“We did that.” Paddy was still beaming, then his smile faded. “I’m terrible sorry to hear what’s happened to your dad,” he said. “Most around here think it’s a terrible shame.” He looked around. “There’s not a person here who wanted to see the castle go out of O’Mara hands in the first place and that American man was never welcome here. Never wanted to have anything to do with the local community. All his food was shipped in from Dublin. Never so much as bought a loaf of bread here. And never showed his face in the village. It was said he wanted to come back to his Irish roots, but not once did he come down to the Harp and meet the local men.”

Darcy nodded, then he said, “Paddy, you wouldn’t happen to know where there might be a vehicle I could borrow? My father’s estate car is locked away in the garage at the big house and the Garda won’t let anyone in or out.”

Paddy frowned. “I’d let you borrow mine but I have urgent need of it myself right now. My wife, Maureen, is about to give birth to our third child any day now. And she didn’t have an easy time of it with the last one. So I’m thinking we might be dashing for the hospital in Kildare.”

“Of course. I quite understand,” Darcy said. “Three children already. Fancy that.”

“You’ve been slacking, I can see.” Paddy laughed. “You’ve got some catching up to do.” Then he held up a finger. “Wait a minute. I know where you’d find a vehicle. I saw your uncle Dooley the other day and he was being driven by their old butler and he said they had to give the motorcar an airing occasionally as they hardly got out anymore.”

“Uncle Dooley. Brilliant. Why didn’t I think of that! I suppose we could walk to their place but the weather is not exactly inviting at the moment.”

“I can take you over there myself if you don’t mind waiting while I complete my errands,” Paddy said. “I need to pick up a sack of chicken feed and some fence wire, then I’m going past Mountjoy.”

“That would be marvelous,” Darcy said and I noticed his voice had started to have an Irish lilt to it. “You live out that way yourself now, do you?”

“I do. I’ve taken over the small holding my grandfather used to have. Nothing much but we’ve a few cows and chickens and we grow barley.”

“But weren’t you working at the stables before?”

“I was until it was taken over. When I questioned the way something was being done Mr. Roach told me to get out. Can’t say I was sorry to leave either. I didn’t like the feel of things there anymore.”