The Darkling Bride

by Laura Andersen

  “I’m Inspector McKenna, Ms. Gallagher. I am sorry about this, but my business is with unsolved crimes. I’m sure you can appreciate that this one looms rather large in our conscience.”

  “A cold case, isn’t that what they call it? I can’t imagine what you think can be learned now.”

  “New eyes, new information…one never knows. As this is the first time since 1992 that family has been gathered at the castle, it seemed convenient to do this now. We’ll need to speak to each of you in turn, if you don’t mind.”

  “If I do mind?”

  The woman might be privileged and elderly, but Sibéal was cowed by no one. “Then my job will be harder, and you will lose the opportunity to tell your story first.”

  She held her breath. Nessa Gallagher looked the sort to cause trouble if she felt others were being less than respectful. But she also looked intelligent, and Sibéal’s reasoning won out. “Is there a particular order in which you’d like to speak to us, Inspector?”

  “Might as well begin with you.” Better to do it at once than allow this self-possessed woman to armor herself even more thoroughly.

  As if she knew Sibéal’s reasoning, Nessa Gallagher gave a slight, scornful smile and escorted them to a less enormous but no less imposing room. A music room, for there was a harp, what Sibéal thought was a spinet, and a grand piano of more recent vintage. She sat directly facing Nessa in a matching set of black painted chairs with faded embroidery seats. Cullen sat to her side and a little withdrawn, to be less obtrusive in his note taking.

  Sibéal opened her own notebook, with the relevant facts and a few loose lines of questioning already written. “Tell me about your nephew’s wife, Lily Gallagher.”

  If Nessa thought that an unexpected beginning, she didn’t show it. “As lovely and charming as a butterfly, and approximately as responsible.”

  “You didn’t like her.”

  “Does my liking enter into it? If so, then please note that I liked Lily quite a lot.” Nessa sat perfectly still, hands in her lap, the overly decorative cane resting against the chair. “It was impossible not to like Lily. That did not change the fact that she was not entirely suitable for the marriage she had made. Her flightiness caused some damage.”

  “What sort of damage?”

  “Beyond getting herself and her husband killed?”

  Ten points to Gryffindor, Sibéal thought. Or, more likely, Slytherin. (She’d been reading Harry Potter with her daughter for several months.)

  “You think Lily was responsible for the murders? How, exactly?”

  “It was Lily who wanted to see the antiquities the Gallaghers have collected over generations. It was for her sake that Cillian arranged to have them brought to the castle that week. Winthrop, the solicitor, was not happy about it—nor were the insurance adjustors; there’s a reason we’ve never filed for compensation—but Lily nearly always got what she wanted.”

  “So you think, as the police apparently did, that it was a crime of opportunity that went badly wrong. What do you believe happened to those antiquities afterward? They haven’t surfaced in twenty-three years.”

  “Truth be told, Inspector, I spent as little time thinking about it as possible. I had two children on my hands in the aftermath, both traumatized and angry, and all my efforts went to raising them to be a credit to their family. It may seem heartless to you, but what was done, was done. Cillian and Lily were gone. The why seemed…less relevant than the mere fact of it.”

  “If it was not a robbery gone wrong, then it would be irresponsible of me not to consider every possibility. Double-murder, murder-suicide, murder-accident…but such domestic crimes do not erupt from nothing. And yet, there was no hint of any serious discord in the marriage itself. Unless there was information you did not choose to share at the time?”

  Grudgingly, Nessa conceded, “No. Cillian adored Lily. Even when exasperated with her, he never gave her cause to doubt his loyalty and affection. And for certain he never hurt or threatened her, if that is what you mean.”

  “Did Lily ever give him cause to doubt her loyalty? You told the police at the time that she was…” Sibéal pretended to look at her notes for the phrase she had actually memorized. “ ‘…a natural flirt who didn’t always know where to draw the line.’ But you declined to provide the name of any man with whom Lily might have been seriously involved. Has anyone specific come to mind in the last twenty years?”

  Sibéal was enjoying this; maybe too much, she reflected. It wasn’t always a good idea to antagonize a witness. Though Nessa didn’t seem antagonized so much as wary. Interesting.

  “I assure you, Inspector, if I had thought of anything that would have led to resolution for my great-niece and -nephew, I should have contacted the police at once. It is a cruel thing to lose both parents at one stroke.”

  Sibéal nodded noncommittally. Deciding to stop here for the moment—let Nessa think she’d controlled the interview—she added, “Thank you for your time. I’d like to see your great-niece next. And I’d prefer you not speculate with anyone about our discussion.”

  “I wouldn’t dream of it.”

  She slanted a look at Cullen as the woman exited and said, “A bit too much protesting on her part. So Nessa Gallagher doesn’t believe that the crimes were robbery gone wrong. Sarcastic and defensive. Is that pertinent, or simply a feature of her personality?”

  “Of her upbringing, more like. She comes from the days when class mattered.”

  “It doesn’t matter now?”

  “You know what I mean,” Cullen answered. “Nessa Gallagher was born in the Old World. She grew up in this castle with probably a dozen servants and a father who never had to work a day in his life. She can hardly help being arrogant.”

  “I almost think you like her.”

  The sergeant snorted. “She might have been born to her arrogance, but that’s no excuse for rudeness.”

  “Let’s see if Kyla Gallagher tempers her arrogance with better manners.”

  Kyla Gallagher did have manners of a more engaging sort than her great-aunt. But Sibéal quickly realized that the woman was very nearly as guarded. She simply hid it with a flow of words and a rueful air of wanting to help and sorry that she couldn’t. Tall and even better-dressed than her great-aunt, Kyla’s copper-brown hair was pinned up in a deceptively casual French twist. Sibéal knew that if she tried to adopt the same style, it would be all messy ends and loose strands.

  “I was so young,” Kyla told them, as though confiding a great secret. “Well, at the time I thought I was very grown-up and knew everything. Fifteen-year-olds do, you know. In my case, I’m afraid it meant I’d been fighting with my mother for some months. Normal adolescent things—she didn’t like my clothes, I thought she was controlling, all the things mothers and daughters fight over. We would have got over it with time. Sadly, we didn’t have more time.”

  “Did you notice anything in your mother’s behavior in the month or so before the deaths that was…different? Out of character?”

  “My mother always had changeable moods and interests. She would take up knitting with religious fervor, only to abandon it three months later for gardening. She always had a passion, but nothing held her interest for long.”

  “What was her passion that summer?”

  “Gallagher history,” Kyla answered promptly. “Drove me mad chattering about the castle and our various ancestors. She seemed determined to authenticate as many of the stories as possible, so they wouldn’t be forgotten or changed too much in future. I also remember her going on about the Darkling Bride and the many variations in that legend. She wanted to find the truth of it if she could.”

  “The Darkling Bride?” Cullen queried.

  Kyla turned her practiced smile on the sergeant. “It’s a mainly Celtic legend; you’ll find versions of it throughout Ireland and Scotland. Wales, parts of Cornwall and Brittany. The Wicklow version had some unique details that my mother hoped could be substantiated, used to show th
at our local legend derived from an actual history.”

  “How did your father feel about that project?” Cullen asked. “Was it something over which your parents disagreed? Perhaps he did not care for her digging in his family’s past.”

  For the first time, Sibéal saw a flicker of real feeling in the eyes of the woman before her. So Kyla wasn’t entirely immune to her loss. “In my memory, my parents never disagreed. It was a happy marriage, insofar as a child could tell. If you’re thinking that my father was so enraged by my mother’s foray into his family history that she was driven to kill him and then herself…no. Never over something so trivial.”

  So Kyla knew about the gossip that claimed the deaths were a murder-suicide. Taking back the reins of the interview, Sibéal asked, “What about something less trivial?”

  “Like money, or cheating, or drugs? You’d have to ask someone else. I never saw it. And children, for all their self-absorption, are aware of emotional undercurrents. Just ask my girls about the state of my marriage, if you don’t believe me,” she said bitterly. “If my parents were half as unhappy as I have been, I would have known it.”

  Now that was information to take note of, seeing as Kyla’s husband had also been at Deeprath Castle in 1992. Philip Grant had been a twenty-one-year-old intern to her father, and according to the records, was a troublesome presence as far as the fifteen-year-old girl was concerned. Sibéal had a great deal of interest in Philip, and if his marriage to Kyla was faltering, that might give her a wedge she could use in the future.

  “What do you think happened to your parents?”

  After a moment, Kyla said, “Someone murdered them both, Inspector. I don’t know who, and I don’t know why. But my mother was no coward. She might have hit my father with something—in a moment of madness, even—but she would have admitted it. Not jumped off the tower and left us to cope all alone.”

  * * *

  —

  Mrs. Bell delivered the news of the police’s arrival to Aidan sotto voce in the library. He was surprised by his instant surge of adrenaline, considering that he’d known they were coming, and he stared sightlessly at the tray of tea and scones the housekeeper had left behind for long minutes. He had forgotten he had company. When he finally looked up, he saw that Carragh was regarding him steadily.

  “Are you all right?” she asked.

  “Of course. It’s just a few questions, after all.”

  “I’m sure all they want is to go over your testimony from before. You were just a boy, they don’t expect much from children.” Spoken as though she knew.

  “That’s just it,” he said almost without thinking. “I realized last night that I don’t remember giving a statement back then.”

  “I thought…Didn’t you find your father?”

  “Yes, I did, and yes, I should have been questioned. Surely I was, a little. I remember sitting with Nessa and a policeman from Rathdrum. I don’t remember anything else.”

  “Well, maybe these people will help you remember. They’ll have all the evidence and stuff. Whatever.” She shrugged.

  He smiled at that. “Yes. Whatever.”

  But a growing sense of unease followed him to the music room when he was finally summoned.

  There were two detectives waiting: a man about his own age, with fairish hair and a ready smile, and a woman with serious brown eyes who offered her hand.

  “Inspector McKenna,” she said. “We spoke on the phone yesterday. And Sergeant Cullen. Thank you for your time.”

  “Am I to assume this is a result of my asking for evidentiary materials in my parents’ case? You didn’t say when you rang.” He knew he sounded pompous and overbearing.

  She was undaunted. “Coincidence, believe it or not. I was assigned your case shortly before hearing from your solicitor.”

  “So you’re not going to return the things I asked for? May I at least ask if you have them?”

  “We have letters written to both of them, as well as your father’s account book.”

  “But you won’t return my mother’s diary?”

  “We don’t have it. The police never did, there’s no mention of a diary or journal. Are you sure it hasn’t simply been misplaced?”

  “I’ve looked.”

  “Everywhere? That could take weeks.” He saw a flicker of sardonic humor as her eyes took in the space of the music room.

  Only if it was hidden, Aidan thought. And why would it have been? “Why has the case been reopened now?” he asked.

  “I’m sure you can figure it out, Detective Inspector Gallagher.”

  He didn’t flinch. “Because it’s technically unsolved, whatever fuss the police made of the stolen antiquities and possible assassin-thieves. Because the deaths occurred within and without this castle, and the castle will soon be handed over to bureaucrats at the National Trust. And probably because you are new and so they gave you a case that’s not a high priority.”

  “That’s not very flattering.”

  “For me, either. It means no one really cares about what happened here. Except us.”

  “I care.”

  When she said it, he believed her. For whatever reason—probably more than one, including advancing her career—Sibéal McKenna was committed to solving this case.

  “Then ask your questions,” he said. “Inspector.”

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Carragh would never have expected anything could distract her from the glory that was the Deeprath library. Turned out a police investigation was sufficient.

  After Aidan left, she wasted an hour before she realized that she hadn’t taken a single legible note about the current shelf she was studying. Guiltily deciding that there was no use working when she couldn’t concentrate, she left her notes on the long table and allowed herself to simply browse.

  She’d located the Victorian novels section yesterday and now indulged to her heart’s content. The chief find was a complete set of first edition Anthony Trollope novels—forty-seven altogether—including all of the Palliser series and the Chronicles of Barsetshire. Sitting cross-legged on the floor, she immersed herself in the domestic worries of Framley Parsonage, of which Trollope himself had said, “There is much church, but more lovemaking.” She only stopped reading when the light grew too dim to make out the type on the 150-year-old pages, reminding her that she was supposed to be working.

  Floor and table lamps had been brought into the library, and Carragh turned them all on. She hoped the electrical circuits could take the strain. If there was a power cut, as Nessa had suggested often happened, she’d have to wander around the place with a flashlight. She managed to work her way to completion of the first two bays, which fortunately retained their order from the days of the fifteenth viscount (Greek translations, French philosophers, and, intriguingly, the American Revolution). She admired an English translation of The Iliad by John Dryden, three early printings of Candide in Voltaire’s original French, and a copy of The Federalist Papers that appeared to have been signed by John Jay, James Madison, and Alexander Hamilton. She set that last one aside for Aidan to decide whether to keep in the family or donate.

  Blinking to loosen the muscles around her eyes, she turned off the multitude of lamps and weighed asking Aidan if she could take Framley Parsonage to her room, then decided just to do it. He had not reappeared—nor had she seen anyone—since he’d left to talk with the police. That was hours ago. She was pretty sure the Gallagher family had other things to worry about than her borrowing one Victorian novel.

  She had her own worries for tonight: her presence had been requested at dinner, perhaps due to Aidan overriding his great-aunt’s protocol. What did one wear to attend dinner in a castle with a viscount and two ladies, especially when one’s presence might not be wholly welcome?

  Carragh would have called or texted Francis or her sister-in-law Abbie for advice, except that Lady Nessa had not exaggerated the lack of mobile signals at Deeprath. Aidan had told her that one could usually be picke
d up where the drive met the road, but that was almost a mile long and she didn’t need advice that badly. It’s not as though she had a wardrobe full of choices.

  She finally chose tights, ankle boots, and a tunic dress edged with silver-threaded embroidery. After leaving her room, she came down the main staircase—the Hollander staircase, she remembered from her tour; she couldn’t remember why—and came to a perplexed stop in the Great Hall. Where, exactly, did she go? The dining room, she seemed to recall from her tour, was somewhere to her left. But then she heard voices from her right and went cautiously in their direction. For all she knew she would end up in the kitchen.

  But no, it was Gallagher voices she’d heard coming from the open doorway of what could only be termed a drawing room. She blinked, dazzled by the blaze of double chandeliers on the gold leaf that seemed to be everywhere. The room was even larger than the library, with a wall of French windows at the far end. Critics might have thought it too-sparsely furnished, until they looked closer. Then they would have realized that each piece was original and gorgeous and chosen specifically to complement each other and the overall design.

  For a brief moment Carragh wished she were eating on her bed in pajamas. It was like entering an Edwardian dinner party before the Great War; what would she do if Nessa was wearing a corset and trailing skirts?

  “Blinded?” It was Aidan, who blessedly wore the same casual dress pants and button-down shirt he’d been wearing earlier today.

  “By all the Gallagher brilliance,” she quipped. “Pity we don’t have those chandeliers in the library. Would save our eyes considerably.”

  She saw Kyla, with a glass in her hand, wearing a pair of perfectly tailored black trousers and a crisp white shirt that looked simple but probably cost more than the contents of her entire suitcase. Nessa was dressier than the rest of them, but not outrageously so. Carragh relaxed slightly, before remembering the tension last night among the three of them together. She vowed not to drink more than a sip or two of anything alcoholic and slip away as soon as she decently could.