Hemlock At Vespers (32 page)

“Why were you not on guard outside the chamber of Wulfstan last night?”

“It was not the custom. Once Wulfstan had secured himself inside, he was well guarded. You have seen the chamber he asked Abbot Laisran to devise for him. Once he was locked inside, there was, apparently, no danger to him. I slept in the next chamber and at his call should he need help.”

“But he did not call?”

“His killer slashed his throat with his first blow. That much was obvious from his body.”

“It becomes obvious that he willingly let the killer into his chamber. Therefore, he knew the killer and trusted him.”

Raedwald’s eyes narrowed.

Fidelma continued.

“Tell me, the messenger who arrived from your country yesterday, what message did he bring Wulfstan?”

Raedwald shook his head.

“That message was for Wulfstan only.”

“Is the messenger still here?”

“Yes.”

“Then I would question him.”

“You may question but he will not answer you.” Raedwald smiled grimly.

Sister Fidelma compressed her lips in annoyance.

“Another Saxon custom? Not even your messengers will speak with women?”

“Another Saxon custom, yes. But this is a custom of kings. The royal messenger has his tongue cut out so that he can never verbally betray the message that he carries from kings and princes to those who might be their enemies.”

Abbot Laisran gestured to those he had summoned to his study chamber, at Sister Fidelma’s request, to be seated. They had entered the room with expressions either of curiosity or defiance, according to their different personalities, as they saw Sister Fidelma standing before the high-manteled hearth. She seemed absorbed in her own thoughts as she stood, hands folded demurely before her, not apparently noticing them as they seated themselves around. Brother Ultan, as steward of the community, took his stand before the door with hands folded into his habit.

Abbot Laisran gave Fidelma an anxious glance and then he, too, took his seat.

“Why are we here?” demanded Talorgen abruptly.

Fidelma raised her head to return his gaze.

“You are here to learn how Wulfstan died and by whose hand,” she replied sharply.

There was a brief pause before Eadred turned to her with a sneer.

“We already know how my kinsman Wulfstan died, woman. He died by the sorcery of a barbarian. Who that barbarian is, it is not hard to deduce. It was one of the
welisc
savages, Talorgen.”

Talorgen was on his feet, fists clenched.

“Repeat your charges outside the walls of this abbey and I will meet your steel with mine, Saxon cur!”

Dagobert came to his feet to intervene as Eadred launched forward from his chair toward Talorgen.

“Stop this!” The usually genial features of Laisran were dark with anger. His voice cut the air like a lash.

The students of the ecclesiastical school of Durrow seemed to freeze at the sound. Then Eadred relaxed and dropped back in his seat with a smile that was more a sneer than amusement. Dagobert tugged at Talorgen’s arm and the prince of Rheged sighed and reseated himself, as did the Frankish prince.

Abbot Laisran growled like an angry bear.

“Sister Fidelma is an official of the Brehon Court of Éireann. Whatever the customs in your own lands, in this land she has supreme authority in conducting this investigation and the full backing of the law of this kingdom. Do I make myself clear?”

There was a silence.

“I shall continue,” said Fidelma quietly. “Yet what Eadred says is partially true.”

Eadred stared at her with bewilderment clouding his eyes.

“Oh yes,” smiled Fidelma.
“One
of you at least knows how Wulfstan died and who is responsible.”

She paused to let her words sink in.

“Let me first tell you how he died.”

“He was stabbed to death in his bed,” Finan, the dark-faced professor of law, pointed out.

“That is true,” agreed Sister Fidelma, “but without the aid of sorcery.”

“How else did the assassin enter a locked room and leave it, still locked from the inside?” demanded Eadred. “How else but sorcery?”

“The killer wanted us to think that it was sorcery. Indeed, the killer prepared an elaborate plan to confuse us and lay the blame away from him. In fact, so elaborate was the plan that it had several layers. One layer was merely to confuse and frighten us by causing us to think the murder was done by a supernatural agency; another was to indicate an obvious suspect, while a third object was to implicate another person.”

“Well,” Laisran sighed, “at the moment I have yet to see through the first layer.”

Sister Fidelma smiled briefly at the rotund Abbot.

“I will leave that to later. Let us firstly consider the method of the killing.”

She had their complete attention now.

“The assassin entered the room by the door. In fact, Wulfstan let his assassin into the bedchamber himself.”

There was an intake of breath from Dagobert.

Unperturbed, she continued.

“Wulfstan knew his killer. Indeed, he had no suspicions, no fear of this man.”

Abbot Laisran regarded her with open-mouthed astonishment.

“Wulfstan let the killer in,” she continued. “The assassin struck. He killed Wulfstan and left his body on the bed. It was an act of swiftness. To spread suspicion, the killer wiped his knife on a linen kerchief which he mistakenly thought belonged to Talorgen, prince of Rheged. As I said, if we managed to see beyond the charade of sorcery, then the assassin sought to put the blame for the murder on Talorgen. He failed to realize that the kerchief was borrowed two days ago from Dagobert. He did not realize that the kerchief prominently carried Dagobert’s motto on it. It was a Latin motto which exhorts ‘Beware what you say!’ ”

She paused to let them digest this information.

“How then did the killer now leave the bedchamber and manage to bar the door from the inside?” asked Dagobert.

“The bedchamber door was barred with two wooden bars. They were usually placed on iron rests which are attached to the frame of the door. When I examined the first wooden bar I observed that at either end there were two pieces of twine wrapped around it as if to protect the wood when it is placed in the iron rests. Yet on the second wooden bar, the curiosity was that the twine had two lengths of four feet still loose. Each end of the twine had been frayed and charred.”

She grimaced and repeated herself.

“A curiosity. Then I noticed that there was a rail at the top of the door on which a heavy woollen curtain could be drawn across the door when closed in order to prevent a draught. It was, of course, impossible to see whether the curtain had been drawn or not once the room was broken into, for the inward movement of the door would have swept the curtain aside on its rail.”

Eadred made a gesture of impatience.

“Where is this explanation leading?”

“Patience, and I will tell you. I spotted two small spots of grease on the ground on either side of the door. As I bent to examine these spots of grease I saw two nails fixed into the wood about three inches from the ground. There were two short pieces of twine still tied on these nails and the ends were frayed and blackened. It was then I realized just how the assassin had left the room and left one of the bars in place.”

“One?” demanded Abbot Laisran, leaning forward on his seat, his face eager.

Fidelma nodded.

“Only one was really needed to secure the door from the inside. The first bar, that at three feet from the bottom of the door, had not been set in place. There were no marks on the bar and its twine protection was intact, nor had the iron rests been wrenched away from the doorjamb when Ultan forced the door. Therefore, the conclusion was that this bar was not in place. Only the second bar, that which rested across the top of the door, about two feet from the top, had been in place.”

“Go on,” instructed Laisran when she paused again.

“Having killed Wulfstan, the assassin was already prepared. He undid the twine on both ends of the wooden bar and threaded it around the wooden curtain rail across the top of the door. He set in place—or had already placed during the day, when the chamber was open—two nails. Then he raised the wooden bar to the level of the curtain rail. He secured it there by tying the ends of the twine to the nails at ground level. This construction allowed him to leave the room.”

Laisran gestured with impatience.

“Yes, but how could he have manipulated the twine to lower the bar in place?”

“Simply. He took two reed candles and as he went to leave, he placed a candle under either piece of the string near the ground. He took a piece of paper and lit it from his tinder box—I found the ashes of the paper on the floor of the chamber, where he had to drop it. He lit the two reed candles, on either side of the door under the twine. Then he left quickly. The twine eventually burned through, releasing the bar, which dropped neatly into place in the iron rests. It had, remember, only two feet to drop. The candles continued to burn until they became mere spots of grease, almost unnoticeable, except I slipped on one. But the result was that we were left with a mystery. A room locked on the inside with a corpse. Sorcery? No. Planning by a devious mind.”

“So what happened then?” Talorgen encouraged, breaking the spellbound silence.

“The assassin left the room, as I have described. He wanted to create this illusion of mystery because the person he wished to implicate was one he felt his countrymen would believe to be a barbaric sorcerer. As I indicated, he wished to place suspicion on you, Talorgen. He left the room and talked to someone outside Wulfstan’s bedchamber for a while. Then they heard the bar drop into place and that was the assassin’s alibi, because it was clear that they had heard Wulfstan, still alive, slide the bar to lock his chamber door.”

Raedwald was frowning as it seemed he struggled to follow her reasoning.

“You have given an excellent reconstruction,” he said slowly. “But it is only a hypothesis. It remains only a hypothesis unless you name the assassin and his motive.”

Sister Fidelma smiled softly.

“Very well. I was, of course, coming to that.”

She turned and let her gaze pass over their upraised faces as they watched her. Then she let her gaze rest on the haughty features of the thane of Andredswald.

Eadred interpreted her gaze as accusation and was on his feet before she had said a word, his face scowling in anger.

Ultan, the steward, moved swiftly across the room to stand before Sister Fidelma, in anticipation lest Eadred let his emotions, which were clearly visible on his angry features, overcome him.

“You haven’t told us the motive,” Dagobert the Frank said softly. “Why would the thane of Andredswald murder his own cousin and prince?”

Sister Fidelma continued to stare at the arrogant Saxon.

“I have not yet said that the thane of Andredswald is the assassin,” she said softly. “But as for motive, the motive is the very laws of the Saxon society, which, thanks be to God, are not our laws.”

Abbot Laisran was frowning.

“Explain, Fidelma. I do not understand.”

“A Saxon prince succeeds to the kingship by primogeniture. The eldest son inherits.”

Dagobert nodded impatiently. “That is also so with our Frankish succession. But how does this provide the motive for Wulfstan’s murder?”

“Two days ago a messenger from the kingdom of the South Saxons arrived here. His message was for Wulfstan. I discovered what his message was.”

“How?” demanded Raedwald. “Royal messengers have their tongues cut out to prevent them revealing such secrets.”

Fidelma grinned.

“So you told me. Fortunately this poor man was taught to write by Diciul, the missionary of Éireann who brought Christianity and learning to your country of the South Saxons.”

“What was the message?” asked Laisran.

“Wulfstan’s father had died, another victim of the yellow plague. Wulfstan was now king of the South Saxons and urged to return home at once.”

She glanced at Raedwald.

The big Saxon nodded silently in agreement.

“You admitted that much to me when I questioned you, Raedwald,” went on Fidelma. “When I asked you if you liked Wulfstan you answered that it was not up to you to like or dislike your appointed king. A slip of the tongue, but it alerted me to the possible motive.”

Raedwald said nothing.

“In such a barbaric system of succession, where the order of birth is the only criterion for claiming an inheritance or kingdom, there are no safeguards. In Éireann, as among our cousins in Britain, a chieftain or king not only has to be of a bloodline but has to be elected by the
derbhfine
of his family. Without such a safeguard it becomes obvious to me that only the death of a predecessor removes the obstacles of the aspirant to the throne.”

Raedwald pursed his lips and said softly: “This is so.”

“And, with Wulfstan’s death, Eadred will now succeed to the kingship?”

“Yes.”

Eadred’s face was livid with anger.

“I did not kill Wulfstan!”

Sister Fidelma turned and stared deeply into his eyes.

“I believe you, for Raedwald is the assassin,” she said calmly.

Finan made a grab at Raedwald as the muscular Saxon thane sought desperately to escape from the room. Dagobert leapt forward together with Ultan, the steward, to help restrain the struggling man. When the thane of Staeningum had been overpowered, Sister Fidelma turned to the others.

“I said that the assassin had a devious mind. Yet in the attempt to lead false trails, Raedwald overexcelled himself and brought suspicion down on him. In trying to implicate Talorgen, Raedwald made a mistake and caused confusion by thinking the kerchief to be Talorgen’s. It bore Dagobert’s motto in Latin. Raedwald has no Latin and so did not spot his mistake. This also ruled out Eadred from suspicion, as Eadred knew Latin to the degree that he could recognize Dagobert’s motto.”

She settled her gaze on Eadred.

“If you had also been slain, then Raedwald was next in line to the kingship, was he not?”