Verdict of the Court Read Online Free PDF Page B

the girl would never relax, she thought, as she said aloud, ‘Come up to the solar with me and I’ll give you all the news. I was going to ask you if you had any ideas about getting scholars for Nuala’s school. She has a great desire to set up a school for young physicians, just as I have a school for young lawyers.’
    ‘I thought that she already had a pupil,’ said Donogh O’Hickey, with a quick sidelong glance at Mara.
    ‘That’s right,’ said Mara readily. ‘But he is almost ready to qualify and she would like a group of young people to instruct. She is a very good teacher,’ she went on earnestly. ‘I remember her explaining to my young scholars how deaths such as Roman Claudius and King Henry I of England, who both died after eating a hearty meal supposedly poisoned by an enemy, might just have been caused by the food itself. Claudius who was supposed to have been poisoned by his wife had just eaten a dish of mushrooms,’ said Mara with a reminiscent smile. ‘Nuala told the boys how a poisonous fungus that looks just like a mushroom could have accidentally got into the dish, and the first of the many Henrys might well have been poisoned by the dangerous innards of the lampreys, so that rather than having a surfeit of them, or being poisoned by his nephew Stephen, as the story goes, he might just have been a victim to a careless cook. She is a wonderful teacher – the boys were testing poisonous fungi on trapped bluebottle flies for weeks after. She makes everything very interesting to them. I always get her to talk to them about the medical aspects of Brehon law.’
    ‘So she is still keen on the idea of a school.’ Donogh O’Hickey gave an indulgent smile.
    ‘That’s right,’ said Mara immediately. ‘And she has two little girls who will be trained up in the ways of medicine.’
    ‘Girls,’ said Donogh O’Hickey, making a slight face. ‘What a pity that she did not have a boy.’
    Mara bit back a sharp report. It was amazing, she thought, that someone like Donogh O’Hickey, who knew that Nuala was probably the cleverest, the hardest-working and the highest-achieving of any of his scholars, would still think like that. She thought thankfully of her father, who had made the best of having no son and had trained his daughter to be a lawyer.
    ‘Tell me, how are things going here?’ she queried politely. ‘Brehon MacClancy does not seem in too good a mood. Is there something wrong?’
    She had not expected him to tell her anything very much out here where people were passing continually and she was not surprised when he shrugged his shoulders and then began to talk hurriedly about the meal which was to be held to celebrate her arrival. She wondered what was going wrong in this castle that both he and the Brehon appeared to be tense and on edge. I must ask Turlough about it, she decided. But in the meantime she would try and get some more out of the physician so she invited him to join her in the solar for a drink. They could talk privately there, she thought.
    ‘I must just make sure that everything is in order for the boys,’ she said by way of excuse. He would have expected her to go straight to the great hall, but a private conversation there would be impossible.
    By the time they went up the stairs, the majority of the castle guests were going for a midday meal in the great hall. As she passed the great hall, Mara could see Rosta in the small kitchen beside the hall rushing to and fro, firing orders at his helpers. This was a very busy time for the King’s cook, but the look on his face told her that he was enjoying himself immensely. He was a man who loved his art and loved to display what he was capable of. Although the Christmas night banquet would take place in six hours’ time, the meal being carried in looked every bit as elaborate as the feast last night.
    ‘There’s something in the solar for you, Brehon, if you would prefer it,’ he called out, seeing her pass his small