Saint's Gate (8 page)

“I did not know,” he said.

“It’s an incredible, fascinating, often bloody history. They were traders, farmers, warriors, skilled craftsmen. The Viking Age is generally considered to have started with the horrific raid on Lindisfarne Abbey in 793 and continued through the eleventh century. Time seems to have moved more slowly then. Imagine how much has changed even here in Heron’s Cove in the past three hundred years.” She paused, obviously enjoying the subject. “Are you from Dublin, Father?”

“The southwest. A Saint Finian’s Church in Kenmare in County Kerry was sacked by Vikings.”

“Ah. Your namesake. Viking raiders knew that the wealth of the population was held in churches and monasteries. There were no banks—loaning money was considered a violation of Christian principles.” She waved a hand dismissively, not slackening her pace. “Of course, most of what we know about the Vikings was written by non-Vikings.”

“Is your interest an avocation or are you studying Viking history?”

“Oh, an avocation. Totally. I’ve only read books and articles. I’m not a scholar.” She cast him a quick smile. “I love your accent. I can’t mimic an Irish accent at all. I’ve been to Ireland, but just Dublin. I want to see more of the country and visit Viking sites. Have you been to Skellig Michael?”

“Several times, yes.”

“I’d love to go. I’ve seen pictures. It was raided by Vikings at least once early in the ninth century.”

Finian looked out at the Maine coastal waters, but in his mind he pictured Skellig Michael, a knob of rock—a submerged mountaintop, really—at the westernmost edge of Europe, twelve kilometers off the tip of Ireland’s Iveragh Peninsula. During the seventh century, monks carved out a monastery on the forbidding landscape. A small monastic community survived there for the next six hundred years. Finian had first climbed through the remote ruins with his wife, who’d been so proud and delighted at going in spite of her fear of heights.

“Did I say something wrong?” Ainsley d’Auberville asked, frowning.

He tugged himself out of the past. “Not at all.”

She scrutinized him a moment before continuing. “There’s no doubt Vikings could be incredibly brutal—raping, pillaging, enslaving people—but it was a brutal age. We can’t demonize them, but we can’t romanticize them, either, can we?”

“There were people of peace at work at the same time,” Finian said.

“I like to think so.” Ainsley shuddered, then gave him a self-deprecating smile. “I love
Thor
comic books.”

“Miss D’Auberville—”

“Ainsley. Please. I’m sorry. I don’t want to burden you with my troubles. I guess I’d rather blather on about Vikings than what’s really on my mind. Although Vikings are on my mind, too.” She slowed her pace as the street curved closer to the ocean. “In a way my obsession with Vikings is part of the reason I’m in such a quandary.”

“Does your quandary have to do with Sister Joan’s death?”

She shot him a slightly panicked look. “You do cut to the chase, don’t you, Father?”

“If you have information the police should have—”

“I don’t know if I do or I don’t.”

“But you know something,” Finian said. “That’s why you wanted to see Lucas Sharpe, isn’t it?”

He slipped his sunglasses out of his suit coat pocket and put them on against the glare of the midday sun. He watched waves crash onto the rocks. Nearby, a lone cormorant dived under a swell and disappeared. Two seagulls passed by overhead. Farther out on the open water, pleasure and working craft went about their day, yesterday’s foggy conditions no longer a worry.

“I can accompany you to the police,” he said, returning his glasses case to his pocket. “I’ve nothing pressing on my schedule the rest of the day.”

“Becoming a witness in the murder of a nun wouldn’t go over well with my family, especially my stepfather. He’s great, but he’s very proper. He likes for us all to keep a low profile. It’s just him, my mother, my baby brother and me.” Ainsley stepped onto a boulder, seeming not to notice it was covered with bird droppings. “That kind of publicity wouldn’t go over well. It’s bad enough I’m…well, interested in Vikings and such.”

“Is your family here in Heron’s Cove?”

“Ogunquit, on the beach. Just for the summer. I’m in my father’s old place just south of here. My biological father.” She paused, the wind catching the ends of her sweater, then added, “It’s a long story.” She left it at that and returned to the pavement.

“Ainsley, if what you’re holding back could prevent further violence—”

“What I know probably makes no difference whatsoever.”

“Perhaps it’s best to let the police make that determination.”

She didn’t seem to hear him, or pretended not to, as the brisk wind tangled her hair. She looked out at the water. “I don’t know, Father. Which do you prefer—sandy beaches or the rocky coast? I go back and forth.”

He wasn’t allowing her to distract herself, or him. “Does your quandary have anything to do with your interest in Vikings?”

She about-faced and plunged back down toward the Sharpe house. Finian thought she’d changed her mind about wanting to talk to him, or perhaps had satisfied herself with what she’d said, but she stopped abruptly, turning back to him, her eyes shining with tears. “I brought a painting to Sister Joan a few days ago. I asked her not to tell a soul. She must have called Emma Sharpe about it, though, and that’s why Emma was at the convent yesterday. Emma’s an art detective. All the Sharpes are art detectives. It makes me wonder what Sister Joan saw in the painting.”

“Where is this painting now, Ainsley?”

“I have no idea. I’ve been expecting the police to show up on my doorstep to ask about it, but they haven’t. It’s been over twenty-four hours.” She shoved her hair back with the palm of a hand. “I’m afraid whoever attacked her took it.”

Finian could hear guilt strangling her voice. “Where did you get the painting?”

“I found it. It’s my father’s work.”

“Your biological father?”

She watched a powerboat speed past them, far from the immediate treachery of the rocks. “He died when I was a baby.”

“It’s a complicated situation?”

She glanced back at Finian and gave a half smile. “It’s a mess.”

Before he could respond, she continued walking toward the Sharpe house.

He matched her long stride. “You’ll call the police?”

She kept her eyes focused in front of her. “I’ll answer any question they put to me if they knock on my door, but I don’t think I should just call them out of the blue.”

“Why not?”

“I think the painting’s a big deal because it’s an interesting newfound work of Jack D’Auberville. Maybe it isn’t. Maybe no one else will care.”

“Did Sister Joan care?”

“She only gave it a quick glance when I handed it to her. I’d already given her two of my father’ paintings to clean, but they weren’t new discoveries. This one was.” She amended quickly,
“Is.”

“You said you found it. Where?”

“What?” His question seemed to confuse her. “Oh. I inherited his former studio. It was there. I can’t imagine why anyone would want to steal it. It’s not like there are a lot of crazed Jack d’Auberville collectors out there. Are you free? Why don’t you come by and see the studio?” Her preoccupied mood seemed to have vanished and she smiled at him. “You must have burned off your pancakes by now. Or are you in Heron’s Cove for another reason?”

“I’m looking into buying art for the rectory.”

“Really? Then you definitely have to come by. I can advise you. I know most of the local artists. I’m one myself, in fact. At least, an artist of sorts.” Her smile brightened, reaching her eyes. “I’ll make you iced tea and we can talk about art, Vikings and Irish ruins.”

Finian raised his eyebrows. Ainsley d’Auberville had met him only minutes ago, under unusual circumstances, and now she was inviting him back to her place?

She blushed. “Sorry. I have a tendency to make everyone I meet a best friend.” She laughed, a little self-consciously. “I’m a terrible judge of character, don’t you think? Meeting an Irish priest far from home and inviting him back to my place. Of course, it’s not like
that
. Gabe’s there. Gabe Campbell, my fiancé. You’ll like him. He’s a painter—as in painting the woodwork. I’m the other kind of painter. We only just got engaged.”

“I appreciate the invitation—”

“Then accept. At least come for iced tea on the patio.” She motioned vaguely with one hand. “I’m just five minutes by car on the other side of the village. On the left over the bridge.”

Finian considered a moment, then nodded. “Thank you, I gladly accept your invitation.”

“Excellent.” She beamed, looking altogether less troubled. Her pace picked up, as if she were quite pleased with herself, and she rattled off directions and a phone number, which Finian managed to log into his iPhone before she glided down to her car and climbed in.

Finian watched her streak out into the street, then returned to the waterfront parking lot behind the inn.

He was positive he’d seen Colin Donovan head in that direction.

Colin was leaning against Finian’s BMW, clearly in no mood to find him in Heron’s Cove. “What are you doing here, Fin?”

Finian shrugged, unperturbed by Colin’s reaction to seeing him. “I was restless after our conversation last night and decided to go on an outing. I was working up an appetite for a lobster roll later on.” That, of course, was before he’d agreed to meet Ainsley d’Auberville and make sure she spoke to the police. “And you?”

“Just docked Andy’s boat. You’d get a better lobster roll at Hurley’s. Cheaper, too.” Colin stood up from the car. “Who was the woman with you?”

“Ainsley d’Auberville. Attractive, isn’t she?”

The name was obviously familiar to his FBI friend. “And you just happened to meet on the street and start chatting?”

Finian, unruffled, nodded toward the Sharpe house above the docks. “I ran into her there, as a matter of fact. She was knocking on the back door. No one was home. She seemed frustrated. Interesting, isn’t it, how the house is squeezed between water and street?”

“Common here. What did she want?”

“Your secrets are safe with me, Colin, if that’s a concern.”

“You’re dodging my question, and I haven’t told you any secrets.”

Undoubtedly. “I’m merely doing what I would do if we weren’t friends and I’d heard about the violent death of a nun in my community.”

“Well, we are friends. You sent me here, remember? Otherwise, I’d be on an island fishing.”

“That’s a good point,” Finian said, calm.

“What did Ainsley d’Auberville have to say, Fin?”

“You know better than to ask.”

“It was a privileged conversation? She was confessing—”

“She didn’t have to confess anything for our conversation to be privileged.”

“But she knew you were a priest,” Colin said.

Finian waved a hand. “Don’t do your FBI thing with me. I’m unmoved.”

Colin didn’t relent. “Was she here to see Lucas Sharpe?”

“So she said. She’s invited me to her place for a drink.”

“A drink?”

“Iced tea. She has a fiancé, Colin, not that it matters. I’m an ordained priest. I made a solemn vow of celibacy.”

“Not poverty,” Colin said, walking around to the passenger’s side of the BMW and looking over the roof at Finian. “Obviously.”

Finian pulled open the driver’s side door and got in behind the wheel. He’d grown accustomed to driving on the right, although it still didn’t feel natural to him. “Are there any developments in the investigation into Sister Joan’s death?”

“I’m not on the investigative team.”

It wasn’t a direct answer, but Finian had no standing to press for one. He stuck the key into the ignition. “She wasn’t killed in the midst of a random break-in, Colin. You know that, don’t you?”

“Once Emma Sharpe sees you, she’s going to want to know who you are.”

“It was that way when she saw you?”

“Yeah. It was that way.”

“Does she know you’re an FBI agent?”

“More or less.” It was a little unsettling to think he couldn’t pass for a lobsterman, but she’d had a heads-up when she’d spotted him with Yank. Colin glanced back at the Sharpe house. “She’s going to want to know why Ainsley d’Auberville was here.”

“That means you’ll tell her?”

Colin shifted his gaze to Finian but said nothing.

“I suppose you’re obligated,” Finian said, starting the engine. “I should go visit Ainsley before she changes her mind about having invited me. I think you should come with me.”

“That’s why I’m in your car, Fin.”

“Yes.” Finian noticed Colin’s rigid expression and frowned. “Are you armed?”

“You don’t talk about privileged conversations,” the FBI agent said. “I don’t talk about guns.”

12

COLIN RODE WITH BRACKEN THROUGH THE bustling village of Heron’s Cove and back out to the ocean, thinking up a reason to be hanging out with an Irish priest. Bracken was going on about just telling the truth, and the distinctions between facts and truth. Colin let him talk. He was more interested in why Ainsley d’Auberville, the daughter of Jack d’Auberville, had been looking for Lucas Sharpe.

Her place wasn’t what Bracken expected, obviously. “One would think a Viking raiding party’s been here and gone,” the priest muttered as he pulled into the gravel driveway.

“I’ve been by here before,” Colin said. “I thought it was a barn.”

“It’s her father’s former studio.”

“That’s not privileged information?”

Bracken adjusted his sunglasses. “No.”

The d’Auberville studio was actually an old barn or carriage house, located on a paved lane just off the main road, a few miles south of Heron’s Cove and in another world from Rock Point farther to the north. It wasn’t directly on the water but sat up on a sandy knoll, just a peek of a cove through birches and ash trees. The coastline was gentler here, sea and land not divided by chunks of granite.

Colin got out of the BMW and Bracken joined him. As they approached a van, its back opened up, an attractive woman— Ainsley d’Auberville—was arguing with a compact, muscular man in painter’s clothes.

“That must be Gabe Campbell,” Bracken said in a low voice. “The fiancé.”

“That’s not privileged information, either?” Colin asked.

The priest didn’t even glance at him. “It is not.”

Ainsley’s face was flushed, her golden hair and thin sweater blowing in a steady wind off the water. “I swear, Gabe, I haven’t
not
told the police what I know. I haven’t lied, or refused to answer their questions. They haven’t asked me anything. Maybe the painting’s not missing, after all. Maybe I’m way off base.”

Gabe shook his head. He had dark, shaggy hair held off his face with a black bandanna. “You have to call them, Ainsley,” he said, not so much with anger as firmness and patience—if limited patience. “You can’t wait for them to figure out you might have relevant information and come find you.”

“Why not? Do you think it’s better to divert them from the investigation and draw attention to myself?”

“That’s your stepdad talking,” Gabe said, “not you.”

Her mouth snapped shut, but not for long. “I don’t want to be accused of exploiting a tragedy for publicity.”

“Sister Joan might not have told anyone about the painting.”

“I’m sure she didn’t. I asked her not to. Well.” Ainsley pushed up the sleeves of her sweater as if she were suddenly hot. “She must have told or meant to tell Emma Sharpe.”

Colin was getting the drift of what Ainsley d’Auberville and Bracken had discussed in confidence.

Ainsley spotted her new friend and smiled, her troubled, intense manner changing to one of cheerful welcome. “Father Bracken!” She clapped her hands together in obvious delight. “I thought for sure you wouldn’t come. I’m so glad you did. Isn’t this place fantastic?”

“It’s brilliant,” Bracken said, then motioned to Colin. “Ainsley, this is Colin Donovan, a friend of mine from Rock Point. Colin, Ainsley d’Auberville.”

She seemed to notice him for the first time and gave a mock bow. “Nice to meet you, Colin. Are you from Ireland, too?”

“No,” Colin said.

“You’re not a priest, I take it.”

“Not a priest. I ran into Father Bracken at the docks in Heron’s Cove.”

“He told you we met there? I invited him here so I could show him a true New England classic. It was originally a carriage house, built in the late-nineteenth century. My father bought it about ten years before I was born and converted it into his studio.” She waved a slender hand, breathless, a little hyper. “He eventually added a kitchen, heat and whatnot and lived here until he married my mother. He died when I was just a baby. I don’t remember him at all. He was a painter.”

“Jack d’Auberville,” Colin said. “I heard he had a studio around here somewhere.”

“This is it.” Ainsley was obviously pleased that he’d recognized her father. “Gabe says it’s structurally sound, except for a few rotted and rattling this and that. It has all the pluses of an antique carriage house with few of the minuses.”

“Horses and flies being among the minuses,” Bracken said with a smile.

“That’s what I said to Gabe!” She laughed, taking in the entire converted structure with a broad sweep of a slim arm. “My father loved it here. He was a prolific artist who lived simply. I like to think I take after him, but I don’t know. I’m not nearly as good a painter as he was.”

“Ainsley,” Gabe said with a smile.

“Oh, dear. I have a tendency to go on once I’m wound up.” She blushed but was clearly not embarrassed. “Father Bracken, Colin, this is Gabe Campbell, my fiancé.”

Colin and Bracken exchanged a brief greeting with Gabe. Bracken said, “If Colin and I are interrupting—”

“Not at all,” Ainsley said as she trotted up the front steps. “Gabe has to run down the lane for a minute. He’s building a house down on the water. That’s how we met, actually. Come on. I’ll give you the grand tour.”

Gabe shut the back of the van. “Go ahead. She loves to show this place off.”

If not for the missing Jack d’Auberville painting and Ainsley’s dilemma about calling the police, Colin would have been out of there. He’d have stolen Bracken’s keys if he had to. Instead, he followed Bracken up the steps to a small porch.

“Gabe’s one of the best housepainters in New England,” Ainsley said, pushing open a solid wood door. “All the high-end architects and contractors recommend him. He pays attention to every detail. He rented this place over the winter. He’s helping fix it up while he works on his own house.”

The dark brown, rough barn-board exterior and white-trimmed windows of the old carriage house looked freshly painted. Colin gritted his teeth. He was thinking about paint. Not good.

He wondered how long before Emma Sharpe turned up at Jack d’Auberville’s old studio. He figured he could always text her to come on out there. He’d been thinking all the wrong ways about Agent Sharpe since meeting her up close and personal that morning.

Bracken frowned at him, as if he knew his new friend had carnal thoughts on his mind.

Ainsley led them into a spacious room with wide-board floors and surprisingly bright white walls. She was still going on about her fiancé. “We actually met last fall when he wandered up the lane to check on a bird he’d heard singing. He’d been working all day and was all dusty and paint-splattered. Isn’t that romantic?”

Colin tried to be sociable and still get pertinent information out of her. “Do you live in Maine year-round?” he asked Ainsley.

“I want to, eventually, but right now I winter in south Florida, near my mother and stepfather. I have a lot of clients there.” She waved a hand as if she were painting. “I paint their gardens.”

Steep, rustic wood stairs led to a loft with an open balustrade. The furnishings were done with a feminine, artistic flare—saturated colors, overstuffed cushions, throws and mirrors. Colin walked over to a wall covered with a mix of paintings, minicollages, sketches, photographs and bits and pieces of what looked like junk Ainsley d’Auberville had picked up at yard sales. It all came together somehow.

The artistic eye, Colin figured.

“If I tried that, it’d never work,” he said. “People would think I’d been drinking one night and slapped stuff up at random.”

Bracken, who’d taken off his sunglasses, glared at Colin as if he’d said something offensive, but Ainsley laughed. “Oh, it’s still very much a work in progress.” She peered at one section of the wall, a mishmash of tear-outs from
Thor
comic books, photographs of Viking artifacts and old maps, all artistically displayed. She pointed to a spot above her. “There, Father Bracken. A map of Dublin’s Viking sites.”

“Ah,” he said. “I see.”

“My father was fascinated by Viking art and history. I can see why.” She squealed and stood on her tiptoes, tapping a small collage with one finger. “Here you go, Father. My collage of Skellig Michael. I’ve wanted to go there
forever.
Is it as scary as they say?”

Bracken stood next to her and examined the collage. “The boat ride was more frightening than was climbing among the ruins. Provided you don’t wander off on your own, it’s reasonably safe.”

“My father went to Ireland at least once that I know of.” Her eyes grew distant, but she seemed to give herself a mental shake. “He married my mother late in life. He was in his sixties and she was barely thirty. It was quite the scandal with her family. They never believed he’d stay with her, but he was ready to settle down. I think he knew he was sick, to be honest. He died of lung cancer.”

“I’m sorry,” Bracken said simply.

Colin decided Finian Bracken wouldn’t make a bad detective. He was willing to let Ainsley talk and, naturally, came at gathering information from an entirely different point of view than a law enforcement officer would. Bracken wasn’t eliciting answers for a police investigation. He had only pretty, fair-haired Ainsley d’Auberville’s best interests in mind.

“My mother remarried when I was five,” Ainsley said, stepping back from the wall of art. “My stepdad’s a great guy, but I kept the d’Auberville name. My father left this place and the contents to me in a trust. It’d been rented on and off. Basic upkeep was done on the bathroom, kitchen, roof, wiring and heating system, but his studio was more or less off-limits. I expected to clear out the place and put it on the market, but I decided to fix it up and see what’s what.”

“Where did your father do his painting?” Colin asked.

“In back. I work there now, too. I’m organizing a show of our work. It won’t be ready until next summer.” She jumped, almost as if she were startled. “Oh! Drinks! I filled the ice bucket. Then Gabe showed up and I went outside and forgot all about it.”

Once she was focused, she moved quickly, heading to the kitchen area and gathering up a pitcher of tea, ice, fresh lemon slices, glasses and a plate of apple-cinnamon muffins and setting them on a large woven tray. She insisted on carrying it herself out back to a stone patio in modest disrepair, descending the chipped steps with assurance, no hint of anything more serious on her mind than whether there were seeds in the lemons.

“Butter,” she said cheerfully, then about-faced and ran back inside.

Colin sat at a weathered teak table, across from Bracken. He thought he might have the patience for one sip of iced tea. He had ice in his glass but no tea when Gabe Campbell walked around from the front of the old carriage house, with Emma Sharpe on his elbow. She looked no happier to see Colin now than she had that morning when he’d run the
Julianne
aground.

Gabe pulled out a chair at the table and sat down, but Emma remained standing, her gaze fixed on Colin. “You do get around, Mr. Donovan,” she said. “Did you slam your boat into more rocks?”

He didn’t think her smart-ass question required an answer.

Bracken got to his feet. “You must be Special Agent Sharpe. I’m Finian Bracken.”

Emma greeted him politely, but she pointed at Colin, her green eyes still on Bracken. “You two know each other?”

“I serve a church in Rock Point,” Bracken said.

“How did you end up here, Father?” she asked.

Colin sat back, deciding not to help his friend out of this one. Let him explain himself to Agent Sharpe. Finian Bracken, however, had succeeded in the competitive whiskey business, then had survived Catholic seminary. He could handle a suspicious Emma Sharpe.

“I was in Heron’s Cove earlier,” he said easily. “I met Ainsley there. She’d just knocked on the door to your family’s business offices, in fact, but no one was there. We chatted. Then Colin came by—”

“He was at my place?”

Colin sighed.

Bracken kept his tone matter-of-fact. “He was in the parking lot behind the inn next door.”

Emma flashed Colin an intensely controlled look that nonetheless he translated as
What the hell were you doing involving a priest in a homicide investigation?
Emma didn’t know Finian Bracken. Colin wasn’t about to defend him, especially since Bracken didn’t seem intimidated by her scrutiny.

“What were you doing in Heron’s Cove?” she asked.

“It’s a lovely day for a wander,” Bracken said, his Irish accent striking Colin as more pronounced.

Emma watched him return to his seat but remained on her feet. “Do you know anything about or have a strong interest in art involving Catholic saints, Father?”

“Please, call me Finian, and no, saints aren’t my particular area of expertise.”

“Sacred art?”

“No.”

“My grandfather, Wendell Sharpe, is an art detective based in Dublin. Do you know him?”

Bracken drank some of his tea, without ice. “We’ve never met.”

Emma fixed her gaze on Colin. “Ever been to Ireland, Mr. Donovan?”

“I have.”

“Did you meet Father Bracken there?”

“We met in Rock Point. I was in Ireland on my own. Hiking. On vacation.”

She didn’t look as if she believed him, but he suspected she wasn’t in the mood to believe anyone. It was a mood he well understood.

“Ainsley and I are thinking about spending our honeymoon in Ireland,” Gabe said, pushing back his chair and stretching out his legs. He seemed relaxed, unaffected by the conversation around him. He smiled. “She wants to visit Viking ruins.”

Ainsley burst onto the patio with a butter dish. “Did I hear someone mention Vikings?” She laughed, setting the butter on the table, then noticed Emma in the shade and immediately went pale. “Oh. Emma. I didn’t realize you were here. It’s been a long time.”

“Hello, Ainsley,” Emma said, contained, cool. “I understand you were just in Heron’s Cove.”

“I was looking for Lucas.”

“Why did you want to see him?”

“I heard about what happened at the convent yesterday. I thought… I don’t know what I thought.”

“You brought several of your father’s paintings to the convent for Sister Joan to clean,” Emma said.