“I am Fidelma of Cashel,” she announced.
“In the absence of Brehon Spélan it is I who will hear this case. Does anyone present object?”
There was a silence and she smiled dryly.
“Qui tacet consentit,” she intoned. Silence implies consent. “Let the plaintiff or the dálaigh for the plaintiff stand forward and state their case.”
A man with dark hair, short of stature but well muscled, with clothes that betrayed his calling-a leather jerkin and trousers-stood up hesitantly and coughed as if to clear his throat.
“We are poor folk in Críonchoill,” he began. “We can’t afford the ten séds that a lawyer would cost to represent us. I will speak for my family.”
Fidelma frowned.
“I presume that you are Fécho the smith?” On receiving a gesture of confirmation, she continued: “Before you commence, I would offer a word of advice. If you do not have funds to pay for legal representation, have you considered the possible outcome of legal action? If you cannot present a good case and I find it so then you have to pay the court fees, that is the aile déc, which is called the judge’s fee. And if your testimony is found false against him that you accuse, you may find yourself having to pay fines and compensation.”
Fécho compressed his lips and shuffled his feet as he stood before her.
“I have discussed the matter,” he waved his hand to encompass his entire family, “they have agreed that they will support me in this matter.”
“So long as you are aware of this fact,” Fidelma said. “I, myself, have to lodge five ounces of silver with this court to ensure that I carry out my duties as judge in an appropriate manner. If I do not, that is my loss. And if, on appeal, my decision is overturned because it is found in error, then I am fined one cumal-the value of three milch cows.”
She did not have to explain this but she saw the trusting and un-lettered people anxiously regarding her and felt that she had to make an effort to reassure them.
“Where is the defendant?”
The man who stood up was almost a replica of Fécho the smith, except his hair was a dirty, corn yellow. He, too, was tanned and muscular.
“I am Colla the wainwright,” he announced nervously.
“Understand, Colla, that what I have told Fécho also applies to you. If you are found guilty, you will have to pay the fines and the court costs. Do you understand?”
“I am not guilty and Fécho. .”
“You will have an opportunity to speak later,” she interrupted him sharply. “I am telling you the course of the law. I presume that you have no legal representation?”
“I do not.”
“Then having warned you of the consequence, I presume your fine, your kindred, are prepared to pay if the case goes against you?”
“But it will not. .” he began to protest.
A plump woman at his side tugged at his sleeve and said loudly: “The kindred are prepared to pay and will appeal if the judgment goes against us.”
“So long as you both understand. Colla the wainwright is classed, I see, as a chief expert wright, and his honor-price is adjudged in law as even greater than the highest grade of judge. Some twenty séds is the sum. Likewise, Fécho, the smith, is similarly classed as having an honor price of twenty séds.”
“We know this,” interrupted Colla brusquely. “The equality of our honor prices is why we exchanged the contract for this fosterage.”
Fidelma sighed softly and indicated that the wainwright should be reseated. It was little use explaining to him the etiquette of court procedure.
“Let us hear your case, Fécho. Keep only to the facts as you know them and do not indulge in any story that you have heard or cannot prove.”
The blacksmith ran a hand nervously through his hair.
“My son was called Enda and he was seven years old. I claim he was murdered.”
“Murdered?” Fidelma was startled. “I thought that this was a case of death by neglect?”
“So I thought at first until Tassach. .”
Fidelma raised a hand to still him.
“Let’s us begin at the beginning. You may start by telling me how Enda came to be in fosterage with Colla.”
“As a wainwright Colla was well known to me for he often brought work to my forge. His workshop is on the far side of the hill from my forge. It occurred to me that Colla, who has several children and two apprentices whom he instructs in his art of wagon making, would be the ideal person to foster my son. One month ago we agreed on this course of action.”
“And was this fosterage done for affection or for fee?”
Fécho shrugged.
“As we have explained, we are poor here, and so we agreed that I would supply my services without cost, if Colla fostered the child and taught him his arts.”
Fidelma nodded thoughtfully.
“And this, you say, was agreed just a month ago?”
“It was. A week ago, Colla came to me in his wagon. He told me that there had been an accident. That Enda, my son, had fallen into a pool near the house and drowned. That poor little Enda. .”
There was a sudden catch in the man’s throat.
“Take your time,” Fidelma advised him gently.
“Tell me what created the suspicion in your mind that this was not an accident as Colla maintained?”
“Things were blurred for a while. I was so shocked, and so was my wife, who even now remains at home prostrate with grief, for little Enda was our only child. I recall that Colla had brought the body of little Enda in his wagon and I lifted it down and carried it into my bothán. We sat a long time before the body. Colla had left. Then it was that my cousin Tassach arrived and he said. .”
“Just a moment. Who is Tassach, apart from being your cousin, and is he in this court?”
A stocky young man stood up.
“I am Tassach, learned Brehon. I am a physician as well as cousin to Fécho.”
“I see. In that case, we will interrupt Fécho’s testimony to hear what you said at this time.”
The young man gestured with his hand toward Fécho.
“I came to visit my cousin and found him and his wife kneeling before the body of little Enda, their only son. His little body was laid out on the table. They were upset; Fécho and his wife, that is. Fécho told me that the child had drowned while in the care of Colla. I was puzzled at this.”
“Puzzled? Why?”
“Because Enda swam like a fish. He was a strong little swimmer. I have seen him fight the torrents of the Siúr like a salmon racing upriver.”
“Even the strongest swimmers can sometimes have accidents and drown,” observed Fidelma.
“This is certainly true,” replied Tassach. “However, to drown in the pool by Colla’s house would take an accident of exceptional means.”
“You speak as if you know that pool?”
“This is a small community, learned Brehon. We all know one another and know the territory of our clan as we know the interior of our own bothán.”
“So you were suspicious and told Fécho so?”
“Not at once. I examined the body of Enda.”
Fidelma had been forming a theory that the claim was being brought by parents motivated by grief and hurt and not able to accept the loss of their only child. But with a physician involved, the evidence was changing. Fidelma turned her undivided attention on the physician.
“And, as a physician, what do you say was the result of your examination?”
“The child had the appearance of having been immersed in water, but on the back of his skull was an abrasion, a deep cut as though he had been hit from behind with something heavy. Perhaps a rock. I believe the child was dead before he was immersed.”