Verdict of the Court (26 page)

Mara waited until the murmurs died down. She did not glance towards Turlough, but looked stiffly ahead of her.

‘I speak,’ she said, ‘of the unlawful killing by strangulation of Maccon MacMahon. The man responsible for ordering the deed was the King but the law expects that the King, like other members of the clan and kingdom, must observe the law and must, if he breaks it, pay the penalty, or else lose his honour price.

‘The man who died, Maccon MacMahon,’ she continued ‘was a man who had betrayed his King and the people of the kingdom. He brought death and destruction to Bunratty by arranging for enemies to attack the castle and the village and by disabling the cannon which was positioned ready to defend against an assault from the river. For these crimes he deserved punishment.’ She stopped for a moment, scanning the faces and feeling within her an urge to share her view of the law, to make them and their children and their children’s children understand the importance of keeping the letter of a law which in this part of Ireland had resisted three centuries of English endeavour to denigrate and to destroy it.

‘Brehon law,’ she went on, ‘has a penalty for almost every crime or misdemeanour known to man. Maccon MacMahon committed a crime and should have been judged, in front of the people of the kingdom, by the law, and retribution exacted. But Maccon MacMahon was not so judged, but was unlawfully killed and so the man who gave the order for this killing, the man who said, “
on my head be it
”, this man is guilty of an unlawful killing.’

Mara took a deep breath and then said in a calm, clear voice: ‘I judge you, King Turlough Donn O’Brien, to be guilty of the unlawful killing of Maccon MacMahon, and I call on you to pay the fine of forty-two
sét
s, or twenty-one ounces of silver, or twenty-one milch cows for this homicide and in addition to that the honour price of the dead man which I reckon, since his status was that of an
aire déso
, to be ten
sét
s, or five ounces of silver, or five milch cows. So, therefore, a total fine of fifty-two
sét
s, or twenty-six ounces of silver, or twenty-six milch cows must be paid by King Turlough Donn O’Brien to the children and heirs of Maccon MacMahon.’

There was a long pause. Everyone in the hall sat very rigid, very quiet, though eyes were all on the figure at the end of the table. And then Turlough said curtly: ‘So be it.’

‘Then the business of this court is over,’ said Mara. ‘Go in peace with each other and with your neighbours.’

And then she sat down and wondered whether her ten years of marriage had come to an end.

(The Law of Marriage)

Exempt from legal suit for ea
ch, is what each may have used or have consumed as against the other, except what lien, obligation or loan may have imposed, or what one of them may have misappropriated from the other.

Exempt from legal suit is:

Everything useful to the partnership

Everything done in good faith.

Liable to legal claim is everything done in bad faith in the law of the couple.

M
ara and her five scholars arrived back in the Burren before the light faded on seventh January. The boys were tired, subdued after the tragedy of so many deaths, puzzled by the verdicts of yesterday and they rode in silence for much of the time, leaving Mara free to think her thoughts. Her mind was bleak. She and Turlough had been very happy together during the last ten years. Custom had not made stale their feelings for each other – he had been a husband, a lover, a friend and the only one in her life whom she trusted with her innermost thoughts, doubts and fears. She had worried about this marriage before she had finally agreed to it; had been concerned that it might interfere with her professional life as a Brehon, but Turlough had always accepted her work, her obligations to the kingdom and to her law school and had never sought to change her in any way. Until now the marriage had been a success. But now?

Her mind went around and around, ceaselessly going over the events of the last few days. Could she have omitted that verdict? Could she have classified the hanging of Maccon MacMahon as an act of war? But she knew that had not been possible. Brehon law made a sharp difference between any action taken against an enemy clan or a person from a foreign land and an act of violence against a member of the clan or kingdom. Maccon MacMahon should not have been hanged, but should have stood trial and paid the fine due for his treachery, his betrayal of his King and over-lord.

How had Turlough reacted to her judgement? Other than that brief and abrupt ‘
so be it
’ he had not spoken to her. She had been busy with her papers and he had his relations and his friends to talk with. From time to time she had looked across at him, but could read nothing from his face, courteous, friendly, interested, as he had exchanged ideas and plans with his guests. They had all eaten a brief meal, served with food as good as they could make it, by Rosta’s assistants and the party which had arrived for the festivities had begun to break up.

Turlough had left Bunratty almost straight after the meal. He had decided to escort Conor and Ellice by easy stages to the abbey near the sea where a skilled monk would once again try to bring his delicate son back to some measure of health. Mara had refused the midday meal and had slept for most of the afternoon and then spent a wakeful night, lying wide awake and alone in the large bed of the sumptuous King’s apartment. If it had not been for the scholars she would have set out for home on the day before, but she dared not allow them to run the risk of doing the last stage of the journey in darkness and mist.

The mist was still there on the morning as they rode along the high path above the marsh, but their way was straight and narrow and the roadway enclosed with stout blackthorn hedges. They skirted the flooded plain around the Franciscan abbey at Innis, burial place of a former O’Brien king, an ancestor of Turlough’s, one of the many King Turlough O’Briens that had reigned over the people of this portion of Ireland.

And then they had turned towards the west.

It was only when they reached the Burren that the land opened out and the sight of the vast tracts of stone-paved fields made Mara’s spirits begin to rise. A brisk west wind had risen and the fog was being blown away in tatters of cloudy white. The limestone clints, each as much as ten yards in length and breadth, ever-changing in colour according to the sky and the sun and the rain, now gleamed black as wet tar. Cows strolled across them, plucking the succulent grass that grew, winter and summer, in the grykes between the clints, where the limestone retained the summer heat right through the winter months. The red and white cattle raised their heads to look from mild eyes with astonishment at the party that rode past them and the boys called out jocose greetings to them. Cormac tossed an apple from the storeroom at Bunratty Castle, but they ignored it and his own pony neighed a reproach.

It had not been a hard winter, thought Mara looking around at her native territory with a sort of hunger for its familiarity. The bare twigs of the hawthorn still bore the dark red berries and a flock of goldfinches fed noisily from the dangling cones of alder trees in the hedgerows. Some fruits of the guelder rose still remained, shining as pink as the sugared cherries in a fruit cake, and these were attacked greedily by a flock of redwings. A plump fox, its coat gleaming gold in a sudden ray of sunshine, emerged from the undergrowth with a large rat dangling from its mouth and then disappeared under the splayed stones of an ancient tomb. In this part of the west of Ireland spring came early and there were signs of birds flying in pairs and even a beginning of nest-building. As Mara watched, she saw a tiny wren with a clump of moss in its mouth investigate a possible site on a field boundary. The walls in this part of the Burren were traditionally made by vertically stacking inch-thick long slabs of stone, each of the slabs angled so that it rested against its neighbours. The resulting wall allowed the wind to be filtered safely through the cracks, but also provided wonderfully inviting spaces for small birds to build their intricate nests. Mara heaved a sigh of relief. I’m home, she thought.

‘Domhnall,’ she said impulsively, ‘would you and the other boys like to ride on ahead. I think my horse is tired and so am I. I will only hold you up. You go on. You can tell Brigid all the news. She’ll want to know everything.’

And that might be a neat way of getting out of having to relate whole story and avoiding too many penetrating questions from the woman who had been her nurse, her mother after the death of Mara’s mother, and who had run her household and looked after her scholars with unceasing devotion. Sooner or later, of course, she would have to discuss the matter with her if there was going to be any parting between herself and her husband. Brigid was devoted to Turlough, who charmed her by his enthusiastic reception of every meal put in front of him and by his deep interest in anything to do with her or her husband Cumhal.

At the thought of Turlough, Mara felt the tears come to her eyes. Now that the boys were ahead of her, galloping enthusiastically across the fields towards Lissylisheen, she was able to indulge in a few regrets – perhaps she had mishandled the business, perhaps she should have warned Turlough of what she was going to say.

But it would have been difficult. There had been no opportunity when she and Turlough could have talked together, an opportunity where she could have explained to him why she had been driven by her respect for the law to have given that verdict at the court of Bunratty. Turlough had just been too busy, too preoccupied. There had been no time where husband and wife could have communicated.

In fact, instantly after the retreat of the Knight of Glin, once the dead were buried and the castle wall shored up and repaired, Turlough had mustered his men, and galloped across the western parts of his territory in order to make sure that there was no attempt to seize the lands and the castle belonging to the MacMahon. He had only returned very late on the night before judgement day. She had already been in bed and in the face of his exuberance, his ardour and his desire for her; she had shirked telling him of her decision.

It had been wrong to have taken him by surprise; she knew that and she admired the dignity of his response.

And wished desperately that things could have been different.

She stopped under an old yew tree beside the tiny church of Noughaval and remained so still that a pine marten, with a splendidly bushy tail, ran cat-like down the trunk of the tree and then disappeared in a streak of dark gold and brown beneath the elaborate stone tomb of the O’Lochlainn family. Her own father was also buried in this graveyard and she dismounted from her horse and walked across to his tomb. She should say a prayer for his soul, she thought, but the words would not come. Instead she just stood there and allowed her mind to calm.

This is the law
, she quoted to herself sadly, remembering what she had memorized as a child within her father’s law school. ‘
No Brehon of the Gaedhil is able to abrogate any law that is found within the Seánchas Mór. In it were established laws for king and vassal, for queen and subject, chief and dependant, wealthy and poor.
’

These were the words. She was a servant of the law and she could not change it to fit her individual circumstances. She had done the right thing so far as the law was concerned, but her marriage, her relationship with Turlough – had she served that well?

By the time that she reached sight of her law school, the faithful Brigid was standing at the gate looking anxiously down the road. By her worried looks, Mara guessed that she had heard the whole story of the judgement day at Bunratty and the verdicts that had been declared.

Cormac and Art, sticks in hands, were walking in the opposite direction down the road in the company of Cumhal. The sound of their high excited voices came to her and she knew that they were glad to be home. She guessed that they would be fetching the cows home for the night from their grazing on the High Burren, a mountainous plateau of flat rock which stretched from Cahermacnaghten right across to beyond the judgement place at Poulnabrone. Mara was glad to see them go. Cormac, adoring of his kingly father, had not spoken a word to his mother ever since the judgement at Bunratty on the morning before. Art, Cormac’s foster-brother and loyal friend, had also been uneasy with her, Finbar and Slevin, too, had been embarrassed and unsure. Only Domhnall had been approving, she sensed; and admired his thorough understanding of the laws in which she had instructed him for the past five years.

But now Brigid had to be faced and Mara kept her head down until she could no longer have any excuse not to raise it in greeting. Brigid would know the whole story by now – she would have demanded all details from the boys. But Brigid’s first concern was for her mistress, her nursling, the Brehon whom she and her husband venerated and served.

‘You’re dead tired,
alanah
, I can see by your eyes; now for once in your life do as I tell you,’ scolded Brigid. ‘Cumhal has lit the fire and filled the bath and your bed is all ready for you. Don’t you worry about the boys today – there’s plenty for them to do; Cumhal will occupy them. “
That will
bring you all down to earth and away from all your talk of castles and battles and feastings
,” that’s what I said to them. And do you know what young Domhnall said, Brehon?’ Brigid stopped to draw a breath, ‘He said to me, and not a word of lie, “
It’s great to be home again, Brigid; I’ve missed your cooking!
” Would you believe that? After all the excitement, all the banquets, that’s what he said. Now, just you leave that horse,’ she went on, looking anxiously up at Mara, ‘don’t you know that young Dathi will see to it? Across to your own house with you, now, and lie down before you fall down – my old mother used to say that and there wasn’t a woman in the neighbourhood that had the brains she had, I’ll tell you that, Brehon. You’ll be a new woman once you’ve had a good rest.’