Free Oh Danny Boy by Rhys Bowen

Theater this fall. Can you imagine the gall?”
    Ryan entered, looking the picture of dejection, although I remembered that he was an actor as well as a playwright. “I feel wounded to the heart, cut to the quick, and all other metaphors that apply.” In deference to the heat he was wearing a white cotton peasant shirt, open at the neck, with wide frills at the wrists, and baggy pantaloons. For Ryan this was no more unconventional than usual, but the resemblance to Lord Byron was startling.
    “How did he get his hands on your idea, Ryan?” I asked, as the latter deposited himself in my one and only armchair without being invited. “Was it someone you had confided in?” From what I knew of Ryan, he did a lot of confiding.
    “Absolutely not,” he said. “I hardly know the man. And what I do know of him, I don’t like. He has no taste in clothes. He wears tweed, my dear. Never trust a man who wears tweed.” He paused and made a dramatic gesture. “He stole it, the blackguard. Or someone stole it and gave it to him.” He looked up with sudden interest and waved a finger at me. “You’re a detective, Molly. You can find out for me how Ben Archer got his hands on my play. And when we have proof, I’ll sue.”
    “I don’t think I can do that, Ryan,” I said. For one thing, I had no time at present; for another, Ryan would not be able to pay me for my services; and for a third, I half suspected that Ryan may well have divulged his idea while in his cups. He was known to talk awful rubbish when drunk.
    “You won’t do it for me, Molly? I am devastated, cut to the quick.”
    “You’re doing an awful lot of cutting to the quick tonight,” I said, not able to stifle my smile. “I’d like to help, Ryan, I really would; but I’ve a big case I’m working on right now, and I’ve no time. In addition to that I don’t think this is something you’d ever be able to prove. Ideas are swapped, shared, and borrowed all the time, aren’t they?”
    “It’s true, Ryan,” Sid said. She had perched herself on one of the kitchen chairs. “It’s not yours until you’ve applied for copyright, surely.”
    “I still want to know,” he said sullenly. “I won’t rest until I know who betrayed me. There is no way in Hades that a buffoon like Ben Archer could have come up with anything as witty and sophisticated as my play. In fact, there are few in the civilized world who can match my wit and wisdom.”
    I glanced across at Sid and shared a smile. Modesty was never Ryan’s strong point.
    “Have you engaged a lawyer, Ryan?” Sid asked. “I should have thought that was the obvious thing to do.”
    Ryan spread his hands in a dramatically hopeless gesture. “Alas, one needs funds to retain a lawyer. At this moment I am not exactly flush.”
    “Can’t you do anything to help him, Molly?” Gus asked.“You are an investigator, after all. And what is this big case you’re working on? You haven’t mentioned it to us. In fact, only this morning you were talking of becoming a schoolmarm in Nebraska.”
    “Molly, a schoolmarm in Nebraska? Never!” Ryan said. “I won’t allow you to leave civilization for life in the wilderness. You can’t dislike our company that much, surely.”
    “I adore your company, as you very well know,” I said. “There seemed to be too many other complications here in New York. Now I fear my complications have only increased. Daniel Sullivan is in jail.”
    I hadn’t meant to tell them. It just slipped out.
    “Daniel the Deceiver in jail?” Gus asked. “What on earth has he done? Or has Miss Norton had him rounded up for not paying enough attention to her?”
    Which shows that we women all had the same suspicious minds. Their thoughts had also gone immediately to Arabella.
    “It’s a trumped-up charge,” I said. “He was caught accepting what looked like a bribe from a gang member, but he says he never accepts bribes. Someone is out to have him ruined.”
    Sid’s face became