by M C Beaton
Back in the kitchen, she put the postcard on the table and thumbed through the rest. “Junk mail and bills,” she said.
“Who’s the postcard from?”
“James.”
“Aha. That explains the smile on your lips and the shine in your eyes. It’s a dead duck, Aggie.”
“Oh, shut up. I’ve got to get into the office, although I could do with some more sleep.”
“Then go back to bed. You’re the boss.”
“No, I can’t sleep now. I’ve got to get out to that blasted manor and see how they’re all taking this latest development. Coming with me?”
“Why not?”
“I’d better get Doris to house-sit. The new cooker’s arriving today.”
“Cooker? Is this for Christmas? Decided to char another bird after all?”
“No, I’m not only getting a caterer, but a chef as well. I’ve ordered a decent turkey and I don’t want to risk getting one of those nasty frozen supermarket ones if I leave it all to the caterers. I’ll just phone Patrick and Phil as well and see how they are getting on and then we’ll be off.”
“How is Phil, by the way?”
“No bad effects after his lightning recovery. He’s a tough old boy.”
It was a steel-grey day as they drove towards the manor house. Flocks of migrating birds drew arrows across the sky. Coloured leaves spiralled down in front of the car. “It really is quite cold,” said Agatha. “Perhaps it will snow this Christmas.”
“It never snows at Christmas. You’re building all this up to an unhealthy level.”
“Nothing is going to go wrong.”
“Except the final death of romance.”
Agatha did not deign to reply as she turned into the gates of the manor.
“Can’t see any police cars,” said Charles.
“Maybe they’ve all gone off to their respective homes,” said Agatha, “and the police are interviewing them there.”
Jill, the groom, came round the side of the house as they were getting out of the car.
“Family at home?” asked Agatha.
“They’re all at the funeral. They’ll be back from the crematorium any minute now.”
Agatha said, “I didn’t know the body had been released for burial.”
“Yes, about a week ago. I suppose it’s all right if you go inside. Some women from the village are preparing sandwiches and things.”
“I wonder if that’s wise,” said Charles as they walked into the manor. “Don’t eat any sandwiches with green in them. Could be hemlock.”
They could hear a clatter of plates coming from the kitchen. “Where will we wait?” asked Agatha. “I mean, it might look a bit cheeky to be found in the drawing room like guests.”
“Particularly as it looks as if you’ve exposed dear Mama as a murderess.”
“I didn’t think of that. They may not know. I mean, the police won’t tell them anything until they have more proof. It’s not as if any one of them were even born at the time. Phyllis was pregnant with the first one as far as I remember. I’m beginning to wonder what sort of man Hugh Tamworthy really was.”
“Sick,” said Charles laconically while he pushed open doors. “Look, there’s a little room here.”
“Used to be the morning room. We can wait here.” Agatha followed him in. “What do you mean, sick?”
“Sick people gravitate to sick people. The formerly abused child marries a wife beater. The child of an alcoholic may not become one but ten to one will marry one. There are professional victims and martyrs all over the place…like you.”
“Just what do you mean by that?” snarled Agatha.
“A normal person wouldn’t have put up with James for a minute.”
“I’ll have you know, both my parents were alcoholics and I am not one, neither is James. I could do with a drink right now, mind you.”
“I hear them arriving.” Charles walked to the window. “The men have black ties but the women are wearing their usual clothes. Just them, no one from the village except the ones in the kitchen and they’re only here because they’re being paid.”
Agatha opened the door. “I’ll waylay Alison. She isn’t a member of the family except by marriage and she didn’t like Phyllis.”
She went out into the hall. Bert, Jimmy, Sadie, Fran and Sir Henry Field saw Agatha but simply walked past her into the drawing room. Alison came hurrying in after them and stopped short at the sight of Agatha.
“I’m surprised you should call at such a time,” she said.
“You haven’t heard?”
“Haven’t heard what?”
“You’d better come into the morning room. There’s been a new development.”
Alison walked in, nodded to Sir Charles and demanded, “What?”
Agatha told her about finding the skeleton and the fact that Phyllis might have killed Susan.
Alison sat down and put her head in her hands. “This is awful,” she mumbled.
“So this is the first you’ve heard of it?” asked Charles.
“Yes, I’d better tell the others. Wait here.”
She got unsteadily to her feet. Charles put out an arm to help her but she gave him a weak smile. “I’ll be all right.”
She closed the door behind her.
“It’s odd,” said Agatha. “I’m actually beginning to feel sorry for the lot of them. What a mother! Let’s hope it doesn’t get round the village or we’ll have all the press you can think of running around the place.”
“Gosh,” said Charles. He wrenched open the door. Two women from the village were standing across the hall, their ears pressed to the panel of the drawing-room door. “What are you doing?” shouted Charles. “Get back to the kitchen!”
He turned to Agatha. “We’d better sit in the hall in case they come back. That’s torn it. There’s no use telling them not to talk and we’ve nothing to threaten them with.”
Someone in the drawing room was sobbing. They waited and waited. A couple of times the kitchen door opened a crack and then closed again.
At last Alison came out. “They want you to leave. Jimmy looks on the point of breakdown. This is something I know nothing about. So I can’t help you either. I really don’t think you should be here on such a day. I’ll call at your office if I have any news.”
In the office, Mrs Freedman said, “Phil came in. I sent him home. I hope you don’t mind. I said it was too early.”
“Poor man,” exclaimed Agatha. “I’d better go and see him. What are Toni and Patrick doing?”
“Patrick’s working on a divorce and Toni’s out looking for a missing teenager.”
“I’ve got things to do,” said Charles. “I’ll leave you to look after Phil. Drop me at your cottage and I’ll pick up my car.”
When Agatha arrived at Phil’s cottage in Carsely, it was to find Mrs Bloxby there.
“I just brought Mr Marshall some of my chicken soup,” said the vicar’s wife.
“I haven’t brought you anything, Phil,” said Agatha. “But wait until you both hear the latest development. First, how are you, Phil?”
“I’m fine. I really would like to get back to work.”
“Maybe tomorrow. Now listen to this…”
When she had finished the story of the skeleton, Mrs Bloxby exclaimed in horror, “That woman was truly evil!”
“They’ll have a devil of a job proving she did it after all this time, and with the case load the police have these days, they might not even try too hard. I mean, the murder was done either by Phyllis or Hugh or both of them. But Hugh was off on an errand for Phyllis, and –”
Her mobile phone rang. It was Doris Simpson. “Could you get back to the cottage? The men are here with the cooker but everything’s got to be moved to fit it in.”
“I’ll be right there,” said Agatha. She rang off. “Got to go.”
When Agatha had left, Mrs Bloxby said, “Agatha needs a psychiatrist.”
“Mrs Bloxby!”
“No, I don’t mean for herself. I mean she should sit down with one of those police psychiatrists and tell him all she knows about Phyllis Tamworthy and her children.”
“I might be able to help there,” said Phil. “There’s a retired psychiatrist who dealt with criminals. He lives in Bourton-on-the-Water. His name is Dr Drayton. I hope he’s still alive.”
Agatha passed what she considered a wasted day. Anything to do with domesticity Agatha considered a wasted day. Electricians and plumbers had to be brought in to move the fridge and dishwasher and refit them to leave space for the large cooker. When everything was finished, the cooker sat there, squat, shiny and big, looking totally out of place.
When the men had finally gone, Agatha’s phone rang. It was to be the first of many newspapers. The story had got out. How Agatha longed to take the credit for finding that skeleton. The only thing that stopped her was that Charles would lecture her and Toni would put her down as a jealous old bat.
Toni was in her flat having tea with George Pyson when Agatha rang her. George had just delivered one very comfortable leather armchair and a sturdy round pine table and had carried the ones those replaced down to his Land Rover, so Toni had made him tea.
“Toni,” said Agatha, “get your glad rags on and full make–up and get to Carsely. The press will be here to interview you quite soon.”
“Do I have to?” pleaded Toni. “You could handle it.”
“They want you,” said Agatha gruffly. “So hurry up.”
Toni told George what had happened. He looked at her outfit critically. She was in her usual jeans and T–shirt.
“Have you got high heels and a skirt?”
“Yes.”
“I’ll wait in the car while you change. You don’t need much make–up except lipstick and mascara.”
Agatha opened the door to them an hour later and looked gloomily at Toni. The girl looked as if she had legs up to her armpits and with her eyelashes darkened, her eyes seemed even larger.
“The press, some of them, are in the sitting room.”
Toni entered and blinked. Crammed into Agatha’s sitting room were reporters, photographers and television cameramen.
Agatha listened sourly as Toni, falteringly at first, and then gaining confidence, told her story.
Then Toni was asked, “Why did you guess a body might be there? What made you leap to that conclusion?”
Toni smiled. “I work for Mrs Agatha Raisin, who must be one of the most brilliant detectives in the country. She taught me everything I know. She encourages me to use my imagination. She could easily have said, “Don’t be silly,” but she said I was to go ahead.”
God bless the girl, thought Agatha as the press began to demand photographs of them together.
When the session was finally over and Agatha was showing them out, she noticed George Pyson sitting in the Land Rover outside.
She turned and said to Toni, “What’s he doing here?”
“He drove me over.” For some reason Toni felt that it would not be wise to tell Agatha about the furniture. Agatha seemed to disapprove of George.
“Of course. You don’t have a car,” said Agatha. “We’ll get one tomorrow. Invite George in and I’ll open a bottle of wine.”
Terry Gilmour watched his sister on television’s late-night news. He felt bitter and mean with jealousy. The house was like a tip, strewn with bottles and cans and empty pizza cartons. His mother had suddenly appeared the day before. Shaky but stone cold sober, she had announced she was going to stay with an old school friend in Southampton who had managed to get off the booze and who was going to help her.
He began to cry drunkenly. He had no one to turn to. Even his friends were beginning to make excuses not to see him. He dimly remembered punching one of them in the face two nights before, but the rest of the evening was lost to him.
“I’ll make them all sorry!” he shouted to the uncaring messy room.
Agatha studied George carefully and watched him closely when he talked to Toni, but she could detect no romantic interest there. A voice in her not usually overworked conscience was telling her that she was behaving like a jealous old maid. The phone rang and she went to answer it. It was her young friend, Roy Silver.
“What’s been going on?” he cried. “Finding a skeleton? You might have told me.”
“As you can imagine, I’m busy. Press by the hordes.”
“Press?” Roy was always trying to get himself some publicity. “Can I come down this weekend?”
“All right. But you might have to sleep on the sofa if Charles is using the spare room.”
“See you.”
George had got up to leave. “Do be careful,” he said. “There’s still a murderer out there.”
After he had gone, taking Toni with him, Agatha received a phone call from Phil.
“Mrs Bloxby had this great idea,” said Phil. “She says what you need is a psychiatrist.” Agatha felt a stab of hurt. “I’m surprised—” she was beginning furiously when Phil interrupted. “No, not for you. A retired police psychiatrist. We tell him everything we know about Phyllis and he might guess that there was something in her character which made her into a murderee.”
“I don’t need a shrink for that,” said Agatha. “She murdered someone herself by the look of things, so it’s easy to imagine someone wanted to kill her. In fact, there must be so many people who wanted to kill her, I don’t know where to start.”
“I’ve made an appointment for us,” said Phil. “Of course, I can always cancel it.”
“May as well give it a try,” said Agatha. “Where? What time?”
“He lives in Bourton-on-the-Water. Ten tomorrow morning.”
“Not far. I’ll pick you up at half nine.”
Agatha yawned and stretched. Time for a good night’s sleep. If only one hadn’t got to eat the whole time. She was poking about in her freezer when the doorbell rang.
Probably Charles, she thought, and, not bothering to look through the spyhole, she swung the door open. Jimmy Tamworthy stood on the step, his face white, his eyes glittering. “I want a word with you,” he hissed.
“It’s late,” said Agatha, barring the doorway. “Call on me at my office tomorrow.”
“You’ll hear me now, you bitch. How dare you go around saying my mother was a murderer! I could kill you.”
“Another time,” babbled Agatha. She nipped inside and slammed the door in his face. She crouched down in a chair in the kitchen while he rang the bell and hammered and kicked the door. Why aren’t I phoning the police? she thought.
Why am I such a wimp?
She marched back to the door and shouted, “I’ve called the police!”
There was a sudden silence. Then a final kick at the door. A car door slammed and she peered through the spyhole and saw him driving off.
Agatha phoned Bill Wong at home, having to tell his formidable mother that it was a matter of life and death before she would call her son.
Bill listened carefully and said, “We should arrest him.”
“I don’t know. Could you maybe just give him a warning, Bill? I can’t help thinking that if I had had a mother like Phyllis, I’d be off my trolley as well.”
“All right. I’ll speak to him tomorrow and put the fear of death into him. Hang on a minute. My mobile’s ringing.”
He seemed to be gone a long time. Then he finally came back on the phone and said, “You’d better get over to Toni’s flat. The police are on their way.”
“What’s happened?”
“That wretched brother of hers has hanged himself.”
“Oh, God. I’ll go immediately.”
Agatha was gathering up her belongings, ready to leave, when she froze in horror. A key was turning in her front door. She ran into the kitchen and seized a carving knife.
When she returned to the hall, brandishing the knife, it was to find Charles smiling at her.
“Going to kill me, Aggie?”
“Ho
w did you get in?”
“I copied your keys.”
“Snakes and bastards! How dare you? Oh, never mind. We’ve got to get to Toni’s. Her brother has hanged himself.”
When they arrived at Toni’s flat, it was to find her being attended by a policewoman.
“Is there anything I can do?” asked Agatha.
Toni rose from the sofa where she had been sitting with her friend, Maggie, and flung her arms around Agatha and burst into tears.
“There, there,” said Agatha, patting the girl awkwardly on the back. “We’ll see you through this. Do you know where your mother is?”
Toni dried her tears. “She sent me a letter the other day. The police have contacted her. Her friend is driving her up from Southampton.”
Agatha asked the policewoman, “Did he leave a note?”
“Fortunately he did. Trying to make everyone feel guilty.”
“Will you need Miss Gilmour tonight? I’d like to take her home with me.”
“I need to stay here for my mother,” said Toni.
“Does she need to identify the body tonight?” Agatha asked the policewoman.
“No, tomorrow will do.” She turned to Toni. “Are you sure you wouldn’t like to let me phone for a doctor? He could give you something to make you sleep.”
Toni shook her head.
“When was he found?” asked Agatha.
“Two hours ago.”
“But Bill Wong phoned me not so long ago.”
“He’s off duty. Probably one of his colleagues at the station realized Miss Gilmour is part of the murder inquiry we’re investigating and phoned him.”
The doorbell rang. “Can’t be your mother already,” said Agatha.
“It’ll be George,” said Toni. “I got Maggie here to phone him.”
Agatha felt slightly miffed that Toni had not thought to phone her.
George Pyson came into the room. “There’s a bed and breakfast down the street. I’ve booked a double room for your mother and her friend. I know the owner. She’s very kind. She says if I phone her when they are due to arrive, she’ll get up to let them in.”
“Do you want us to wait?” asked Agatha, feeling superfluous.
“No,” said Toni weakly. “I think George will take care of everything. And my friend, Maggie, says she’ll stay the night.”
