forty-one

The smell of rashers and coffee permeated Nathan’s house even though it was just gone noon. Danny’s stomach growled, but he staved it off with a sip of water from the glass that Zoe handed him.

“I didn’t know who else to call,” Zoe said. “I’m trying to entice him out of his room with good smells.”

Upstairs, O’Neil held a one-sided conversation with Nathan through the locked bedroom door.

“What happened?” Danny said.

Zoe grabbed the sizzling rashers off the stove and set them in the sink. The pan hissed. “I wish I knew. He locked himself in his room sometime last night and hasn’t come out.”

“Jesus, man, the smell of that would entice the dead,” O’Neil said as he entered the kitchen. “You mind?”

Zoe tossed him a fork. “Someone should eat it.”

O’Neil managed to talk and eat without appearing rude. “I can hear him pacing back and forth.”

“The question is whether he’s a danger to himself,” Danny said. “Zoe, stay here. Let’s not agitate him any more than we have to.”

Danny led O’Neil through Nathan’s studio and out the back door. A firing shed occupied most of the backyard. Nathan’s bedroom overlooked the yard from the second floor. Danny peered up to see Nathan fading back into the shadows.

O’Neil continued talking as they went on the hunt for a ladder. “I’m on to meet Merrit for dinner tomorrow tonight,” he said. “So you know.”

“She’s a material witness now that she’s found the murder weapon that killed Elder Joe. The sleán’s your priority, not Merrit.”

They’d gotten the lab results back. Someone had stabbed EJ with the sleán, which meant that someone had nicked it from Alan’s pub. Danny and the men would pass the next twenty-four hours talking to everyone who had entered the pub over the last few weeks.

A ladder leaned against the side of the house near the trash bins. O’Neil tilted and lowered one end while Danny picked up the other end. They maneuvered the ladder around the corner of the house and leaned it against the siding below Nathan’s window.

O’Neil anchored the legs into the soggy soil. “You know Merrit better than I do …”

He let the sentence hang. Danny didn’t oblige him by either confirming or denying the statement.

“It’s this,” O’Neil said. “Do you think she’d prefer Doolin for a night of good music or Ennis for a proper low-lit restaurant?”

“You’re treading thin, you daft prick.” Danny climbed the ladder while O’Neil braced it. “Have you thought about asking her?”

“No.”

“There’s your answer. She’ll have no qualms telling you which she’d prefer. I don’t want to hear any more about it. That’s an order.”

Danny peeked over the window trim. Nathan perched on the end of the bed, rocking in place. His blank expression spooked Danny. Also odd, Nathan’s slackness reminded him of the children when they slept. The smooth terrain of sleep, yet Nathan’s eyes were open.

Danny pried at the window but it didn’t budge. He hesitated and then tapped the glass. Nathan pressed his hands against his ears, muttering to himself.

“Grab a brick,” Danny said to O’Neil.

O’Neil picked one of the bricks piled up against the side of the firing shed and climbed partway up the ladder behind Danny to hand it to him. With a hard thrust, Danny shattered the window and reached in to unlock the latch, taking care not to cut his arm on the broken glass. The window opened easily once he unlocked it. Danny spilled his long body onto the floor.

Nathan gaped at Danny with slow-dawning awareness. “What are you about?”

“It’s gone twelve. You’ve been locked in this room since Christ only knows when.”

Nathan’s eyes shone a bleary blue from within taut, bruised skin and gaunt face. His gaze darted around the room, pausing on the bedside clock and jumping to the lock on the door.

“Painkillers.” He reached for the crutches propped next to his bed. “I’m not supposed to put weight on my toe.”

Danny let that lie go for now. Or the half lie, at least. Nathan’s toe may have been painful, but no way in bloody hell did a pain pill cause the fugue state that Danny had just witnessed.

Nathan crutched his way toward the door to unlock it. The smell of rashers rolled into the room along with Zoe, who wrapped her arms around Nathan. Nathan let her hug him.

“You frightened me silly,” she said when she let him go.

“I’m fine. Didn’t I say I was fine?”

“Not exactly.” She ushered Nathan down the stairs ahead of her with Danny in the rear. “Breakfast. You need breakfast.”

Nathan paused at the foot of the stairs while Zoe rushed ahead. “Did she call you to check up on me?”

“Yes,” Danny said.

Nathan peered into the kitchen, where Zoe laid a fresh portion of rashers in a pan with O’Neil loitering nearby. Instead of the kitchen, Nathan settled himself in the living room. Danny followed, more perplexed than ever by Nathan’s behavior.

“Zoe’s a social creature,” Nathan said. “Quite the chatter monkey, but she doesn’t say anything of substance. All those words with nothing to show for them.”

“I expect that’s good for you,” Danny said. “She keeps your secrets like a good daughter.”

“Good daughter.” Nathan pondered that for a moment with head tilted back and eyes on the ceiling. “Dutiful or doting are more precise, I think.”

And that was it. No explanation about the interior lock, no apologies for worrying Zoe, not even annoyance at the broken window.

Danny pulled a photo of the sleán out of his pocket. “Do you recognize this implement?”

“It looks familiar. What is it?”

“An antique turf cutter.”

“Right. Off Alan’s wall.”

“Look closer.”

Nathan squinted at the photo. “Is that blood?”

“Yes. Do you know anything about it?”

Nathan’s expression shuttered; that eerie slackness again. Danny almost shook him, but Nathan roused himself on his own. “Should I know something about it?”

“That’s my question to you.”

“I don’t know. My memory’s nothing but a sieve these days. Lack of sleep does that.”

“Did lack of sleep have anything to do with your stay in the psychiatric hospital?”

“You could say that, but I don’t see the point of your questions.”

Danny thought it was obvious enough. “Someone used this weapon to kill EJ.”

Nathan’s expression remained glassy-eyed and blank. “I can’t help you, I’m afraid.”

“When was the last time you saw the sleán?” Danny said.

“I don’t know. I remember it on Alan’s wall, though.”

Zoe arrived and arranged a breakfast tray on Nathan’s lap. Scrambled eggs, more rashers, and coffee.

“Eat, please.” Her attention caught on the photo that Nathan still held. She pulled it from his grasp and handed it back to Danny. “That’s nothing to do with him. He’s overtired from his antics last night. Let’s rest, shall we?”

Nathan’s gaze jumped around the room like it had in his bedroom. “Antics?”

Zoe returned to the kitchen.

“Did you go out last night?” Danny said.

“No.” Nathan peered down at his jeans, his jumper, his socks and shoes. “At least, I don’t think so. Zoe was referring to my usual restlessness at night.”

“Tell me about your psychiatric stay. Involuntary, wasn’t it?”

Nathan shoveled in a mouthful of eggs as if he hadn’t eaten in a week. Danny waited while Nathan finished the meal. At last, he sat back with a spark of life entering his eyes. “I had a mental breakdown.”

“Caused by?”

Nathan smiled. “They labeled me delusional and self-harming.” His smile faded. “I never agreed with their diagnosis. Here’s a tip: Best to go along with what the doctors say so that they’ll deem you sane.”

Out of the corner of his eye, Danny felt rather than saw Zoe hovering beyond the doorway. Nathan fell silent. A moment later, water gurgled from the kitchen taps.

“Would anyone like more coffee?” Zoe called.

“What did I tell you?” Nathan said. “Doting.”