‘Where does that lead? Is it still part of the abbey?’
‘It leads to a small tunnel under the walls of the city itself; an exit to the south west. In the old days, when all the nobles lived in the city, it used to be an escape route south to the great forests if the city was under attack.’
‘Is it still used?’
‘Not since I have been in the abbey. I have seen it, of course. All the bolts are on the inner side of the doors so that no one can enter without having someone with foreknowledge on this side of the door.’
Eadulf looked apprehensively around into the gloom. There seemed a faint light emanating from somewhere but he could not locate it. Brother Sigeric saw his wandering gaze and realised what he was looking for.
‘There is a faint light that issues through the vaults. It seems to come from some of the rocks that were in the roof of the original caverns. A sort of phosphorus, I think.’
‘And was Sister Valretrade ever concerned about coming alone to a place such as this to meet with you?’ Eadulf demanded, awe-struck at the magnitude of the vast vaults.
‘She knew the route well, so she was not worried. However, it was simpler for me to meet with her on the far side, which I will show you shortly.’
‘I was thinking,’ begun Eadulf, ‘as you were not there to meet her, that night when Dabhóc was killed, was there a possibility that she could have set off to come into the chapel, but that her candle blew out and she lost her way in the darkness?’
It was a grim thought but he felt it had to be voiced. However, Brother Sigeric dismissed it immediately.
‘There is no way. She knew the place too well. Also, we met by a special spot. If either of us went to that spot and the other did not turn up, then we moved a particular stone ornament so that the other might know we had been there. Then we returned to our chambers to rearrange our meeting. We had agreed never to go beyond that point.’
They had reached an area in which there seemed a series of small side rooms; in each of them was some sort of very ornate sarcophagus: Brother Sigeric halted before one of the rooms and motioned them inside.
‘This is where we met, and you see that little statuette there?’ He pointed to a miniature statuette of a little man with the legs of a goat and horns on his head, holding a set of pipes. Fidelma thought she had seen something similar before in Rome. ‘We used to place that on one side of the sarcophagus or the other to indicate that we had come here but not found the other. Of course, that did not happen often.’
He led them from the mausoleum and a short distance to where another flight of stone stairs ascended.
‘The doorway at the top leads directly into the Domus Femini,’ he told Fidelma, taking from his pocket a candle, which he handed to her. ‘You should not need this but if you do, use it only in an emergency. Valretrade told me that Abbess Audofleda allows the corridors to be lit with lanterns here and there. That can be a good thing or a bad thing. If you meet anyone…well, let us hope that they are all asleep.’
Fidelma silently admitted that she shared that hope.
‘I wish you’d let me come with you,’ Eadulf urged.
She shook her head immediately. ‘Don’t be silly. If I did run into anyone, it would be hopeless to disguise you as one of the Sisters. I will try to bluff them and hope that that works.’
Eadulf did not look convinced.
Fidelma drew out Brother Sigeric’s plan and studied it again.
‘The door above is not locked?’
‘Never to my knowledge,’ Brother Sigeric replied.
‘And it enters at this point, between the storeroom and the kitchen of the Domus Femini?’
‘It does.’
‘Then I shall delay no longer.’
‘We will wait for you here,’ Eadulf assured her.
Brother Sigeric pointed back to the meeting place that he had shown them.
‘We will make ourselves comfortable there until your return. It should not take you long to find the chamber of Inginde and Valretrade.’
Without another word, Fidelma climbed the stairs to the door. It was closed but she felt for the latch, and it opened easily. She glanced down to where the men were waiting, Brother Sigeric holding the lantern high to give her as much light as possible, then she raised her hand to them before stepping through the doorway and closing the door behind her.
She stood for a while, back against the door, waiting for her eyes to adjust to the gloom. She was determined to follow Brother Sigeric’s advice and not use the candle that she had now placed in her marsupium unless there was a need.
In fact, moonlight was filtering through a window somewhere, giving a strange soft blue light in the stone corridor before her. She moved forward determinedly, keeping the image of Brother Sigeric’s plan in her mind. The plan was, indeed, accurate for there were no surprises to confront her and, thankfully, all the corridors appeared to be deserted.
She had no problems traversing the large hall that appeared to be the women’s calefactorium. Then she had to choose the right-hand passageway, which led to a stairway going up to the next level. There Fidelma paused to examine the plan by the light of a lantern hanging from a metal arm on the corner and which lit the divergence in the passageway. According to Brother Sigeric’s directions she must bear to the right and then climb up another circular stone stairwell to the next level, before turning left. Three doors along would land her at the chamber that Sister Valretrade had shared with Sister Inginde.
Folding the map, she thrust it back into her marsupium and moved cautiously forward. The only thing that worried her was, if Sister Valretrade had truly been moved, would Sister Inginde have a new companion in her chamber? But it was a risk that she felt was worth the taking.
She reached the circular stairwell easily enough and had her foot on the bottom step when she heard a sound above her. Someone was coming down. Thankfully they were moving slowly, but the light from their candle was casting its glow downwards. Fidelma froze, her mind racing, and then she retreated, searching desperately for some place to hide from the oncoming figure. There was none-and no time to get back to the entrance of this corridor before the person reached the bottom step.
Pulling her hood over her head, she drew her robe around her and turned, pretending to be walking towards the stairwell just as the figure emerged.
The figure halted and raised the candle carried before it.
From beneath her hood Fidelma saw that it was an old woman, an elderly member of the community. The candle was held in a skeletal and shaking hand. The eyes were wide and vacant-looking, and the mouth was slack. Fidelma took a quick decision.
‘Bene vobis,’ she intoned hollowly as she moved past the old woman.
‘Blessings on you, Sister,’ the elderly woman mumbled in reply as she stood aside.
Heaving a deep sigh, Fidelma ascended the spiral stairs quickly and moved up into the darkness. She paused at the next floor, listening, and heard the sounds of the old woman shuffling along the corridor. There was no cry of alarm nor quickening of pace which could have meant that she had been recognised as an interloper. Fidelma waited a moment more and then peered in the gloom along the row of doors, counting them until she identified the right one.
This would now be the most dangerous moment, in her estimation.
If it was the wrong door, if Sister Inginde had been moved or if someone else had been moved in with her…If! What was the saying that she had heard once? ‘With an “if” one could place Rome in a bottle.’ No time for an ‘if’ now. Pushing back her hood, she moved quickly to the door. Pausing, she listened for a moment. All was quiet.
Reaching for the handle, she turned it slowly, scarcely daring to breathe. It opened noiselessly and she slipped inside, closing the door behind her.