Page 7 of Death at Inishmore Castle

That curiosity gets me into trouble all the time.

There was a license with his picture. I took a photo with my phone so I could look him up later.

“Wait,” I said. “When we were on the whiskey tour didn’t Nora’s husband call him Father Brennen?”

“I think so,” Rob said.

“I wonder why his license says Carl Doyle. That’s weird, right? Why would he change his name?”

“I think nuns do that when they marry God,” Rob said. “But I’m not sure about priests.”

“The bigger question is, why would someone kill him here? And the even bigger question is, why haven’t you called Kieran?” my sister asked. “And has anyone thought about the fact there is a murderer in the castle?”

As she finished her sentence, there was a big boom of thunder, and we all jumped.

“You’re right. We need to call Kieran,” I said, as I stuffed the wallet back in the robes. I used my flashlight to scan the room once again. There were several books on the desk, as if he’d been doing some kind of research and I wondered what that was about. Nothing was turned over. There was no sign of a struggle. It was as if someone had stabbed him in the chest, and then he sat down at the desk.

I checked the carpet with my flashlight, and there was blood spatter on the floor near the curtains behind the desk. There weren’t any footprints, but the killer wouldn’t have been able to avoid the blood spatter. It would be on their clothes.

“I don’t get it,” I said.

“What?” Rob asked.

The dead man’s hands were palms up and surprisingly clean. “I could see him not struggling if someone had stabbed him from behind. But he had to see it coming. So why didn’t he fight back? There should be defensive marks on his hands if he tried to stop the killer.”

“That’s something Kieran will need to figure out,” Lizzie said. “You need to call him. Now.”

It was time to bring the detective into the situation. Still, he would not be happy that we’d found another dead body. It had become common since we moved to the normally crime-free Shamrock Cove. We had a habit of showing up at the worst time.

Thunder rolled and there was a flash of lightning, and we all jumped again.

“This weather is wearing on my nerves,” Rob said.

“Same,” Lizzie said. “I’ll find Nora and her husband to tell them what is happening. Promise me you’ll let Kieran deal with this.”

I nodded.

“Rob, you stay here with Mercy and the body. I’ll go with Lizzie,” the always sensible Scott said. “Until we know what’s going on, I think we should travel in pairs.”

“That’s a good idea,” I said.

I dialed Kieran on my cell, but there was no ring, only odd clicking sounds like something couldn’t connect. “Darn,” I said.

“What’s wrong?”

“I don’t have any bars. How about you?”

He glanced down at his cell and shook his head.

“There’s a phone on the desk. Maybe they have a landline.” Using my tissue so that I didn’t mess up any prints, I gingerly picked up the receiver. There was no dial tone.

“Anything?” he asked.

I shook my head.

“What do we do?”

“I have no idea. If all the lines are out, and the internet is down, we’ll have no way of reaching him.”

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