What Father Brown hadn’t counted on was that the penitent would tell him exactly how she was going to murder Nikki Rice and when and where.
In many states, if someone is threatened or their life is in jeopardy, doctors, lawyers, psychiatrists, school personnel, and others who may have knowledge of such a threat, are required by law to report it to the appropriate authorities. Not so for Catholic priests. They are required to do the exact opposite, namely, nothing.
It was a situation unlike anything the aging priest had ever faced, because he was bound by canon law never to reveal what someone told him when they were in the confessional booth. But when the person to be murdered was the godmother of a baby he would be baptizing in his church, and part of a family unit he’d been close with for over fifty years, it created an internal struggle for Father Brown, the likes of which he’d never encountered.
Kelly, the owner of Kelly’s Koffee Shop, was the grandmother of the baby who was going to be baptized. And that baptism was where the murder would be taking place.
Kelly’s husband, Sheriff Mike, heard about the impending murder from several sources, but none of them could reveal how they knew about the impending murder. Essentially, they fell into the category of anonymous tips, and often those weren’t all that reliable. Even so, he’s faced with two difficult choices. Either cancelling the baptism or doing everything in his power to make sure the murder doesn’t happen. But what if it does?