With a thin smile, Fidelma stepped from behind the building. ‘Sooner than you think, Tadhg,’ she said.
The young man wheeled round and his hand went to the knife at his belt.
‘Don’t make it worse for yourself than it already is,’ snapped Fidelma.
Tadhg hesitated a fraction and let his hand drop, his shoulders slumping in resignation.
Blinne was gazing at them in bewilderment. ‘I don’t understand this.’
Fidelma glanced at her sadly and then at Tadhg. ‘Perhaps we can illuminate the situation?’
Blinne’s eyes suddenly widened. ‘Tadhg claims that he has always loved me. When he came back from Finnan’s Height he would waylay and annoy me like a sick dog, mooning after me. I told him that I didn’t love him. Is it…it cannot be…did he…did he kill…?’
Tadhg looked at her in anguish. ‘You cannot reject me so, Blinne. Don’t try to lay the blame for Ernán’s death on me. I know you pretended that you did not love me in public, but I had your messages. I know the truth. I told you to elope with me.’ His voice rose like a wailing child.
Blinne turned to Fidelma. ‘I have no idea what he is saying. Make him stop. I cannot stand it.’
Fidelma was looking at Tadhg. ‘You say you had messages from Blinne? Written messages?’
He shook his head. ‘Verbal, but from an unimpeachable source. They were genuine, right enough, and now she denies me and tries to blame me for what has happened…’
Fidelma held up her hand to silence him. ‘I think I know who gave you those messages,’ she said.
After the burial of Ernán, Fidelma sat on the opposite side of the fire to Brother Abán in the tiny stone house next to the chapel. They were sipping mulled wine. ‘A sad story,’ sighed Brother Abán. ‘When you have seen someone born and grow up, it is sad to see them take a human life for no better reason than greed and envy.’
‘Yet greed and envy are among the great motivations for murder, Brother.’
‘What made you suspect Bláth?’
‘Had she said that she heard the Banshee wail once, it might have been more credible because she had a witness in her uncle who heard the wail. All those with whom I spoke, who had claimed to have heard it, said they heard it once, like Glass did, on the morning of Ernán’s killing.
The so-called Banshee only wailed once. It was an afterthought of Bláth’s once she had killed her brother-in-law.’
‘You mean that she was the one wailing?’
‘I was sure of it when I heard hat she had a good voice and, moreover, knew the caoine, the keening, the lament for the dead. I have heard the caoine and know it would have been only a small step from producing that terrible sound to producing the wail associated with a Banshee.’
‘But then she claimed she had done so to lay a false trail away from her sister. Why did you not believe that?’
‘I had already been alerted that all was not well, for when I asked Blinne about her sleep, I found that she had not even awoken when Ernán rose in the morning. She slept oblivious to the world and woke in a befuddled state. She was nauseous and had a headache. Blinne admitted that both she and Bláth knew all about herbal remedies and could mix a potion to ensure sleep. Bláth had given her sister a strong sleeping draught so that she would not wake up. Only on the third night did an opportunity present itself by which she killed Ernán.
‘Her intention all along was to lay the blame at her sister’s door, but she had to be very careful about it. She had been planning this for some time. She knew that Tadhg was besotted by Blinne. She began to tell Tadhg an invented story about how Blinne and Ernán did not get on. She told Tadhg that Blinne was really in love with him but could not admit it in public. She hoped that Tadhg would tell someone and thus sow the seeds about Blinne’s possible motive for murder.’
Brother Abán shook his head sadly. ‘You are describing a devious mind.’
‘One must have a clever but disturbed mind to set out to paint another guilty for one’s own acts. Bláth had both.’
‘But what I do not understand is why — why did she do this?’
‘The oldest motives in the world — as we have said — greed and envy.’
‘How so?’
‘She knew that Ernán had no male heirs and so on his death his land, under the law of the banchomarba, would go to Blinne. And Bláth stood as Blinne’s banchomarba. Once Blinne was convicted of her husband’s death, she would lose that right and so the farm and land would come to Bláth, making her a rich woman.’
Fidelma put down her empty glass and rose.
‘The moon is up. I shall use its light to return to Cashel.’
‘You will not stay until dawn? Night is fraught with dangers.’
‘Only of our making. Night is when things come alive; it is the mother of counsels. My mentor, Brehon Morann, says that the dead of night is when wisdom ascends with the stars to the zenith of thought and all things are seen. Night is the quiet time for contemplation.’
They stood on the threshold of Brother Abán’s house. Fidelma’s horse had been brought to the door. Just as Fidelma was about to mount, a strange, eerie wailing sound echoed out of the valley. It rose, shrill and clear against the night sky, rose and ended abruptly, rose again and this time died away. It was like the caoine.
Brother Abán crossed himself. ‘The Banshee!’ he whispered.
Fidelma smiled. ‘To each their own interpretation. I hear only the lonely cry of a wolf searching for a mate. Yet I will concede that for each act there is a consequence. Bláth conjured the Banshee to cover her crime and perhaps the Banshee is having the last word.’
She mounted her horse, raised her hand in salute, and turned along the moonlit road towards Cashel.