Hemlock at Vespers: Fifteen Sister Fidelma Mysteries Read online

  The young religieuse smiled.

  “In that case, I call upon my right to speak with the accused and then with the witnesses.”

  “Very well. But there can be only one plea before the court. The evidence is too damning to say other than that Brother Fergal is guilty of the murder of Barrdub.”

  Brother Fergal was, as the Brehon said, a handsome young man no more than five and twenty years of age. He wore a bewildered expression on his pale features. The brown eyes were wide, the auburn hair was tousled. He looked like a young man awakened from sleep to find himself in a world he did not recognize. He rose awkwardly as Sister Fidelma entered the cell, coughing nervously.

  The burly jailer closed the door behind her but stood outside.

  “The grace of God to you, Brother Fergal,” she greeted.

  “And of God and Mary to you, Sister,” responded the young religieux automatically. His voice was slightly breathless and wheezy.

  “I am Fidelma sent from the Abbey to act as your advocate.”

  A bitter expression passed over the face of the young man.

  “What good will that do? The Brehon has already judged me guilty.”

  “And are you?”

  Fidelma seated herself on a stool which, apart from the rough straw pallaisse, was the only furniture in the cell, and gazed up at the young monk.

  “By the Holy Virgin, I am not!” The cry was immediate, angry and despairing at the same time. The young man punctuated his response with a paroxysm of coughing.

  “Be seated, Brother,” said Fidelma solicitously. “The cell is cold and you must take care of your cough.”

  The young man contrived to shrug indifferently.

  “I have suffered from asthma for several years now, Sister. I ease it by inhaling the odors of the burning leaves of stramóiniam or taking a little herbal drink before I retire at night. Alas, such a luxury is denied me here.”

  “I will speak to the Brehon about it,” Fidelma assured him. “He is not a harsh man. Perhaps we can find some leaves and seeds of the stramóiniam and have them sent into you.”

  “I would be grateful.”

  After a little while, Fidelma reminded the young man that she awaited his story.

  Reluctantly, the young man squatted on the pallaisse and coughed again.

  “Little to tell. The Abbess sent me to the clan of Eóghanacht of Cashel, to preach and administer to them, four weeks ago. I came here and rebuilt a deserted cell on the blue hill of Cnoc-gorm. For a while all went well. True that in this part of Éireann, two hundred years after the blessed saint Patrick converted our people, I have found some whose hearts and souls have not been won over for Christ. That was a great sadness to me ...”

  “I have heard that there is one here who still follows the old ways of the druids,” Fidelma commented encouragingly when the young man paused and faltered in his thoughts.

  “The hermit Erca? Yes. He dwells on Cnoc-gorm, too. He hates all Christians.”

  “Does he now?” mused Fidelma. “But tell me, what of the events of the night of the murder?”

  Brother Fergal grimaced expressively.

  “All I remember is that I returned to my cell at dusk. I was exhausted for I had walked sixteen miles that day, taking the Word of Christ to the shepherds in the mountains. I felt a soreness on my chest and so I heated and drank my herbal potion. It did me good for I slept soundly. The next thing I knew was being shaken awake to find the Brehon standing over me and Congal with him. Congal was screaming that I had killed his sister. There was blood on my hands and clothes. Then I saw, in my cell, the poor, bloodied body of the girl, Barrdub.”

  He started coughing again. Fidelma watched the face of the young religieux intently. There was no guile there. The eyes were puzzled yet honest.

  “That is all?” she pressed when he had drawn breath.

  “You asked me what I knew of the events of the night of the murder. That is all.”

  Fidelma bit her lip. It sounded an implausible story.

  “You were not disturbed at all? You heard nothing? You went to sleep and knew nothing until the Brehon and Congal woke you, when you saw blood on your clothes and the body of the dead girl in your cabin?”

  The young man moaned softly, placing his face in his hands.

  “I know nothing else,” he insisted. “It is fantastic, I know, but it is the truth.”

  “Do you admit that you knew the girl, Barrdub?”

  “Of course. In the time I was here, I knew everyone of the clan of Eóghanacht.”

  “And what of Barrdub? How well did you know her?”

  “She came to religious service regularly and once or twice came to help me when I was rebuilding my bothán. But so did many others from the village here.”

  “You had no special relationship with Barrdub?”

  Priests, monks and nuns of the Celtic Church could enter into marriage provided such unions were blessed by a bishop or the congregation of the Abbey.

  “I had no relationship with Barrdub other than as pastor to one of his flock. Besides, the girl is not yet of the age of choice.”

  “You know that Congal is claiming that Barrdub was in love with you and that you had encouraged this? The argument of the prosecution will be that she came to you that night and for some reason you rejected her and when she would not leave you, you killed her. It will be argued that her love became an embarrassment to you.”

  The young monk looked outraged.

  “But I did not! I only knew the girl slightly and nothing passed between us. Why ... why, the girl is also betrothed, as I recall, to someone in the village. I can’t remember his name. I can assure you that there was nothing between the girl and me.”

  Fidelma nodded slowly and rose.

  “Very well, Brother Fergal. If you have nothing else to tell me...?”

  The young man looked up at her with large, pleading eyes.

  “What will become of me?”

  “I will plead for you,” she consented. “But I have little so far to present to the court in your defense.”

  “Then if I am found guilty?”

  “You know the law of the land. If you are adjudged guilty of homicide then you must pay the honor-price of the girl, the eric, to her next of kin. The girl, I understand, was a free person, the daughter of a member of the clan assembly. The eric fine stands at forty-five milk cows plus four milk cows as the fee to the Brehon.”

  “But I have no wealth. It was given up when I decided to serve Christ and took a vow of poverty.”

  “You will also know that your family becomes responsible for the fine.”

  “But my only family is the Abbey, our order of Brothers and Sisters in Christ.”

  Fidelma grimaced.

  “Exactly so. The Abbess has to decide whether she will pay your eric fine on behalf of our order. And the greater trial for your immortal soul will be heard under her jurisdiction. If you are judged guilty of killing Barrdub then not only must you make atonement to the civil court but, as a member of the religieux, you must make atonement to Christ.”

  “What if the Abbess refuses to pay the eric fine ... ?” whispered Fergal, his breath becoming laboured again.

  “It would be unusual for her to refuse,” Fidelma assured him. “In some exceptional circumstances she can do so. It is the right of the Abbess to renounce you if your crime is so heinous. You can be expelled from the Abbey. If so, you can be handed over by the Brehon to the victim’s family to be disposed of, to treat as a slave or punish in any way thought fitting to compensate them. That is the law. But it will not come to that. The Abbess cannot believe that you killed this girl.”

  “Before God, I am innocent!” sobbed the young man.

  Fidelma strode with the Brehon up the winding path to the tree-sheltered nook on Cnoc-gorm where Fergal had refurbished an old bothán for use as his cell. The Brehon led the way to the building which was constructed of inter-laid stones without mortar.

  “This i
s where you found Brother Fergal and the dead girl, Barrdub?” asked Fidelma, as they paused outside the door.

  “It is,” acknowledged the Brehon. “Though the girl’s body has been removed. I cannot see what use it will be to your advocacy to view this place.”

  Fidelma simply smiled and went in under the lintel.

  The room was small and dark, almost like the cell in which she had left Fergal, except that the bothán was dry whereas the cell was damp. There was a wooden cot, a table and chair, a crucifix and some other items of furnishing. Fidelma sniffed, catching a bittersweet aromatic smell which permeated from the small hearth. The smell was of burnt leaves of stramóiniam.

  The Brehon had entered behind her.

  “Has anything been removed apart from the girl’s body and the person of Brother Fergal?” Fidelma asked as her eye traveled to a wooden vessel on the table.

  “As you see, nothing has been touched. Brother Fergal was in the bed, there, and the girl lay by the hearth. Only the girl’s body and the person of Brother Fergal have been removed. Nothing else has been removed as nothing else was of consequence.”

  “No other objects?”

  “None.”

  Fidelma went to the table, took up the wooden vessel and sniffed at it. There was a trace of liquid left and she dipped her finger in it and placed it, sniffing as she did so, against her lips. She grimaced at the taste and frowned.

  “As Brehon, how do you account for the fact that, if Brother Fergal is guilty, it would follow he killed Barrdub and then went to bed, leaving her body here, and slept peacefully until morning? Surely a person who killed killer would have first done their best to hide the body and remove all trace of the crime lest anyone arrive and discover it?”

  The round-faced Brehon nodded and smiled.

  “That had already occurred to me, Sister Fidelma. But I am a simple judge. I have to deal with the facts. My concern is the evidence. It is not in my training to consider why a man should behave in the way he does. My interest is only to know that he does behave in such a manner.”

  Fidelma sighed, set down the vessel and looked round again before leaving the cell.

  Outside she paused, noticing a dark smear on one of the upright stone pillars framing the doorway. It was a little over shoulder height.

  “Barrdub’s blood, I presume?”

  “Perhaps made as my men were carrying the body out,” agreed the Brehon uninterestedly.

  Fidelma gazed at the smear a moment more before turning to examine the surroundings of the bothán which was protected by a bank of trees to one side, bending before the winds which whipped across the hill, while bracken grew thickly all around. The main path to the bothán, which led down to the village, was narrow and well trodden. An even narrower path ascended farther up the hill behind the building while a third track meandered away to the right across the hillside. The paths were certainly used more than occasionally.

  “Where do they lead?”

  The Brehon frowned, slightly surprised at her question.

  “The way up the hill will eventually bring you to the dwelling of the hermit, Erca. The path across the hillside is one of many that goes wherever you will. It is even an alternative route to the village. ”

  “I would see this Erca,” Fidelma decided.

  The Brehon frowned, went to say something and then shrugged.

  Erca was everything Fidelma had expected.

  A thin, dirty man, clad in a single threadbare woollen cloak; he had wild, matted hair and staring eyes, and he showered abuse on them as they approached his smoking fire.

  “Christians!” he spat. “Out of my sight with your foreign god. Would you profane the sacred territory of The Dagda, father of all gods?”

  The Brehon frowned angrily but Fidelma smiled gently and continued to approach.

  “Peace to you, brother.”

  “I am not your brother!” snarled the man.

  “We are all brothers and sisters, Erca, under the one God who is above us all, whichever name we call Him by. I mean you no harm.”

  “Harm, is it? I would see the gods of the Dé Danaan rise up from the sidhe and drive all followers of the foreign god out of this land as they did with the evil Fomorii in the times of the great mists.”

  “So you hate Christians?”

  “I hate Christians.”

  “You hate Brother Fergal?”

  “This land could not set boundaries to my hatred of all Christians.”

  “You would harm Brother Fergal, if you could?”

  The man cracked his thumb at her.

  “That to Fergal and all his kind!”

  Fidelma seemed unperturbed. She nodded toward the cooking pot which sat atop the man’s smoking fire.

  “You are boiling herbs. You must be knowledgeable of the local herbs.”

  Erca sneered.

  “I am trained in the ancient ways. When your mad Patrick drove our priests from the Hill of Slane and forced our people to turn to his Christ, he could not destroy our knowledge.”

  “I see you have a pile of pale brown roots, there. What herb is that?”

  Erca frowned curiously at her a moment.

  “That is lus mór na coille.”

  “Ah, deadly nightshade,” Fidelma acknowledged. “And those leaves with the white points next to them?”

  “Those of the leaves of the muing, or poison hemlock.”

  “And they grow on this hill?”

  Erca made an impatient gesture of affirmation.

  “Peace to you, then, brother Erca,” Fidelma ended the conversation abruptly, and she turned away down the hill leaving the bewildered Erca behind. The perplexed Brehon trotted after her.

  “No peace to you, Christian,” came Erca’s wild call behind them as the hermit collected his thoughts. “No peace until all worshippers of foreign gods are driven from the land of Éireann!”

  Fidelma said nothing as she made her way down the hillside back to Fergal’s bothán. As she reached it, she darted inside and then reemerged a moment or two later carrying the wooden vessel.

  “I shall need this in my presentation. Will you take it into your custody?”

  “What line are you following, Sister?” frowned the Brehon as he accepted the vessel and they continued on to the village. “For a moment I thought you might be suggesting that Erca is somehow involved in this matter.”

  Fidelma smiled but did not answer the question.

  “I would now like to see the brother of Barrdub. What was his name? Congal?”

  They found the brother of Barrdub in a poor dwelling by the river bank, a bothán of rotting wood. The Brehon had made some preparation as they walked to Congal’s cabin.

  “Congal’s father was once the hostel keeper for the Eóghanacht of Cashel, a man held in high honor, and a spokesman at the clan assembly. Congal was not the man his father was. Congal was always a dreamer. When his father died, he squandered away what could have been his so that he and his sister were reduced to living in this bothán and Congal forced to hire himself to work for other members of the clan rather than run his own cattle.”

  Congal was a dark, brooding person with fathomless grey eyes as deep and angry as the sea on a stormy winter’s day.

  “If you have come to defend the murderer of my sister, I will answer no questions!” he told Fidelma belligerently, his thin, bloodless lips set firm.

  The Brehon sighed in annoyance.

  “Congal, you will obey the law. It is the right of the dálaigh, the advocate, to ask you questions and your duty to reply truthfully.”

  Sister Fidelma motioned the man to be seated but he would not.

  “Did you ever take stramóiniam to Brother Fergae?” she opened.

  Congal blinked at the unexpectedness of her question.

  “No,” he replied. “He purchased his asthma medication from Iland the herbalist.”

  “Good. Now I have heard how you discovered the body of your sister. Before you confirm the Brehon’s
account of that discovery, I want you to tell me what made you seek your sister in Brother Fergal’s bothán when you knew her to be missing?”

  Congal grimaced.

  “Because Barrdub was enamored of the man. He mesmerized her and used her.”

  “Mesmerized? Why do you say this?”

  Congal’s voice was harsh.

  “I knew my sister, did I not? Since Fergal came to this village, Barrdub mooned after the man like a sick cow after a farmer, always making excuses to go to visit him and help him rebuild the priest’s bothán. It was disgusting.”

  “Why disgusting?” the Brehon chimed in, suddenly interested. “If she would have Fergal, or he would have her, there was nothing to prevent her save she have your consent or had reached the age of choice. You know as well as I do that all servants of Christ have the ancient right to marry the partner of their choice, even to an abbot or abbess?”

  “It was disgusting because she was betrothed to Rimid,” Congal insisted.

  “Yet before Fergal arrived here,” the Brehon observed wryly, “you objected to Rimid as husband for Barrdub.”

  Congal flushed.

  “Why did you object to Rimid?” interposed Fidelma.

  “Because ...”

  “Because he could not afford the full bride-price,” offered the Brehon before the man could reply. “Isn’t that so?”

  “The tinnscra is as old as Éireann. No one marries without an offering of dowry to compensate the family of the bride,” Congal said stubbornly.

  “And you were Barrdub’s only family?” asked Fidelma.

  “She kept my house. With her gone, I have no one else. It is right that I be compensated according to our ancient law.”

  “Presumably, you raised this same objection over her liaison with Fergal? As a religieux he was not able to supply a tinnscra.”

  Congal said sullenly: “There was no question of that. He had no thought of marriage. He was using my sister and when she went to him seeking marriage, he killed her.”

  “That remains to be proved,” Fidelma responded. “Who else knew about the affair between your sister and Fergal?”

  “No one,” Congal said promptly. “My sister only admitted it to me with great unwillingness.”