wasn’t the king after all, praise be to God,’ observed Brigid, seating herself on the window seat.

  ‘How did Fergal and Conall come to make that mistake? And why were they at the church if the king had not gone there?’ asked Mara, with her mouth full of griddlecake. The salted butter was incredibly creamy. No wonder the abbey cows were famous for their milk!

  ‘Well, it was I that thought of waking them,’ explained Brigid. ‘You see we all heard the king the night before – everyone heard him, even the people at the low table at the end of the refectory, they heard him, so when I woke up this morning and I saw all the light in the room, I sat up in bed and I said to Cumhal: “that’ll be the rain turned to snow.” So he had a look and I was right, there was a great fall of it last night and then I sent him to wake up the bodyguards and get them to make a bit of a path over to the church before the king got up, and that was how they discovered the body with the head beaten in. The king’s cousin it was, Mahon O’Brien, is that right?’

  ‘That’s right,’ said Mara, rinsing her hands in the pewter bowl and then combing out her long dark hair and braiding it neatly. She crouched down by the brazier, holding her hands out to its warmth. Two minutes with Brigid would be enough to give her all the background to what was going on, as well as warming her, she told herself.

  ‘And it couldn’t have been anyone from outside,’ continued Brigid with a dramatic toss of her sandy-coloured hair, still in its overnight braids. ‘Cumhal’s been out and had a look. Ardal O’Lochlainn was there when he went. “There’s been no one in and no one out, Cumhal,” he says. “You’re right, my lord,” says Cumhal. And it wouldn’t have been any of the brothers.’ Brigid had a great respect for the monks of St Mary’s abbey. ‘So that just leaves the people in the guest hall and a few travellers in the lay dormitory.’

  ‘So who do you think it might have been, Brigid?’ asked Mara, examining herself carefully in the small silver mirror she had brought with her.

  ‘I couldn’t rightly say,’ said Brigid, an unusual note of doubt in her mind. Normally her opinions were firm, instant and then unshakeable. ‘Perhaps it wasn’t the king that was meant, after all,’ she continued. ‘Who would want to harm him? A nice man like him.’ Brigid adored Turlough who lavished extravagant praise on her cooking.

  ‘You think the murderer knew that it was Mahon?’ queried Mara dubiously. Unlikely, she thought. And why had Mahon gone to the church at dawn? That was something she had to find out about.

  Brigid lowered her voice. ‘The word is that wife of Mahon O’Brien was in a great state about him bringing a new wife to the household, and her a girl young enough to be his own daughter. And then of course, I don’t suppose that Teige O’Brien was too happy about the last meeting of the O’Briens. Somebody was telling Cumhal about that at the Samhain fair. It seems that some of the clans would prefer Mahon to Teige as tánaiste if anything happens to the mac an ri,’ she paused to gasp in a breath and then added, ‘God bless and save him, the poor lad; he doesn’t look well at all. The wasting sickness, they say it is. Everyone was talking about it last night.’

  Mara put down the mirror and gave a last rub of her hands in front of the glow from the brazier and then straightened up. Her quick ear had caught a sound of the door opening from the king’s bedroom up a flight of stairs from her own. She went to the door and waited for him.

  ‘My lord, this is a terrible matter,’ she said looking up at him, her voice as formal as she could make it. He had dressed, she noticed, and was booted and enveloped in a fur mantle.

  ‘Terrible,’ he echoed. He didn’t look as shocked as she had expected. And yet, it was surely obvious that the victim was meant to be him. He was a man of war, of course, despite his essential soft and sweet nature. He would have lived with danger from a very early age. Looking at him now, Mara felt her legs unsteady once more. This man, this king, that she had lain with last night to her great pleasure, was still in the utmost danger. Whether it was a murder committed by one of his traditional enemies, or by one of his jealous relations, this was a crime that she had to solve and that had to be solved quickly. If she delayed, then the assassin might make a second attempt and this might result in the death of the man whom, above all others, she loved.

  ‘I am going now to interview the strangers, the passers-by and the pilgrim in the lay dormitory,’ she said to him, noting with satisfaction that her tones were clipped and unemotional. He bowed his head.

  ‘I will accompany you, my lady judge,’ he said and his tone was as formal as her own and if he squeezed the soft flesh of her arm rather too intimately when he took her by the elbow, then no one but the two of them knew of that.

  Three

  Bretha Crólige

  (Judgements of Bloodlettings)

  There are two fines to be paid by a person who murders another. The first is called the éraic, or body fine, and this is paid to the nearest kin of a murdered person. It is forty-two séts, or twenty-one milch cows, or twenty-one ounces of silver. Added to this is the second fine, which is based on the victim’s honour price.

  In the case of duinetháide, a secret killing, the éraic is doubled.

  A small drifting snowflake stung Mara’s cheek as she stepped out from the front door. The storm clouds of earlier had begun to fulfil their promise. The sun had disappeared and the sky was blue-black. No travellers could stir outside the abbey today, she thought, with a quick glance at the snow-clad mountains on all sides of the valley of the monks. The four chieftains, who had been waiting, had moved into the shelter of the doorway to the guest house.

  ‘My dear lord!’ It was Teige O’Brien who stepped forward. Mara was moved to see the close embrace between the cousins. He and Turlough were of the same age, had been brought
up together and usually the greeting was more of a playful punch.

  ‘God has spared you to us,’ said Ardal O’Lochlainn solemnly and the other two taoiseachs, Garrett MacNamara and Finn O’Connor, murmured echoing sentiments.

  ‘The wife of our cousin would like to see you and the Brehon, my lord,’ said Teige. ‘I mean the chief wife, Banna,’ he corrected himself.

  Probably wants to find out what the division of property will be, thought Mara, but I have to start somewhere and it may as well be with the wife, or better still, the two wives of the dead man.

  ‘You go; I’ll wait here for you,’ said Turlough to Mara, an expression of almost comical dismay on his face, but she shook her head at him.

  ‘I think that Banna will wish to see you, also, my lord,’ she said firmly. The more people that were clustered around Turlough until the assassin were found the safer he would be. There was no doubt that he was probably the intended victim, she thought. Why should anyone want to kill Mahon O’Brien? Resolutely she took his arm and steered him towards the guest house.

  The guest house was a large handsome stone building of two floors high. It had four guest bedrooms on the first floor with rooms for servants in the garret above. The ground floor had a large handsome parlour and a kitchen and washroom with water piped from one of the many spring wells that encircled the abbey. Like the Royal Lodge it was built on the south-west side of the cloisters. It was newly built, replacing a much smaller building, and was unusually large for a small abbey like St Mary’s of the Burren. A recent inspection, by an official from a French Cistercian abbey, had spoken rather sourly of the luxury of the guest accommodation, and of the abbot’s house, in comparison with the quarters allocated to the monks and to the lay brothers. However, the abbot, Father Donogh, was an O’Brien, part of the royal family of O’Briens. O’Brien money had paid for the original building and O’Brien money paid for the upkeep and the embellishments to the abbey; fitting provision for the kinsmen would be a priority.