Peter Tremayne - Hemlock at Vespers

“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 Fi-delma 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 Wulf-stan 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.”