Still on Castle, sorry. There will be Lucifer soon. Promise.
Chapter 2: The strange, squiggly writing
Absolutely nothing. Beckett surveyed their murder board. The last twelve hours had been a whirl-wind of interviews. The church had a fairly large membership and they had questioned everyone in the congregation who had known Graves. Beckett had spoken to his wife personally. Graves had been a good man, a good father, a good provider. They had no money problems, his phone and banking records had come back clean.
Everyone they had spoken to had said the same thing. Graves was a good, God-fearing man who had worked hard and helped anyone who had asked for help.
They all had the ring of honesty and Beckett hadn't detected anyone keeping anything back. The problem was that the church had an open door policy and no CCTV, so realistically anyone could have wandered in and caught Graves on his Friday night stop at the church.
The writing on the ground had been a bust too.
Despite sending it to cryptographers and a few linguistics professors at the local universities no one recognised the language. Castle had even tried Google translate, but that had come up with nothing as well. It was infuriating because they were all sure the writing was a big clue.
"Detective Beckett, Mr Castle do you have any progress?" Gates asked as she stopped by the murder board. Beckett sighed and shook her head. "No sir. We can't find a single lead to point us at anyone who would want Graves dead."
"We need these words translated, but it must be a made up language and there isn't enough for the cryptographers to work with." Castle rubbed his fingers through his hair in frustration.
Gates nodded and took a closer look at the photo of the strange, squiggly writing on the church floor. "Maybe it's time to send this to a wider audience." She said. "I'll email this picture out to the wider police community. Maybe someone will recognise it, or at worst will have a case that matches it."
"It's the best option I've heard all day sir." Beckett told their Captain.
Gates nodded and turned to leave. "Get some sleep Beckett, come back with a fresh pair of eyes tomorrow."
"Yes sir." Beckett as usual resisted the urge to salute as Gates hurried back to her office. "This is a nightmare Castle."
He gave her a tired smile. "We'll get there. We always do." He paused and looked over at Gate's office. "I hate to agree with her, but I think it's time to call it a night. Come on I'll drive you home."
Beckett shook her head, but picked up her coat. "Thanks Castle. Maybe we'll have some good news in the morning."