Peter Tremayne - Absolution by Murder

Colmán grimaced irritably.

‘That was the obvious conclusion.’

Fidelma was unperturbed.

‘You have all assumed that Etain, as chief counsel for the church of Columba, was killed to silence her voice; that the Roman faction realised that she was their most implacable enemy. Is that not so?’

There was a murmur of assent from those who supported the Columban ranks, but Wighard was shaking his head.

‘It is a scurrilous suggestion.’

Fidelma let her cool gaze fall on the Kentish cenobite.

‘But surely an easy mistake to make given the circumstances?’ she parried.

‘You admit that it was a mistake?’ Wighard seized eagerly on her phraseology.

‘Yes. Abbess Étain was slain for a reason other than that of the religious belief she held.’

Colmán’s eyes narrowed.

‘Are you saying that Athelnoth was the killer after all? That he made improper advances to Étain, was rejected and so slew her? That when he knew he was discovered, he killed himself in remorse?’

Fidelma smiled softly.

‘You race ahead of me, bishop.’

‘That was the rumour whispered in the cloisters of this abbey. Started, I suspect, by the Roman faction.’ Colmán’s voice was full of anger.

The dark-eyed priest Agatho, who had been quiet so far, suddenly broke his silence. He began to sing in a shrill voice:

‘Rumour goes forth at once, Rumour and

No other speedier evil thing exists.’

He dropped his head and was silent as abruptly as he had begun.

All eyes were on him in bewilderment.

Fidelma’s eyes flickered to Eadulf, giving him a warning. Soon now. She would have to display her hand soon. She drew herself up and continued, ignoring Agatho’s interruption.

‘You have the right reason, Bishop of Lindisfarne, but the wrong person.’

Colman snorted in disgust.

‘A crime of passion? Pah! I have always argued that male and female should be separated. In Job it is written: “I made a covenant with mine eyes: how then should I look upon a maid?” We should forbid these double houses as did the blessed Finnian of Clonard who refused to look upon any woman.’

Abbess Abbe was red with indignation.

‘If it were left to you, Colman of Lindisfarne, we would live a joyless life. You would probably applaud Enda who, having taken his vows, refused to speak even with his own sister, Faenche, except when a sheet was hung between them!’

‘Better a joyless life than a life of debauchery and hedonism,’ responded the bishop hotly.

Abbe’s colour increased and she seemed to be choking, for she opened her mouth to speak but no words would come. Fidelma interrupted sharply.

‘Sisters, brothers, are we not forgetting the purpose of this meeting?’

Oswy had been smiling bitterly at the arguing of his clerics.

‘Yes, Fidelma of Kildare,’ he added in agreement. ‘This begins to sound like the assembly in the sacrarium. Tell us, if you can, why we have seen the death of your abbess, why the death of the Archbishop of Canterbury, why the death of Athelnoth, of Seaxwulf and, indeed, the death of even my own first-born son, Alhfrith. Death hangs around Streoneshalh like a plague. Can this be some ill-omened place?’

‘There is nothing ill omened about this matter. And you already have the answer for the death of Alhfrith, Oswy. I know a part of you grieves for a son while a part of you recognises that you have come unscathed from the clutches of a traitorous conspiracy,’ replied Fidelma. ‘And God can answer for the death of Deusdedit of Canterbury, for he died of a plague. But another and a single hand is responsible for the deaths of Étain, of Athelnoth and Seaxwulf.’

There was an expectant silence in the room.

Fidelma gazed at them, each in turn. They stood glaring back defiantly.

‘Then speak. Tell us whose hand?’

Fidelma turned back to Oswy, who had spoken sharply.

‘I will speak, but it will be at my own pace and without interruption.’

Agatho lifted his head and smiled, raising his hand in the sign of the Cross.

‘Amen. The truth will out, Deo volente!’

Abbess Hilda bit her lip.

‘Should Sister Athelswith take Brother Agatho to his cubiculum, sister? I fear the strain of recent weeks has made him unwell.’

‘Unwell? When a man is unwell his very goodness is ill!’ cried Agatho, suddenly smiling. ‘But the sleep of a sick man has keen eyes.’

Fidelma hesitated and then shook her head.

‘It is best if Agatho hears what we have to say.’

Abbess Hilda sniffed her disapproval. Fidelma paused a moment and continued.

‘Étain told me that she intended to resign from being abbess of Kildare as soon as she returned to Ireland following the end of this synod. Étain was a woman of enormous gifts, as you all know for you invited her here to be chief spokesperson of the church of Colmcille, whom you call Columba. Had she not been of the family of Brigit, she might have attained high position on her own merits. She married young but was widowed and followed her family tradition of becoming a religieuse.

‘She excelled in learning and the time came when she was chosen as abbess of Kildare, the abbey founded by her illustrious kinswomen Brigit, the daughter of Dubhtach.’

‘We all know of Étain’s reputation and authority,’ snapped Abbess Hilda impatiently.

Fidelma threw her a withering look. A silence fell.

‘I had scarcely arrived at Streoneshalh,’ went on Fidelma after a few seconds, ‘when I met and spoke with Étain and she told me that she had found a man whom she wanted to be with, to be with so strongly that she had decided that she would give up the position of abbess and go with her love into a double house where men and women and their children can dedicate themselves to God’s work.

‘At first I stupidly and wrongly assumed that Étain’s new love was in Ireland.’

‘It was a natural assumption.’ Eadulf suddenly intervened for the first time. ‘You see, Étain had never left the shores of Ireland.’

Fidelma cast an appreciative look at Eadulf.

‘Brother Eadulf comforts me in my shortcomings,’ she murmured. ‘But one should assume nothing. In fact, Étain had fallen in love with a Saxon and he with her.’

She had their attention now.

‘You see, Étain had met Brother Athelnoth at the abbey of Emly where she instructed in philosophy until last year.’

‘Athelnoth had spent six months in the abbey of Emly in the kingdom of Munster in Ireland,’ explained Eadulf.

Colmán was nodding his head.

‘Indeed. That was why I chose Brother Athelnoth to go to Catraeth to meet the abbess and escort her here to Streoneshalh. He knew Étain.’

‘Of course he did,’ agreed Fidelma. ‘A fact that he denied after Étain’s murder. Why? Simply because he was aggressively in favour of the rule of Rome and his association with Étain would be counted against him? I think not.’

‘Of course, many of the Roman faction were themselves educated or trained in Ireland,’ Oswy pointed out. ‘There are even some Irish brethren here, like Tuda, who side with Rome. No, that is no reason to deny friends among the Columban faction.’

‘Athelnoth denied his relationship because he was the man whom Étain was going to marry,’ Fidelma said quietly.

Abbess Abbe snorted indignantly.

‘How could Étain contemplate a relationship with such a man?’ she enquired indignantly.

Fidelma smiled thinly.

‘You who preach that love is God’s greatest gift to humankind ought to be able to answer that, abbess of Coldingham.’

Abbe brought her chin up, a flush coming to her cheeks.

‘Thinking back over Étain’s conversation with me,’ Fidelma went on, ‘I realise now that she had given me all the answers to her subsequent murder. She told me that she loved a stranger. At least, I interpreted her word as “stranger” and took it for a relative term, meaning a man she had not long known, when I should have taken it to be “foreigner”, for we in Ireland use that same word in both meanings. She told me that she had exchanged betrothal gifts with her lover and he with her. I should have remembered before that there is an Eoghanacht custom of exchanging brooches. Eadulf later found Étain’s brooch in a sacculus on the body of Athelnoth.’