The Dead Ringer

by M C Beaton

  “I should think the Greek restaurant is a good place to start,” said Agatha.

  * * *

  When Roy came downstairs that evening, Agatha surveyed his evening outfit of pale blue jacket with three-quarter sleeves, pink shirt and jeans with holes torn in the knees. “You look so retro, Roy. If you wore an ordinary suit and took that gel out of your hair, you would look very much younger.”

  “I knew it would happen eventually!” cried Roy. “You’ve finally gone countryfied. You’ll be wearing tweed knickers next. Let’s just go. I’m hungry. What’s the food like?”

  “Awful!”

  “So why are we going there?”

  “Because,” said Agatha, “you’ve fallen for the bishop and I am detecting.”

  * * *

  It had been a fine summer’s day, but the evening had turned cold and drizzly. “Zorba the Greek” was thudding out from the Greek restaurant. “Can I smash plates?” asked Roy.

  They entered the restaurant. Only a couple of men were customers. The rest of the tables were empty. Agatha saw the Glaswegian waiter approaching.

  “Devils for punishment,” he said cheerfully. “Whit’s it tae be?”

  “What about some menus, matey,” said Roy in what he thought was a sort of bloke-to-bloke voice.

  “Weel, matey, the menu is up there on the blackboard. I waud hae the stuffed vine leaves although they’re cabbage leaves but the stuff’s fresh.”

  Agatha suggested that they all have some garlic bread and wine and then go somewhere afterwards where they could get a decent meal. “Is the bishop coming tonight?” she asked.

  “Oh, aye, all the biddies’ll be here and he’ll be trying to get money offa them. It’s a fund-raiser for the auld folks.”

  “What time?”

  “Nine o’clock.”

  “Bit late for the elderly,” said Charles.

  “I heard that dean say that the plum picking couldnae get here any earlier.”

  “It’s an odd thing,” said Agatha, “the way he is so determined to provide a home for the elderly. I mean, quite honestly, I can’t imagine him having a charitable bone in his body. Also, we never really looked up why he was adopted and where he was adopted from.”

  “I know that one,” said Charles. “Met Lady Fathering last year. Her best friend, Molly Hepworth, got pregnant after some wild party. Her parents were anti-abortion and so she had the child and there was Lady Fathering gasping for one and the deed was done. Husband, Henry, fought against it, but he was not firing on all cylinders so it wasn’t as if he could give her one, so he learned to shut up although he does loathe our Peter.”

  “My mind keeps going back to that dead policeman,” said Agatha. “Surely the one person interested in getting rid of him is our bishop because Larry was, I am sure, about to sell stories about naughty vicars and sadomasochism to the newspapers.”

  “That dean bothers me,” said Charles. “He’s a thug. Uh-oh, here he comes.”

  A little procession, headed by the bishop, entered the restaurant. Bishop Peter led the way with Ducksy on his arm. Behind her with the dean came Mavis Dupin, darting angry little looks into Ducksy’s back. Behind her walked three women and one man.

  Peter said something to Ducksy and came over to their table. He kissed Agatha’s hand and gazed into her eyes. “Introduce me,” hissed Roy.

  Agatha made the introductions. “That purple does suit you,” gushed Roy. “Ever so flattering.”

  “And so are you,” said Peter. “Are you a detective as well?”

  “He’s in public relations,” said Agatha.

  “I can speak for myself, sweetie,” said Roy.

  “There’s a coincidence,” cried Peter. “I am raising money for an old folks’ home but we have never achieved the necessary publicity.”

  “I’ve got some ideas,” said Roy eagerly.

  “Wonderful! If Agatha will excuse us…”

  “Is Roy actually any good?” asked Charles. “He always seems to be picking your brains.”

  “Oh, yes, he loves that whole trashy world and revels in it. I am the one who is glad to get out of public relations.”

  “Be careful. The bishop has just swivelled round to cast an enquiring eye in your direction.”

  “He can cast as much as he likes. Mind you, it might be a way of getting something on missing Jennifer. Oh, here comes the first murderer, I mean, the dean. He’s coming here.”

  “Bugger off,” said Charles.

  “I owe you one, said the dean placidly. “Who’s the spotty chappy with Peter?”

  “I’ll scratch your back, you scratch mine. Where’s Jennifer Toynby?”

  “I really, honest to God, don’t know. One minute she was all over the place. Oh, this other preacher was a sort of Billy Graham. He was seated next to her at a dinner at the palace. Next day, she had gone.”

  “I gather,” said Agatha, “that the countrywide police hunt was immediate. Why?”

  “Because all her clothes and wallet, purse, passport and house keys had been left behind, that’s why. Last message texted to her mum said, ‘Getting out of this world.’”

  “I’d had better go with my little brush and shovel to pick up the pieces.”

  “From which one?”

  “Ducksy. No amount of money could make anyone tolerate that dreadful smell.”

  “He looks a bit standoffish,” said Charles. “She only blooms in moments of rapture.”

  * * *

  “Okay. Pay some more attention to me and leave the Rainbow Alliance alone,” Ducksy was saying.

  Under the checked tablecloth, he ran a hand up her leg, caressing and stroking. She wriggled and closed her eyes. Peter signalled the waiter. “There is rotten fish under this table. Get rid of it. No, move us all to another table.”

  “Could I hae a wee word in your ear, Your Eminence?” said the waiter.

  “Can’t it wait? Oh, very well.”

  “The waiter is about to explain the smell,” said Charles.

  “Surely not,” said Agatha.

  “’Fraid so. Gustav said dear Ducksy was apt to put it about a bit. Didn’t believe him. But the dear bishop is now looking a whiter shade of pale. Think of all that money, man! Yes, he’s thought. He is smiling on his beloved. Wait a bit! Who is not smiling back.”

  “A note was delivered to her,” said Agatha. “She read it and looked as surly as hell. Yes, she’s getting up to leave.” They watched Peter pleading with her, then getting angry and saying something, and that was when Ducky slapped him savagely across the whiteness of his face, leaving an angry red mark.

  The dean took her arm in a strong grip and marched her from the restaurant. “Good grief, I do believe he’s going to lock her up in that cell he put me in!” exclaimed Charles.

  Then from outside the restaurant came the sound of a shot, a man crying out and the sound of running feet. Agatha was the first outside the restaurant.

  Dean Donald Whitby was lying on the ground, clutching his stomach, blood oozing through his fingers. While Agatha phoned for police and ambulance, Peter knelt down and cradled the dean’s head. “I’ll make the bitch pay for this,” he said. “Hang in there.”

  * * *

  Outside the restaurant was cordoned off after the dean had been taken off to hospital. It was then that they discovered the bishop was missing. “He didn’t go in the ambulance,” said Agatha.

  “He went to search the palace,” said Roy eagerly as he watched the press arriving on the other side of the tape.

  Police and detectives searched all night but there was no sign of Ducksy. The searched widened to ports and airports but nothing could be found. Like Jennifer, she had disappeared, not even taking a passport with her.

  “You would think the bloodhounds would have found her if that smell is as bad as reported.”

  “And there’s a lot of it,” said Charles. “It’s not an orgasm. She just needs to feel flattered and this awful body odour sours the air. Smells like ro
tting kippers.”

  “Or red herrings,” said Roy and shrieked with laughter at his own wit. Then when he judged the police were not looking, he nipped under the tape and could be seen busily talking to the press.

  “Where is Peter?” asked Charles.

  “The police have taken him away,” said Agatha. “We’d better move. We’re next to be grilled at headquarters but Alice is going to take our statements first and then we go tomorrow and sign the things. Here she comes. Alice, let’s go back inside the restaurant where we can sit down and have a drink.”

  Alice agreed. “Wiz yiz be wantin yir vine leaves?” asked the waiter.

  “May as well,” said Agatha. “And a bottle of wine. Merlot.”

  She turned to Charles. “Did you know she carried a gun?”

  “Of course not. I mean, this is Britain.”

  “The things men will do and the lengths they will go for money is sickening,” said Agatha.

  Roy came hurrying to join them, tears running down his face. Pimples stood out red against the pallor of his skin. Agatha had a sudden mad impulse to take out a pen and play “join the dots.” Instead she asked, “What happened?”

  “I was talking to the reporters and this policeman came up and snarled at me to join you and I said, “‘In a minute, my good man.’ Polite, see? He stamped on my foot and I think he’s broken a bone. He said, ‘Shut up and do as you’re told, poofter.’”

  Alice said, “Excuse me,” and slid from the table, only to return in a few moments with a brute of a policeman who had to humbly apologise to Roy.

  Roy, delighted to be the centre of attention and finding his foot didn’t hurt anymore, graciously forgave the policeman and only Alice, interrupting to say she really wanted to get their statements, had the effect of shutting him up.

  The “vine leaves” were cabbage stuffed with glutinous rice. Agatha paid the waiter and tipped him so that he could go to the nearest Marks & Spencer and buy them a selection of sandwiches. Alice was a calm and efficient interviewer with a soothing manner but Agatha’s mind turned and churned with unanswered questions. Why had Ducksy been carrying a gun?

  The waiter came back with a bag of sandwiches. To Agatha’s fury, he not only picked out one of the better sandwiches for himself but sat down at the table and joined them.

  Charles looked amused. “As the Victorians used to say, know your place, my good man.”

  “Or as I would say, haggis face,” hissed Agatha, “get lost.”

  “Oh, weel, and here’s me just figured out what caused that awfy smell o’ hers.”

  “I’ll see you all at headquarters in the morning,” said Alice. “I’ll type your statements up ready for you to sign.”

  Agatha stared at the waiter. “Okay. But I thought it was because she was sexually aroused.”

  “Naw, it was when she was scared.”

  “You mean like a skunk!” said Roy.

  “Could be. But take ma word for it. It’s the vodka. Awfy stuff. In some folk that drinks it day and nicht, it comes up through the skin wi’ the worst stink this side o’ hell. If fear makes them sweat, then you get the aroma o’ dead kippers.” He reached for another sandwich but Agatha slapped his wrist.

  “So obviously it was any intimacy that frightened her,” said Charles. “So why get married?”

  “It’s them lesbians. Some o’ them waud rather stay in the closet.”

  “In this day and age!” said Roy. “How bizarre.”

  “If all she wanted was the outward appearance of marriage, why didn’t she say so?” said Charles. “I’d have married her like a shot.”

  “Dream on,” snapped Agatha. “I bet the marriage settlement would have bankrupted you. Oh, let’s get back to all this business. Heiress goes missing, not Ducksy, another one goes missing. What have they in common? Both engaged to Peter. Our bishop has a thuggish dean. Maybe he is the reason Ducksy carried a gun.”

  Charles stifled a yawn. “We can’t do anything tonight. That wine is Chateau Yesterday. Make it in the bathtub, waiter? No. Don’t answer that. On second thought I just don’t want to know.”

  * * *

  To Agatha’s relief, Roy decided to drive back to London and Charles, too, said he would go home.

  She had showered before bed but lifted an arm and sniffed it cautiously. Did gin make one smell? How would poor Ducksy ever know? Men wouldn’t tell her. They would just drop her. Was she really a lesbian? That was the sort of thing men usually said when they got a rejection.

  She sat on the kitchen floor with her cats on her lap, wondering why she could not be content with her own company, always looking for some man to fill the hole in the soul.

  Her mobile phone rang. She looked at the dial. It was Julian Brody. Agatha answered it, reluctantly as she felt tired and just wanted to go to bed.

  “I’m outside,” said Julian. “I’ll only take a few minutes of your time.”

  Agatha lifted each cat onto the floor and went to open the front door. It dawned on her again that Julian was a very good-looking young man.

  “Come in,” she said. “It has been quite an evening.”

  “I heard all sorts of things. What happened?”

  Agatha gave him a concise summary up of the evening’s events right down to the fact of Ducksy’s odd body odour.

  “That can’t be right,” protested Julian. He had followed her through to the kitchen and was seated at the table with Hodge and Boswell on his lap. “I mean, we all drink vodka because it doesn’t smell.”

  “I’ve just remembered I knew someone that vodka had the same effect on. You have to drink buckets of the stuff, mind you.” She stifled a yawn. “Sorry, I am weary.”

  “I do not understand women at all,” complained Julian. “Helen won’t divorce that husband of hers.”

  “Stand by for this old chestnut. Maybe she’s afraid of commitment. Maybe she doesn’t like sex. I used to have lousy digs down the East End of London when I was a young woman. The girls were saucy and flirty up until they were married and then with the first pram they ran to seed and their friends would ask, ‘Does he bother you much?’ And if she said, ‘No,’ they’d sigh with envy and say, ‘Aren’t you lucky?’ Because ‘yes’ meant another squalling kid.”

  “What about the birth control pill?”

  “If the husband wants kids, the wife will get a beating for taking them. He won’t use a condom because he says it’s like having sex with your socks on.”

  “Do you think you will ever get anything on Peter? I think it is his influence that is keeping Helen away from me.”

  “I am sorry to say this,” said Agatha, “but I think she’s a born martyr and she is never going to leave her husband but she likes keeping you on a string. Look! Try ignoring her. I bet she tries to get you back on the hook. And, so, do you want me to stop investigating?”

  “Just a few more weeks. And you could do something else. Go out with me a couple of evenings to events that Helen will be at and look as if you are attracted to me. If she is jealous, then there is hope there.”

  Agatha opened her mouth to refuse, but then the thought slid into her head. What if Charles could be made jealous? It would be interesting to find out. But he would need to be there as well.

  “The annual charity ball is at Barfield House.”

  “Charles’s home?”

  “Fraith. Yes, holds one every year to raise money for disabled people. Lets the committee use the house but doesn’t attend himself.”

  “He just might if he knew I was there,” said Agatha. “When is it?”

  “Tomorrow evening.”

  “I haven’t got a ball gown.”

  “It’s not like Come Dancing on television, all sequins and net. A long skirt and blouse are all that is needed.”

  * * *

  Later, when Agatha lay in bed, common sense deserted her and teenage dreams of being Cinderella filled her mind. She knew Barfield House well and knew that one went downstairs to the ballroom. She woul
d descend on Julian’s arm in a froth of rose chiffon with just a few sequins like stars twinkling in the light. She and Charles would announce their engagement, so went her dream, and Julian, who had actually fallen in love with her, would try not to cry. It would be like that wonderful evening when she was sixteen and bought a standing-room ticket for a Covent Garden Opera touring company. The opera was Eugene Onegin. And, oh, how she gazed with her mouth open when Tchaikovsky’s music swelled into the famous polonaise and the richly gowned dancers swirled onto the stage, filling it with beauty and colour. But then she remembered the awful comedown after all that beauty to have to go back to the slum where she lived with her parents, to noise and filth and the garbage-strewn stairwell and, of course, the lift didn’t work. Feeling the blackness inside her and the resentment that such visits to the opera were not for such as herself, and from then on growing older and harder and finding she could get what she wanted if she tried long enough, and yet, somehow, losing her innocence along the way and with it her appreciation of beauty. But she kept her talent for escaping into Walter Mitty dreams. Agatha fell asleep smiling, because that child was still somewhere inside, sheltered by ridiculous dreams and fantasies.

  * * *

  The next day, she emailed Charles to say she would be at the ball. He did not reply and Gustav had already refused to pass on any message.

  Agatha looked up old photographs in Cotswold Life of the ball. The gowns weren’t very grand. So much for dreams. A velvet skirt and a rose chiffon blouse would do. “Oh, why did I agree to this stupid idea?” she complained to Hodge and Boswell, who gave fur shrugs of cat indifference and slid off into the garden.

  * * *

  It was only when she was dressing for the ball that she realised she had not worked hard enough for Julian. She was sure that somehow the disappearance of Jennifer Toynby, Agatha began to speculate, was connected to the murder of Millicent and the murder of Larry. And she was pretty sure the murderer was the bishop, or his dean acting on the bishop’s commands. Say Jennifer had found out something, then it stood to reason that she had to go, if what she knew was dangerous for the bishop. Larry had found out about the sex games and, yes, that certainly would have damaged the bishop it had got into the newspapers because it was Bishop Peter who had started the games.