Writ in Stone

by Cora Harrison

  ‘That can’t be all. You recognized me, didn’t you? I kept thinking that, sooner or later, you must recognize me.’

  ‘No,’ said Mara with weary honesty. ‘I did not recognize you. You are very changed.’

  He picked up the candle, holding it closely against his face, moving it around.

  ‘Look at me now, there must be something of the old Dualta, the man you married twenty-two years ago.’ There was a pleading note in the rough, hoarse voice.

  Mara looked at him compassionately. He was only three years older than herself, but life had not been good to him. She looked at the white hair, the heavy drooping white moustache, the deeply scored wrinkles, the stooping figure. She shook her head wordlessly. Even his voice was completely changed, she thought. Years of breathing in stone dust, years of tramping through bad weather, sleeping in wet clothes, years of steady drinking had altered him completely.

  ‘Don’t look at me like that.’ Now the husky voice was charged with passion. He had always had that streak of a bully in him. ‘I’m as good as you any day, better. Just because I did not spend my time chanting all those silly laws and Fithail . . . I was sick of Fithail being rammed down our throats every day. I had far more brains than you ever had but you thought yourself to be something special. Your father worshipped you. He neglected the other scholars just so that he could boast about his brilliant daughter. He never wanted you to marry me, of course. I wasn’t good enough for the wonderful Mara. You ruined my life between you: you and your father. I think about it every day and every night. I know what I could have been if I had never met you.’

  He sounded sincere, but he had always been someone who could be convinced by the sound of his own words. For a moment she felt sorry for him, but then her eyes went to the still-gaping hole above their heads and returned to his face.

  ‘Don’t live in the past, Dualta; you have made yourself another life,’ she said quietly, but he ignored this and hurried on.

  ‘When I fixed that bell there and when I imagined it falling on you I suddenly felt free. I knew that if you were killed I would no longer have you looking over my shoulder, always telling me not to drink so much, to do this and to do that. While you lived I could never get the sound of your accursed voice out of my mind. And then you didn’t come to church and now it is to do again. Unless . . .’ He paused and looked closely at her. He took a long drink from his flask of brócoit and then upended the flask and watched the last few drops drip on the flagged floor before replacing it in his pouch. When he spoke again, Mara recognized that he was now quite drunk.

  ‘Perhaps we could get together again?’ he said flippantly. ‘You owe me that, surely. Why should you go off with another man? The abbot here would tell you that it is a sin. You cannot have another husband; I’m your husband so I should save you from that sin.’

  There was no mistaking his meaning and suddenly Mara was filled with conviction that she had made a bad mistake. She should have interviewed him in the presence of others, should have kept everything on a professional basis. This was an unhappy, disappointed man trying to hurt in every way possible, and more worrying, perhaps, trying to resurrect the past.

  ‘Dualta,’ she said quickly. ‘There is nothing left of any feeling that prompted that marriage twenty-two years ago. However, for the sake of the bond that was once between us I will give you the silver to pay the fine. You can go back to Galway once judgement day is over. The affairs of the kingdom of the Burren will be of little interest to any there. Your life will not have changed, but the law must be upheld.’

  ‘The law,’ he sneered. ‘That’s all that matters to you, isn’t it? That’s all that ever mattered to you. You wrecked our marriage, left our daughter without a father, and all so that you could be Brehon and ollamh of the law school; all so that you could take your father’s place.’

  She made no reply. Was it true? She swept the accusation aside. She had done what had seemed to be right at the time. The past was over and could not be undone. Dualta had made his own future and so had she. She had cared for Sorcha as best she could and her daughter had grown up happy and secure. The presence of a father such as this man before her was unlikely to have added much to that security. She brushed aside these speculations. She now had a duty to perform; she was the king’s representative; she would have to summon him to appear before the king and the people of the Burren and if he refused, to serve the writ of the law upon him.

  ‘Dualta,’ Mara said quietly and calmly, ‘I have now solved this crime, so I shall have to lay my findings before the king, hear the case at Poulnabrone and allocate the compensation.’

  She got to her feet. How long had elapsed during this conversation? she wondered. Nothing more needed to be said about the past. The future was what concerned her now. Willing or unwilling, Dualta had to admit his crime at Poulnabrone and the fine had to be paid. She glanced towards the west door. Soon the king, members of his family, the abbot, monks, lay brothers, guests and servants would all come streaming through it. She still hoped to bring Dualta to a reasonable frame of mind before they arrived.

  ‘Our lives have parted and they can never come together again.’ She said the words resolutely and without warmth. First she had to convince him to abandon all dreams of a future by her side. Then she could talk about his future. She had silver in plenty. Her years as Brehon of the Burren had brought her wealth. Her law school was popular, the fees had accumulated and Cumhal managed the farm so well that there was always a profit. She would give Dualta what he needed to set himself up in Galway, she decided. Once the trial at Poulnabrone was over and he had admitted his guilt and the fine had been paid then she would make him the offer. He would no longer need to be a jobbing mason, travelling the countryside, but could have his own shop and perhaps some pupils to train in the prosperous city of Galway.

  ‘We are two very different people now from the boy and girl of twenty years ago,’ she added firmly.

  She watched him keenly and saw the realization of the position come into his eyes. After a minute, he nodded indifferently.

  ‘I’ll go, now,’ he said, and she recognized that his voice was devoid of hope. ‘Don’t worry; I’ll get out easily, no matter how many instructions you have issued. I tested it myself a few hours ago. I just told the porter that I needed a stone from outside the gate and he handed the key into my own hand. I locked the gate behind me when I came back in and pretended to put the key back on the peg, but here it is now.’ From his pouch he produced a large key.

  ‘And why didn’t you go then?’ Perhaps that would have been best, she thought, though recognizing the feeling as a weakness.

  He gave a short laugh. ‘Why not, indeed? There speaks a lady who has plenty of money. I wanted to finish the work and get my payment for it. I can’t live through the winter in Galway without that. Anyway, by then I was sure that you did not recognize me and without recognizing me what would be the motive for the crime? However, you were cleverer than I thought, so now I will go.’

  ‘No,’ she said firmly. ‘Not without admitting the crime in public.’

  ‘Perhaps I’ll take you with me,’ he said. He pulled out another flask of brócoit from his pouch, emptied it in one long swallow and then replaced it. ‘You would have come willingly at one time.’

  She ignored that. She would say no more about giving him money, she decided. He was obviously a very heavy drinker; there might well be no saving of him. ‘If you are not prepared to acknowledge your crime,’ she continued, ‘then I shall order that you be bound and guarded until the case can be tried. I will find a lawyer to speak for you if you wish, but I can assure you that my evidence will convict you.’

  ‘You were always hard,’ he said, looking at her gloomily.

  ‘Three years with you meant that I had to harden, or else break.’ She flashed the words out like the thrust of a dagger, breaking her own resolution not to talk about the past.

  It should not have been said; she knew that as soo
n as she had uttered the words. His face darkened and changed.

  And yet all might still have been well if the west door had not opened suddenly, young, confident feet strode up the church and then Shane’s voice, high and light:

  ‘Brehon, the abbot has sent me to tell you that we are on our way.’

  Close on his heels were a couple of young monks, one of whom, with a taper in his hand, proceeded to go from candlestick to candlestick filling the church with light. They passed the three figures at the top of the nave and the brilliance of the lights that they carried blinded Mara for a moment.

  As soon as they lit the candles in the chancel, Dualta blew out his own candle. The strong, burning-flesh smell of the tallow floated beneath Mara’s nostrils. Now she could no longer see him properly, but he stood very close to her and very close to Shane. And then came the sound of voices and the noise of footsteps coming across in through the west door, walking to their places in the nave. And then more footsteps, tramping in disciplined silence, of the monks entering the church behind the abbot.

  At that moment Dualta acted.

  Swiftly he took a step forward and seized Shane, dragging him away from Mara and up the steps towards the altar. All candles had now been lit there and their light illuminated the scene. At the same moment as Shane screamed, Mara saw the dagger at his throat.

  ‘Keep away, everyone, keep away from me.’ Dualta’s hoarse, rough voice rasped through the church and a stunned silence fell instantly.

  ‘What is the meaning of this?’ The abbot spoke carefully and quietly; the menace to the boy’s life was obvious. Mara glanced at Conall and Fergal; each had a dagger in his hand. Teige O’Brien was fumbling for his, while Ardal O’Lochlainn moved slowly, but softly, towards the north transept.

  ‘The meaning of this is that I have accused this man, Dualta, the mason, of the murder of Mahon O’Brien.’ Mara made her voice as loud as she could. She heard it ring from the arches and hoped that it could cover the small, soft movements that Ardal was making. Deliberately she moved to the opposite side of the church, near to the door leading out on to the cloisters. Let all attention be focused on her, she prayed, and let Ardal approach the altar without being seen.

  ‘This man,’ she repeated, ‘this man, Dualta, the mason, was my husband once. I divorced him nineteen years ago. Yesterday, in a fit of insanity, he planned to murder the king, rather than to allow me to marry again.’

  A murmur arose in the church and Mara heard the soft noise with pleasure, even the brothers were turning one to the other. Let Dualta be occupied in looking across at her, in listening to her words, let him not look towards Ardal.

  ‘As we all know now, Mahon O’Brien took the king’s place in the church. One hooded man, of the same size and build, looks like another,’ she went on, spacing her words to allow the echo to return its response. Ardal had now reached the scalloped archway leading to the small north transept chapel.

  ‘He went into the church,’ she continued. She was accustomed to holding attention by her voice, but it was a long time since she had tried so consciously to use every trick of oratory. She raised her voice dramatically, ‘He lifted the hammer, his own mason’s hammer; he swung it and then battered in the head of the man who was kneeling in prayer. It was a violent and hate-filled attack,’ she finished. Now Ardal had one foot on the stone flags of the chancel.

  ‘I call on Dualta, the mason, to answer this case,’ she said loudly. Surely he would say something now. For twelve years he had been part of Cahermacnaghten Law School. This procedure must be imbedded in his mind.

  There was a quick exclamation from Shane, which tore at her heart. He would never cry out unless he was hurt. He was a courageous, strong-willed child. Dualta must have pressed the knife a little further into his throat.

  ‘What do you say, Dualta the mason, are you guilty or not guilty?’ she called out quickly and loudly. These words should have been saved for judgement day at Poulnabrone, but she did not care that she was going outside the legal procedure. Patrick now had started to move. She could understand that; he was, after all, the father, but he was heavily built, elderly and unfit; it would be best to leave it to Ardal.

  And then everything went wrong. Dualta suddenly swung around. He had caught the movement from Patrick and had then seen Ardal.

  ‘Stay still,’ he roared. ‘Stay still, everyone, or this boy will be killed here on the altar. Get back!’ he signalled frantically to Ardal. ‘Get back, get back into the nave.’

  Ardal moved back instantly. A man who had worked all of his life with highly strung thoroughbred horses, he recognized the dangerous note of hysteria in Dualta’s voice. Patrick became quite immobilized, like a marble saint standing with his back against one of the stone columns.

  ‘Lock the west door, Father Abbot,’ shouted Dualta. His voice rose to a hoarse scream. ‘Lock it, I say. Lock it immediately. Yes, that’s right. Don’t stop. Go straight down. Lock it. Let me hear the noise of the key turning.’

  The abbot hesitated for a moment and then strode down the centre of the nave and locked the door, the click sounding very loud in a silence where people almost forbore to breathe. He returned up the centre of the church and approached the altar.

  ‘Stop there,’ shouted Dualta. ‘Don’t come any nearer. Stay where you are. That’s right. No one else move.’ Like a maddened bull, he swung around from the right side to left. No one moved.

  ‘Dualta,’ said Mara calmly, her voice high and steady. ‘Remember what I said to you. For the sake of that marriage that once existed I will take your debt upon me. You have nothing to fear.’

  ‘Throw the church keys up here on the altar, Father Abbot,’ shouted Dualta. ‘I am going now by the cloister door and I will lock you in. I don’t want any pursuers.’

  ‘I shall not give you the keys,’ said the abbot, his voice steady and low.

  Dualta ignored this. ‘I’ll leave the keys somewhere outside the gate. Sooner or later someone will release you. But I am taking the boy with me. He’ll be my safeguard, I may leave him, also, somewhere, or I may cut his throat on the way. I don’t know.’

  From the corner of her eye, Mara knew that Ardal, once again, was braced and ready. Cumhal had begun to steal softly from the back of the church and was directing his noiseless route towards the cloisters’ door. Turlough had his dagger out and the bodyguards had moved a silent step forward. There was no way that Dualta could leave the church unscathed. But what about Shane? No one wanted to put his life in danger.

  ‘Throw the keys,’ suddenly screamed Dualta with a hasty glance around. ‘Throw the keys now. No more talking, no more waiting.’

  ‘Give him the keys, Father Abbot,’ said Mara in a loud clear voice. Anything to keep the talking going, she thought! Surely the man had enough wit to throw them awkwardly, to make Dualta shift, bend down, move that deadly dagger from Shane’s neck. She turned to look at the priest and her heart sank. His face was set in obstinate lines and his grey eyes were ice-cold.

  ‘No,’ he said loudly. ‘No, I will do nothing to allow this man to escape. This man has murdered my brother. This man must hang.’

  ‘I will kill the boy.’ Dualta’s voice was hoarse, but everyone in the church heard the words and there was a low murmur and a restless stirring of feet.

  ‘Keep still!’ The scream was so loud that the sound echoed through the stone church. Instantly the church was as silent as if it were empty of all but the graven saints.

  ‘I tell you once again,’ Dualta’s voice was all the more sinister for the low tone in which he now spoke. He stopped and then started again. ‘I tell you that I must leave this church now. I will take a horse from the stable and I will never be seen in the Burren again. Now I give you one last chance. Throw those keys to me, or I shall come and get them from you, but before that I will leave another dead body in this church.’

  ‘No,’ said the abbot. ‘You will not escape. You are one man against many.’ Quickly he went over toward
s the cloisters’ door and locked it rapidly. ‘Put down that knife and let that child go.’

  ‘Give him the keys, Father Abbot,’ said Mara urgently. ‘Stand back from the door, everyone.’

  ‘No,’ said the abbot. ‘I will not allow the man who killed my brother to escape. Brehon law holds no sway here; this case must be judged by Roman law and the culprit punished according to its rules.’ Deliberately he reached up to the full extent of his very tall figure and placed the keys on top of the fluted column, where they rested on the frieze of poppy heads.

  ‘Now you have left me no way out; now the boy will die,’ said Dualta. His voice was deep and resolute. With his left hand he grabbed the heavy glib of black hair that overhung Shane’s brow and bent the child’s head back so that his skull rested on the altar and his white throat was exposed to the knife.

  Eighteen

  Senchas Már

  (The Great Tradition)

  A king may make a treaty with another kingdom. If a crime such as murder, wounding, theft, rape or satire is committed by a member of this other kingdom then restitution will be paid.

  The nave of the church was almost in darkness. It was only a couple of hours past noon, but it was a dark day and very little light entered the church, just one pale gleam slanting in through one tall, narrow window at the end of the south aisle. The chancel, however, with its rows of candles, was now brightly lit and all eyes were focused on the altar with the two figures in front of it: the man with the knife and the boy with the dangerously exposed throat. There were nearly sixty people in that church and yet the silence was intense. No one moved, no one spoke; hardly a breath disturbed the air.

  There had been no noise, nothing to alarm: no creak of a door, no whisper of wood sliding on wood, no rippling of string.