Princes of Ireland - Edward Rutherfurd [188]
Because you usually do, Una thought; but instead she said, “He really means it this time, Fionnuala. He’ll send you home to your parents. Is that what you want?”
“You’ll look after me.”
Yes, thought Una, I always do. And perhaps I shouldn’t. Fionnuala was loveable because she was funny and good-hearted—when she wasn’t quarrelling with her mother—and somehow when you were with her, life seemed brighter and more exciting, because you never knew what was going to happen next. But when a man as kind as Ailred the Palmer ran out of patience …
“I’ll be good, Una. I promise.”
No you won’t, Una could have screamed. You won’t at all. And we both of us know it.
“Look, Una,” Fionnuala suddenly cried. “Apples.” And with her long, dark hair flying behind her, she was running across the little marketplace towards a fruit stall.
How could Fionnuala behave the way she did? Especially when you considered who her father was. The Ui Fergusa might long ago have ceased to be a power in the land, but people still looked up to them with respect. Their little monastery on the slope above the dark pool had been wound up some while ago and the chapel converted into a small parish church for the family and their dependants; but as head of the family, Fionnuala’s father, Conn, was the priest and was much respected. With his ancient position and his ancestral lands in the area, he was treated with courtesy by the King of Dublin and by the archbishop equally. With his tall, stately presence and his dignified way of speaking, Una had always held him in awe. But she was sure he was kindly. She couldn’t imagine him mistreating Fionnuala. How could Fionnuala think of doing anything to let him down?
Her mother, admittedly, was another matter. She and Fionnuala were always fighting. She wanted her daughter to do one thing; Fionnuala wanted to do something else. But Una wasn’t sure she blamed the mother for the constant rows. “If I were your mother I’d slap you,” she’d several times told her friend. Two years ago, however, the friction in the household up by the little church had become so bad that it had been agreed that Fionnuala should reside during the week with Ailred the Palmer and his wife. And now even Ailred had had enough.
Una sighed. It would be hard to imagine any nicer people. Everyone in Dublin loved the rich Norseman whose family had owned the big farmstead out in Fingal for so long. His mother had come from a Saxon family who’d left England after the Norman conquest and she had given him the English name of Ailred; but she was blue-eyed like her husband, and Ailred looked just like his red-haired Norwegian ancestors. He was generous and kindly. And he was religious.
The Irish had always made pilgrimages to holy places. There were many holy sites in Ireland. If they went across the seas, they might journey as far as the great shrine of Saint James at Compostela in Spain. But a few, a very few, had gone all the way on the perilous journey to the Holy Land, and if they reached Jerusalem they would enter the Holy City holding a palm. Upon their return, such a pilgrim would be known as a “Palmer.” Ailred had done this.
And God it seemed had rewarded him. As well as the big farmstead in Fingal, he had other lands. He had a loving wife. But then their only son, Harold, had gone on pilgrimage, it was said, and never returned. Five years had passed. No word had come; and his unhappy parents had finally accepted that they would not see him again. Perhaps it was to compensate for this loss that Ailred and his comfortable wife had started a hospital on a piece of land he owned just outside the city gate where the ancient Slige Mhor came in from the west. As a pilgrim he had often seen such places, where the sick could be tended and weary travellers could rest; but until now there had never been such a facility at Dublin. He and his wife spent much of their time there nowadays. He named it the Hospital of Saint John the Baptist.
But despite all this activity, Una suspected that Ailred and his wife