Free Chain of Evidence by Cora Harrison Page A

mention the ‘Our Fathers’ and ‘Glory be to the Fathers’ and the other prayers that Slaney kept inserting, thought Mara, hearing an impatient sigh from Shane. She rose resolutely to her feet and beckoned to Slaney and withdrew to the window, waiting for the woman to follow. Let her servants go on praying; the Brehon had work to do. The scholars had not hesitated but had immediately got to their feet and clustered around her. She did not wave them away. This was law school business. She waited grimly until the sour-faced Slaney approached.
    ‘I’m sorry that you cannot spare the time to pray for the soul of—’ she was saying in a furious whisper, but Mara silenced her with an imperative gesture.
    ‘Make no arrangements for the wake or the burial at the moment, Slaney,’ she said sternly. ‘I am not satisfied that this was an accident. It may be that it was a secret and unlawful killing – one that I and my scholars must investigate. I want this body moved to a small room and the keys of it handed to me until my enquiries have finished.’
    ‘What!’ Stony-faced, Slaney glared at her, and then gulped and clutched at her heart. Mara ignored her. Maol the steward had just entered the room and she beckoned to him.
    ‘Have the body of your
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carried to a small wall chamber,’ she said.
    He stared at her and she stared back – all the authority of her eighteen years of office in her gaze. The light was poor in this north-facing room, but she had an impression that he had paled.
    ‘Immediately,’ she said in a peremptory way. ‘This terrible death must be investigated.’
    ‘I am to be nobody in my own house,’ exclaimed Slaney bitterly.
    ‘This is now a matter for the king and his officers,’ said Mara. She spoke more gently than she had done to the steward. Though a tall, heavily-built woman Slaney seemed to shrink and there was a look of terror in her very blue eyes. She was clutching the back of a large oak chair for support and Mara thought she saw a slight tremor in the sturdily built piece of furniture.
    Garrett’s body lay on a wooden pallet and within minutes it was being carried to one of the small wall chambers that were slotted in, here and there, by the sides of the spiral staircase in the old part of the castle. Its window was not much bigger than a loop hole for an arrow to pass through, but the place was small enough to be well lit by a couple of candles. Once the pallet had been placed on a pair of trestles, Mara ordered a double candlestick and positioned it in the deep sill of the tiny window. There would, she thought, be enough light. She nodded her thanks to the servant and then held out her hand for the key, waiting until Slaney summoned her housekeeper and handed over the second key, also. The room was freezing cold, but so much the better to preserve the corpse.
    With a great air of ceremony Mara watched Fachtnan lock the door, melt in the flame of Maol’s candle a piece of sealing wax from his satchel and then paste it over the lock. While it was still warm Mara scratched her initials into the wax with a quill pen from her own satchel. The pen would be ruined, but if anyone in the castle were guilty of having anything to do with Garrett’s death, then these elaborate preparations should alarm them.
    ‘I shall be back,’ she said to Slaney. ‘Do nothing about this death until I give permission.’
    And with those words she went soberly down the wide staircase followed by Fachtnan and her scholars who were exchanging slightly over-awed looks. Mara said nothing to them until they were all outside the iron gates and then she spoke.
    ‘Fachtnan,’ she said. ‘I want you to ride to Thomond as quickly as you can safely do so. Tell the king about the death of Garrett MacNamara. He will want to attend the burial and conduct the inauguration ceremony for the new
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as soon as possible. Oh, and Fachtnan, I have one other task for you. Bring back Nuala. Tell her I need