He sighed. “I don’t know, Georgie. I don’t know anything anymore. How can I do my best for my father if I’m constantly worrying about protecting you?”

“You don’t have to protect me. I’m a big girl. And if this whole thing had happened a day later, if there hadn’t been a snowstorm in Yorkshire, then I’d have been your wife by now and of course my place would be at your side. So let’s have no more talk about sending me back to London, all right?”

“I can see you’re going to be stubborn about this.”

“Absolutely right. I am. You can’t get rid of me that easily, Darcy O’Mara. I’ve wanted to marry you since the moment we first met. When you picked me up in a London café and told me to put on my posh frock because we were going to crash a wedding.”

“You should have refused me then. It would have saved you a lot of trouble.”

“What, and ended up married to Prince Fishface instead? That would have been a better option?”

We looked at each other and had to laugh.

“God, Georgie. What a mess.”

“We’ll get through it.” I took his hand and we walked on.

“So where do we start?” I asked after we had walked for a while in silence.

“I suppose the question would be who else might have a motive for wanting a reclusive American dead,” he said.

“His manservant?”

“Hired in America. Seemed intensely loyal. Quite broken up about his employer’s death.”

“What do we know about this Mr. Roach?” I asked.

“Not very much,” Darcy said. “I wasn’t around when my father declared bankruptcy and the castle and stables had to be sold to pay his debts. An American millionaire, I was told.”

“That’s all?”

“Apparently a reclusive type who had inherited money and wanted to go back to his Irish roots. Books and horses, those were his interests, so I heard. One of the reasons he bought this particular castle was that it came with both.”

“And his money came from where?”

“Family money. They built property in Chicago at the beginning of the century. He was the last survivor and inherited it all, I’m told.”

“Are there any valuable objects in the castle?” I asked.

Darcy frowned. “Apparently the rare books in the library are worth something. Maybe some of the portraits. But it’s not as if we had a Frans Hals or a Gainsborough.”

“And nothing was stolen? I was wondering if Mr. Roach interrupted a burglary in progress.”

“I don’t think anything was taken. The Garda nosed around a bit and found nothing suspicious.”

“The manservant heard nothing?”