Down the Hatch

by M C Beaton

  “There are still a few on the loose, then?”

  “Only a handful, but they need to be found. They’re fine in this summer weather, but when it turns colder, they might not survive.”

  “The kids aren’t likely to come across any white lions or tigers, are they?”

  “No. All but those quokkas are accounted for. Bill says that Blackbeard’s crew kept a pretty good inventory. I’m afraid I added to his workload a bit today.”

  “He’s not bothered about that,” Alice said. “He’s made some new contacts with the wildlife unit and the National Crime Agency, so he’s happy.”

  “But you’re not, are you? Have you told him how upset you are about his parents?”

  “Not exactly, but I think he realises what the problem is.”

  “Does he? He adores them so much that he’s blind to their failings. I’ve seen this happen before. His parents have driven other girls away.”

  “Other girls? Well, I know I’m not exactly his first girlfriend … I’m not even his first fiancée…”

  “You’re not, but are you the one who’s going to last the course?”

  “I hope so.”

  “Have you had his mum’s Sunday lunch?”

  “The canned tomato soup…”

  “The soggy roast potatoes…”

  “Beef like grey leather…”

  “Disintegrating sprouts…”

  “His mother never took her eyes off me, so I ended up eating the lot.” Alice burst out laughing. “It was really awful, but I finished every last mouthful.”

  “That shows true dedication.” Agatha smiled. “You must really love him.”

  “I do. I really do.” Alice sighed. “I can’t imagine life without him. I want to spend my whole life with him, but…”

  “But his mother’s cooking is abysmal,” said Agatha, taking a sip of wine, “and talking at the table is forbidden.”

  “That’s just as well,” Alice groaned, “because all they ever do is tell me how I need to eat more to ‘put some meat on your bones, girl!’ But I can’t do that. I can’t put on weight. I’m not like you.”

  “What does that mean?” Agatha bristled slightly.

  “I mean I’ve never had a great figure like you.” Alice swallowed some wine. “I’ve always been too tall and too skinny with scrawny chicken legs.”

  “What are you talking about?” Agatha was appalled at her companion’s lack of confidence. “You look fantastic. Most women would kill to be able to eat whatever they like and look like you do. You are so beautiful—and I know Bill thinks so too.”

  “Bill always makes me feel special,” Alice admitted, and Agatha noted the way her expression softened when she spoke about her fiancé.

  “He’s grown into a handsome young man,” said Agatha. “You two look really glamorous together.”

  “I don’t think his parents agree. I overheard his father telling his mother that he wished Bill would find a nice Chinese girl to settle down with.”

  “Really?” Agatha paused, wondering for a moment if that was perhaps something Bill’s father had meant Alice to hear. She had heard him say the same thing about Bill’s previous girlfriends. A waiter appeared and topped up her glass from the bottle of Chablis chilling in the ice bucket standing by their table. “You have to try not to take that to heart. Bill’s father has been deluding himself for years. He still seems to think that Bill will one day give up being a police officer and join him in his dry-cleaning business.”

  “That won’t happen.” Alice shook her head. “Bill loves the job. So do I, for that matter.”

  “And you are both very good at it,” Agatha pointed out, picking up the menu. “Maybe that’s something else Mr. and Mrs. Wong need to appreciate. Come on, let’s order some food. All that talk of eating whatever you like has made me hungry!”

  Agatha ordered a chicken liver and foie gras parfait followed by a ribeye steak, while Alice went for a salmon and crab salad, with roast venison as her main. Having almost polished off their white wine, they each ordered a glass of Beaujolais to enjoy with their main courses. The waiter, a small, round man who looked like he regularly ate his way through the entire menu, complimented them on their choices and began fawning over Alice in an even more complimentary way, warbling in a heavy French accent that Agatha reckoned to be about as genuine as the dodgy diamond in his ear stud.

  “That’ll do, Napoleon,” she chided. “We’re hungry and we’d like to eat tonight, if you don’t mind.”

  The waiter nodded with a poorly pronounced “Mais oui,” and waddled off.

  “I wish I was as strong and confident as you,” said Alice.

  “What makes you think you’re not? I’ve seen you at work. There’s no lack of confidence when you’re dealing with people then—and I’ve seen you handle some fairly awkward customers.”

  “Well, that’s all down to the training, really.”

  “Then maybe you need training in how to deal with Ma and Pa Wong.”

  “They’d have to start a whole new course at the police college for that. Anyway, what I meant was that I’ve never been as confident as you are with men.”

  Agatha tutted, savoured the last of her Chablis and looked Alice straight in the eye. “That’s mainly just fake and bluster,” she admitted. “I can be every bit as insecure as anyone else. I used to tell people that I thought of men like new shoes. You put up with the pain of the blisters because they look good, but as soon as you get used to them, they’re chucked in the back of the cupboard because another pair has caught your eye.”

  Alice giggled, the chat and the wine having relaxed her to the point where Agatha could see she was having fun. “Have you really had as many men as you have new shoes?”

  “Well,” Agatha was surprising herself with her own honesty, but carried on regardless, “it’s actually a lot easier to pick up new shoes. I haven’t always been quite as much in control of my love life as I like people to think. In fact, I could tell you—”

  She was saved from making any further personal revelations by the ringing of her mobile phone. She reached for it instinctively, without checking who was calling.

  “Aggie—I’ve caught you at last!” It was Charles.

  “Don’t call me that.” There was a sudden chill in Agatha’s voice. “What do you want?”

  “Actually, I need to discuss some business.” Charles managed to maintain a cheerful tone, despite his frosty reception. “A friend of mine needs your help. It would be ideal if you could meet him here at the house on Saturday. Are you free? I have some other friends arriving for dinner if you would like to join us.”

  “I don’t think dinner is a good idea.” Agatha’s expression was tense, but her voice was calm. “Can’t he come to my office?”

  “Well, it’s dashed awkward, you know. He’d like to keep things a tad more discreet.”

  “Very well. If he’s at the house on Saturday, I can be there in the afternoon, around two.”

  “Splendid!” Charles sounded genuinely delighted. “I’m looking forward to seeing you again.”

  “Goodbye, Charles.”

  The waiter delivered their starters with a dramatically overstated “Voilà!” and Agatha dismissed him with a dark glower.

  “A problem?” Alice nodded towards the phone that Agatha was tucking into her handbag.

  “No.” Agatha let out a long breath, then looked across at Alice and recharged her smile, restoring the genial atmosphere they had both been enjoying. “Just an old blister. Let’s eat, I’m starved.”

  Chapter Five

  In fair weather, the main square in the centre of Mircester, with its concrete flower beds and public benches, would have been a pleasant enough place to sit and chat, or enjoy a lunchtime sandwich, had it not been for the forbidding presence of Mircester Town Hall. The building loomed over the square, with dark windows set in featureless brick, and uninspired cement columns supporting a triangular shelter over the gloomy entrance—a Victorian
architect’s cost-constrained failed attempt to mould an empyrean mock-Greek edifice out of common English clay. Agatha rarely gave the unremarkable building any thought at all, but now, looking up at it, she felt dismayed. How could the town planners in the sixties and seventies have torn down so many fine old buildings to make way for ghastly concrete monstrosities, yet somehow have managed to leave the supremely hideous Mircester Town Hall completely unscathed?

  She was standing in the sunshine on the steps leading up to the entrance, scanning the notes that Patrick had prepared for her on the Admiral, more correctly known as Harold Nelson. She smiled to herself, thinking about military nicknames. James had told her how in his army days tall people were nicknamed Shorty, bald people were called Curly and the most morose characters were dubbed Smiler. Now here was Admiral Nelson. She wondered what rank he had actually achieved during his time in the navy. Patrick was still checking on that.

  She was steeling herself for the inevitable drudgery of the coroner’s hearing when a large, shabby, billowing and wholly unnecessary raincoat approached, containing Dr. Charles Bunbury.

  “Ah, Mrs. Raisin,” said the pathologist. “I guessed you would be attending these proceedings—”

  “Mrs. Raisin? Mrs. Agatha Raisin?” another voice interrupted, and Agatha turned to see a tall, handsome dark-haired man in a finely tailored charcoal-grey suit stepping towards her with hand outstretched. His eyes were as blue as Burmese sapphires, captivating her to the extent that she accepted his handshake without a word. “I’m John Spinner, the coroner. I’ll be presiding over today’s hearing. So glad to have the chance to talk to you beforehand. Do you mind, Dr. Bunbury?”

  He led Agatha away from the pathologist and into a shadowy corner by the building’s entrance, lowering his head as though for a confidential conversation. Agatha judged him to be a couple of years older than herself, or possibly a couple of years younger—it was difficult to tell, even though she regarded herself as something of an expert in assessing a man’s age and desirability. He had one of those faces that had probably put the ageing process on hold some time in his early forties; a gift, she observed ruefully, that Mother Nature unfairly bestowed rather more often on men than women.

  “Is there something I can help you with?” she asked, feeling her voice squeak a little and inwardly scolding herself for allowing herself to flush like a schoolgirl at being the focus of such a charming man’s attention.

  “I’m sure we can think of something,” he gave her a slightly lopsided grin, “but I think I probably rescued you from Dr. Dreary in the nick of time.”

  “Well, thanks for that.” Agatha laughed awkwardly. “I owe you one.”

  “I suppose you do—so how about dinner tonight?”

  “You don’t hang around, do you, Mr. Spinner?”

  “Life, as they say, is too short, and I’ve been reading up on you. You intrigue me.”

  “You make me sound like some kind of academic research project.”

  “What I was thinking about was a more practical experience—more hands-on, you might say.”

  His grin now looked worryingly well practised and had taken on a hard edge that Agatha found slightly disturbing.

  “No, I would not say that,” she said, backing away from him, her smile having melted into a grimace, “and I think you’ve said enough.”

  “Actions speak louder than words,” he reached out to stroke the side of her face, “and I’m sure you like a bit of action.”

  “Back off,” she warned, slapping his hand away, “and don’t ever try to touch me again.”

  “Think it over,” he said, pressing a card into her hand. “Here’s my number. Give me a call, but don’t leave it too long. A woman your age can’t afford to pass up too many opportunities.”

  “A woman my…?” Agatha inhaled slowly, then stuffed the card into his breast pocket, her eyes wide with outrage. “You’re not thinking straight. Must be the bruise on your shin.”

  “What bru—”

  Her right foot shot out, the pointed toe of her crocodile-effect shoe demonstrating that it was just as dangerous as the real thing. Spinner winced and his shoulders stooped. His face was taut with pain and fury, although he resisted the indignity of bending to clutch his leg.

  “You shouldn’t have done that,” he hissed. “I’ll make sure you regret it.”

  “You’re filling me up with regrets,” Agatha growled at him. “I already regret having met you, I regret having listened to you, and I regret not shoving that card right up—”

  “Agatha!” Bill Wong was waving from the foot of the steps. Spinner glanced towards him, shot Agatha a look from eyes now as cold as ice, and skulked off.

  “Good morning, Bill,” Agatha greeted him as he trotted up the steps. “Nice to see a friendly face.”

  “Wasn’t that the new coroner you were talking to?” Bill asked.

  “Yes—what happened to the old one?”

  “Retired. Snoozed his way through one too many hearings and was advised to go. The new one’s so much better to deal with—full of energy and ideas.”

  “He’s certainly full of something. So how is this hearing going to go, Bill?”

  “We expect that he’ll agree with our findings—that Harold Nelson’s death was accidental. There’s no evidence to suggest anything else.”

  “I was sent this.” Agatha produced the typewritten note from her handbag. Bill read it quickly, then gave her a weary look.

  “Why didn’t you show this to me before now, Agatha?”

  “Because it’s anonymous and untraceable. It’s not hard evidence of anything except that someone knows how to use a typewriter.”

  “That’s certainly how Wilkes will see it.”

  “Yet there’s something fishy about the Admiral’s death, Bill. He seems to have been the kind of person people either loved or hated. I think someone may well have hated him enough to kill him, and I simply don’t believe he drank weedkiller accidentally.”

  “Well,” Bill sighed and scratched his head, “your instincts have been right before, and I’m not happy about the way we had to rush through our procedures. Wilkes won’t like it, but I’ll try to have a word with the coroner before the hearing starts. He may insist that we spend more time on the case.”

  The wood-panelled room where the hearing was to be held was overheated and under-ventilated, and the linoleum on the floor, having recently been polished, caused the chairs to make a screech like a sparrow being strangled every time someone stood up or sat down. Fortunately, there were very few people in attendance. Agatha noticed Charlotte Clark, a reporter from the Mircester Telegraph, and a couple of people she recognised from the bowls club, as well as Dr. Bunbury and Bill Wong. A woman wearing a black coat sat alone, and from Patrick’s notes, Agatha guessed she was Cathy Nelson, the Admiral’s widow. She also identified a well-built man and a woman, dressed in white shirts and dark trousers, as the security stewards. At the front of the room, facing the rows of mainly empty chairs, the coroner’s clerk, a small, balding man, sat at a desk with a computer terminal. A larger desk, clearly for the coroner himself, took centre stage.

  John Spinner marched in carrying a sheaf of papers and barked at the clerk to open a window or two. His icy blue eyes settled on Agatha. “Something in here,” he said, “has turned the air foul.”

  Agatha cocked her head and smiled at him, leaving him in no doubt about who had come off better from their earlier encounter.

  Spinner made some introductory remarks and then called on Dr. Bunbury to answer a few questions. Bunbury’s answers were long and rambling, the pathologist clearly revelling in the opportunity to show off his knowledge of medical science.

  “So, Doctor,” Spinner interrupted with exquisite timing, cutting off the monologue during one of the doctor’s infrequent pauses for breath, “in short, you believe that the weedkiller was accidentally ingested by the deceased? You believe that he swallowed the stuff when he was in an intoxicated stupor, ha
ving drunk a large amount of alcohol on top of having taken a quantity of powerful painkillers?”

  “Indeed. The alcohol combined with the painkillers would have left him all but incoherent. Then, given that there are no indications of…” Bunbury was clearly gearing up his vocal cords for a fresh oration.

  “Yes, we understand,” Spinner butted in again. “There is no medical evidence of a struggle or of the deceased being forced to drink the poison. Thank you, Doctor. There is no evidence at all to suggest foul play save for a note of dubious origin presented late in the day to the police by an individual whose motives are decidedly suspect and whose credibility as a witness is questionable, given her past record of abusing this office for her own egotistical personal publicity and pompous self-aggrandisement—”

  “That is outrageous!” Agatha leapt to her feet. “How dare you!”

  “Ah, it’s Mrs. Raisin, isn’t it?” Spinner acted as though they had never met. “The previous coroner was once obliged to have you removed from this room. Sit down or I shall do likewise.”

  “You have no right to question my motives and reputation like that!” Agatha was furious.

  “Stewards.” Spinner’s voice and expression were impassive but his eyes were blue flames of triumph. “Remove this woman from the building.”

  “Don’t worry, I’m going!” Agatha yelled. “But the death of Harold Nelson was no accident! It was murder, and I’m going to prove it!”

  All heads were now turned to face her, but the look that drew her eyes like a magnet was not the sneer of John Spinner, the delight of Charlotte Clark or the despair of Bill Wong; it was the haunting expression of Cathy Nelson. She may have been dressed in black, assuming the appearance of a widow in mourning, but despite the fact that she had just listened to distressing evidence about her husband’s traumatic final moments, she didn’t seem at all distraught. She looked unsettled, possibly a little anxious, but in no way upset. There was not a tear in her eye, and her countenance gave Agatha the distinct impression that none had been shed over the death of Harold Nelson. The grieving widow was devoid of grief.