Act of Mercy

by Peter Tremayne

  ‘Persuasively she led him on,

  She pressed him with seductive words.

  Like a simple fool he followed her,

  Like an ox on its way to the slaughterhouse,

  Like an antelope bounding into the noose,

  Like a bird hurrying into the trap,

  He did not know that he was risking his life …’

  ‘Stop that rubbish!’ Cian cried. ‘I have had enough of these nonsensical ramblings.’

  Sister Ainder bent forward and chided him with a frosty look.

  ‘The Book of Proverbs is not rubbish, Brother Cian. You are unworthy to hear those words and not fit to wear the habit of a religieux.’

  ‘Do you think I ever wanted to wear these stupid rags?’ Cian shot back at her.

  ‘What I have heard today is disgusting,’ replied Sister Ainder. ‘If nothing else, I shall give all the details to the Abbot of Bangor. When you return to your Abbey, you will suffer by bell, book and candle, if I have anything to do with it.’

  ‘If I ever return to Bangor,’ sneered Cian.

  Sister Gormán, in the meantime, was continuing to speak as if she had become oblivious to her surroundings.

  Fidelma bent forward and spoke to her slowly and clearly.

  ‘Why did you kill Sister Canair?’ she demanded.

  ‘Canair seduced him, lured him away from me,’ she replied diffidently. ‘She had to die.’

  Cian opened his mouth to protest but Fidelma waved him to silence and addressed the girl.

  ‘How did it happen? From what I know, Canair had left your company before you reached Ardmore. The group all went on to the Abbey of St Declan to stay the night. You went with them, didn’t you?’

  ‘I overheard Canair arranging with Cian to meet him in the tavern later.’

  Fidelma glanced back to Cian who simply shrugged.

  ‘It is true,’ he admitted. ‘Canair said she would be at the tavern after midnight, after she had seen her friend. That was the principal reason why she did not come to the Abbey. She went to see a friend who dwelt nearby. It was as an afterthought that we made arrangements to meet.’

  ‘Did you go to the tavern, Cian?’

  There was a silence.

  ‘Did you go to meet Canair?’ pressed Fidelma.

  Cian sullenly nodded as if reluctant to admit the fact.

  ‘What then?’

  ‘I reached the tavern when there were still people about. I wasn’t sure whether Canair had arrived and while I was hesitating outside I saw Muirgel and Guss arrive. From the way they were behaving, it seemed they had the same intention as Canair and me.’ Cian sniffed. ‘It was no business of mine. As I said, my affair with Muirgel was long over.’

  ‘Go on,’ Fidelma pressed when he paused.

  ‘I waited. The hour was late and Canair had not turned up. I decided to go back to the Abbey. That’s all.’

  Fidelma waited expectantly.

  Cian sat back and folded his arms with an air of finality.

  ‘You say that is all?’ asked Fidelma, slightly incredulously.

  ‘I went back to the Abbey,’ repeated Cian. ‘What else would I do?’

  ‘You weren’t worried when Canair did not turn up at your rendezvous?’

  ‘She was no child. She could make her own decisions as to whether or not she turned up.’

  ‘Didn’t you think it strange when Canair did not appear at the quay either, to take the boat the next morning? Why didn’t you raise an alarm?’

  ‘What alarm should I raise?’ he asked defensively. ‘Canair did not turn up, either at the rendezvous or at the quay, so what was I to do about that? It was her decision. I had no idea that she had been killed.’

  ‘But …’ For once Fidelma was left without words at the self centred attitude of Cian.

  ‘Anyway, what alarm was there to raise and with whom?’ he added.

  Fidelma turned back to Gormán.

  ‘Can you tell us what happened at the tavern?’

  Gormán looked at her with dull, unseeing eyes.

  ‘I was there as the right hand of God’s vengeance. Vengeance is—’

  ‘Did you go there to kill Canair?’ Fidelma interrupted her firmly.

  ‘Canair came to the inn. I was hiding in the shadows. She stood in the doorway for a while, looking about. She was waiting for Cian but he had already gone back to the Abbey. I watched him go. Then Canair seemed to make up her mind and she went in. I heard her ask in the tavern if anyone had asked for her, or if a religieux had taken a room. She was told that a male and female religieux had taken a room but when she was given a description, she lost interest. I stayed in the shadows listening. Eventually she took a room and went to it. I stood in the inn yard, wondering what to do. Then I saw a light at an upstairs window. There was Canair looking out, still hoping that Cian would turn up. I slid back into the shadows. She did not see me.’

  Suddenly Gormán had become alive, alive with an expression of malicious elation as she told the story.

  ‘I waited a while and then, when the inn was quiet, I entered. It was quite easy.’

  ‘A curse on the law which forbids innkeepers to bar their doors to prevent travellers seeking rest,’ muttered Sister Ainder. ‘The same law leaves us unprotected.’

  The girl continued without paying attention to her.

  ‘I went up to Canair’s room. The whore was asleep and I killed her. Then I left as silently as I had arrived.’

  ‘What made you take her crucifix?’ demanded Fidelma, holding out the cross that had fallen from the hand of the dying Muirgel.

  Gormán giggled again.

  ‘It was … so pretty. So pretty.’

  ‘Then you went back to the Abbey?’

  ‘The next morning Muirgel and Guss were at the Abbey, breakfasting as if they had not left it. Well, I could punish Muirgel later. And so I did.’

  ‘And so you did,’ repeated Fidelma. ‘So Canair’s body remained in the tavern, presumably undiscovered, until after we had set sail?’

  Her remark was not expressly addressed to Gormán and it was Murchad who answered.

  ‘It would seem so,’ he said, rubbing the back of his neck with his hand. ‘I know Colla, the owner of the inn. He would have raised the alarm immediately he discovered the body.’

  ‘Muirgel and Guss were in the next room and heard the dying moans of Canair. So Guss told me,’ Fidelma explained. ‘They saw her body and stupidly decided to return to the Abbey and say nothing. Only when she came aboard did Muirgel see Gormán wearing Canair’s crucifix. It was Muirgel who worked out why Gormán had killed Canair, and she realised that she was going to be next. That’s why she pretended first to be seasick and then to be washed overboard. But Gormán stumbled on her as she left Guss’s cabin and killed her. Muirgel seized the crucifix that Gormán had taken. Muirgel was still alive when I saw her and tried to warn me … but all she could do was attempt to press Canair’s crucifix into my hand.’

  ‘So Canair, Muirgel and Toca Nia have all fallen to this madness,’ muttered Sister Ainder. ‘The girls because they had the misfortune to be seduced by this,’ she jerked her head at Cian, ‘this degenerate wretch, and the Laigin warrior because he accused Cian of high crimes and misdemeanours, and this insane creature saw that as a further danger. What madness and evil is here, brethren?’

  Cian stood up angrily.

  ‘It seems that you are putting the blame on me rather than on this stupid bitch!’ he snarled.

  Once again, Gormán’s head jerked back as if he had physically assaulted her.

  ‘Deserting me, you have stripped and lain down

  On the wide bed which you have made,

  And you drove bargains …

  For the pleasure of sleeping together

  And you have committed countless acts of fornication

  In the heat of your lust …’

  Then her hand reached inside her habit and something flew from it. Murchad, standing near to Cian, reacted quic
kly and shoved the former warrior to one side. A knife embedded itself a wooden beam just behind Cian.

  With a cry of rage at having missed him, Gormán seized the opportunity offered by their confusion and indecision, to turn out of the cabin and scamper up the companionway to the deck above.

  Fidelma was the first to recover her senses and start to rush after her, but Murchad held her back.

  ‘Don’t worry, lady,’ he said. ‘Where is she going to flee to? We are in the middle of the ocean.’

  ‘It is not fear of escape that concerns me,’ she told him. ‘It is fear of what she might do to herself. Madness acknowledges no logic.’

  As they tumbled onto the deck, Drogon, who stood at the steering oar, cried out to them; he was pointing upwards.

  They looked up.

  Gormán was swaying dangerously from the rigging at least twenty feet or more above them.

  ‘Stop!’ cried Fidelma. ‘Gormán, stop! There is nowhere to run to.’

  The girl kept climbing up the swaying ropes.

  ‘Gormán, come down. We can find a resolution to the problem. Come down. No one will harm you.’ As Fidelma called, she realised how hollow her assurances sounded, even to someone whose mind was so damaged.

  Murchad, standing at Fidelma’s side, touched her arm and shook his head.

  ‘She can’t hear you for the wind up there.’

  Fidelma continued to stare up. The wind was whipping at the girl’s hair and clothing as she clung to the rigging. Murchad was right. There was no way sound could carry up.

  ‘I’ll go up,’ Fidelma volunteered. ‘Someone needs to bring her down.’

  Murchad laid a hand on her arm.

  ‘You are not acquainted with the dangers of being aloft in a strong wind on shipboard. I’ll go up.’

  Fidelma hesitated and then stood back. She realised that it would need someone more sure-footed than she was to bring the insane young woman down.

  ‘Don’t scare her,’ she instructed. ‘She is completely mad and there is no telling what she is liable to do.’

  Murchad’s face was grim.

  ‘She is only a slight young girl.’

  ‘There is an old saying, Murchad. If a sane dog fights a mad dog then it is the sane dog’s ear that is likely to be bitten off.’

  ‘I’ll be careful,’ he assured her and started up the rigging.

  He had hardly reached it when Sister Ainder gave an inarticulate cry of warning which made Fidelma look up.

  Gormán had missed her footing and was hanging desperately onto the ropes with one hand, reaching out, trying to grasp hold of the rigging with the other.

  ‘Hold on!’ yelled Fidelma, her cry disappearing into the wind.

  Murchad, too, had seen the slip and launched himself into the rigging. He had hardly risen a few feet when Gormán’s grip relaxed and she fell, crashing down onto the deck with a sickening thud.

  Fidelma was the first to reach her-side.

  There was no need to check for a pulse. It was obvious that the young girl had broken her neck in the fall. Fidelma leaned forward and closed Gormán’s staring eyes while Sister Ainder began to intone a prayer for the dead.

  Murchad dropped back to the deck and joined them.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ he panted. ‘Is she … ?’

  ‘Yes, she’s dead. It’s not your fault,’ Fidelma said, rising from the deck.

  Cian was peering over the shoulder of Brother Dathal, gazing down at the body of the girl.

  ‘Well,’ he said with relief in his voice. ‘That’s that.’

  Chapter Twenty-two

  Fidelma stood on the quay in the warm autumnal sunshine, inhaling the exotic scents of the picturesque little port which stood under the shelter of an ancient Roman lighthouse known as the Tower of Hercules. The Barnacle Goose was tied up in the harbour against the quay. Her remaining passengers had dispersed inland on their pilgrimage towards the Holy Shrine of St James. Fidelma had refused to continue in their company, using the excuse of writing a report of the voyage for the Chief Brehon of Cashel so that Murchad could take it back on his return voyage.

  Within an hour of The Barnacle Goose easing into the port on the north-west coast of Iberia, perhaps one of the very ports from which Golamh and the Children of the Gael had sailed to Éireann over a millennium ago, the final drama of the voyage had been played out.

  Cian had disappeared from the ship once more, but this time along with Sister Crella. Fidelma was not unduly surprised.

  ‘Don’t you remember when Cian fled from the ship at the island of Ushant?’ she asked Murchad. ‘It was obvious that he had help.’

  The captain was puzzled and said so.

  ‘It was evident that a man who did not have the use of his right arm could not row a skiff to the island, let alone bring the skiff back to the ship.’

  Murchad seemed chagrined that he had not considered the fact.

  ‘I had not thought of that.’

  ‘He had to have an accomplice. He persuaded Crella to help him, as he has persuaded her now. Perhaps I should have tried to warn her about further involvement with Cian, but I doubt if she would have taken any notice of me. He always had a way with women. He can charm the birds from the trees when he needs to.’

  ‘Where will they go now? They surely can’t go back to Éireann.’

  ‘Who knows? Perhaps he will continue his journey to Mormohec the physician to see if his arm can be healed. Perhaps not. I feel sorry for poor Crella. She will be in for a rude awakening one day.’

  ‘What made her return to him if he had rejected her as a lover once before?’ demanded Murchad.

  ‘Maybe she has never learnt that if one is bitten once, one should be careful about being bitten twice. He will discard her when he feels that he has no more need of her. We will probably never see him back in Éireann but not from any feeling of guilt of what has happened on this voyage. His arrogance would not allow him to accept any culpability there. He will avoid the land of his birth to avoid any further witnesses who might charge him with being the “Butcher of Rath Bíle”.’

  ‘So he will go free and unpunished?’

  ‘In these things, it is often the person who holds the real guilt who goes free while those they use as mere tools or dupes are punished.’

  Not long after, the surviving band of pilgrims had set off from the port under the charge of Brother Tola. She had watched Brother Tola and Sister Ainder leaving with the less willing company of Brother Dathal and Brother Adamrae. Brother Bairne accompanied them, but he seemed as reluctant to go with them as they were to have him. Forgiveness did not seem to be a feature of the Faith shared by their little band.

  Fidelma stayed in the port while The Barnacle Goose had its storm damage repaired. She took a room in a small tavern overlooking the harbour, resting and readjusting to the feeling of land under her feet and writing her report. When she heard that The Barnacle Goose was preparing to sail, she went down to the quay.

  She went on board to say her farewells, especially to Mouse Lord with a gift of fish bought on the quay. The cat was limping slightly but recovering well from the knife-wound. He let her stroke him and purred for a few moments before turning his attention to more important matters, such as the fish she had laid down on the deck before him.

  On the now familiar stern deck she had a final word with Murchad.

  ‘When do you set off to the Holy Shrine, lady? There have been several bands of pilgrims passing that way already since we docked. I would have thought that you would have gone by now.’

  Fidelma was not worried about finding a suitable group to accompany.

  ‘There is an old proverb, Murchad. Choose your company before you sit down. I would not have chosen the travellers you had to transport as companions, had I known what was going to happen.’

  Murchad chuckled broadly but he was still worried for her.

  ‘Do you intend to travel alone? I have a saying for you: is it not said that a healthy sheep will
not spurn a scabby flock for company?’

  Fidelma allowed one of her mischievous grins to mould her features.

  ‘I think you have reversed it, Murchad. The proverb is: there never was a scabby sheep which did not like to have the flock for company. But I thank you for the thought. No, I shall wait here for a few days, for there are many sheep coming through this port. I shall see if there is a flock that appeals to me. I might, as you say, even go on the journey alone.’

  ‘Is that wise, lady?’

  ‘They tell me that the bandits on the road between here and the Shrine are not many. I am sure the dangers of the road will be fewer than those I encountered on The Barnacle Goose.’

  Murchad shook his head.

  ‘I still do not see how you finally realised that it was Sister Gormán who was the guilty one. Nor what my wife Aoife had to do with it.’

  ‘It was not your wife – I told you. It was the name Aoife and the story of Lir. Aoife who was the second of the three daughters of the King of Aran, in the story of the Children of Lir. Aoife was beautiful but Lir, the ocean god, married her young sister, Albha. Albha died and Lir then married her eldest sister Niamh. Niamh also died and finally Lir married Aoife.’

  ‘I vaguely remember the story,’ Murchad said, but without conviction.

  ‘Well, you will then remember that Aoife became jealous of those who were close to Lir, even though Lir did love her. It grew into such an obsession that she became full of bitterness and brooding evil and set out to destroy everything that loved Lir so that she could have him for herself. The barb of unreasonable jealousy lodged in her heart and she had to destroy. “Jealousy as cruel as the grave”, as Muirgel put it.’

  ‘I can see how that fits with Gormán but how … ?’

  ‘I was curious that Gormán seemed so interested in how long I had known Cian, almost as soon as I stepped on the ship. Then Crella told me that Cian had slept with Gormán when I questioned her on the second day out. I dismissed these things from my mind. But a good dálaigh must be possessed of a retentive memory. I stored the facts. It was when I kept hearing those Biblical quotations about lust and jealousy that I started to realise that the answer must lie in that direction. Yet only when you mentioned the name of your wife, Aoife, and I thought of the jealousy of the character, did I realise what I should be looking for. An unreasoning, insane jealousy.