marriage.’
‘Really,’ said Mara. ‘I didn’t know that.’
That was enough for Brigid. She herself and her husband Cumhal belonged to the O’Connor clan and would know it, seed, breed and generation, as she put it herself. She was a woman who loved to impart knowledge, to pass on gossip and, above all, she liked to be asked to have a hand in the law business of the kingdom.
‘Why would you?’ she said immediately. ‘Gobnait would be a good ten years older than you. You wouldn’t have been interested.’
‘Gobnait,’ mused Mara, ‘it’s an unusual name. I haven’t heard of it before in these regions, but there was a Gobnait once, way back, a thousand years or so. She was an abbess, with a convent full of nuns, this Gobnait. Anyway, an army was approaching and coming very near to these holy nuns, so what did Gobnait, the abbess, do? Well, she released swarm after swarm of bees, a hundred thousand of them, the story tells, and they flew, straight as an arrow, towards the army and the soldiers could not stand up to them and they fled and the noise of their shrieks of pain filled the plain of Ireland. That’s how the story goes.’
‘Sounds like this Gobnait,’ said Brigid smiling. ‘A tough woman. I can just imagine her sending a swarm of bees after you if you annoyed her. I knew her mother well and she was a tough woman, also. Gobnait is the living image of her. She was well trained by her mother in spinning and weaving and they say that she was the one that pushed Cathal into making the offer for the flax garden and she was the one that made a success of it. Wouldn’t be easily robbed of that place, Brehon, that’s what I say.’
Brigid looked meaningfully at Mara and then, as if she feared she was saying too much, she backed away and went out of the small house.
‘I wanted to talk to you about this injury,’ said Nuala as soon Brigid had gone out and shut the door behind her. ‘It’s a bit difficult to explain –’ she frowned thoughtfully – ‘it’s not something that I have been taught exactly but I noticed it first a few years ago when father was called to a farm to attend to a man who had been gored by a bull, though he was dead by the time that we arrived. The wife of the farmer had sent someone for Malachy and I went along with him. I suppose I was only about twelve at the time,’ said fifteen-year-old Nuala and Mara smiled briefly, remembering the long-legged, dark-eyed child lugging around the heavy leather medical bag belonging to her grandfather.
‘The bull was still in the field and the farm workers could not get it away from the body for quite a while. I saw the animal toss the poor man again and again, until eventually they managed to drive it away and lock it up. But – and this is the strange thing – although the man had been gored again and again, there were gouged out places all over his body, but only one of these holes seemed to have bled much. I remember asking father whether blood didn’t gush out after someone is dead – he said he didn’t know – that’s what he usually said to me. But from then on I kept an eye on dead bodies and I even did a little experiment with one by cutting a vein when no one was around and that proved to me that, after death, blood doesn’t really flow. And I also found out that the longer after death the cut occurs, the less blood there is.’
Mara looked at her attentively. Nuala was a true professional. She had a huge admiration for the girl patiently experimenting with no help given to her by her strange father, Malachy O’Davoren.
‘Why I’m telling you this is because I know you have to find out what happened to Eamon,’ continued Nuala. ‘I think that someone killed him.’ Once again she pulled down the cloak and showed the terrible bruise at the base of the neck. ‘This injury killed him, I think. The thyroid cartilage here is one of the spots that is most vulnerable. Someone pressed their thumbs in here and
‘Really,’ said Mara. ‘I didn’t know that.’
That was enough for Brigid. She herself and her husband Cumhal belonged to the O’Connor clan and would know it, seed, breed and generation, as she put it herself. She was a woman who loved to impart knowledge, to pass on gossip and, above all, she liked to be asked to have a hand in the law business of the kingdom.
‘Why would you?’ she said immediately. ‘Gobnait would be a good ten years older than you. You wouldn’t have been interested.’
‘Gobnait,’ mused Mara, ‘it’s an unusual name. I haven’t heard of it before in these regions, but there was a Gobnait once, way back, a thousand years or so. She was an abbess, with a convent full of nuns, this Gobnait. Anyway, an army was approaching and coming very near to these holy nuns, so what did Gobnait, the abbess, do? Well, she released swarm after swarm of bees, a hundred thousand of them, the story tells, and they flew, straight as an arrow, towards the army and the soldiers could not stand up to them and they fled and the noise of their shrieks of pain filled the plain of Ireland. That’s how the story goes.’
‘Sounds like this Gobnait,’ said Brigid smiling. ‘A tough woman. I can just imagine her sending a swarm of bees after you if you annoyed her. I knew her mother well and she was a tough woman, also. Gobnait is the living image of her. She was well trained by her mother in spinning and weaving and they say that she was the one that pushed Cathal into making the offer for the flax garden and she was the one that made a success of it. Wouldn’t be easily robbed of that place, Brehon, that’s what I say.’
Brigid looked meaningfully at Mara and then, as if she feared she was saying too much, she backed away and went out of the small house.
‘I wanted to talk to you about this injury,’ said Nuala as soon Brigid had gone out and shut the door behind her. ‘It’s a bit difficult to explain –’ she frowned thoughtfully – ‘it’s not something that I have been taught exactly but I noticed it first a few years ago when father was called to a farm to attend to a man who had been gored by a bull, though he was dead by the time that we arrived. The wife of the farmer had sent someone for Malachy and I went along with him. I suppose I was only about twelve at the time,’ said fifteen-year-old Nuala and Mara smiled briefly, remembering the long-legged, dark-eyed child lugging around the heavy leather medical bag belonging to her grandfather.
‘The bull was still in the field and the farm workers could not get it away from the body for quite a while. I saw the animal toss the poor man again and again, until eventually they managed to drive it away and lock it up. But – and this is the strange thing – although the man had been gored again and again, there were gouged out places all over his body, but only one of these holes seemed to have bled much. I remember asking father whether blood didn’t gush out after someone is dead – he said he didn’t know – that’s what he usually said to me. But from then on I kept an eye on dead bodies and I even did a little experiment with one by cutting a vein when no one was around and that proved to me that, after death, blood doesn’t really flow. And I also found out that the longer after death the cut occurs, the less blood there is.’
Mara looked at her attentively. Nuala was a true professional. She had a huge admiration for the girl patiently experimenting with no help given to her by her strange father, Malachy O’Davoren.
‘Why I’m telling you this is because I know you have to find out what happened to Eamon,’ continued Nuala. ‘I think that someone killed him.’ Once again she pulled down the cloak and showed the terrible bruise at the base of the neck. ‘This injury killed him, I think. The thyroid cartilage here is one of the spots that is most vulnerable. Someone pressed their thumbs in here and
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