“If it were a spirit, that would be of little assistance,” she observed dryly.
Belach said nothing, but he looked and bolted the door behind Fidelma as she came into the room. He replaced the sword without comment as she went to the fire the warm herself after her exertion into the night.
Monchae was standing on the bottom step, her arms folded across her breast, moaning a little.
Fidelma went in search of the jug of
“You heard it? You saw it?” the wife of the innkeeper wailed.
Fidelma nodded.
Belach bit his lip. “It is the ghost of Murgán. We are doomed.”
“Nonsense!” snapped Fidelma.
“Then explain that!” replied Belach, pointing to the table.
There was nothing on the table. It was then Fidelma realized what was missing. She had left the pipes on the table when she had returned to bed.
“It is two hours or so until sunrise,” Fidelma said slowly. “I want you two to return to bed. There is something here which I must deal with. Whatever occurs, I do not wish either of you to stir from your room unless I specifically call you.”
Belach stared at her with white, taut features.
“You mean that you will do battle with this evil force?”
Fidelma smiled thinly.
“That is what I mean,” she said emphatically.
Reluctantly, Belach helped Monchae back up the stairs, leaving Fidelma standing in the darkness. She stood still, thinking, for a while. She had an instinct that whatever was happening in this troubled isolated inn, it was building toward its climax. Perhaps that climax would come before sunrise. There was no logic to the idea but Fidelma had long come to the belief that one should not ignore one’s instincts.
She turned and made her way toward a darkened alcove at the far end of the room in which only a deep wooden bench was situated. She tightened her cloak against the chill, seated herself and prepared to wait. Wait for what, she did not know. But she believed that she would not have to wait for long before some other manifestation occurred.
It was a short time before she heard the sounds of the pipe once more.
The sweet, melodious lullaby was gone. The pipes were now wild keening. It was the hair-raising lament of the
Fidelma held her head to one side.
The music was no longer outside the old inn but seeming to echo from within, seeping up under the floorboards, through the walls and down from the rafters.
She shivered but made no move to go in search of the sound, praying all the while that neither Monchae nor Belach would disobey her instructions and leave their room.
She waited until the tune came to an end.
There was a silence in the old building.
Then she heard the sound, the sound she had heard on her first waking. It was a soft, dragging sound. Her body tensed as she bent forward in the alcove; her eyes narrowed as she tried to focus into the darkness.
A figure seemed to be rising from the floor, upward, slowly upward on the far side of the room.
Fidelma held her breath.
The figure, reaching its full height, appeared to be clutching a set of pipes beneath its arms. It moved toward the table in a curious limping gait.
Fidelma noticed that now and again, as the light of the glowing embers in the hearth caught it, the figure’s cloak sparkled and danced with a myriad pinpricks of fire.
Fidelma rose to her feet.
“The charade is over!” she cried harshly.
The figure dropped the pipes and wheeled around, seeking to identify the speaker. Then it seemed to catch its breath.
“Is that you, Monchae?” came a sibilant, mocking whisper.
Then, before Fidelma could prepare herself, the figure seemed the fly across the room at her. She caught sight of light flashing on an upraised blade and instinct made her react by grasping at the descending arm with both hands, twisting her body to take the weight of the impact.
The figure grunted angrily as the surprise of the attack failed.
The collision of their bodies threw Fidelma back into the alcove, slamming her against the wooden seat. She grunted in pain. The figure had shaken her grip loose and once more the knife hand was descending.
“You should have fled while you had the chance, Monchae,” came the masculine growl. “I had no wish to harm you or the old man. I just wanted to get you out of this inn. Now, you must die!”
Fidelma sprang aside once more, feverishly searching for some weapon, some means of defense.
Her flailing hand knocked against something. She dimly recognized it as the alabaster figure of the Madonna and Child. Automatically, her fingers closed on it and she swung it up like a club. She struck the figure where she thought the side of the head would be.
She was surprised at the shock of the impact. The alabaster seemed to shatter into pieces, as she would have expected from a plaster statuette, but its impact seemed firm and weighty, causing a vibration in her hand and arm. The sound was that of a sickening smack of flesh meeting a hard substance.
The figure grunted, a curious sound as the air was sharply expelled from his lungs. Then he dropped to the floor. She heard the sound of metal ringing on the floor planks as the knife dropped and bounced.
Fidelma stood for a moment or two, shoulders heaving as she sought to recover her breath and control her pounding emotions.
Slowly she walked to the foot of the stairs and called up in a firm voice.
“You can come down now. I have laid your ghost!”
She turned, stumbling a little in the darkness, until she found a candle and lit it. Then she went back to the figure of her erstwhile assailant. He lay on his side, hands outstretched. He was a young man. She gave a soft intake of breath when she saw the ugly wound on his temple. She reached forward and felt for a pulse. There was none.
She looked round curiously. The impact of a plaster statuette could not have caused such a death blow.
Fragments and powdered plaster were scattered in a large area. But there, lying in the debris, was a long cylindrical tube of sacking. It was no more than a foot high and perhaps one inch in diameter. Fidelma bent and picked it up. It was heavy. She sighed and replaced it where she had found it.
Monchae and Belach were creeping down the stairs now.
“Belach, have you a lantern?” asked Fidelma as she stood up.
“Yes. What is it?” demanded the innkeeper.
“Light it, if you please. I think we have solved your haunting.”
As she spoke she turned and walked across the floor to the spot where she had seen the figure rise, as if from the floor. There was a trapdoor and beneath it some steps which led into a tunnel.
Belach had lit the lamp.
“What has happened?” he demanded.
“Your ghost was simply a man,” Fidelma explained.
Monchae let out a moan.
“You mean it is Murgán? He was not killed at Loch Derg?”
Fidelma perched herself on the edge of the table and shook her head. She stooped to pick up the pipes where the figure had dropped them onto the table.
“No; it was someone who looked and sounded a little like Murgán as you knew him. Take a look at his face, Monchae. I think you will recognize Cano, Murgán’s younger brother.”
A gasp of astonishment from the woman confirmed Fidelma’s identification.
“But why, what…?”
