Laisran shook his head.
“No. Eadred was right. That belligerent motto, Fidelma, ‘beware what you say,’ is the motto of the Frankish prince-Dagobert. I have recently remarked on its pugnacity to the young man.”
Sister Fidelma stretched reflectively. “It seems things do not look good for Dagobert of the Franks. He now stands as the most likely suspect.”
“Not necessarily. Anyone could have taken and dropped the cloth, and there are many here who have come to hate the arrogance of the Saxons. Why, I have even heard the dour Finan declare that he would like to drown the lot of them!”
Fidelma raised her eyebrows.
“Are you telling me that we must suspect Finan, the professor of your law faculty?”
Abbot Laisran suddenly laughed.
“Oh, the idea of Finan being able to shape-change to enter a locked room, commit murder and sneak out without disturbing the locks, is an idea I find amusing but hardly worthy of consideration.”
Sister Fidelma gazed thoughtfully at Laisran.
“Do you believe that this murder could only be carried out by sorcery, then?”
Laisran’s rotund face clouded and he genuflected quickly.
“God between me and all evil, Fidelma, but is there any other explanation? We come from a culture which accepted shape-changing as a normal occurrence. Move among our people and they will tell you that Druids still exist and have such capabilities. Wasn’t Diarmuid’s foster brother changed into a boar, and wasn’t Caer, the beloved of Aengus Og, condemned to change her form every alternate year?”
“These are ancient legends, Laisran,” admonished Sister Fidelma. “We live in reality, in the here and now. And it is among the people of this community that we will find the person who slew Wulfstan. Before I question Dagobert, however, I would like to see Wulfstan’s chamber once more.”
Abbot Laisran pulled at his lower lip. His usually jovial face was creased in a frown of perplexity.
“I do not understand, Sister Fidelma. Everyone in our community here at Durrow had cause to kill Wulfstan and everyone is suspect. Is that what you are saying? At the same time that everyone is suspect, no one could have done the deed, for its implementation was beyond the hand of any human agency.”
“Now that I did not say,” Sister Fidelma admonished the Abbot firmly, as she led the way along the corridor to halt at the open door of what had been Wulfstan’s chamber.
The body of Wulfstan had been removed to the chapel of St. Benignus, where preparations were being made to transport its sarcophagus to the coast, from where Eadred and his entourage would accompany it, by sea, to the land of the South Saxons which lay on the southern shore of Britain.
Sister Fidelma stared once again at the grey stone-flagged floor. She walked over the slabs, pressing each with her foot. Then she stared upward toward the ceiling, which rose about eleven feet above the chamber floor. Her eyes eventually turned back to the bars on the window.
“Give me a hand,” she suddenly demanded.
Abbot Laisran stared at her in surprise as she began pushing the wooden table toward the window.
Hastily, he joined her in the effort, grinning sheepishly.
“If the young novitiates of my order could see their abbot heaving furniture about…” he began.
“They would realize that their abbot was merely human,” replied Fidelma, smiling.
They pushed the table under the barred window and, to Abbot Laisran’s astonishment, Sister Fidelma suddenly scrambled on top of the table. It rose three feet above the ground and by standing on it, Sister Fidelma, being tall, could reach easily to the bars of the solitary window whose bottom level was eight feet above the floor. She reached up with both her hands and tested each inch-thick iron bar carefully.
The lowering of her shoulders showed her disappointment.
Slowly she clambered down, helped by the arm of Laisran.
Her lips were compressed. “I thought the bars might have been loose.”
“It was a good idea,” smiled Laisran, encouragingly.
“Come, show me the floor above this,” Sister Fidelma said abruptly.
With a sigh, Laisran hastened after her as she strode swiftly away.
The floor above turned out to be equally disappointing. Over Wulfstan’s chamber stretched a long wooden floor which was the floor of one of the long dormitories for the novitiates of the community. There were over a dozen beds in the dormitory. Even had she not examined the boards of the floor carefully, to see whether any had been prized up in order that a person could be lowered into the chamber below, and realized that none of the floorboards had been moved in many years, Sister Fidelma would still have recognized the fact that such an exercise would have necessitated the participation of everyone in the dormitory.
She turned away with disappointment on her features.
“Tell me, Laisran, what lies below Wulfstan’s chamber?”
Laisran shook his head.
“I have had that thought also, Fidelma,” he confided. “Nothing but solid earth lies below. There is no cellar, nor tunnel. The stone flags are laid on solid ground, so no person could enter the chamber by removing one of the floor stones. Besides,” he smiled wryly, “what would Wulfstan have been doing during the commotion required to enter his chamber by the removing of the ceiling planks or floor slabs or the removal of the bars of the window?”
Sister Fidelma smiled.
“The pursuit of truth is paved by the consideration and rejection of all the alternatives, no matter how unlikely they may be, Lais-ran.”
“The truth,” replied the Abbot, looking troubled, “is that it was impossible for the hand of man to strike down Wulfstan while he was locked alone in his chamber.”
“Now that I
Abbot Laisran looked puzzled.
“I thought you said that no sorcery was employed. Do you mean that he was not killed by the hand of a man?”
“No,” grinned Sister Fidelma. “I mean that he was not alone in his chamber. It is a syllogism. “I mean that he has not alone in his chamber. It is a syllogism. Wulfstan was stabbed to death. Wulfstan was in his bedchamber. Therefore he was not alone in his bedchamber when he was killed.”
“But…”
“We have ruled out the argument that our murderer could have come through the window. Do you agree?”
Laisran frowned, trying hard to follow the logic.
“We have ruled out the possibility that our murderer could have entered the chamber through the roof.”
“Agreed.”
“We have concluded that it would be impossible for the murderer to enter via the stone-flagged floor.”
Abbot Laisran nodded emphatically.
“Then that leaves one obvious method of entry and exit.”
Now Laisran was truly bewildered.
“I do not see …” he began.
“The chamber door. That is how our murderer gained entry and how he left.”
“Impossible!” Laisran shook his head. “The door was secured from the inside.”
“Nevertheless, that was how it was done. And whoever did it hoped that we would be so bemused by this curiosity that we would not inquire too deeply of the motive, for he hoped the motive was one that was obvious to all: the hatred of Wulfstan and the Saxons. Ideas of sorcery, of evil spirits, of Wulfstan being slain by no human hand, might cloud our judgment, or so our killer desired it to do.”
“Then you know who the killer is?”
Fldelma shook her head.
“I have not questioned all the suspects. I think it is now time that we spoke with the Frankish prince, Dagobert.”
