Darcy shook his head, staring out past me. “Plenty. There were no visitors that evening and nobody in the castle except Mr. Roach’s manservant. Mrs. McNalley, who comes in to cook and clean, had already gone home for the night. Mr. Roach’s man went into the library to see if his master needed anything before he went to bed, saw signs of a struggle, and found Roach lying there with the back of his head stove in and an ancient battle club that had hung on the wall lying nearby, covered with blood. And when the Garda tested the club my father’s fingerprints were on it. Nobody else’s. Rather conclusive, wouldn’t you say?”

“But what does your father say?”

Darcy sighed. “The trouble is he can’t remember anything. I should have told you before, but after my mother died my father took to the bottle. That evening he drank himself into oblivion, judging by the empty Jameson bottle that was found on his kitchen table next morning. He remembered the argument earlier and even remembered telling Roach that one day he’d push my father too far. But the evening is a blank. He has no recollection of going to the castle and certainly not of killing Roach.”

“So he might not be guilty.”

Darcy gave a short and bitter laugh. “Do you think any jury would take drunkenness or amnesia as an excuse? His fingerprints were on the club. Nobody else’s.”

“Was there any blood on his clothing?” I asked.

“I have no idea.”

“Because if this Mr. Roach was hit with considerable force then it’s highly likely that at least one drop of blood spattered in the killer’s direction.”

Darcy looked at me and shook his head in disbelief. “Your royal relatives would swoon on the spot if they heard you saying that.”

“I’m trying to be helpful, Darcy. I’m trying to see if there is any remote possibility that your father was framed.”

“Framed? How could he have been framed?” He was shouting now and rooks rose cawing again.

“He would be the ideal person to pin this on, wouldn’t he? Turned out of his ancestral home. Accused of horse doping. Sacked from his position as trainer at the stables. And the recent argument when he threatened to kill this Mr. Roach. Such a strong motive for wanting Mr. Roach dead.”

“Exactly,” Darcy snapped. “So many reasons that any jury would find him guilty.”

“But if he wasn’t guilty?” I asked quietly.

He stared out past me, to where the distant shapes of horses galloped across the landscape. For a long while he said nothing. I could hear the distant thud of hoofbeats that faded away to silence.

“Do you believe with all your heart that he is guilty?” I asked. “From all that you know of your father?”