A MASS FOR THE DEAD (5 page)

“And Columbanus?”

“He would not be hurting Crispinus. Never.” It was the first time I had heard her say my father’s name, and I wondered at the sureness in her voice.

“How do you know that, Sheena?”

“He is a man of God,” she said flatly.

“And so was my father, and your lover, a man of God, Sheena,” I said, angry now. “And did that keep him from giving you that bruise on your cheek? Did he treat you with honor, Sheena? And did he treat my mother with honor, for all that he was a man of God?”

She looked at me, and sighed, a long, tired, cold sigh into the wind, a sigh that cut to the bone.

“It’s little enough you know of it all, Muirteach, and little enough you know of your father, for all that.”

“I know more than enough of him,” I replied. “But I do not know who killed him.”

She picked up the
mether
with her free hand, settling the child against her hip again. “Mayhap I will go to the burial mass. Surely they will not begrudge me that. When is it to be?”

“Friday. They are wanting the time for the great Lords to arrive.”

“Friday is it then,” she mused. “Well then, we shall see.” And with that she turned and went back inside, leaving me sitting in the wind.

* * * * *

In the end, I took Sheena’s advice and stopped at her brothers’ cottage. It was not too far from her own, close to Balerominmore and the beach at Rubha Dubh. Cows had wandered from the byre and munched on the thatching of the roof. The midden heap looked fair overflowing, and, nearby, some dogs fought over a scrap of something. The place showed none of the marks of good order or husbandry that a well-run holding would show. Angus and Alasdair were bachelors, and I felt right at home.

I approached the door, raised the door-flap, and stuck my head inside. All seemed quiet enough. As my eyes adjusted to the dark I began to see the details—the hearth fire out, the ashes cold, I found, when I went to check. Angus and Alasdair were nowhere to be seen.

“Angus! Alasdair!”

Of course they did not answer. Either they had not returned home after visiting Sheena, or they had left again. As I emerged, blinking at the daylight, I heard a noise and got a glimpse of what the dogs were fighting for—a foreleg of a deer. One of the hounds had the hoof in his mouth, and the other, a young puppy, circled, whining, waiting his chance to try and grab it from the larger dog. Or perhaps he just waited for the leavings.

So it seemed Angus and Alasdair had returned home, and left again—to Scalasaig? I was nothing loathe to look for them there, as I felt more than ready to return home myself, and thought longingly of the fire I could build and what I could drink once I returned home. So I hiked the few miles back to Scalasaig, as the winds blew away all the fine weather and a wet drizzle set in.

I found Angus and Alasdair at the tavern. It was not a tavern such as you would find in large cities, that I know now, but the wife of Donald Dubh was a fine alewife, and people often gathered there to drink the stuff, and leave some coins in return. As his store of coins had grown, Donald had started to buy claret, and distill
uisgebeatha
as well, and so Scalasaig had its own tavern, for all that it was little more than a hut. And inside it, sitting close to the turf fire and already far-gone with drink, I found Angus and Alasdair.

Of course, the talk today was much of the murdered Prior, but the clamor of voices ceased when I walked in the door. I found a seat on a stool by the fire, and asked for some whiskey. Donald’s wife brought a wooden
quaich
quickly enough, and I settled back to drink it, enjoying the bite of it on my tongue. After a few sips I spoke to Angus and Alasdair, who were sitting not far from me.

“I was by your house,” I said to them, “and saw your dogs are gnawing away at a fine deer leg. Is that the deer you were lifting from Jura?”

Alasdair looked at me for a moment, then cursed. “I told you to tie that leg up,” he said to his brother. “And now himself here is telling us that the dogs have got it after all.” He then finished glaring at his brother, who made some reply, and turned to glare at me, instead, his broad face and red hair glinting by the fire light. “And so you were visiting us, Muirteach? What was it you were wanting? And how were you finding out about the deer?”

“Easy enough to see,” I said, not answering the first question, “with the hide drying on the roof and the dogs gnawing at the hoof there. But your sister was speaking of it, as well.”

“You went to see Sheena?” asked Angus.

Well, Angus had good enough reason to be surprised, for I had never been on good terms with his sister, although my father had taken her as mistress long after my own mother had died. Still, I had resented her, as I resented everyone who thought well of my father. Although after seeing the bruise on her cheek, I wondered now how well she had thought of him.

“So how long was it taking you to hunt that fine stag?” I asked, changing the subject.

Both men were happy to talk of that, and they insisted that they had indeed been on Jura, tracking and hunting the deer, at the time when my father had been murdered two nights ago. And from the look of the carcass at their house I had to think they were perhaps not lying.

But deer can be found on Colonsay as well, and how long does it take to shoot one with a lucky arrow?

“That was a nasty bruise your sister had on the one cheek,” I said, after a bit. “However was she getting it?”

Alasdair shrugged his shoulders, and Angus answered. “Och, perhaps himself was hitting her again. He’ll no be hitting her the now, at least.”

“He hit her often then?” I did not remember my father hitting my mother, but then she had died when I was young, and my father had not come to Islay all that often.

“Often enough, although she would deny it. A black heart he had, for all that he was a man of God.”

The close air in the blackhouse suddenly stifled me. I drained my cup, stood up abruptly, and went out into the rainy afternoon without another word.

Chapter 4

T
hinking of the bruise on Sheena’s cheek and what her brothers had told me put me in mind of the Beatons. They were physicians, after all, and so instead of heading towards my own fine house in Scalasaig I turned my steps up the hill towards Dun Evin. The rain let up as I climbed, but left the track up to the dun wet and slippery. I was breathing hard when I reached the top, and, my leg aching, turned for a moment before entering the walls to look out on the landscape.

Although with the low clouds the view was not so fine as you could be seeing on other days, I could still see to the east the Paps of Jura and the bulk of Islay some miles away across the water. It was not difficult to understand why the old chiefs had chosen this site for their home, as easily defensible as it was.

A pair of Uncle Gillespic’s
luchd-tighe
lounged against the stone and wooden defenses, which surrounded the Dun, and just then the sun peeked out through the clouds, sending glints reflecting off of their shields and great swords that leaned against the stones of the fortress wall.

“So it is Muirteach, is it?” commented Fergus Mor, with a bit of a smile. I had known him since my childhood days there, in my uncle’s hall. Fergus it was who had helped me take my first red deer in the hunt. “And how was it at Donald Dubh’s this afternoon?” he asked.

I grinned a little sheepishly, for him having guessed so quickly how I had spent the afternoon, but only replied, “Fine enough.”

“We were hearing about the Prior,” interjected the other guard, curiosity evident in his voice. He must, of course, have heard of my mission to Islay.

“Aye,” said Fergus. “I am that sorry for you Muirteach. The man was your father.”

The words were kindly meant, and brought an unexpected lump to my throat. As I thanked Fergus, I noted how gray streaks now mixed with the chestnut in his beard, and felt suddenly old myself, for all that I was only three and twenty.

Once inside the Dun I headed towards the great hall, a rectangular building against the south wall. I blinked as I entered, my eyes adjusting to the dark interior and my nose smelling the acrid odor of the peat fire. After a moment I was able to see Uncle Gillespic, and my aunt Euluasaid sitting at the large table, along with Fearchar Beaton and his daughter.

“Och, Muirteach,” my uncle greeted me, “it is yourself. And so His Lordship himself was wanting you to be finding the killer.” He beamed. “It is just as I was thinking he would do, and a fine thing indeed it will be to see you bring that black-hearted murderer to justice.”

I settled down on a bench, not thinking it such a fine thing as my uncle did. My aunt embraced me warmly, and insisted, as I had hoped she would, that I sit down and eat with them. I watched her put more food on the table: good cheese, bannocks, butter, some venison, fresh milk and honey.

The harper who had come with us from Islay to Colonsay sat closer to the hearth, playing a tune. I would have liked to hear the song about the taking of Castle Sween, but the harper had chosen something less martial and more mournful to play this evening, perhaps in deference to my father’s death.

I closed my eyes a moment, listening to the familiar bustle, the hum of her voice, and the sad, lilting notes of the harp, wishing myself back a boy again, at home here with my uncle and aunt, with no murders to solve or dead fathers to avenge.

“Och, Muirteach,” laughed my aunt Euluasaid, as I opened my eyes and she handed me a bannock, “and are you as tired as all that? You will be spoiling those good looks of yours if you are not resting a bit.”

For some reason I could not understand, my aunt believed me to be handsome, and often teased me on it. But I did realize, as I ate the bannock she had given me, that I was exhausted. The climb had wearied my leg, I’d had too much drink at Donald Dubh’s, and the last two days had been far from easy. I pushed the image of my father’s body away, however, and smiled at her a little as I ate.

“Are you not thinking, Mariota, that he is well-favored, with that dark hair, and those gray eyes of his? Especially when he is smiling?” she continued. “He has a smile that could be charming the angels, does Muirteach, but we see it too seldom.” Well and truly embarrassed now, I was grateful that Mariota did not respond, and I prayed she had not heard my aunt, above the general noise in the hall.

“Now, Mariota,” my aunt asked a moment or two later, “what would you be using for teething?” My newest cousin was proving somewhat colicky, and none of my aunt’s remedies so far had worked to help the bairn.

I listened idly to Mariota describing to my aunt a concoction of
uisgebeatha
, fennel, and milk until Gillespic interrupted my thoughts.

“You went to Sheena’s?” he asked.

“Aye.”

“And?”

“She claimed to know nothing, but she had a fresh big bruise on her cheek. Angus and Alasdair claim they were away at Jura, and have a deer to prove it.”

“Deer run on Colonsay,” said my uncle. “Wasn’t it Fergus who saw a large stag and some other deer just up north of the Bay last week?”

“They say Rhodri and Malcolm were with them,” I continued, “but Rhodri and Malcolm are gone now, to Barra, for word came that Rhodri’s great-uncle was taken ill there, and they left this morning. Myself, I do not see how they could have been doing it, if Rhodri and Malcolm were with them, for I am thinking they have no reason to be killing the Prior whatever,” I concluded.

“A great pity that is,” said Gillespic, and I looked at him, wondering what he meant by that—a pity that Angus and Alasdair might not be our killers, or a pity Rhodri and Malcolm had no reason to murder my father.

“Still, there is the bruise on her cheek you said,” added the Beaton, who had been listening intently. “Is Sheena a big woman?”

“Tall enough.”

“Tall and strong enough to kill?

I did not think so. And whyever would she do so now, at any rate, for my father had been beating her, it seemed, as long as he had known her. I said as much to my uncle and the Beaton. The meal ended, the harper stopped his music, and began to eat the food my aunt brought to him while the Beaton, Gillespic, Mariota and I went outside the Hall, into the courtyard.

“Perhaps I had best be paying a visit to this Sheena,” said Mariota abruptly. I had thought she had not heard my conversation with her father and my uncle, but apparently the discussion of cures for the colic had not prevented her from hearing that, at least.

“Whyever for?” I asked.

“Are you not wanting to know how she got the bruises?”

“Aye.”

“And she was not telling you, was she? But she might tell another woman, and a healer at that.”

“Were you not going back to Islay?” I said, starting to argue, but her father interrupted.

“Muirteach, His Lordship himself was wanting me to help you a bit. And though I have inspected your father’s body, we were not going to be leaving for yet another day or so; your aunt is aye worried about her youngest, although for myself I do not think she need be. But there may well be some others here who would like to see a physician.”

I nodded.

“You should know,” he added, “that Mariota herself is a fine healer. And she is good with the speaking, and with the listening. She might be having some luck talking with the woman. And what would be making better sense than that you would be sending her to check on Sheena’s bruising.”

“She’s had bruises before,” I said, churlishly, “and none to check on them.”

“Aye, and the more pity that, then,” replied Mariota tartly.

“I am thinking it is not such a bad idea, Muirteach,” put in my uncle. “Fine I am knowing that women have their own ways when it comes to the speaking. Your dear aunt was teaching me that when first we were wed. Perhaps Sheena would talk more to a woman. Although Sheena has never been much of one for words,” he added.

We moved out of the way of some chickens rooting in the courtyard, as the last of the sunset faded away in the west, and I considered. My next step, I had decided, for lack of any other ideas, must be to go to the Priory. But if Mariota did visit Sheena, and was able to find out more information about why my father had beaten her, well, that could only be of help. Grudgingly, I was forced to admit as much.