Arcanum: An Irish Mystery

by Ann Mann

  A check was immediately run on the part time actor whom Mrs. Connelly had lived with for about a year, and it transpired that he had three convictions including an indecent assault on a young girl in Limerick four years previously. “Shouldn’t we have known this?” Joe asked angrily, believing that routine checks had been ordered on all the families and those immediately connected to them. But everyone he spoke to passed the buck, adding to his continuing sense of deep frustration.

  They brought him in and under the detective’s aggressive questioning, the smoothly confident thespian finally confessed to having seen Maureen drop her mobile from her bag as she left his car that evening. From playing the cool dude when he first entered the interview room, he then became less than cool, owning up to making the fake ransom demand and obviously considering that misdemeanour far less serious than the suspicion that he might have behaved improperly with the young dancer.

  Joe Tierney watched him being led away and had never felt so empty. Clodagh didn’t mention how the trio’s own investigations were going and he wondered if it was now time to start seriously reviewing Blossom Fayard’s suggestion of what she described as ‘looking outside the normal sphere of understanding.’

  The concern that scorn from his colleagues and superiors would be released upon him suddenly didn’t seem like a problem any longer. He would have to open his mind and view paranormal manifestations not as supernatural phenomena but as natural events subject to rational interpretation.

  But he was going to need help.

  *

  Co. Clare.

  1735

  He would locate her tonight, of that he was sure. But as Mick Gilligan pulled to a halt beside the bridge and watched his horse’s breath hit the freezing air in a cloud of steam, he suddenly wondered if his need for a priest far exceeded his need for the old woman.

  The desire for confession was acute and absolute. He had laid two bodies into the ground without Christian burials and even though he hadn’t killed them, he felt a heavy responsibility, for he had lured the boy there and used the pregnant Kathleen Dooley as bait.

  But priests were hard to come by these days. Outlawed and threatened, they sought refuge where they could find it. In the ruins of desolate abbeys or with any brave soul amongst the peasantry that might take them in and give them food and succour and he knew of none within the immediate vicinity.

  In the forefront of his mind also were the strange ones. The men and women who resembled human beings but spoke, dressed and smelt differently. Were they from the stars? Where had the old woman conjured them up from and when would she return them to their rightful place? Mick felt a deep sympathy in his heart for their unhappiness and for their incarceration, but far more towards his neighbours and friends for whom he still fervently wished a future of joy and hope, free from any curse.

  He knew that something had gone wrong. The spell or whatever it was that she tried to evoke had somehow, through chance or destiny, failed to produce the chosen mentor within their midst and that was why he had to find her. The situation was worsening and she was now the only lifeline for the townspeople and for those poor souls imprisoned in his barn.

  He had visited the home she had shared with her Master many times over the past few weeks but she had not been there. Now, as he saw candles burning in the windows, he dismounted and banged on the rotting wooden door determined to extract from her an explanation of whatever magic she was spinning.

  She looked joyful. That was the first thing he noticed. Unlike the night of the apparition and the visitors, she was wearing an expression of satisfaction which made him both wary and optimistic.

  The first thing she did was press two small muslin bags into his hand. Surprised, he pulled the drawstrings to reveal six gold coins in each. He shook his head but she refused to take them from him and gestured towards her Master’s rocking chair for him to sit.

  “Dos na cuairteoirí!” (“For the visitors!”)

  He knew where the coins had come from and simply nodded in understanding. Positioning his heavy frame into the chair he noticed that she had laid her cards out on the table and had been consulting them when he had obviously interrupted her.

  Grinning, she gathered them up, shuffled them and then offered him to pick one from the pack.

  Mick chose a card at random which meant nothing to him. The picture was of a woman in a blindfold balancing two figures on a wheel while another female figure sat at the top of the wheel appearing to be manipulating it. Beneath the wheel was a bearded old man in white on his hands and knees.

  He raised his eyebrows questioningly.

  “Athrú Fortúne.” (“Change of Fortune”) She told him.

  “Cathain?” (“When?”)

  “Go ivath” (“Soon.”)

  Mick sighed and stood up. It was no use pretending to understand because he didn’t, and because she was his only hope in unravelling the unholy mess that had been created, he was forced to believe that this time her prophecy would be right. Things would have to change, and for the better.

  *

  “Come in, Superintendent.” It was late morning when Blossom ushered Joe Tierney into her tiny but comfortable hotel suite after he had called her yesterday. Jugs of coffee and tea were on a side-table along with plates of sandwiches and biscuits indicating an atmosphere of normality, which it was anything but.

  He greeted the dancers who seemed distracted. Clodagh, in her practice clothes, was curled up on a window seat watching the shadows of a winter’s day pass desolately across the room and Silas unable to sit, paced around anxiously, his forehead knotted into a deep frown.

  There was no denying that the room was charged and Joe Tierney realised to his discomfort that these three young people were almost certainly in the grip of the occult. It was something so extrinsic to him that he felt as though he had entered an elite members’ club, where everyone else knew the rules and where the men’s room was, but regarded those who had just dropped in with some mistrust.

  Blossom was wearing a peach sweater over black leggings and the colour flattered her tawny skin. It was shaped in a deep V that hung across one shoulder, while the silver jewellery around her neck and wrists glistened and tinkled harmoniously as she moved. Today she wore little make-up, just a touch of peach gloss on her lips and coal black eye-liner.

  He had to keep reminding himself that she had once been a man but refused to be blindsided from the seriousness of the circumstances they were here to discuss.

  “May I start this meeting by saying how glad we are to see you, Superintendent. I realise how hard it must have been for you to make that call and it is very gratifying to know that you are prepared to open your eyes to all possibilities regarding this case and that maybe we can work together to bring it to some kind of successful conclusion.”

  Joe acknowledged her welcome with a nod as she continued.

  “By agreeing to participate in our quest, you will now find yourself inside an intricate puzzle surrounded by magical, half-understood phenomenon which we are desperately trying to solve. I mentioned last time about the coach having disappeared into another dimension. What I meant by that is that it slipped into a past date in history. We three have experienced it briefly ourselves and can each swear to its authenticity.”

  “You have?” Joe asked incredulously. “When and where?”

  “Up on the hill near the lake.” Clodagh volunteered. “We saw the town before it was even a town.”

  “You asked when we last met to explain to you in simple layman’s terms, Superintendent.” Blossom continued. “That is what I will try to do. First, think about the fiction you have encountered about time travel, probably as a child. Think “Doctor Who” meets “Back to the Future,” but forget the monsters and forget time machines. They don’t exist. Think Woody Allen’s “Midnight in Paris.” She paused, wondering whethe
r he had seen the recent movie.

  “Okay…” Joe nodded. “I saw it.”

  “Good. Well, but now we get serious. This isn’t a romantic comedy. When people encounter glimpses of the past or dislocations as we call it, it is most usually accidental. A trigger such as sunlight flickering through trees or a sudden change in light or maybe a strong sense of history of the place you are in at the time, such as the famous case in Versailles…”

  This was lost on the detective but he struggled to keep up with her explanation of what may have occurred and tried not to feel as if he was in some parallel universe of his own.

  “To cut to the chase, Superintendent, I strongly believe that the disappearance of the coach and the dancers was not an accidental slip into the past. They were drawn into it by a combination of magic using the Tarot cards, and through a desperate need.”

  “What kind of need?”

  Blossom took a sip of coffee and threw a concerned glance at Silas who had buried his head in his hands.

  “I have been researching the history of the area quite extensively to try and find some way of explaining both the disappearance and the Tarot messages and I’ve had to combine instinct with what I’ve uncovered. I believe that the year they are trapped in is around 1735 in one of the many townlands that existed then. The overwhelming sadness I experienced just before we encountered the time slip ourselves was palpable and I think it has something to do with dancing and dance masters.”

  She paused for breath as Joe walked towards the table and poured himself a dark trickle of coffee. “What makes you think that?” He asked, his tone flat though not sceptical.

  “Because Superintendent….”

  He interrupted, deciding to cut formal ties, after all enough barriers were being dismantled today. “Joe. All of you, call me Joe.”

  Blossom gave a half smile. “Okay, Joe. I was deeply disturbed to read about the Penal Laws that existed in Ireland up until the 19th century. How it affected religious freedom and property, but also, to my amazement, how it banned Irish cultural traditions, with secrecy demanding that Irish dancing was only practiced behind closed doors. Silas and Clodagh had some knowledge of this, but I had no idea.”

  This was something Joe Tierney was familiar with and he surprised her by offering up his own understanding of those times.

  “That’s right. Irish dance dates back to traditions in Ireland in the 1500’s and is closely tied to our independence and cultural identity. These ancient dances were never formally recorded or documented due to our occupation by the English. But by the 1700’s, dance masters appeared in Ireland and were the creators of the Set and Ceili dances. It was still outlawed then, but some areas were more relaxed than others.”

  Blossom was impressed. “You know your history, Joe. And you’re right, it’s difficult to find any records of the dances that were practiced then or anything written about dance during those times.” She turned to Silas who had finally decided to sit down. “Do you want to take it from here?” She asked him gently.

  “Sure.” The worried frown had faded slightly and he leaned forward to make his point. “These dance masters were crucial in keeping the tradition alive and they could be very possessive about the areas where they practiced. For instance, when they were unable to continue either through illness or old age, they would personally try and find another dance master that would take over and he would have to be of a similar high standard or woe betide him if he wasn’t.”

  “Woe betide him.” Blossom repeated slowly, turning again to look at the detective who was following everything with more attention than she had expected. “Joe, these guys were flamboyant and probably a little crazy to take such forbidden chances in such dark days. What if, say, a revered dance master had not been able to find someone suitable to replace him? I read that in the courts of Renaissance Italy they took their vocation so seriously that a curse could be placed upon a chosen one who didn’t step up to the task.”

  Joe heard himself laugh, then immediately regretted it. “I believe curses were common in those days.”

  Blossom nodded. “I’m not one hundred per cent certain that this is what’s happened. But I know I’m pretty close. Another Tarot contact was made yesterday from the same Trionfi pack. To Silas specifically.”

  “So, you think…what? That some place from the past wants Silas to go and be their Dance Master?

  Blossom moved her chair closer. “What I’m saying is that through the language of the Tarot I have interpreted the message to the best of my ability. The plan from the beginning was to capture Silas because he chose the Tarot as the theme for his choreography, but it was thwarted because he didn’t take the coach that night. They then tried to reach out to Clodagh for help in her role of the High Priestess because she is more tuned in psychically. I believe now that the dancers will come back only if Silas crosses into that other dimension.”

  A pin could have fallen on the carpeted floor and everyone would have heard it. The silence was so intense that nobody felt they could be the first to speak but it was Silas who found his voice and it was broken and emotional.

  “I’m so sorry, I just can’t. I don’t have the courage. I know I should as it’s only me in exchange for so many others, but I’m frightened. I can’t give up my life to the past. To an unknown future.” He stood up and went to face the window, his shoulders heaving as he gulped back tears of anguish.

  While Clodagh and Blossom offered him comfort, Joe collected his thoughts as best he could. He was unable to give them any advice and the problem had still not been solved. In fact this morning’s exchange had created new ones. Dilemmas of such magnitude that they seemed impossible to face.

  “That’s it, then.” He said dully, crossing the room to replace his cup on the tray. “If your theory is correct then they’re never coming back.”

  With great effort Silas pulled himself together and repeated his regret.

  “You don’t need to keep saying sorry.” Blossom told him. “No-one expects you to make this sacrifice, it’s too much to ask. I will have to find a way to communicate with whoever is holding them somehow.”

  Just as he thought he had heard it all, Joe Tierney was to always remember the time and the place where he witnessed the next words that would change the goalposts yet again.

  “I’ll go.”

  Clodagh’s voice was strong and determined, hypnotic as the wind whipping up outside the window.

  “If they are waiting for a teacher, then I will help them. It might take them a while to accept a woman in the role of Dance Master, but when they see that I can dance and choreograph, it shouldn’t be a problem. I’ll go.”

  “No!” Silas cried, rushing towards her. “I can’t let that happen.”

  Clodagh stretched out her hands to keep him back. “You have no choice in the matter, Silas. This is my decision and it feels right for me.”

  Blossom took a deep breath and rose from her chair. She spoke softly, looking at the girl with admiration and understanding. Yes, of course that was meant to be. How could it be any other way?

  “Alright.” She said firmly. “Let’s make plans.”

  *

  She had visited the church immediately following the meeting and, as she had been doing regularly since staying in Ennis, lit twenty-five candles in the memory of her friends and for their safe return.

  Clodagh gazed up at the blue-robed figure of Mary cradling the baby Jesus in her arms and once again envisaged the High Priestess. What was it about the old religions and women? There was no doubt that they were held in the deepest of respect, were powerful emblems of their gender and could exercise control in a fair and moderate fashion. Yet notably, the two most prominent female figures from the Bible, Eve and Mary were, as her dream had suggested, hardly models of female emancipation.

  Clodagh knew that she coul
d never abandon her faith but having made the decision to take Silas’s place on this vital journey into the unknown, it was as though she were travelling towards some kind of mystical destiny. She had been instructed through a dream to connect with her inner wisdom and everything that had happened in the last few months had been building up to this decision; the Sister’s words at the hospital, her sense of being part of a universal whole during her long walk and Blossom’s recognition of the freeing up of her spirit through dance.

  But she also considered herself a modern day feminist, a young woman living and working in the twenty-first century who had grown up with a dancer’s ferocious discipline and attention to detail. This year, she realised she had been searching for something intangible, a pursuit through which she could exercise her creative talents and also satisfy the cravings of her psyche. If Blossom’s theory was correct, then she could aid those who were lost both metaphorically and literally and the sense of achievement that she would experience would be like no other.

  That was not to say that she was without fear. The immense excitement of the coming challenges mingled with trepidation flowed through her veins like a fever, for this was no normal adventure. She knew that Blossom would guide her safely towards the path, but the pain she would have to endure before then when leaving her family would be tortuous. Would she ever see them again? Who could say? And how would they ever understand? But while so many things in life were uncertain, hanging on a tenuous thread that could snap at any given moment or bend on any whim of fate, then she would deal with it when the time came by embracing yet another symbol of the Major Arcana. Fortitude.

  *

  That night their eyes spoke a language which had nothing to do with the story behind the dance. His were burning, pleading with her to change her mind. Hers sympathetic but resolute and while the heels and toes of his new shoes seemed to drive the steps he performed even harder and faster than before, each played out their sweetly sad finale in front of an audience totally unaware of the enormous pressure their two favourite dancers were experiencing.