I laughed too. It was a wonderful feeling that we were coconspirators, two of us against the world.

“How long will she be, do you think?” I asked. “Is there something else we should be doing while we wait?”

Darcy stared at the lift into which she had disappeared. “I don’t see what else we can do until we know who the dead man really was. That was a turnup for the books, wasn’t it? He comes to Ireland with enough money to buy a castle. . . .”

“And enough know-how to get a passport in the name of a dead man. That must indicate he’s a criminal, don’t you think?”

“Either that or a very rich man who needs to escape for some reason.”

“Like what?”

“He’s murdered his wife? He was involved in a scandal and he’s faking his own death?”

“Oh yes. Good point. And anyone rich enough can pay for most things. But if he was rich wouldn’t he be well-known? Wouldn’t he worry about being recognized and having somebody say, ‘You’re not Timothy Roach, you are . . .’”

“Which is why he acted the recluse,” Darcy finished for me.

“But he went to race meetings. We know that.”

“Maybe just to the stable area, though. Maybe he never appeared in the grandstand or the paddock where he might have been recognized.”

“So . . .” I was warming to this subject now. “We need to know of any scandals among the rich in the last few years. Any millionaires who disappeared and were presumed dead. That shouldn’t be too hard to find out. And Chief Inspector Callahan has photographs he’s going to give to the American embassy. There’s a good chance someone will recognize him.”

“But none of this alters the fact that my father’s prints were the only ones on the club,” Darcy said. He stared past me, out to the front door where a lively party had just entered, laughing as if they hadn’t a care in the world.

“There may be an explanation for that too,” I said.

“Such as?”

“What if the club was not the weapon? What if it was left beside the corpse and the real weapon was destroyed or hidden? Surely your father would have handled the club sometime. Maybe he showed it to somebody. Took it down from the wall and it has his prints on it.”

“Then how would the real killer know to plant that particular weapon, chosen from all of them, on the wall? A little far-fetched, I’m afraid.”

“What about an interrupted burglary?” I said. “That’s not far-fetched. It’s all too plausible. Drat. We should have brought up the possibility of burglary when we were speaking to the detective inspector. He should let you look around the castle to see if anything has been taken.”