by M C Beaton
‘That doesn’t mean to say it doesn’t exist,’ Agatha pointed out. ‘But, say these people were terrorists. What good would Beech have been to them?’
‘He was always ferreting around,’ said Bill. ‘He could have discovered enough to blackmail them.’
‘But,’ protested James, ‘why, with Beech out of the way, still go after Agatha? Maybe they thought Roy was her son.’
Agatha bridled. She hated to be reminded of her age.
‘The thing is,’ said Bill slowly, ‘you are all at risk: you, Agatha, James and your staff. In the past there has been a lot in the media about your successes, Agatha. They want to make sure you don’t find out anything.’
‘Was there any clue in that—’ Agatha coloured and bit her lip. She had been about to ask if the ledger found in Beech’s secret room had given them any clues.
‘In what?’ demanded Bill suspiciously.
‘In, for example, the cottage to which Roy was taken. Who does it belong to?’
‘It’s a derelict building out in the fields of a farm that’s been on the market for the past six months. The farmer is in an old folks’ home, and his heirs don’t want to continue with the farm and so no one lives there. No fingerprints. The storm scrubbed everything pretty clean when part of the roof caved in. By the way, that vicar who gave Roy a lift to Chipping Norton Police Station would like to be paid for the phone calls.’
‘Which calls?’ asked Agatha.
‘Roy asked if he could borrow the man’s mobile to call his mother.’
‘She’s dead!’
‘Anyway, he used it to phone a lot of the media.’
Agatha sighed. ‘I’ll make sure Roy pays him back.’ She suddenly felt low as she looked at Bill’s pleasant face. Bill was the only normal man she knew. James was a cold fish, Charles was flighty, and Roy, a publicity-grabbing pain in the fundament. At that moment, Bill exchanged a smile with pretty Alice, and Agatha felt a stabbing pang of jealousy.
‘Now,’ said Bill. ‘We will put a guard on your cottage and one on your office. But we cannot guard the homes of all of your staff. For your own safety, you should close your business, let everyone go off somewhere safe and leave the detection to the police.’
‘In the middle of a recession!’ exclaimed Agatha.
‘You would not like anything to happen to Toni, for example,’ said Bill. ‘I want you to announce in the press that you are dropping all your investigations into this case to protect your staff. At least will you do that?’
Their conversation had been periodically interrupted by rings at the doorbell. ‘The press are still outside, Agatha. Go and do it now.’
‘Oh, all right,’ said Agatha. ‘I must admit, whoever they are, they’ve really got me scared.’
They waited while she made her statement.
She eventually returned in a bad temper. The press had seen her capitulation as possibly the end to more horror stories and had tried to goad her about ‘giving in’.
After Bill and Alice had left, James stayed on guard with Agatha, pointing out that she was at risk until her story appeared in the news. Agatha was waiting for workmen to come and beef up her security, change the locks and change the burglar-alarm code and for a local man to put bars on all the downstairs windows.
James made an omelette for lunch and then waited with Agatha until the workmen had finished.
‘I think you should move in with me,’ he said again.
Agatha gave a reluctant smile. ‘May I smoke?’
‘No.’
‘Then no thanks. But thanks all the same for sticking by me and looking after my cats. I’ll go to the office now, and tell everyone to leave the investigation into Beech’s death alone.’
‘Including you?’
‘Yes, including me,’ said Agatha.
Everything seemed to go very quiet in Agatha’s life after her statement appeared on television and in the press.
May came in, cold, blustery and rainy, but then cleared up into long, sunny days.
Agatha had prepared herself carefully for the Woman of the Year banquet. Her favourite hairdresser, Jeanelle, had recoloured her hair to a rich, glossy brown, and her beautician, Dawn, had performed a series of nonsurgical face-lifts. Agatha felt ready for what she privately considered the battle ahead.
Wearing a soft white chiffon blouse, her good pearls and a black silk chiffon skirt with a slit up the side and high heels, Agatha drove to the George Hotel, looking always in her driving mirror to check any cars behind her that might look suspicious. She had not lost her fear of the murderers of Gary Beech.
The restaurant, which had been taken over for the evening for the event, was already crowded when she arrived. She was directed to a table that held three other nominees: Cressida Jones-Wilkes, the woman who owned a garden centre; Joanna Tripp, local poetess, and Fairy Mather, a stocky woman who painted angry abstracts.
‘You’re that detective woman who chickened out of a case out of fear,’ said Fairy truculently.
Agatha’s small eyes narrowed. ‘What were your parents thinking of to give you a name like Fairy?’ she said. ‘You look more like a troll.’
‘Why, you bitch!’
‘Yes, that’s me. Pass the wine.’
The three contestants looked uneasily at Agatha.
‘I have never been so insulted in my life,’ said Fairy at last.
‘Time you were, then,’ said Agatha. ‘Oh, snakes and bastards, mulligatawny soup, and on such a hot evening. Couldn’t they do better than that?’
Joanna Tripp, neat in a pink blouse and evening skirt, small features and heavy glasses, looked at Agatha with disgust. ‘You are a truly horrible woman,’ she remarked.
Joanna wrote ‘sweet’ poems about the Cotswolds in the local magazines and newspapers. Even to Agatha’s half-educated mind, they seemed like doggerel.
She surveyed the poetess and said, ‘Why don’t you shut up and go away / And live to fight another day.’
The three women moved their chairs closer together as if for comfort and began to talk to one another in low whispers.
The soup was followed by a plate of chicken and mashed potatoes in a gummy white sauce. The George was usually famous for its food. As that course was followed by a sliver of cheesecake, Agatha reflected that it was the most cut-price meal she had ever endured.
As the coffee was served, Guy Brandon took the microphone. Most of the men at the banquet were wearing black tie, but Guy was wearing a pale blue sweater over a striped shirt and very tight jeans.
He began to ‘amuse’. He twittered, he clowned, he laughed hilariously at his own jokes, and in all, thought Agatha, he bored for Britain.
The evening wore on. Guy had a very loud voice. There was a speaker right over Agatha’s table, and she began to feel that endless voice was booming inside her head. People began to shift restlessly, and the laughter grew thin and sporadic. Only the other three contestants at last were left to laugh sycophantically at each new sally.
At last, the mayor, seated behind Guy on the stage, leaned forward and tapped his watch.
‘Ah, yes . . .’ Guy beamed. ‘The great moment. If you will just pass me that envelope, Mayor. Who have we here?’ He grinned at the audience. ‘And the winner is . . .’ Long silence.
Someone shouted, ‘Oh, get on with it!’
Guy scowled. ‘The winner is . . . Mrs Agatha Raisin! Come on up, Mrs Raisin!’ he cried.
Cameras flashed as Agatha made her way to the little stage. Guy flung an arm around her shoulders. ‘What have you got to say? You must be overwhelmed.’
‘I have to say this,’ said Agatha, seizing the microphone. ‘I am sure you would all like to know how the judging is done. Listen to this.’ She held a tape recorder up to the microphone and switched it on. The whole room could clearly hear Guy suggesting she pay him and the other judges for the prize.
When the recording had finished, Guy began to back off the stage, and a chorus of jeers and catcalls rang i
n his ears. The newspaper reporters were furious because all this was too late for the morning editions and television would scoop the lot. But each reporter decided to do a really nasty piece on Guy for the day afterwards.
Agatha raised her hands for silence. ‘In view of this chicanery,’ she said, ‘I think the prize should be divided up amongst the three other nominees and that each of them should be given the title of Woman of the Year. Come along, girls.’
Guy fled. The three women who had spent the evening loathing Agatha all now joined her with beaming smiles.
Bill Wong, watching local television news before he went to work, stared at the screen in a mixture of anger and dismay. Didn’t Agatha know that it was important these days to keep a low profile? Guy Brandon was interviewed. He said it had all been a bit of a joke that Mrs Raisin had taken seriously. She had a reputation as being a pushy and ambitious woman, and he had just wondered how far she would go. The interviewer then demanded why he had gone ahead and elected her. He hummed and hawed and mumbled something and then fled the studio after unplugging his microphone.
Agatha found Bill waiting for her as she opened up her office. She had never seen the usually placid detective so angry.
‘How could you?’ he raged. ‘The minute you had that tape you should have come to us. This is not the time to have a high profile. You’re as bad as Roy. Grabbing publicity no matter what. You are a very silly woman.’
‘It was nothing to do with the case,’ howled Agatha defiantly. ‘Anyway, I’ll bet you’re no further forward in finding who murdered either Gary Beech or his ex-wife.’
‘We’re pursuing certain leads,’ said Bill.
‘Oh, yeah? Well, that means you’ve got zilch. I watch these real-life forensic programmes on TV and they always seem to find someone through a bit of hair or dust.’
‘If you were watching properly, you might have noticed that some of them take years to solve. Just be careful,’ he said in a quieter voice.
When he had left, Agatha sat down suddenly. The fear of whoever it was who had sent her that head two months ago had never gone away. She had a craving for sleep most days. She often thought during the day of the moment when she could get home and pull the duvet up round her ears. Death by duvet.
The fear ebbed as her temper rose. She must find out something, anything, to try to break the case. She could not go on living like this.
Agatha looked up as her staff filed in. They discussed jobs to be covered that day.
‘Aren’t we ever going to find out what happened to Beech?’ asked Toni.
‘No,’ said Agatha sharply. ‘We will drop that one. Leave it to the police.’
‘When did we ever leave anything to the police?’ said Patrick plaintively, but Agatha ignored him.
‘And what are you doing today?’ asked Phil after they all had their assignments.
‘I’ve got paperwork to do,’ said Agatha. ‘Off you go.’
She cast a quick suspicious glance at Toni as the girl left. Toni appeared to be carrying a golden glow around with her. I hope she’s not found another unsuitable older man, thought Agatha.
Toni’s job was to find a missing teenager. She had not told Agatha that she had found the girl the night before and had returned her to her parents. She needed the day free to meet Simon. They had arranged to meet in a teashop in Winter Parva, the one place Toni was sure Agatha would not visit. Simon had got in touch with her as soon as he had returned from Afghanistan on leave. He had told her his impending wedding had all been a mistake. Susie, his intended, had turned out to be bossy. He had phoned Toni the night before to arrange to meet her, where he said he would explain everything.
As Toni parked near the teashop, Winter Parva was not living up to its name. Great fluffy clouds sailed in the blue sky above, and the trees in the main street were ruffled by the lightest of breezes. The old village cottages and shops lining the main street appeared to crouch beside the road like very old villagers surveying the passing of time. In these days of chain shops, Winter Parva had retained its individuality. There were teashops, souvenir shops, an ironmonger, a baker, a fishmonger and a butcher – all the traditional fabric of a Cotswold village. There was a huge church at one end, built by rich merchants in the days when the wool trade was at its height. Its huge Gothic spire cast a long finger of shadow down the main street like the pointer on a giant sundial.
Toni’s heart rose as she saw Simon seated at a table in the bay window of the teashop. She recognized his thick hair and his jester’s face.
When she joined him, they began to talk at once about the perfidy of Agatha Raisin, until Toni said sadly, ‘You can hardly back out of the wedding now.’
He hung his head and mumbled, ‘It’s all got out of hand. The regiment’s on leave and they’re all going to be there. It’s going to be a big production. Toni, the mayor is going to attend. I’m trapped. It’s all Agatha’s fault.’
‘Hardly,’ said Toni. ‘She wasn’t in Afghanistan. She didn’t make you propose to Susie.’
‘No, but I was feeling flat, and Susie’s a good sort. She was very sympathetic, and one thing led to another.’
‘There’s still time to get out of it,’ urged Toni. ‘Think of the misery of a loveless marriage.’
‘Oh, Susie does love me. Oh, what is it?’
‘The waitress wants your order,’ said Toni.
They both ordered tea and scones. The shadow of the church spire moved across the window of the tearoom. Toni felt bleak. When Simon had phoned her, she was sure he was going to tell her the marriage was off.
‘So you are going ahead with it,’ she said in a small voice.
‘I have to—’ Simon broke off as tea and scones arrived.
Toni gave a little sigh. ‘It’s up to you. Why did you let it get so far?’
‘She’s pregnant.’
‘Oh, Simon!’
He shrugged. ‘Maybe being a dad will have a lot of compensations.’ He looked at her eagerly. ‘We can still see each other.’
‘No, we can’t,’ said Toni roundly. ‘I’ve got my own life to lead, and creeping around meeting a married man doesn’t come into it.’
There was a long, awkward silence. Then Simon said, ‘Tell me about this dead policeman case.’
Toni gave him a précis. ‘It sounds like a gang,’ she concluded. ‘Look at all the criminal gangs Britain let in after the European Union opened the borders: Bulgarians, Romanians and so on.’
‘But what is there for them in Mircester, of all places?’ said Simon. ‘It’s hardly a big city like Birmingham. For one thing, there’s nowhere really to hide out. And is this Tom Richards squeaky clean? Seems a bit of an odd fish wanting two women to have plastic surgery.’
‘It’s not as odd as you think. The divorce cases we handle are usually instigated by the women. The husband sees all these sexual fantasies on television and wants to try some of them out at home. The woman says no. Fights ensue. Divorce follows. I suppose wanting the wife to have plastic surgery is another part of the fantasy. Agatha’s told us not to go near anything to do with the murders.’
‘Not like her.’
‘Well, getting a dead head through the post was enough to frighten even Agatha Raisin. I’d better be getting back, Simon. I won’t be seeing you again.’
‘You’ll come to my wedding?’
‘No thanks.’
‘But I’ve invited the whole agency. They’re all coming.’
‘Well, in that case, I might drop along.’
Chapter Nine
When Toni reached her car, she had a sudden urge to watch Mrs Fiona Richards. Phil had told her that Fiona had not called him, and when he had called her, she’d said she was too busy. Amy Richards might have said something to her husband, and he might have told Fiona. It might be he was too afraid to pass any information along to the police in case something happened to him. In her car, she put on a baseball cap and pulled it down over her face and put on a pair of dark glasses. Satisf
ied she looked like any other anonymous teenager, she set out for Fiona Richards’s house. Fiona’s car was not in the drive.
Toni set off for the centre of town. Perhaps Fiona had gone to do some shopping. It was market day. Toni walked up and down between the stalls. As lunchtime approached, she decided to try the George. She checked the hotel’s private parking place and recognized Fiona’s car. Toni decided to sit in an armchair in reception and say she was waiting for someone.
Armed with a newspaper, she glanced round it occasionally as people entered the hotel.
She found to her surprise as she waited that she no longer felt anything for Simon at all. He had only been a dream. If Agatha had not interfered, then the dream would not have been kept alive.
‘Excuse me, are you Toni Gilmour?’
Toni lowered her newspaper. A man was standing there, smiling down at her. She registered that he was very expensively dressed and immaculately barbered. He smelled faintly of cologne. He had a wide, pleasant face, and although his body was broad, it looked sturdy. His eyes were brown with little flecks of gold.
‘I am Toni Gilmour,’ said Toni, thinking her baseball cap and dark glasses had turned out to be a pretty poor disguise.
He sat down beside her. ‘It’s cheeky of me to come right up to you. I wanted your advice. It’s really Mrs Raisin I want to meet. Here’s my card. I’m Peter Powell, estate agent.’
‘And what did you want with Mrs Raisin?’ asked Toni suspiciously.
‘It’s like this. I’ve got this client who wants a cottage in the Cotswolds. He was driving with me around the villages and we ended up in Carsely. He fell in love with Mrs Raisin’s cottage.’
‘Odd that he should spot it,’ said Toni suspiciously. ‘It’s in a cul-de-sac.’
‘He spotted it from the end of Lilac Lane. We drove up. He said he must have it.’
‘Agatha won’t sell, I can tell you that.’
‘Ah, but wait to hear what he’s offering.’
‘Who is this man?’
‘At the moment he prefers to remain anonymous.’
‘Mr . . .’
‘Peter. Call me Peter.’
