The Leper's bell sf-14

by Peter Tremayne

  Delia looked at her with a deepening frown.

  ‘What do you mean? I think you owe me some explanation,’ she demanded.

  ‘Delia, where were you on the night that Sárait was killed?’

  The woman’s lips trembled a little.

  ‘Am I being accused of something?’

  ‘Please, Delia.’ Fidelma’s voice was now soft and coaxing. In other circumstances she would have been harsh, demanding, but she knew Delia too well. ‘I will explain if you answer a couple of questions.’

  ‘So far as I recall, I was here. I am usually here.’

  ‘Can anyone vouch for that?’

  Delia seemed to hesitate a moment and then shook her head. ‘I was alone.’

  Something made Fidelma feel that her friend was not being truthful. She decided to let it pass for the moment.

  ‘When was the last time that you saw your green cloak?’

  ‘As I have said, I put it away in this chest when I ceased to be a bé-táide, which was, as you know, three years ago. I have not bothered to look at it since.’

  ‘Why keep it, then? You could have sold it. It is a very valuable cloak.’

  Delia shrugged. ‘We do many things in life that are not logical, lady. You have seen these clothes that I have kept. They are a reminder of times past… to remind myself of what I was.’

  ‘You are not aware of anyone breaking into your house? Perhaps the cloak could have been stolen?’

  Delia shook her head. ‘There is no reason why anyone should break in here. I never keep a locked door — it is open to anyone to come and go as they please.’

  ‘And you have left the house with the door unlocked?’

  Fidelma well knew that locking doors was not a custom among the local people. However, the doors of nobles and professionals were secured on either side by a bolt or more usually by an iron lock — a glais iarnaidhi. When the Blessed Colmcille went to preach to the pagan King Brude of the Picts, he found that the king had caused all the doors of his fortress to be locked against him. Colmcille uttered a prayer which caused the iron locks to be miraculously opened. Why she suddenly thought of the story, she did not know.

  ‘I always leave my door unlocked. Only at night, I draw the bolt shut.’

  ‘So anyone might have come in at any time and taken the cloak?’

  ‘I suppose so. Now, are you going to tell me what this is all about?’

  Fidelma compressed her lips for a moment.

  ‘On the night Sárait died and my baby was taken, she was lured from the palace by a false message. A dwarf went to her and told her that her sister wanted to see her urgently.’

  ‘Gobnat? She hardly spoke to her sister.’

  ‘You know her that well?’

  ‘Everyone in the township knows her. Gobnat is one of those righteous women who still refuse to acknowledge my existence. She is supposed to be very moral, a pillar of the Faith.’

  Fidelma stretched before the fire.

  ‘You sound as if you do not like her?’

  ‘I am merely irritated by her attitude. But then many people are.’

  Fidelma looked at Delia curiously. ‘What do you mean?’

  Delia shrugged quickly. ‘I mean her inflated self-esteem as if she is far better than other women here. Her conceit has grown immensely now that her husband, Capa, is captain of the élite warriors that guard your brother.’

  ‘My mentor, the Brehon Morann, used to say that pride is but a mask covering one’s own faults.’

  Delia smiled humorously. ‘If anyone has a true reason for pride, it is you, Fidelma. You are wise and learned and your deeds are known in all five kingdoms of Éireann.’

  Fidelma shook her head. ‘When I went to attend the law school of Brehon Morann, the first thing I had to do was part with self-conceit. Admitting one knew nothing and would never know more than a fraction even if one spent an entire life in contemplation and study, was the start of learning. Otherwise it would have been impossible to learn even what I thought I already knew.’

  Delia tried to bring Fidelma’s mind back to the matter in hand.

  ‘You mentioned that a dwarf went to the palace. Are you trying to track down this dwarf?’

  Fidelma smiled thinly. ‘I have already done so. He told me a story that I believe. I believe it because the poor creature’s brother paid for its veracity with his life.’

  ‘And that story is?’

  ‘That the dwarf was passing through Cashel on that night and was asked to deliver the message to Sárait by a woman — a woman dressed in a green silk cloak, enriched with red embroidery.’

  She was watching Delia’s face carefully. She was surprised to see a look of relief relax her features.

  ‘Then the dwarf will be able to identify the wearer of this garment and prove who it was.’

  ‘Not exactly,’ replied Fidelma. ‘You see, while the light of a lamp fell on the woman’s clothing, it did not reveal her features. All he could see was that she was not youthful but had a good figure. The woman paid him to take the message to Sárait.’

  Delia began to look a little strained and pale again.

  ‘I see now why you have come to me with your questions,’ she said. ‘You think that I am that woman. However, other women could have cloaks of green silk with red embroidery.’

  Fidelma indicated the chest of clothes.

  ‘The fact that you cannot produce your cloak seems to indicate that it was the cloak in question.’

  ‘It does not mean that I was wearing it.’

  ‘True. Can you add anything to your explanation of where you were that night?’

  Delia hesitated.

  ‘Fidelma, you have befriended me when others shunned my company. You defended me when others would have condemned me. By that friendship I swear this, that I am not the woman whom you seek. I know nothing of the matter other than that I once possessed a green silk cloak and now it is gone.’

  Fidelma looked intently at her for a moment or two.

  ‘Speaking as your friend, Delia, I believe you. But in this matter, I have to speak as a dálaigh. I have to try to find out when this cloak was stolen from you and have some corroboration of where you were on the night Sárait was killed.’

  Delia raised her arms in a helpless gesture.

  ‘I know nothing of law, lady. You must do as you must. I will answer your questions so far as I am able but I can tell you nothing further that will help you in this matter.’

  ‘You cannot tell me where you were on that night or provide me with the name of anyone who would vouch for you?’ she pressed.

  ‘I can say nothing more on that subject,’ Delia replied firmly.

  Fidelma sighed deeply.

  ‘Very well. I do believe you, Delia, but I must do what I must to find my child. You can appreciate that.’

  Delia impulsively leant forward and touched Fidelma’s arm.

  ‘Believe me, I am a mother, too. I would do the same were I in your place. I have not had a happy life. When I was young, I had ambitions to marry and have children. That was denied me. My problem, if you like, was that I always fell in love with the wrong man. I gave love and trust, and those men took them from me and then left me with nothing but angry memories. That was how I was led into being a bé-táide, seeking to revenge myself on men.’

  ‘I cannot see,’ Fidelma replied with a frown, ‘how prostitution is a form of revenge on men?’

  Delia chuckled, a sound without any humour.

  ‘It makes men come cap in hand, seeking women’s favours and having to pay for the privilege. That is revenge for all those women whom they force their attentions on, whom they claim mastery over, simply because they are their husbands.’

  ‘Women do not have to put up with men’s pretensions in that field,’ admonished Fidelma. ‘Under law, women have the right to separate and to divorce.’

  Delia was still bitter.

  ‘Law is logical. Sometimes the law is only as good as human nature.
What happens between a man and wife within the bedroom is often beyond the reach of the law.’

  ‘A woman does not have to be afraid. If a man threatens or inflicts physical violence on his partner it is grounds for an immediate divorce. Likewise, if the man circulates lies about his partner and holds her up to ridicule-’

  Delia cut her short.

  ‘You do not understand, lady. I know you have a perfect marriage and I wish you well in it. But the minds of men and women are not always logical. Sometimes a woman will bear ills that logic might dictate are easily curable in law because of her feelings for her partner. Not everything can be cured by logic’

  Fidelma felt a sudden overwhelming weariness. Then, she could not help it, tears sprang into her eyes. She tried to blink them away.

  Delia gazed at her in surprise.

  ‘Why, lady, what is amiss?’ she asked, leaning forward, a hand on Fidelma’s arm.

  Fidelma found that she could not speak.

  ‘Oh, forgive me, lady, I am too selfish.’ Delia seemed truly in distress. ‘I forgot this was about your missing child. How can I be so unthinking?’

  Fidelma tried to recover her poise. Then she sighed.

  ‘Oh, Delia, it is not just Alchú’s loss that has cast me into an abyss I can see no way out of.’

  The woman stared at her for a moment, lost in thought. Then she shook her head.

  The Saxon brother? Your husband? Is he the cause of this grief, lady?’

  ‘It is more that I have been upsetting him by my vanity, Delia,’ she replied brokenly.

  The woman regarded her with an appraising look.

  ‘Tell me about it,’ she instructed.

  At first Fidelma hesitated and then, slowly at first, but with growing abandon, she began to tell Delia about the situation that had evolved between herself and Eadulf. It flooded out. As she spoke, she began to realise that it was a long time since she had talked to a woman, someone she could trust. In fact, Fidelma had not had an anam chara, a soul friend, since the disgrace of her friend Liadin, who had once been as a sister to her. They had grown up together and when they had reached the ‘age of choice’, when they had become women under the law, they had become soul friends, sworn to be spiritual guides to one another as was the custom of the Faith in Ireland. Liadin had married a foreign chieftain, Scoriath of the Fir More, who had been driven from his own lands to dwell among the Uí Dróna of Laigin. Liadin had acquired a lover and become involved in the murder of her husband and son and betrayed her oath to Fidelma. Since then, Fidelma had not accepted anyone as a soul friend.

  Now all her fears, her hopes and her worries, came out in a rush like a dam breaking and the waters gushing forth.

  For some time after she had finished speaking, Delia sat quietly.

  ‘The one thing that I have learnt, lady, is never to advise someone on a course of action when it comes to a relationship between a man and a woman,’ she said at last. ‘From what you say, the pursuit was all on the Saxon’s side. He must take the greater responsibility. Is there not an old saying among our people, lady, that a man who marries a woman from the glen marries the whole glen? Did your man not realise that when he married you he had to marry who you were, and that meant he had to accept you were of the Eóghanacht?’

  ‘Perhaps he did not understand exactly what it entailed.’

  ‘He cannot blame you for his lack of knowledge, lady.’

  ‘He is not happy here, Delia, nor could I be happy in his country.’

  ‘There is always a compromise to be found between two extremes.’

  ‘But what compromise?’

  ‘That is for discussion between yourself and your man.’

  ‘It is not that easy.’

  ‘Perhaps it is because you are trying to find a route by logic. The shortest cut through emotional problems is often to let your feelings show you the road. When you have seen the choice before you then it is time to make a decision.’

  Fidelma shook her head. ‘Where the heart leads, logic must go also.’

  ‘You may see the problem through logic, lady, but you will understand truth through your emotion. It is emotion that has taught people how to reason.’

  Fidelma suddenly rose with a brief smile. ‘You are a wise woman, Delia.’

  Delia rose also. ‘Wisdom has not made me rich.’

  ‘Wisdom excels all riches, Delia.’

  ‘That is as may be, lady, but for now I am a former bé-táide under suspicion of encompassing the death of Sárait.’

  Fidelma looked Delia straight in the eye.

  ‘My instinct tells me that you are not involved. Yet it also tells me something else. It tells me that you are holding something back.’

  Delia flushed. ‘I can assure you that I am innocent of any involvement in the killing of Sárait or the disappearance of your baby. You are the last person I would inflict hurt upon.’

  Fidelma inclined her head for a moment.

  ‘I will accept that until it is proved otherwise,’ she said quietly, before turning towards the door. At the door she halted as a thought occurred to her. ‘Promise me this, Delia, that you will not mention anything to anyone about the garment that is missing or my interest in it.’

  Delia smiled wryly.

  ‘That I can easily do. I did not even know it was missing until you asked me to look for it. The garment that you are interested in, and the fact that it is missing, will remain a matter strictly between the two of us.’

  Fidelma smiled.

  ‘Let it be so,’ she said softly before she left.

  Chapter Ten

  Fidelma sat opposite Eadulf as they breakfasted together on goat’s milk, freshly baked bread, cheese and apples. Fidelma had been reticent about the details of her meeting with Delia on the previous evening. She had told him about the boy at the inn and went so far as to tell him that Delia had once possessed the green and red silk cloak. She had also mentioned seeing Gorman, but little else, and Eadulf had not bothered to press her further. In fact, he had come late to their chamber, when she was almost asleep, for he had discovered in the library of Cashel a copy of Historia Francorum, a history of the Franks, by Bishop Gregory of Tours. Eadulf was always interested in the history of various peoples. The scriptor in the library had told him that this had been one of the last books to be copied at the great book-copying centre in Alexandria. The story was told with much verve and enthusiasm and Eadulf soon discovered that Gregory was no Frank but a Gaul, a Romanised Gaul it was true, but not above pointing out the error of Frankish ways and praising his own people. The time had passed quickly and so, returning to their chamber, he had found Fidelma already in bed. He re-emerged into the real world with a feeling of guilt that a mere book could provide him with escape from his problems for a few hours.

  ‘So what can we do now?’ Eadulf asked, as he poured a drink from the jug of goat’s milk.

  ‘There is little we can do but wait,’ Fidelma replied. ‘Let us hope we get a quick response to our demand for proof.’

  ‘Do you think that we shall?’

  ‘If Alchú has really been kidnapped and if his kidnappers are serious about the exchange — yes. But there is nothing to be done until we hear. Anyway, old Conchobar has asked me to go and play brandubh with him this morning. He probably knows that I need some distraction.’

  Brandubh was ‘black raven’, an ancient board game which Eadulf prided himself on being rather good at. Before the coining of the Faith to the five kingdoms, it was said that the great god of arts and crafts, Lugh, had invented it and most of the kings and heroes were thought little of unless they were masters of the game.

  Conchobar was an elderly apothecary and physician who dwelt at Cashel and had known Fidelma since she was born.

  ‘You might ask him if he can discover where Alchú is,’ Eadulf said with some bitterness in his voice.

  Conchobar was not only a physician but also an adept at making speculations from the patterns of the stars. Indeed, me
dicine and astrology were often twins in the practice of the physician’s lore and the study of the heavens, nemgnacht, was an ancient art in this land where most people who could afford to do so had a chart cast for the moment of their children’s birth which was called nemindithib, a horoscope.

  ‘That is nothing to joke about,’ Fidelma replied sharply.

  Eadulf sat back and gazed thoughtfully at her.

  ‘Who said I was joking?’ he countered. ‘Your astrologers claim to be able to answer all manner of questions and even find people, don’t they?’

  Fidelma rose abruptly, her mouth a thin disapproving line.

  ‘I am going to join Conchobar for a game of brandubh!’

  There was almost a flounce in her gait as she left the room and slammed the door shut behind her.

  Eadulf sniffed in irritation and stretched in his seat, gazing at the closed door for a moment or two. Everything he said seemed to upset Fidelma. Yet he had been half serious in his suggestion, because he knew that Fidelma was not one to dismiss the ancient beliefs and customs of her people. Old Conchobar himself had often told him that Fidelma had shown a talent for casting star charts and several times her knowledge had come in handy to solve a particularly puzzling mystery. So he was not exactly being sarcastic when he suggested that the answer to Alchú’s kidnapping might be found in some astrological map of the heavens.

  He finished his meal slowly and rose reluctantly, wondering how he should occupy his day. He already felt guilty at wasting time reading when he should have been thinking about how to investigate further. He went to the window and stared out across the grey walls of the palace complex. The late autumnal day was bright. There did not seem to be a cloud in the clear blue of the sky and yet the weather was not unduly cold. At this time or year when the sky was clear, it usually meant the day was cold and frost would lie on the ground. Clouds often meant the day would not be so cold even though they might bring rain.

  His view from the window gave access to the south where the forest stretched from the far side of the township down towards the distant River Suir.

  It was then that the notion struck him. It would probably result in hearing the same information but to pursue the idea would be better than just sitting around doing nothing.