Beating About the Bush

by M C Beaton

  “You can’t do that!” she yelled, turning back to the room. “WIZZ-WAZZ IS INNOCENT!!”

  Every face in the council chamber was now turned towards her. She raised a clenched fist and repeated, “WIZZ-WAZZ IS INNOCENT!!” One of the grey suits reached for her arm. Agatha snatched it away. “Try that again,” she snarled in a low voice, “and I’ll rip your throat out.” The man backed away.

  * * *

  Standing on the town hall steps staring out into the square, her heart pounding, seething with anger, Agatha suddenly craved a cigarette more than anything else in the world. No, she told herself. Those bastards in there are not going to beat me, and neither is smoking! I will fight them all! She heard a phone ring and saw, out of the corner of her eye, Toni taking the call on her mobile. A voice came from behind her.

  “‘Wizz-Wazz is innocent’. That’s a catchy slogan.”

  A slightly built young woman with dark hair and black-rimmed spectacles stepped into her line of sight. “Charlotte Clark,” she introduced herself, clasping a reporter’s notepad. “Mircester Telegraph.”

  “Yes … yes, that’s exactly what it will be,” said Agatha, her old instincts from her years spent in PR suddenly clicking into place. “Our slogan for the Save Wizz-Wazz campaign. We are not going to let that poor donkey take the blame for this foul murder!”

  “You said that in the council chamber,” said Clark. “Murder? What makes you think it was murder?

  “I have many, many reasons for thinking that,” said Agatha. “Believe me, Miss Clark, this was murder and Wizz-Wazz is being framed for it.”

  Chief Inspector Wilkes came striding down the steps, his long legs taking them two at a time. “Whatever that woman is telling you,” he sneered, “is utter claptrap. She is a fantasist, desperate for attention. Quite mad.” And without pausing, he loped past.

  “He’s really not getting laid enough, is he?” said Agatha.

  “Or even at all,” Clark giggled.

  “He can’t stop us, though,” Agatha affirmed. “We are going to save Wizz-Wazz.”

  “You’s got me wid ya on that!” Aphrodite clacked down the steps on unfeasibly high heels with a balance and poise that drew Agatha’s grudging admiration. “You ain’t gonna let them execute my Wizz-Wazz, is you, Mrs. Raisin?”

  “You have my word,” Agatha said, watching Aphrodite effect a pitiful sob and dab a tissue at a completely tearless eye. “Why don’t we launch our campaign at the stables on Monday morning?”

  “You got it,” Aphrodite said. “Anythin’ you want, talk to him.” She jabbed a thumb towards Sayer, who stood, as always, at Albert Morrison’s side. Sayer smiled and nodded at Agatha. Morrison ignored her entirely, leading his wife off towards where Dunster waited with their car.

  “That was an interesting performance,” said Clark.

  “She’s an interesting woman.” Agatha nodded. “You must come along to our campaign launch. It will be a great story.”

  “I already have a great story,” said Clark, waving her notebook. “‘Killer Donkey Sentenced to Death. Chaos at Inquest. Private Eye Screams Murder.’ I can make the front page of tomorrow’s special edition.”

  This girl is a shrewd cookie, thought Agatha, but I need to keep control of how the publicity plays out now. This could be good for me, good for the business, and a great way to keep us involved at Morrison’s.

  “You could get that front page,” said Agatha, “but I will level with you. I want to keep this under control. It’s only going to get bigger. I think we can get the nationals involved, but they won’t like it if you’ve beaten them to it. I need you to hold the story for now and pick it up along with everyone else on Monday.”

  “Why would I want to do that?” asked the girl. “What’s in it for me?”

  “This is going to be a story that has glamour, money, sex, a poor victimised donkey, and a murder,” said Agatha. “And I will be at the centre of it all. When it’s all over, you can have an exclusive. A one-on-one interview—the whole story. All the big boys will want it. It will be syndicated throughout the country and it will hit the newsstands in New York, too—all with your name on the byline.”

  “I will hold you to this,” said Clark, tucking her notepad away.

  I bet you will too, thought Agatha as the reporter walked away. Well, it would be worth it. She slid her hand across her stomach. A strange feeling. Hunger? No—excitement. You are buzzing, Agatha Raisin, like you did when you sat in the centre of a PR web in London, horse-trading with editors on newspaper picture desks, cajoling feature writers and bullying reporters. “You can have an exclusive’—when was the last time she had said that? Where was Toni? Still fiddling with her phone. What was she up to?

  The woman in the black coat was standing just beyond Toni, her pale features turned towards Agatha. She took a couple of paces forward and said in a quiet voice, “Might I have a word with you, Mrs. Raisin?” Her grey eyes were filled with tears, but she was stubbornly refusing to allow even a single drop to fall.

  “Of course,” said Agatha. “How can I help?”

  “I am Elizabeth Thirkettle,” said the woman, “and this is my husband, Clive. I am Clarissa Dinwiddy’s sister.”

  “I am so sorry about your sister,” said Agatha, shaking the older woman’s hand, “and I apologise if anything I said in there caused you any further upset.”

  “Not at all, my dear. In fact, you are the only one who is taking Clarissa’s death seriously. You see, I agree with you. I too believe that my sister was murdered.”

  “You do? Why is that? Is there something you want to tell me, Mrs Thirkettle?”

  “Not here,” said the woman, her eyes darting warily left and right. “Come to my house on Monday afternoon. Our address…”

  She reached out to shake hands once again, and Agatha felt a neatly folded piece of paper being pressed into her palm. Clive Thirkettle also shook hands, his silver curls dipping forward as he nodded, then springing neatly back into place.

  “Agatha,” called Toni, holding up her phone. “Patrick’s on to something. He sent me a photo. He’ll have more by the time we get back to the office.”

  “Let’s go then,” said Agatha. Now things were really starting to move.

  Agatha was invigorated with the thrill of the chase, and Toni struggled to keep up as she pounded the pavement all the way back to the office. When they arrived, Patrick was waiting by Toni’s desk.

  “I should have it on my screen,” Toni said, sitting and tapping at her keyboard. “Here’s the photo you sent.”

  A formal picture of a detachment of soldiers flickered onto the screen, front rows sitting, back rows standing, all wearing dark berets and dusky green-and-beige desert camouflage.

  “This is Bream and Dunster’s unit photographed in Afghanistan,” said Mulligan.

  “That’s them,” Agatha pointed, “in the back row.”

  “But when I looked at it on my phone,” said Toni, “I spotted another familiar face.”

  She zoomed in on the photograph and moved it around on the screen to show a smiling figure in the front row.

  “Sayer!” gasped Agatha.

  “Actually,” said Mulligan, “he is Lieutenant Neil Webster. Once Toni identified him, it was easy to check him out. He joined the army straight out of university and served with Bream and Dunster in Germany. He even spoke for Bream at his court martial. He was a martial arts, fitness, and survival expert—obsessed, it seems. Then a Land Rover he was driving alone in Helmand was blown up. No body was ever recovered.”

  “That’s because there was no body!” Agatha crowed. “He’s alive and well and up to no good at Morrison’s!”

  “We should let the police know about him,” said Toni.

  “All in good time. Let’s find out what those three are up to with Albert Morrison first. Wizz-Wazz should be able to help us with that.”

  Agatha crossed to her office, picked up the phone and hit a speed-dial number.

  “Ro
y?” she said as soon as the call was answered. “It’s me.”

  “Agatha, darling,” gushed Roy Silver, “long time no hear.”

  “We spoke just a couple of weeks ago.”

  “Two weeks is a lifetime in this business, darling, as you well know.”

  “I need you up here tonight, Roy.”

  “Tonight? But I couldn’t possibly, Aggie. I am absolutely and totally rushed off my poor little feet. Why else would I be in the office on a Saturday?”

  Agatha imagined Roy Silver sitting with his feet on his desk in the London offices of Pedman’s PR, the company that had bought her own PR business. He was the only one of her former staff still with Pedman’s and had taken several giant steps up the career ladder due to Agatha having handed him a treasure trove of opportunities on a plate.

  “Roy,” she said, “you owe me, and this is going to put you back on the national stage again, right in the spotlight. There’s been a murder.”

  “Another murder?” he squealed. “Do tell, darling.”

  By the time Agatha had finished spinning Roy Silver the tale of a sweet, adorable donkey who was to be put to death for a crime she did not commit, she had him eating out of her hand.

  “I can see the headlines now,” he said. “‘Donkey Framed for Murder. Wizz-Wazz Is Innocent.’ I’ll start rounding up the press pack and the TV and radio right now. We’ll get them all at Morrison’s for the first press call on Monday morning. I’ll drive up to Carsely later and see you for dinner. This is going to be simply marvellous, darling!”

  Agatha congratulated herself as she put down the phone. The campaign to save Wizz-Wazz was under way. It would be a cover for her to continue her investigation at the factory. Nothing at Morrison’s, she smiled, was ever what it seemed.

  Chapter Six

  Roy Silver arrived in Lilac Lane early that evening, erupting out of his small car in a blur of dusky-pink corduroy and breathless excitement. He began talking as soon as Agatha opened the front door and did not miss a beat while dumping a suitcase, rather too large even for several nights away from home, in the hall.

  “I have been on the phone literally all afternoon, sweetheart. So much to tell you and something absolutely adorable to show you,” he gushed. “What do you think of this look?” He struck a pose near the door. The pink corduroy trousers were matched with a flat cap, a dark brown waxed jacket, and two-tone pink-and-brown shoes. “I’m going for relaxed country fun with a hint of city sophistication,” he chattered on without waiting for a response. “I’m wearing it for the press call tomorrow morning. We need to appeal across the board for the launch of the Wizz-Wazz Is Innocent campaign—from elderly animal-lovers to young children. The kids will draw in their parents. You know what kids are like once they start making a noise about something as sensitive as a poor little donkey being put to death, and…”

  That, thought Agatha, as Roy continued to talk, wasn’t such a bad idea at all, and Roy dressing himself like a caricature of a children’s TV presenter would be just right.

  “… so it’s mainly regional press and agencies with a few stringers from the nationals for the campaign announcement on Monday morning,” he continued. “We’ll use that to generate interest and draw in the big boys on national TV for the campaign and product launch the following morning. You said there was a US angle as well? We need to capitalise on that to bring in international media and—”

  “Product launch?” Agatha interrupted. “What are you talking about?”

  “Oh, just a little idea I had, darling.” Roy smiled. “I will tell you all about it over dinner. I am totally famished. Can we go to your lovely little local pub? It’s so quaint and villagey.”

  Roy carried on talking all the way along the lane and out into Carsely High Street. He paused outside the Red Lion and pronounced it “adorably rural.” It was, Agatha thought, walking into the bar area, really a very lovely old pub. The ceilings were low, but unlike the hideous Jolly Farmer that she had visited with Toni, the beams in the Red Lion were authentic and the atmosphere comfortably cosy. Vases of fresh flowers dotted here and there on tables brightened the large bar area. There had been a chill in the air on their walk to the pub, and she was pleased to see a log fire burning gently in the grate below the thick oak beam that served as a mantelpiece.

  A few men drinking at the bar smiled and nodded, and the landlord’s daughter gave them a cheery welcome as they settled at a table near the fire. She had a notepad at the ready to take their order. The menu at the Red Lion was limited, but the food was edible. They both ordered lasagne and chips. Agatha knew that the lasagne would be reheated in a microwave and would stick stubbornly to the bottom of the dish, but the chips here were always good. She asked for a bottle of white wine that she trusted. Roy placed on the table a padded brown envelope that he had brought with him.

  “Is this something to do with the product?” asked Agatha.

  “It is indeed,” said Roy, sliding a sheet of paper out of the envelope. “Ta-daaa!”

  On the sheet were a number of T-shirt designs featuring a donkey wearing something red and fluffy around its neck. Agatha couldn’t recall telling Roy about the coat she had inadvertently donated to Wizz-Wazz, but she clearly must have done. Accompanying the image were slogans: Wizz-Wazz Is Innocent!, Save Wizz-Wazz! and Don’t Let Me Die!

  “Remarkable,” said Agatha. “The donkey isn’t quite the right colour, and the coat needs to look more furry than fluffy—”

  “These are only roughs,” Roy bristled, retrieving the paper, “that I had our in-house designer mock up. We’ll have better by Tuesday.”

  “They’re great,” said Agatha, smiling. “I wasn’t expecting T-shirt designs, that’s all.”

  “Well you’re going to love this, then,” Roy replied, his enthusiasm magically restored. Reaching into the envelope once again, he gave an unconvincing imitation of a drum roll and cymbal clash, then produced with a flourish a small cloth donkey toy wearing a red fluffy collar. He stood it on the table. “This is Wizz-Wazz the Cranky Donkey!” He squeezed it and it barked like a dog. Agatha laughed.

  “I have heard Wizz-Wazz make a number of different noises,” she said, “but never ‘Woof’!”

  “It’s just a prototype.” Roy grinned. “The production model will go ‘Hee-haw’. A contact in the soft toy business got this to me before I left the office. We can market these with profits going to the Wizz-Wazz Is Innocent campaign, or a donkey sanctuary, or whatever.”

  “All of the profits?” asked Agatha, raising an eyebrow.

  “Well, clearly I will have certain … expenses to recoup.”

  “Dinner’s on you, then.”

  “Of course,” said Roy. “We can go through our plans in detail tomorrow. I’ll call in a few favours and we will be ready to roll by Monday morning. Now, tell me again about the murder—and I want to hear all about the absolutely fabulous Aphrodite.”

  * * *

  “Why the hell are there so many of them?” demanded Albert Morrison, staring out of his office window on Monday morning. Half a dozen cars filled the small parking area outside the factory, and others were bumping off the drive to park on the grass verge.

  “The Raisin woman has brought in a PR man from London,” said John Sayer. “He’s stirred up some interest across the region.”

  “We don’t need anyone stirring up interest in our business!” barked Morrison. He turned to face Sayer, who stood on the other side of the desk along with Farley Dunster. “Make sure they all behave themselves. We don’t know who any of those press people are, so keep an eye on them. Count them in and count them out again. I don’t want anyone hanging around here afterwards.”

  “They will be back tomorrow,” said Sayer. “More of them, probably.”

  “Then you’ll have to do the same tomorrow, won’t you?” Morrison shouted at him. “I don’t know why we’re letting them stage this farce here.”

  “It would have looked odd if we hadn’t,” said Saye
r calmly, “and your wife was—”

  “Keep an eye on her too,” growled Morrison. “We can’t afford to let any of this affect our plans. We have a schedule to maintain. Tell the Raisin woman I want to see her as soon as she has done her bit in front of the press. Now get down there and keep this shambles under control!”

  The two men turned to go.

  “And Dunster,” Morrison called. “Best leave your little toy with me for now.”

  Dunster looked at Sayer, who nodded. He stripped off his jacket to reveal a leather holster nestling under his left arm. A dark glimmer of gunmetal caught the light as he removed the holster. He wrapped its straps around it and placed it on Morrison’s desk. Morrison picked up the gun and locked it in his desk drawer.

  * * *

  The weather was kind to them for the press call. Agatha felt relieved. It was not something that either she or Roy could control. A few fluffy clouds crept across a weak blue sky, but there was no hint of rain. Perfect, she thought, for the photographs.

  She watched Roy Silver at work, marshalling a small scrum of photographers and keeping up a stream of instructions, parrying journalists’ requests and imploring them all to be patient. He certainly stood out from the crowd in his pinkness. Agatha herself had chosen a more sober look that she felt would better reflect her role as the head of a detective agency. The dark blue Max Mara trouser suit was suitably restrained. Roy would play the role of the eccentric and colourful campaign manager, while she would give serious interviews. One would entertain, the other would inform. This wasn’t a “good cop, bad cop” situation, she reflected, more “clown and ringmaster.”

  She turned to Toni at her side. “Okay, Toni,” she said softly. “All the attention is now going to be on that lot. You can slip away and try to sneak into the dispatch department. Have a good look around. If any of the regular workforce are in today, have a word with them. Ask if they’ve noticed anything unusual going on.”