Free Chalice of Blood by Peter Tremayne Page B

if I am not in possession of all the facts?’

    Abbot Iarnla lowered his head. ‘Perhaps my steward should explain matters,’ he said in resignation. ‘He dealt with them.’
    Brother Lugna hesitated. Fidelma faced him, waiting. Then he sighed. ‘It is true that, when Brother Donnchad came back, he returned with some things which he said he had picked up on his pilgrimage. He wanted them kept safe while he considered them.’
    ‘Considered them?’ queried Eadulf.
    ‘They were supposed to be mostly manuscripts rather than objects,’ explained the steward. ‘Like his brother, Cathal, Brother Donnchad was a scholar of many languages, of Greek and Hebrew as well as Latin, and also Aramaic. I never saw the documents, for he kept them hidden.’
    ‘The abbey here has a renowned scriptorium , a great library containing many such manuscripts,’ Fidelma pointed out. ‘Why did he not simply place the documents there? Surely the library is secure enough? What made these manuscripts so precious they had to be locked elsewhere?’
    Brother Lugna raised his shoulders and let them drop in a resigned gesture. ‘As I say, I never saw them nor were they found in his cell after his death.’
    Fidelma’s eyes narrowed for a moment and she looked at the abbot. ‘Did you see them, Abbot Iarnla?’
    The abbot had not.
    ‘Anyway,’ the steward continued, ‘Brother Donnchad seemed so concerned, so anxious, that we decided to humour him and have a lock made for his door.’
    ‘Not simply a bolt on the inside?’
    ‘He was specific about a lock and key.’
    ‘Who made the lock and key?’
    ‘Our own smith, Brother Giolla-na-Naomh. He holds the rank of flaith-goba ,’ he added with a note of pride.
    Fidelma knew that smiths had three distinctions of rank
according to their qualifications, and the flaith-goba , or chief smith, had knowledge of all metalworking. The other two ranks were limited in both the metals they worked and the artefacts they could produce.
    ‘How many keys to this lock did he make?’
    ‘He was instructed to make only one and I presume that he made only one,’ replied the steward.
    ‘Presumption is not fact,’ observed Fidelma.
    It was Abbot Iarnla who said: ‘When we could not gain entrance to Brother Donnchad’s cell, I summoned Brother Giolla-na-Naomh to help us. He had to break down the door. Had he made an extra key, he would have fetched it to save breaking the door.’
    It was a good point but Fidelma was not entirely satisfied.
    ‘You say that you decided to humour Brother Donnchad in his demand for a key. “Humour” seems a curious word to use.’
    Abbot Iarnla and Brother Lugna exchanged an uncomfortable glance.
    ‘Brother Donnchad was—’
    ‘He had begun to behave in a curious fashion,’ interrupted Brother Lugna.
    ‘In what way? How did this manifest itself?’ asked Eadulf.
    ‘He became reclusive,’ the abbot explained. ‘He shut himself away from his oldest friend in the community.’
    ‘He even stopped going to Mass,’ pointed out Brother Lugna. ‘When we found that he had shut himself away and would not communicate with anyone, I sent for his mother, Lady Eithne, to see if she could find out what was vexing him.’
    ‘And did she?’
    He was about to speak when he was interrupted by the noise of several horses arriving in the quadrangle of the abbey. With a muttered apology, he rose and went to the window to peer out. Then he turned back.

    ‘You may ask the question of Lady Eithne herself, Sister Fidelma, for she has just arrived with an escort.’
    He left the room to greet the newcomers.
    Lady Eithne was imposing. Tall though Fidelma was, she had to look up into the face of the woman. There were still traces of a youthful beauty in her features. She wore a slightly austere expression. The sharp blue eyes bore few of the tell-tale marks of age; only when one came nearer was age discernible, for she used berry juice to darken her brows and hair. The person who dressed