My Lady Judge

by Cora Harrison

  Just as well if the tale travelled around before judgement day. The people would have the time to get used to their shock and their horror at the guilt of the privileged and the sacred; and would be able to turn their minds towards justice for the weak and the unimportant, thought Mara. She waited until Diarmuid had finished trussing up the priest. From time to time she glanced down at her wrist, but the wrappings still stayed white. Her spirits began to rise.

  ‘Go and get help, Diarmuid,’ she said. ‘It will only take you a few minutes to go to Caherconnell. Tell Malachy the whole story. Get him to bring some men and a cart. We will send this … this man back to the bishop at Kilfenora. Let the bishop look after him now. He is his responsibility.’

  ‘Will you be all right?’ asked Diarmuid. He lifted the lantern and cast a quick worried glance at her wrist. She looked also; some blood had leaked through, but not much.

  ‘I’ll be fine,’ she said decisively. ‘The bleeding must be quite slow now. Malachy will be able to stitch it. Tell him he’ll need to bring something. Ask him to bring a piece of parchment and pen and ink, also. I’ll write a note to the bishop of Kilfenora and explain everything. Tell him not to bring Nuala,’ she added urgently. ‘Tell him I said that Nuala was not to come.’

  Diarmuid grinned at her. ‘You’re feeling better,’ he observed mildly. ‘I know you are yourself when you start giving me strings of instructions. You were always like that even when you were five years old.’

  She was surprised to hear herself laugh. ‘Go on, then,’ she said lightly. ‘Go quickly. I’ll be all right.’

  ‘I’ll get you out of here, first of all,’ said Diarmuid. ‘You won’t want to be staying here with him. Just stay still for a moment; let me carry you.’

  ‘I’m heavier than I was when I was five years old,’ said Mara, but he had picked her up in a minute and carried her outside. The night was still very black and there was a slight mist blowing in from the Atlantic. Mara tasted the salt on her lips and was suddenly filled with an overwhelming joy that she was still alive.

  ‘Put me down, Diarmuid,’ she said curtly. ‘I’ll just sit with my back against that stone; I’ll be fine.’

  ‘I’ll leave you the lantern,’ said Diarmuid.

  ‘No, take it,’ said Mara. ‘I don’t want you falling and breaking your leg in the darkness. I need Malachy here quickly and I need to have that priest moved off the Burren as soon as possible.’

  ‘Come on, Wolf,’ said Diarmuid. He was a man of few words, she thought, and, yes, he had always obeyed her instructions to the letter even when they were both five years old. She had absolute confidence in him.

  Mara half wished that he had disobeyed her instruction and had left the lantern or else had relit her own lantern. The time seemed long to her. She watched the light bobbing until he had reached the edge of the high tableland; he would have dropped down over the broken slabs there to the back of Caherconnell, she thought, her mind following his journey through the mounds of ferns unfurling into croziers of palest green. It would take him another few minutes to climb down there, and then perhaps another few minutes to rouse one of the household if they had all gone to bed. And then Malachy, never the quickest thinker, would have to collect his medical bag, give instructions to his men, the cart would have to be harnessed and taken around by the road and across the flat tableland. She strained her ears for any sound and then heard a mutter from within the cairn.

  ‘I wish he had left Wolf,’ she murmured. ‘I would feel better then.’ Diarmuid would not have done that because he would have feared the dog might attack her, but Mara had no fear of that happening. She knew that Wolf had accepted her. ‘Dogs are less complicated than human beings; they live by their rules,’ she said aloud and then smiled to herself to hear her usual clear, confident voice ringing against the limestone. Her wrist ached fiercely and she welcomed the pain; anything was better than the clouds of faintness welling up and smothering her mind. She heard a mutter from inside the cairn and hoped that Diarmuid had securely tied

  … that animal, she allowed herself to call him in the privacy of her own mind. She strained her ears again towards the east, towards Caherconnell, and this time she heard something. There was definitely a slam of a door, and a shout. She prayed that the mist would not get worse; already it was deadening sounds. Surely she should be hearing more noises by now?

  Deliberately she jerked her wounded wrist. There was a stab of pain – that would keep her senses alert. She strained her ears, turning her head slowly from side to side, but she could hear no more sounds from the Caherconnell direction. At least her faintness was not worsening. Her mind had to remain alert for the next hour or so. She had to get these two crimes, the murder and the rape, acknowledged and the price paid for them.

  Diarmuid was the first to arrive. She could hear his dog panting and the noise of Diarmuid’s nailed boots striking hard against the stone clints.

  ‘Mara,’ he was saying, ‘Mara, is everything all right?’

  ‘I’m fine, Diarmuid,’ she said and noted with satisfaction that some of the strength had come back into her voice. Her mind was clear and alert and her wrist would heal. She felt suddenly cheerful. She would never speak of the degradation of the attempted rape to any person living in the kingdom of the Burren, she decided. There was plenty to accuse the priest of without that. She knew herself, and knew that she would find it easy to put something like that behind her; what she could not bear would be covert sympathy.

  ‘Is Malachy coming?’ she asked, with a sudden trace of anxiety. ‘He’s not away, is he?’ She suddenly remembered how surprised she was that he had not turned up to escort Nuala home earlier in the evening.

  ‘No, he’s coming. He had to pack his medical satchel. He’s coming around with the cart and the men. Look, you can just see the lights.’

  ‘Have you noticed anything, Diarmuid?’ asked Mara after a quick glance had shown her the hazy lights in the distance. ‘Have you noticed anything strange?’

  ‘No,’ said Diarmuid, gazing all around him and holding up the little lantern.

  ‘Something strange about the dog?’

  ‘What’s strange about the dog?’ asked Diarmuid, shining the light on the huge reddish-brown dog sitting with a pink tongue hanging over his chin.

  ‘He didn’t bark when he came up to me,’ said Mara with immense satisfaction. ‘That’s what’s strange about him.’

  Diarmuid tried to reply but his words were drowned by an explosion of barks. The cart was trundling across the stone pavements and men walked in front holding flaming pitch-pine torches. Wolf barked again and again and lunged towards them and Mara looked at him with maternal pride.

  ‘He doesn’t bark at me,’ she said in the brief interval of the volley of barking and Wolf turned and wagged his tail. Diarmuid began to laugh.

  ‘Well, I don’t know,’ he said. ‘You are the coolest person I have ever known. You were nearly murdered by a madman and all you are interested in now is having tamed the dog. I’d better tie him up over there to one of the stones or no one will want to come near to you.’

  ‘Are you all right, Brehon?’ said Malachy, looming up out of the mist.

  ‘I’m all right, Malachy,’ she said. ‘Has Diarmuid told you all?’

  ‘Yes, he has, what a terrible business. I suppose the poor man has gone right out of his mind.’

  Mara sniffed. ‘I think he has had some sort of fit,’ she said coolly. ‘Get your men to load him into the cart, Malachy. Diarmuid has left him tied up inside the cairn. I would keep him tied up. He is guilty of two crimes. The most important is the violent rape of a child; but he has also tried to murder me.’

  Malachy gave her a quick glance and put his hand out. Silently she showed him the injured wrist. He inspected the wrapping and gave a nod. Then he took her other hand and placed his finger on her pulse. Again he nodded and gave her a quick smile.

  ‘I’m probably hard to kill,’ she said light-heartedly.

/>   He laughed. He looked well himself, she thought as she watched him carefully unwrap her bandage and mop the clotted blood from her wrist. She moved her mind away from the pain and continued to study Malachy. Perhaps it was just the dimness of the lantern’s light, but the black shadows under his eyes had gone and the air of heavy depression seemed to have lifted from him. Even his skin looked brighter. Perhaps he had been sleeping in the evening and now he was rested and alert.

  ‘I’ll take you back to the house and stitch this up when I get you there,’ he said when he had wrapped up her wrist again. ‘Have a drink, now.’ He took a small flask from his satchel.

  ‘Brandy, I hope,’ she joked.

  He smiled again. ‘No, water, I’m afraid, but I’ll get you some brandy when we are back in Caherconnell.’

  He took a pitch torch from one of his servants and strode over towards the cairn. After a minute he shouted an order and his servants came forward and then backed out, carefully carrying the priest trussed up like a pig for slaughter.

  ‘Did you bring the pen and the parchment?’ asked Mara.

  ‘I did, indeed,’ called Malachy. ‘Are you able to write?’

  Mara held out her right hand and Malachy came and brought her the small leaf of parchment and a well-trimmed goose quill.

  ‘Diarmuid will hold the parchment straight for me,’ she said, placing the inkhorn on the stone slab beside her. ‘You go and attend to the dog’s bite on the arm of the priest. I don’t want anything to happen to him before he is brought, in chains, if necessary, to stand before the people of the Burren and to confess to his sin. Diarmuid,’ she called. ‘Come and hold this for me, like a good man.’

  He came instantly. There were traces of a grin lurking under the ginger hair of his moustache.

  ‘Yes, I know, I’m still ordering you about,’ she said, laughing at the expression on his face. Funny how I have forgotten what a sense of humour he has, she thought.

  ‘It’s good to see you able to do it,’ he said warmly, and there was a lifetime of affection in his voice. ‘You’re looking and sounding more like yourself now.’

  He unrolled the parchment, flattened it on the stone slab, and held it steadily while she dipped the quill into the soot-black liquid in the inkhorn.

  Mauritius,

  Bishop of Kilfenora,

  Kingdom of Corcomroe

  She wrote carefully at the top of the leaf, and then underneath in her square italic hand she wrote:

  My Lord Bishop,

  It gives me much pain to report the wrongdoing of one of your priests. I am sending him back to you under armed guard. He has violently raped and made pregnant a twelve-year-old girl. He did not acknowledge his sin and did not make any amends. I got a confession from him and I am prepared to swear to it. The case will come up on the next judgement day on 10 May at Poulnabrone. I would ask that you keep this man under guard and return him for judgement on that day.

  If found guilty, the fine will be the sum of forty—fiveséts, or twenty-two and a half ounces of silver or twenty-three milch cows.

  This man also tried to murder me, but I will not ask for a fine on this count.

  Mara,

  Brehon of the Burren,

  By appointment to King Turlough Donn O’Brien, King of Thomond, Corcomroe and the Burren

  When she had finished she returned the quill to Diarmuid and rolled up the leaf of vellum awkwardly with her right hand.

  ‘I have no seal,’ she said. ‘I should have a seal with me.’ I left it at the cave yesterday, she remembered. It all seemed a very long time ago.

  ‘I have some string in my pocket,’ said Diarmuid. ‘That will do. I’ll give it to Malachy’s chief man. He won’t lose it.’

  ‘No,’ she said stubbornly. ‘Malachy,’ she called. ‘I can’t send a private and important message to the bishop without tying and sealing it. We must go back to Cahermacnaghten and then I’ll get a seal.’

  ‘I suppose Cahermacnaghten will be on the way,’ said Malachy calmly. ‘If it’s really that important to you to get a seal, then we’ll go over there. I can stitch you up there as well as I can in Caherconnell. You can ride on the cart.’

  ‘No,’ said Mara, feeling a sudden sick disgust at the idea of riding next to that priest. ‘No, I’ll walk.’

  ‘You can’t walk,’ said Malachy. ‘You’ve just been badly injured.’

  ‘It was my arm that was injured, not my leg,’ said Mara sharply. She knew he was right, she did feel weak, but nothing would have persuaded her to sit on the cart.

  ‘Diarmuid,’ she called. ‘Give me your arm, like a good man. Walk with me to Cahermacnaghten.’ She set off, staggering slightly, across the clints, determined to prove her vigour by out-walking them all. Malachy tried to call out a protest but that set Wolf off barking again so his words were lost. Diarmuid caught up with her and slipped an arm around her waist, holding her right elbow with a steady, firm grasp. She leaned against him, glad of his strength and warmed by his constant affection. Wolf stopped barking and walked beside Diarmuid with an occasional turn of his large furry head towards Mara. Neither spoke. Mara was turning over in her mind the ordeal that lay ahead of her and Diarmuid was a man of few words. From behind them came the sound of the steady trundling of the cart wheels and from time to time Malachy’s deep voice speaking to his men. Mara breathed deeply, sucking in great gulps of the Atlantic mist and trying to give herself energy to go on.

  ‘Leave me here, Diarmuid,’ she said when they reached the gate of the Brehon’s house at Cahermacnaghten. ‘Malachy will look after me now.’

  TWENTY-THREE

  CASE NOTES AND JUDGEMENT TEXTS FROM MARA, BREHON OF THE BURREN, 15 MAY 1509

  Judgement day: tenth day of May 1509. I judged the case between Declan O‘Lochlainn and Gabur Conglach, priest of the parish of Kilcorney. Declan O’Lochlainn declared that his daughter Nessa, aged twelve, had been raped by the aforesaid priest on the day after the feast of Samhain of the previous year.

  Judgement given was that the priest, the aforesaid Gabur Conglach, was guilty of the rape of a girl in plaits. The fine awarded to the aforesaid Declan O’Lochlainn was forty-five sets, or twenty-two and a half ounces of silver, or twenty-three milch cows, to be paid within five days.

  AND DID THE PRIEST turn up for the hearing?’ asked King Turlough Donn.

  Mara leaned back in the luxuriously cushioned chair and took a sip from her wine cup before answering. It was very splendid, this castle of Turlough’s – or palace, as they were now calling it, after the English fashion. The stone walls were hung with painted leather and every seat had a velvet cushion. On the floor was a carpet made from velvet and the windows were hung with velvet hangings. The room was crammed with heavy oak furniture, gleaming in the light of the candles and reflecting the deep orange glow of the fire. She would make a few improvements, she thought, if she lived there. The leather was cracked, it could do with regular polishing, and the velvet hangings were dark with peat smoke. Nevertheless, it was a comfortable room, high up in the stone castle. She had felt tired after her ride to Thomond, but now she felt relaxed, lapped in the warmth of fire and affection.

  ‘No,’ she said after a minute. ‘The bishop sent Fergus, the Brehon of Corcomroe, to represent him in my court. Apparently, the priest’ – she still could not bring herself to call him Father Conglach – ‘is still sunk in some sort of trance. He has not spoken and he has had several fits. The bishop has sent a new priest to Kilcorney. He seems a nice man, very scholarly, and kind to the old people of the parish.’

  ‘Poor man … the bishop, I mean,’ said Turlough. ‘It must be a great worry for him. He’s a relation of mine, you know.’

  ‘He should go by the old ways and allow the priests to marry if they wish,’ said Mara with a shrug of her shoulders. She had little sympathy with the bishop.

  ‘And so Colman blackmailed Father Conglach? How did he know about the rape?’

  ‘He guessed, I think,’ said Mara. ‘The
priest thought Nessa told him, but she had no idea who had raped her, poor child. Colman was a clever boy. In any case, I think most of the young people knew that the priest had a habit of lurking around and spying on the courting couples. Rory – you remember the young bard, Rory, the handsome young fellow with the red hair? – he knew about the priest; I have no doubt that Colman knew, also. Who knows, but Colman might have been spying himself. That was probably what gave him the notion of buying Emer as his bride.’ She finished with a sigh. Every time she thought of Colman she was filled with a great sense of sorrow and guilt – not guilt for his death, she was clear-minded enough to know that the murder was caused by his own greed, but guilt for his lack of morality.

  ‘And what about the little girl, Nessa?’ asked Turlough, poking the fire and then refilling both of their glasses.

  ‘Well, she’s getting on very well,’ said Mara. ‘I’ve taken her under my wing a little. Brigid is teaching her to cook and I’m teaching her to garden. She’s a bit silly and giggly with the boys, but she is developing quite a mind of her own and it’s good to get her away from that mother of hers. I have a horrible suspicion that her mother suspected the truth all of the time. Anyway, I’ve tried to put the fear of God into the parents about not rushing her into a marriage for a while. I told them to let things settle, to let people forget, and Malachy backed me up with a whole lot of long medical words. They didn’t understand a word of it – neither did I, to be honest – but they said no more about marriage for her.’

  Turlough nodded, his face alert and interested. He picked up the leaf of vellum again and then frowned.

  ‘But, Mara,’ he said. ‘You have nothing here about the murder of Colman. Presumably this priest did it. You told me that he was being blackmailed. He could not let this scandal come out. Mauritius is a bishop who is very keen on the Roman ways; he would not even allow any of his clergy to marry. He would have unfrocked Father Conglach for this rape.’