Hemlock at Vespers: Fifteen Sister Fidelma Mysteries

by Peter Tremayne

  “Do women have such a status in your country?” he demanded in astonishment.

  “Is that so strange?” Fidelma replied irritably. “Anyway, we waste time. We must find Sister Della for she may be in danger. If Sister Cessair was not robbed, and was not attacked for sexual motives, the alternative is that she was killed from some personal motive which, judging from the savagery of the attack, shows a depth of malice that makes me shudder. Who could have been so angered by her that they would attempt to destroy her beauty? It is as if she were attacked by a jealous lover for it is known that hate and love are two sides of the same coin.”

  Fidelma suddenly saw Abbot Heribert’s eyes widen a fraction. She saw him glance swiftly at Ballgel and then drop his gaze.

  “Why does the mention of a lover have some special meaning for you?” she demanded.

  It was Abbess Ballgel who answered for him.

  “Sister Cessair did have a ... a liaison,” she said quietly.

  “It was disgusting!” grunted Abbot Heribert.

  “A curious choice of word.” Fidelma’s eyes narrowed. “Disgusting in what way?”

  “Abbot Heribert is a firm believer in the concept of celibacy,” explained Ballgel.

  “Celibacy is by no means universally approved of by the Church,” Fidelma pointed out. “There are many double houses where religious of both sexes live and raise their children to the service of God. What is disgusting about that?”

  “Paul of Tarsus spoke firmly in favor of celibacy and many other Church Fathers have done so. There are those of us who argue that only through celibacy do we have the power to spread the Faith.”

  “I am not here to discuss theology, Heribert. Are you telling me that Cessair was in love with a religieux from your abbey of Fosse?”

  “God forgive him,” Heribert lowered his head piously.

  “Only him?” Was there sarcasm in Fidelma’s voice. “Surely forgiveness is universal? Who was this monk?”

  “Brother Cano,” replied Ballgel. “He was a young monk who arrived from Eireann only a few weeks ago. It seems that he and Sister Cessair met and were immediately attracted by one another.”

  “And this relationship was disapproved of?”

  “It did not matter to me,” Ballgel said hastily. “Our culture does not forbid such relationships as you have pointed out. Even Kildare, where we studied, was a mixed house.”

  “But it mattered to Abbot Heribert.” Fidelma swung round on the tall Frankish prelate.

  “Of course it mattered. My Abbey of Fosse is for men of the Faith only. I follow the strict rule of celibacy and expect all members of my community to do the same. I warned Brother Cano several times to cease this disgusting alliance. Abbess Ballgel knew my views. It does not surprise me that this woman of loose morals has paid a bitter price.”

  Fidelma raised her eyebrows in surprise.

  “That is also an interesting statement. Are you given to much passion over this matter, Father Abbot?”

  Heribert frowned suspiciously at her.

  “What do you mean?”

  “I merely make an observation. Does it worry you that I comment on the passionate tones by which you denounce this poor Sister?”

  “I believe in the teachings of Paul of Tarsus.”

  “Yet it is not the rule of the Church. Nor, indeed, does the Holy Father denounce those who reject celibacy. It is not even a rule of our Faith.”

  “Not yet. But the ranks of those of us who believe in the segregation of men and woman and the rule of celibacy are increasing. One day the Holy Father will have to pay us heed. Already he has suggested that celibacy is the best way forward ...”

  “Until that happens, it is not a rule. Very well, I understand your position now. But we have a murder to be solved. Where is this Brother Cano?”

  Abbot Heribert shrugged.

  “I understand from Brother Sinsear that Brother Cano left the abbey this morning and was last seen heading along this road. Perhaps he meant to meet Sister Cessair?”

  Abbess Ballgel groaned softly. “If Cano was coming to meet Sister Cessair ... if he could do this to her ... we must find Sister Della!”

  Fidelma gave her a reassuring smile. “No one has said that Cano did this as yet,” she observed quietly. “However, it seems that, as well as the missing Sister, we also have a missing Brother to account for. Perhaps we will find one with the other. Where is this Brother Sinsear?”

  A religieux who was standing nearby coughed nervously and took a hesitant step toward her. He was a pale-faced young man, hardly more than an adolescent youth. His features were taut and he appeared in the grip of strong emotions.

  “I am Sinsear.”

  Fidelma regarded his flushed, anxious face.

  “You appear agitated, Brother.”

  “I work with Brother Cano in the gardens of our abbey, Sister. I am his friend. I knew that he had a ...” he glanced nervously at his abbot, “... a passion for Sister Cessair.”

  “A passion? You do not have to bandy words, Brother. Was he in love with her?”

  “I only knew that they met at regular times in the forest here because of Father Abbot’s disapproval of their relationship.”

  Abbot Heribert’s brows drew together in anger but Fidelma held up a hand to silence him.

  “Go on, Brother Sinsear. What are you saying?”

  “They had a special meeting spot in a glade not a far distance from here. A woodsman’s hut. It occurs to me, in the circumstances, that the hut might be examined.”

  “You should have spoken up sooner, Brother,” snapped Abbot Heribert. “Cano may have fled by now. I see no point in seeking him in that hut.”

  “You are presuming that he is guilty of this deed, Heribert,” Fidelma rebuked him. “Yet I think we should investigate this hut. Do you know the way to it, Brother Sinsear?”

  “I think so. There is a small path leading off this track about fifty meters in that direction.” He pointed toward Fosse, and on the far side of the track to the oak tree where Cessair had been found.

  “How far into the forest?”

  “No more than three hundred meters.”

  “Then lead the way. Father Abbot, you may send the rest of Brothers of your community to escort the Sisters and the body of Cessair back to the abbey of Nivelles.”

  Heribert made to object and then did her bidding.

  Brother Sinsear turned pale eyes on Fidelma.

  “Could Cano really have done such a terrible deed? Oh God, to maltreat such grace and beauty! Why did she not give her love to one who would appreciate such exquisite—”

  Abbot Heribert interrupted him.

  “Let us get a move on, Brother Sinsear. I expect it will be a waste of time. If Cano killed her then he will not be hiding in a forest hut but will have left the area by now.”

  “You are also forgetting the missing Sister Della,” Fidelma pointed out. “And it is wrong to assume Cano’s guilt.”

  “Yes, yes,” Heribert snapped. “Have it your own way.”

  With the young Brother Sinsear leading the way, clutching at a newly cut hawthorn stick, they trod a well-worn little path through the great forest.

  Eventually they came on a little glade, a pleasant spot through which a small stream meandered. By it stood a woodsman’s crude hut. The door was shut and there was no sign of life.

  Fidelma raised her hand and brought them to a halt on the edge of the glade. As they neared the door of the hut, Fidelma’s keen eyes surveyed it quickly. The first things she noticed were bloodstains on the doorjamb and several palm prints on the door as if someone had, with bloodied hands, pushed it open with their palm or palms. Blood was on a piece of wood near the door.

  They heard a sobbing sound from within.

  “Brother Cano!” Sinsear suddenly called. “The Abbot and I are here.”

  There was a silence. The sobbing suddenly halted.

  “Sinsear?” came a hesitant male voice. “Thank God! I need help.”r />
  There was another sound now. A feminine cry which sounded as if it were stifled almost immediately.

  Fidelma glanced at her companions.

  “Stay back. I shall go in first.” She turned and raised her voice. “Brother Cano? I am Fidelma of Kildare. I have come to help you. I am coming in.”

  There was no response.

  Slowly Fidelma leant forward, placing her hand near the bloodied imprint and pushed against the door. It swung open easily.

  At the far end of the woodsman’s hut she saw a young man clad in religious robes, kneeling on the floor. His hair was disheveled, his eyes red and cheeks stained as if from weeping. He held a piece of bloodstained cloth in his hands. Before him lay the prone figure of a girl. Her eyes were open and she appeared conscious but her clothes were covered in blood.

  Fidelma heard a sound behind her and swung round. She saw Abbot Heribert and the others trying to squeeze behind her and swiftly waved them back.

  “Stay there!” she snapped. There was such a power in her voice that they paused. “I will speak with Cano and Sister Della first.”

  Fidelma turned and took a step into the hut.

  “I am Sister Fidelma,” she repeated. “May I attend to Sister Della?”

  “Of course.” The young man seemed bewildered.

  Fidelma knelt by his side. He had been trying to cleanse her wounds.

  “Lie still,” she said, as she examined the wound of the young religieuse. Sister Della had been clubbed on the back of the head in the same fashion as Sister Cessair. Unlike the blow delivered to Cessair, it had not broken the bone of the skull. There was, however, a nasty swelling.

  “Am I dying, Sister?” The girl’s voice was faint.

  “No. In a moment we will get you back to the Abbey so that you may be properly attended. What can you tell me about the attack on Sister Cessair and yourself?”

  “Little enough.”

  “A little in these circumstances may mean a lot,” encouraged Fidelma.

  “Alas, the little is nothing. Sister Cessair and I were bringing the phial of the holy blood of Blessed Gertrude to the Abbey of Fosse. We were walking through the woods. I remember ...” She paused and groaned. “I did not hear anyone behind us for we were talking together and ...” She held up a hand to her head. “There came a sharp blow and then I can remember nothing until I came to, lying on the path with a blinding pain in my head. I thought I was alone. I could see no one. I began to look around and then, then I saw Cessair....”

  She gave a heart-rending sob.

  “What then?” prompted Fidelma gently.

  “I could do nothing for her, except try to get help. I came here and—”

  “You came here?” Fidelma interrupted quickly. “Why come to this woodsman’s hut? Why not go on to the Abbey of Fosse or back to Nivelles?”

  “I knew Cano would be here.” The girl groaned again.

  “She knew that I had arranged to meet Cessair here on the journey from Nivelles to Fosse,” interrupted Cano defiantly. “I am not ashamed of it.”

  Fidelma ignored him and smiled down at the girl.

  “Rest awhile. It will not be long before we have you safe and your wound attended.”

  Only then did she turned to Cano.

  “So you were waiting here for Cessair?”

  “Cessair and I loved one another. We often met here because Abbot Heribert was vehement against us.”

  “Tell me about it.”

  “There is not much to tell. I arrived at Fosse about a month ago to join the community. Although there are several Irish religious here and in Nivelles, it is a strange land. They are more inclined to celibacy than we are in Eireann. They do not have the number of mixed houses that we do. Abbot Heribert was fanatical for the rule of celibacy; even though there is no such proscription in the church, he makes it a rule in his abbey. I think I would have left long ago had I not met Cessair.”

  “When did you and Cessair meet?”

  “The week after I came here. It was Brother Sinsear who introduced me when we were taking produce from Fosse to Nivelles.”

  “Brother Sinsear introduced you?”

  “Yes. As a gardener, Sinsear often took produce between the two abbeys. He knew many of the religieuse at Nivelles.”

  “Did Cessair have any enemies that you knew of ?”

  “Only Abbot Heribert, when he discovered our relationship.” Cano’s voice was bitter. From the doorway, Fidelma heard Heribert’s expression of anger.

  “Why didn’t you leave and move on to a mixed house?”

  “We planned to but Abbess Ballgel counseled Cessair against it.”

  Fidelma frowned.

  “Why would she be against such a plan?”

  Cano shrugged.

  “She was ... protective of Cessair. She felt Cessair was too young.”

  “More protective than of her other charges?”

  “I do not know. All I know is that we were desperate and planning to leave here.”

  Fidelma waited a while. Then she said abruptly:

  “Did you kill Cessair?”

  The young monk raised a tear-stained face to her and there was a haunted look in his eyes.

  “How can you ask such a question?”

  “Because I am a dálaigh, an advocate of the law,” replied Fidelma. “It is my duty to ask.”

  “I did not.”

  “Tell me what happened this morning, then.”

  “I knew that Cessair and Della were bringing the vial to Fosse for the annual blessing. So we arranged to meet here.”

  “Surely that would mean a delay in the bringing of the vial to Fosse? The service was at midday.”

  “Cessair was going to persuade Della to take the phial on to Fosse while she joined me here. We only meant to meet briefly to make some arrangements and then Cessair would hasten after Della, pretending she had broke her sandal on the road.”

  “What arrangements were you going to make?”

  “Arrangements to leave this place. Perhaps to go back to Ireland.”

  “I see. So you arrived here ... ?”

  “And here I waited. I thought Cessair was late and was about to go down to the main track to see if there was a sign of her when Della came stumbling into the hut. She was almost hysterical and told me what had happened, then she passed out. I could not leave her alone and have been trying to return her to consciousness ever since. It is only a moment ago that she regained her senses.”

  Fidelma turned to Della.

  “Do you agree with this account?”

  The girl had raised herself on an elbow, she still looked pale and shaken.

  “So far as I am able. I do not remember much at all.”

  “Very well. Then I think we should get you to the abbey where you may have the wound tended.” She glanced at Cano who was twisting his hands nervously. Then she remembered something.

  “Do you have the vial of blood, Sister Della? The holy blood of the Blessed Gertrude?”

  Della frowned and shook her head

  “Cessair carried it in her marsupium.”

  “I see,” replied Fidelma thoughtfully, before turning to the others and waving them forward.

  “We will carry Sister Della to Fosse,” she told them. “There are a few more questions that I wish to ask but we should ensure that Sister Della gets proper treatment for her wound.”

  The church and community of Fosse was not as spectacular as some of the abbeys which Fidelma had encountered in her travels. She reminded herself that it was barely twenty years old. It was not more than a collection of timber houses around a large, rectangular wooden church.

  Sister Della was immediately taken to the infirmary while the Abbot led the Abbess and Fidelma to the refectory for refreshments. Brother Sinsear and Brother Cano were told to go to their cells and await the Abbot’s call.

  Abbess Ballgel was the first to break the uneasy silence that had fallen among them. She had seen Fidelma’s work before whil
e they had been together at the Abbey of Kildare.

  “Well, Fidelma, do you see a solution to this horror? And where is the holy blood of Gertrude?”

  “Let us summarize what we know. We can eliminate certain things. Firstly, the concept that this action was committed by robbers. I have already given one main reason, that is the mutilation of Cessair. That was done from hate. Secondly, we have the testimony from Della who says that she was walking along talking with Cessair and did not hear or see anything until she was struck from behind.”

  “You mean, if there had been robbers waiting in ambush then she would have seen something of them?”

  “Just so. The very idea of even a single person creeping unobserved behind someone walking in a forest is, I find, rather a difficult one to accept.”

  Abbess Ballgel frowned quickly.

  “You claim that Sister Della is lying?”

  “Not necessarily. But think of it in this way; think of a forest path strewn with dead leaves, twigs and the like. An animal might move quietly over such a carpet but can a human? Could a man or woman creep up so quickly behind someone walking along and strike them before they knew it?”

  “Then we must question the girl further,” snapped Heribert, “and force her to confess.”

  Fidelma looked at him in disapproval.

  “Confess to what?”

  “Why, the killing of the other girl,” replied Heribert.

  Fidelma gave a deep sigh.

  “There is another more plausible explanation why Sister Della did not hear her assailant creep up behind her.”

  The Abbot frowned in anger.

  “What game are you playing? First you say one thing and then you say another. I do not follow.”

  The Abbess Ballgel intervened as she saw Fidelma’s facial muscles go taut and her eyes change color.

  “Fidelma is a qualified advocate used to these puzzles. I suggest we allow her to follow her path of reasoning.”

  The Abbot sat back his face set in a sneer.

  “Proceed, then.”

  “Before I come back to that point, let us proceed along another route. The savagery with which Sister Cessair was attacked, the fact that her features were mutilated, the fact that Sister Della was left unmarked except for the blow that laid her unconscious, means that Cessair was, indeed, singled out particularly in this attack. She was, as I said before, attacked out of some great malice toward her.”