The little procession passed the silent people and turned into the gaol. Mara waited for a couple of minutes and then crossed over. As she had guessed, there was no sign of them when she entered the gaol. There was a strong smell of incense around and a minute later the gaoler came up the stairs with a large key in his hand.
‘I’d like to see prisoner Sheedy O’Connor; I have some clothing for him,’ she said. She put down her parcel on his table and opened it, taking a shilling from her purse while he was lifting and turning over the clothes with a dubious expression.
‘Not sure if I can allow you to go down yourself,’ he observed. He saw the shilling though, and she could see a hesitation in his face. ‘I’ll take them to him,’ he offered obligingly. ‘People aren’t normally allowed to visit condemned prisoners.’
‘Walter Lynch has just had three visitors,’ pointed out Mara, moving the shilling slightly so that it caught the light from the candle and glinted invitingly.
‘That’s just to pray with him.’ His eyes were on the shilling and she took another one from her purse.
‘Exactly what I have come to do,’ she said briskly, and gathered up her parcel. ‘We should go down quickly so that we do not get in the way of the priest coming back up, shouldn’t we?’ she suggested.
That convinced him. He began to walk very quietly and carefully down the stone steps and she followed him, handing over the two shillings once he had unlocked the door.
‘Look, I won’t lock you in so that you can let yourself out whenever you wish,’ he whispered. ‘Sometimes ladies come over faint when they are down in cells like these. Not used to the smell, they aren’t. Don’t worry that he’ll attack you when I leave; he’s harmless. And he’s in chains. He can’t hurt you. Speak quietly, too – and don’t come out until they’re gone from next door.’
The walls were fairly thick and Mara could only just hear the priest’s voice. He appeared to be reciting an act of contrition, preparing the lad for death, perhaps, thought Mara, appalled afresh at the notion of that young life being cut short. The words were echoed by the high voice of the altar boy. There was no sound from Walter, but James Lynch joined in halfway through with a loud steady voice.
Sheedy was sleeping peacefully. Mara did not disturb him. She had seen fairly clearly at the trial that his wits were completely gone. There was nothing that could help him except a royal pardon by reason of insanity.
And this royal pardon could be given by James Lynch as the king’s representative in the city of Galway.
Mara placed the warm, thick cloak over Sheedy and hung up the hose, shirt and doublet on a nail on the back of the door. She would bribe the gaoler to bring some hot water to wash the old man and to change his clothing.
In the meantime, she would wait until the prayers next door were finished and the visitors had left. She needed to talk to Walter and see what memories might have come back. He had now had two days’ sobriety after that night of drunkenness. She turned over in her mind various reasons which might persuade the gaoler to allow her access.
If Moylan was correct about how his own recollections of a drunken night did not resurface until two days later, then it would be interesting to hear what Walter’s memory might now have dredged up.
The prayers were over more quickly than she had hoped. There was a sound of the door opening and a smell of incense drifted into Sheedy’s cell.
‘I will visit you again on the morrow, my son, and hope to find you more repentant then,’ Mara heard James Lynch say, and then the sound of footsteps going back up the stairs – two men and a boy, she thought, as she listened intently to the sound. But there had been no click of a key turning. So they had not been locked in either!
As quick as a flash, Mara came out of Sheedy’s cell and slipped into Walter’s. She might get a few minutes’ conversation with him. The gaoler would be in no hurry to lock the door. Walter, like Sheedy, would be chained up, both hands and feet, so there would be no chance of escape unless a blacksmith was summoned to strike off his bonds.
Walter, unlike Sheedy, was wide awake. His clothes had been changed and he had been washed and shaved. A heavy sheepskin cloak hung around his shoulders and he wore stout, sheepskin-lined boots. A candle had been left in the corner of the cell and she could see him well. He was still very white-faced but his eyes were clear. He had seen her as she came through the door and she heard him draw in his breath with surprise at her presence.
‘You’re looking better, young man,’ she said in the slightly tart tones that she would address to one of her young scholars who had been in trouble.
He smiled ruefully at her tone. ‘That was Uncle Valentine. He came in at dawn this morning,’ he said. ‘He boxed my ears and made me strip, wash and shave and dress in fresh clothes, and told me what an idiot I was. “Get your head up and get ready to fight”, that’s what he kept saying to me.’ He looked carefully at Mara, and then said wonderingly, ‘And do you know, he didn’t ask me a single question.’
Mara’s heart warmed to Valentine. What the boy had needed now in order to pull himself together was simple, practical love and unconditional acceptance. That was something that he did not get from his father, she thought, but it was something that his mother’s brother had supplied unstintingly.
And then she thought of Valentine as he was when she had met him that morning. So he had been at the gaol at dawn! And when had he sent a message to the Blakes of Menlough so that they had travelled down the river from Lough Corrib to arrive in the city by daybreak? The chances were that Valentine Blake had not been to bed. Had he been on the streets all night? Had the riot been spontaneous? And even if it were, had Valentine fanned the flames? Still, that was his affair; it didn’t alter the help that she wanted to give to Walter.
‘I’m going to ask you a question, though,’ she said firmly. ‘I wouldn’t have asked it yesterday because you were in no state to answer it, but I am asking now. Did you kill Carlos Gomez?’
He opened his mouth quickly, and then shut it again. From upstairs Mara heard the gaoler’s voice talking to the mayor and then begging for a blessing from the priest. Let him ask to receive the Blessed Sacrament, she prayed. Let them say the Rosary together – that prayer was interminable. She needed some information from this boy, something that would shed light on what happened on that fateful night. Rapidly she repeated her question.
‘I’m not sure,’ he said eventually.
‘Not sure?’ she queried.
‘I don’t think I did. I certainly don’t remember doing it,’ he said. ‘I remember nothing until the constable shook me awake.’ He paused and then frowned. ‘At least nothing important,’ he said then.
‘Tell me what you remember; I’ll be the judge of whether it is important.’
‘I just remember waking up and finding my cloak spread over me and then I went back to sleep,’ said Walter.
‘And why did that surprise you?’
‘It’s just that I had a memory of searching for it and not being able to find it.’
‘Ah,’ said Mara. ‘And that is all that you remember?’
‘That’s all,’ said Walter. He began to look a little miserable.
‘Let me give you some advice, Walter,’ said Mara rapidly, with one ear inclined towards the conversation between the priest and the gaoler above. She took the boy’s hand within her own two hands and said emphatically, ‘Under no circumstances confess to a murder that you may not have committed. Make no acts of contrition, either to your father or to the priest, or even to the Lord above, as you never know who may be listening. If you don’t remember killing a man, then deny you have done so. You would remember if you did a thing like that,’ she said bracingly. ‘Keep that in your mind and keep your courage up. Now I must go, but I will try to see you again.’
Quickly, Mara opened the door, pulled it closed noiselessly behind her and then re-entered Sheedy’s cell. The old man still slept, now cosily warm, she judged by the slight flush of colour
in his cheeks.
In a way, she thought as she watched him, his plight might be more dangerous than that of Walter. The boy had powerful friends in his mother’s family – the Blakes were roused for action and would not allow this affair to go ahead without protest.
But was James Lynch vulnerable to pressure? Or would he just go ahead with this unnatural execution of his son?
When the gaoler came in, Mara was sitting peacefully in the corner of the room and her eyes were shut as if in prayer. She heaved a big sigh and opened them when he set down the candle.
‘May the Lord have mercy on his soul,’ she said as she followed him upstairs, and negotiated a sum which would ensure that Sheedy was kept clean, warm and well fed for the few days of life that were still left to him.
On the way out she paused and examined some large dents in the heavy, studded door.
‘What happened to your door?’ she asked innocently.
‘That crowd last night, drunk they were, most of them – trying to keep up the festival for a second night,’ he said. ‘I couldn’t see much myself, inside here, but I can tell you that I feared for my life for a while when I heard the blows on the door. The mayor was good though. Had a troop of soldiers down here before they could do much! He’s just told me that he will send them out to clear the streets at sundown as the curfew bell is ringing, and then they will stand guard outside the gaol for the night.’ He lowered his voice. ‘He’s a hard man, the mayor, but he’s a very just one. The law is the law; that’s what he said to me. The citizens and people like me must be protected from those who would break the law. Even if one of them is his own son! You have to admire a man like that – well that’s my view anyway, but there’s plenty would disagree with me. They say he’ll have to resign!’
The law is the law, said Mara to herself as she walked away. She had lived all of her life as far back as she could remember with that saying. Her father, a man admired by all for his firmness of principle, could well have said that. There was no reason why Walter, though the son of the judge, should not be found guilty by a just law. But was this law just? And had it even been followed? Did English law countenance the holding of a trial hours after the deed was committed? The evidence against Walter was evidence of circumstance only. And even if he had committed the deed, it was obvious that the boy had been drunk and incapable – out of his mind, as her scholars would say. What was it that Fiona had read out from the book of English law? Mara murmured the words to herself: ‘And that man, though found guilty by the judge, being generally considered to possess no greater understanding than a beast, was granted a royal pardon by Ricardus Tertius Rex.’ This applied to young Walter – out of his mind with drink – almost as much as it did to poor Sheedy.
I must do my best for both, thought Mara.
Fourteen
Utopia
(Thomas More’s novel which describes an ideal society)
‘Instead of inflicting these horrible punishments, it would be far more to the point to provide everyone with some means of livelihood, so that nobody is under the frightful necessity of becoming first a thief and then a corpse.’
Thomas More (1474–1535), student at Lincoln’s Inn from 1496–1500
Fachtnan was sitting beside the window of a large inn called Blake’s, which was situated across the street from the magnificent Athy tower house and quite near to the back of St Nicholas’s Church. Beside him was a young man and they seemed to be chatting amiably. Mara hesitated for a moment, but Fachtnan smiled a welcome so she went to join them. Fachtnan, even as a young boy, always showed good judgement about the right thing to do and she assumed that he had reached the end of his conversation.
‘This is Anthony Skerrett, law student from Lincoln’s Inn, Brehon,’ said Fachtnan, punctiliously introducing them to each other once she was inside the building.
‘Welcome to Galway, and welcome to Blake’s, the best drinking place in town.’ Anthony was a rather square-looking young man with black hair cut very short, grey eyes and resolute chin. He looked full of character and intelligent. Fachtnan was drinking small beer, but young Skerrett had a cup filled with a dark red wine, which he sipped slowly and with the air of one who appreciates fine wines.
‘Do let me get you something to drink, Brehon,’ he said, seeing her eyes go to the cup.
‘I mustn’t stay,’ she said. ‘We are due back at the Bodkin household for a meal shortly so I must walk up to The Green and escort back Fiona, one of my scholars.’
‘Yes, I’ve heard that you have a girl law student,’ he said with an amused smile. ‘By Jupiter, that would wake up the law school at Lincoln’s Inn.’
‘You would find it hard to keep up with her sharp wits,’ agreed Mara affably. She knew that was not exactly what he had meant, but was unwilling to acknowledge that it was odd for girls to study law. ‘She’s riding with Catarina Browne at the moment,’ she added.
She was not surprised when he immediately tossed back the remainder of his wine and rose to his feet. His face had lit up at the very name of Catarina.
‘You must allow us to accompany you, there,’ he said politely, and shook his head at the girl beside the bar. ‘No more, Anna; we must be off,’ he said, his smile discreet and restrained. Not a young man to flirt with girls in taverns, thought Mara.
Nevertheless, Anna was looking after them regretfully as they left. There were no other customers at the inn and a pair of personable young men was company for her. In fact, thought Mara, there was no other member of staff, either, no male member of the Blake family, here at this inn; just as there had been no males at the pie shop. Even Blake’s blacksmith business at Lombard Street, she had noticed, had held only one rather young boy anxiously tending the fire.
‘That was kind of Catarina to take your girl student riding,’ said Anthony as they went out into the street.
Mara smiled but made no reply. She was busy looking around the streets. Soldiers in pairs tramped around, walking belligerently down the centre of the roadway, looking intently down alleyways and lanes. Constables, armed with short stout truncheons, stood in doorways or else walked slowly amongst the people, eyeing every face that passed as if looking for trouble. She listened with half an ear to Anthony telling Fachtnan about Catarina’s new horse and about her excellence as a rider. There was no doubt, she thought, the young man was very much in love. He was at that stage of infatuation where he found excuses to drag his loved one’s name into everything irrespective of the subject. Fachtnan’s remark about the fine clock outside the tower of St Nicholas’s Church brought forth an anecdote of how he was once late for a meeting and how Catarina had taken him down to the church to prove how late he was; the mention of Lawyer Bodkin reminded him that Catarina had predicted that the lawyer would now import horses of Arab breeding; and the sight of a beautiful length of red silk displayed in the window of a clothier made him stop, with his eyes widening as he told Fachtnan that he thought Catarina would love that colour.
So could it have been he who killed Carlos in order to eliminate the opposition; or was a young man with a steady, square jaw and a pair of intelligent eyes really the type to commit a crime passionel? A man who was legally trained and probably schooled to hold his passions at bay.
‘Anthony was telling me about the dinners at Lincoln’s Inn, Brehon,’ said Fachtnan. ‘Tell the Brehon about it, Anthony.’
‘Well,’ said Anthony, ‘as we, the students, are eating our dinners, there is a scroll of vellum, tied with tape, placed in the centre of the table. As soon as the meal is over, one of the sergeants of law stands up, unties the vellum, unrolls it and then reads a case that has taken place that day or on a preceding day. It’s read just once and then all the students have to debate it – some are nominated to defend, and others to prosecute.’
‘And no one has seen the case before?’ Mara thought about this as a teaching method. Her own scholars attended every case that was heard in the Burren and listened to her judgements, but perhaps she
could do something like that with cases from earlier years, even the cases that her father had heard.
‘The quality of the debate might be better before the meal than after it,’ she remarked smiling, but Anthony shook his head. ‘Not for me,’ he said with a quiet smile. ‘I always do well at that because I drink very little. I was brought up by my uncle, Edmond Deane, and when I was a boy he sent me to a school in France. I learned to drink good wine there and . . .’
He stopped, and Mara said with a smile, ‘And you learned to appreciate the taste; not to use it just to get drunk.’
‘Too much bad Spanish wine here in Galway,’ said Anthony. ‘Now that . . . well, I can understand a man wanting to swallow enough to drown the taste . . .’ He laughed gently and indulgently as one tolerant of his friends’ excesses. Mara looked at him with interest. She remembered the knife lodged in the chest of the dead man. It had been inserted expertly, slightly upwards at an angle, avoiding the bones of the ribs and aimed straight at the heart. Certainly, it had not been jabbed recklessly. She wished it had been possible to have a physician of her choice examine the dead body, but even without that, somehow she was strongly of the opinion that the knife had not been wielded by a drunken man.
‘Will you come back to Galway to practise law or stay in London?’ she asked as her mind ranged over the possible suspects for the murder of Carlos Gomez. The dead man had been rich, had been enterprising, had been judgemental and had been in love. Someone had killed him for one of those four reasons. The last reason would fit Anthony and she waited with interest for his answer to her question.
He had paused, staring straight ahead of him. There was little spare business for a fourth lawyer here in a city of three thousand, she thought. The sensible thing for him to do was to get some sort of position in London.
‘Come back to Galway, of course,’ he said, and then, almost angrily, ‘Have you ever been to London, Brehon? I can tell you it’s a terrible place to live, a stinking, violent, unpleasant place.’ He laughed slightly, perhaps conscious that his tone had been aggressive. ‘When I am in London, I get lonely for the sea, for my sailing boat and for my friends here in Galway. Ah, here we are at the Gate; don’t worry, the guard knows me well and we can get through and back again with no trouble.’
Laws in Conflict Page 17
