Cross of Vengeance (9 page)

‘There is now no reason why you should not go on your journey tomorrow,’ she said, ‘but there will be no boat to Aran until tomorrow afternoon so I think it best if you stay in the inn until then. I shall come over first thing tomorrow morning and we will all ride together over to Poulnabrone, the judgement place for this kingdom. There you will see how justice is done and retribution paid under our laws.’

It was possible, she thought at the time, that some words from the pilgrims about conversations with the accused man, Hans Kaufmann, might prove of use to her in deciding the punishment for this very unusual crime. And also, she acknowledged to herself, it would afford her great satisfaction to show these people from other countries how law and order could be maintained without the use of savage punishments or shedding of human blood.

(Small Primer)

The heir to abbey lands, even if not in holy orders, has the same honour price as would have an abbot to that monastery.

The honour price of the abbot of the largest abbey in the country is 42
séts
, 22 ounces of silver or 22 milch cows.

The honour price of the abbot of a small abbey is 10
séts
, 5 ounces of silver or 5 milch cows.

Where a monastery no longer exists, the
coarb
is in receipt of the revenues from the old monastic lands.

The
coarb
, also, bears responsibility to safeguard the ancient privileges of the former abbey or monastery.

M
ara felt tired but contented when she, Fachtnan and her five scholars set out from Cahermacnaghten Law School on the following morning. She had sat up late going through all of the books which her father had left to her, as well as the many manuscripts which she had collected during her twenty-five years as Brehon of the Burren, but had found little to help her until she had come across some notes that her father had made on the history of the monks of St Columba. In his precise minuscule script he had noted the presence of those
Ceile Dé
(companions of God) on the shores of Lake Inchiquin and of the church that they had built at Kilnaboy on the southern edge of the kingdom of Burren. Their lands had extended to the foot of Mullaghmore Mountain and their rights had included that of sanctuary to anyone who claimed it by touching the altar within the church. At the very bottom of the page, squeezed into the tiny space left, her father had written damage to the church must be repaid to the abbot or to his heir, the
comharbae ecalso.

Nechtan was the man to whom recompense should be paid, and this was an easy matter. Nechtan, as the
coarb
, would have an honour price of ten
séts
or five ounces of silver. For a long time she puzzled over how to estimate the value of the property destroyed, but then she had a sudden brilliant inspiration. Of course, she thought triumphantly, slamming her law book closed and getting to her feet ready for sleep;
Críth Gablach
, as usual, had the answer. Hans Kaufmann must restore the value of what has been lost.

And how would he do that? Well, thought Mara as she climbed the stairs to her bedroom, that was a matter between him and the officials of Kilnaboy Church; between him and Father MacMahon and Nechtan, the
coarb
, the descendant of the ancient line of O’Quinn.

I’m sure, thought Mara, that if I see Nechtan beforehand, the fine that we collect from the German can be transmitted immediately as a donation to Father MacMahon. This, she planned, she would announce as soon as she finished sentencing. Notice had been sent out, by Fachtnan, to various churches, mills and other places, of this unscheduled hearing at Poulnabrone, but probably since this unexpected spell of fine weather was ideal for taking a second cut of hay from the fields before autumn and winter set in, or going to the bog, or taking a load of seaweed from the coast for fertilizing the fields, not many would bother turning up for a case against someone who was just passing through the kingdom.

And it was a glorious day. The night had been stiflingly hot and with a heavy downpour a couple of hours after sunset. Mara had feared the thunderstorm would bring to an end the fine weather. But weather was hard to predict here on the fringe of the Atlantic and this morning a light, fresh breeze had sprung up, blowing straight in from the west and making their ride a time of great pleasure. The early morning sun sparkled on the silver-grey lichen that clung to the stones on the wall, and the shiny coral red berries of the guelder rose shone like jewels. To their left, as they rode down the steep slope of Roughan, the mountain of Mullaghmore gleamed in swirls of silver. Mara looked up at the pathway that wound around the slopes and promised herself that she would climb it again when Turlough returned from Donegal – just the two of us, she thought. They had too few moments together; Turlough had his duties as king of three kingdoms, and she hers as Brehon of the Burren and
ollamh
(professor) of the law school. The last occasion when she had climbed Mullaghmore – the holy mountain as it was known – had been on the eve of
Bealtaine
on the night before the first of May, the day of the big ceremonial occasion when every move, every word spoken by either their king or their Brehon would be watched and listened to with reverential interest by the people of the Burren.

‘Let’s approach by this way,’ she said to Fachtnan. ‘I would like to have a quick word with Nechtan O’Quinn before I see Father MacMahon – and the German pilgrim … or follower of Luther,’ she amended. She doubted whether he had ever been a pilgrim; his mission was other. No doubt shrines all over Europe were now bewailing the destruction of some cherished relic. What was going to happen in the future, she wondered? Would the doctrines of Luther have any effect on the Church of Rome? Whatever happened, she hoped that here in the west of Ireland it would not affect them too much. She and her fellow countrymen and women had come to a comfortable compromise with the more rigid doctrines of Rome. Many monks were married men who had the discretion to send their wives and children on visits to relatives when inspections were threatened from England – and quite a few priests were fathers of sons as well as fathers to their religious congregations. And frequently a son inherited his father’s position in the religious hierarchy. The church of the early
Céile Dé
still lived on in this remote spot.

‘If we turn this way, we will ride through the clump of trees and no one will see us arrive,’ said Fachtnan, breaking into her theological musings.

‘Good idea,’ said Mara, and told him of her conclusions.

He nodded. ‘And we should make sure that the other pilgrims are on their way to Aran straight after the trial so that there is no trouble between them and Hans Kaufmann,’ he said. ‘I’ll have a word with the O’Lochlainn and tell him that I heard the boat was leaving early because of the thunderstorm last night.’

‘Good idea,’ said Mara. Ardal would not question any message from her and would speed the pilgrims on their way while the German was still under the court’s protection. It was clever of Fachtnan to have thought of this. She reflected, with a moment’s regret, that he would have made a wonderful Brehon. He was thoughtful, intelligent and always very aware of the feelings of others and the need for careful handling in matters where pride and precedent were of the utmost importance. Still, his loss was her gain. She could ask for no better sounding board for her thoughts and worries.

‘Ride on ahead, boys, but wait for us when you come to the wall,’ she called, and then turned to Fachtnan and began to tell him her conclusions about the recompense due from Hans Kaufmann after the burning of the relic. Fachtnan was more religious than she and could probably spot any flaw in her solution.

The boys had taken her permission to ride ahead with the exuberance of their age and their delight in the fresh and lovely September morning, and she had hardly finished her sentence to them before the noise of hoofs pounding on the limestone almost drowned the sound of her voice. She smiled to herself. There was something very endearing about them all, she thought, enjoying their energy and their sense of fun.

‘So that’s the way my mind is working,’ she finished, ‘and I was wondering …’ and then she stopped. Somehow in the last few moments the pounding noise of horses’ hoofs had stopped. She frowned, puzzled. Had something happened? They couldn’t have reached the churchyard wall so quickly. And those horses’ hoofs had not slowed gradually as they would have done had they seen their destination.

No, they had stopped abruptly.

And there were no sounds of young voices.

‘Quick,’ she said to Fachtnan, and clapped her heels to the sides of her old mare.

A moment later she and Fachtnan burst through the trees into a small, rounded space open to the sky – a space where the grass grew oddly short, as though cropped nightly. It was almost completely surrounded by prickly gorse bushes and was often used as a circle to gather sheep. In the centre of the vividly green grass was a sloping mound and on top of that mound was a low tomb, shaped like a wedge, made from two thick slabs, propped up on their sides, sloping towards each other and crowned by an enormous capstone of lichen-encrusted limestone. The boys, each holding a pony, were grouped around the stones. The first thing Mara saw was the white face of her son, and then, automatically, she counted heads. All were there …

And then she saw what they were looking at.

There was a naked body on the tomb.

In silence Mara dismounted from her mare, handing over the reins to Slevin and walking forward steadily as Domhnall and Finbar stood back to let her take their places.

The man was dead. The eyes, like blue pebbles, stared up at the sky above. She touched the wrist: stone cold.

But that was not all.

The naked body was arranged in the shape of a cross. The arms were stretched out, fingers touching the outer edge of the capstone. The feet were placed side by side.

And there was a spot of blood in the centre of each palm and in the centre of each foot. And, she observed, a knife wound in the side.

‘He’s been crucified.’ Art’s voice broke on a sob and Cormac awkwardly put an arm around his foster brother’s shoulders.

‘No.’ Mara’s voice was sharp. ‘No, Art, he’s been murdered, and it’s for us, for the Brehon and her helpers, to find out who did this terrible deed and punish them.’ The unknown murderer, she noticed, had even gone to the trouble of cutting off a few twigs of holly from a nearby bush and twisting them together with some woodbine to form a rough crown.

‘It’s not a crucifixion, Art,’ said Domhnall consolingly. ‘Look, you can see that these are not real holes in the hands – just someone twisted a knife …’

He stopped abruptly as Art heaved noisily. Fachtnan seized him by the arm and dragged him over to the bushes, and the boys stood in silence listening to the sounds of him vomiting. Cormac was very white, but glared when Mara stretched out a hand to him, so she left him. His pride was very important to him. Both he and Art were too young for this, she thought, gazing down with horror at the sight. Death they knew – there had been killings on the Burren – but never anything like this twisted, vile horror. The symbolism was obvious – or was it? Perhaps it was meant to imply that Hans Kaufmann was a Christ-like figure, but she doubted it. More likely some perverted religious instinct had deemed this was the ultimate punishment and humiliation for a man who had desecrated the relic of the true cross.

‘Don’t touch,’ said Mara as she saw Cormac’s hand go forward towards the crown of thorns.

‘There’s something there, Brehon,’ he said. ‘Look, Domhnall, there’s something under the pieces of holly – down there by his ear.’

Mara leaned over. ‘You’re right,’ she said. ‘I didn’t notice it before as the holly was over it. I can see it now.’

‘Looks like a piece of vellum – just like the one that we found inside the lamp, the one that was used to set fire to the cushion,’ said Slevin.

Mara put out her hand carefully and without touching the corpse plucked out the small scroll. It was not the same; she knew that. The scorched piece of vellum which had played its part in destroying the relic of the true cross was safely in her own satchel. She had hoped to confront the person responsible for that misdeed today, but now he was dead and she was faced with a far greater crime – the greatest of all – the taking of a human life.

‘Looks the same,’ said Slevin, as she unrolled the small leaf of vellum. ‘It’s decorated in the same way around the four margins.’

‘So it is,’ said Mara. ‘But not written in German – look.’ She flattened it and held it out towards her scholars so that they could read the Latin words.

‘“
God is not mocked”,’
said Domhnall thoughtfully, and then continued, ‘“
Be not deceived; God is not mocked: for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap
.” Do you think that the murderer wrote that, Brehon?’

‘I don’t think so,’ said Mara, ‘look how faded the ink is. This is something from one of the epistles of St Paul to the Galatians, if I remember aright. Pilgrims carry these prayers with them. It’s apt, though, isn’t it?’

‘The murderer tried to make a fool of God by burning the piece of the true cross and God has had his revenge,’ said Finbar dramatically.

‘Birdbrain,’ said Slevin with a curl of his lip. ‘Do you really think that God has nothing better to do than to set up this – pretending that the man was crucified?’ He waved his hand at the figure spreadeagled across the tomb.

‘He’d just send down a thunderbolt and have it over and done with.’ Cormac was recovering and eager to show how tough he was.

Mara nodded absent-mindedly. She retained the leaf of vellum in her hand, but crossed over to where Fachtnan stood with his arm around the shivering Art.

‘Poor Art,’ she said compassionately, touching his clammy skin. ‘You don’t look well; perhaps you’ve eaten something that did not agree with you. Fachtnan, would you take Art back to Brigid – and Cormac, you go too to help Fachtnan.’