Agatha Raisin and the Murderous Marriage (6 page)

‘I wish I had some good news for you,’ he said, ‘but we still cannot find out any reason why your late husband was murdered, Agatha. If it had been among the down-and-outs in
London, then it might have been decided he had been killed for no greater reason than the bottle in his pocket. But here, in the Cotswolds?’

‘Haven’t the police in London been questioning his old cronies?’ asked James.

‘Of course. But that lot have only to see a police uniform to clam up, and they can smell a detective at a hundred paces. I wish I could go there myself and see what I could dig up.
How’s the village taking it?’ said Bill, who lived in Mircester.

‘I gather Agatha and I are being regarded as first and second murderer,’ said James. ‘Tell us about the forensic evidence, Bill.’

‘Pretty much still what I told Agatha. He had been strangled with a man’s silk tie. Now that sounds like a good clue, but it is a Harvey Nichols tie and can be bought at just about
any good outfitter’s in the country. It’s also quite old and frayed at the edges.’

‘That was Jimmy’s own tie,’ said Agatha suddenly. ‘He wasn’t wearing it when I last saw him but he had it on at the wedding. Wait a bit. Maybe he had it in his
pocket. He wouldn’t surely stand there and let someone fish in his pockets for a murder weapon?’

‘What did the tie look like?’ asked Bill. ‘I can’t remember.’

But Agatha did. She thought every horrible fact and item of that day would be burned into her brain forever. ‘It was one of those ones which look like an old school tie but aren’t
– discreet stripes. Dark blue, gold and green.’

Bill whipped out a notebook and scribbled busily. Then he said, ‘We’ve found out he got cleaned up in a Salvation Army hostel before he came down here and they gave him clothes. Of
course, they probably gave him the tie as well.’

‘Was he hit with anything first?’ asked Agatha.

‘Only the back of your hand.’

‘He can’t just have stood there and let it happen.’

‘I think I know,’ said Roy triumphantly. ‘He’s lying there in the ditch after Aggie here swiped him. Now, if you’re a drunk and someone swipes you and you fall in
the ditch, the first thing you’d do would be to take that bottle out of your pocket to make sure it hadn’t got broken. Then you’d take a good swig out of it. Maybe when he pulled
the bottle out of his pocket, the tie came out as well. Enter murderer. Jimmy in ditch, Jimmy with bottle to his mouth, tie sticking out of pocket, seizes tie, strangle, choke, one dead
body.’

‘Thank you, Mr Jingle,’ said James. ‘Mind you, it’s possible. What do you think, Bill?’

‘I think you all know something you aren’t telling me,’ said Bill, looking at them.

‘How’s dear Maddie?’ asked Agatha sweetly.

His round face flushed. ‘Detective Constable Hurd is well, thank you.’

‘Do, please, please, give her my regards.’

Bill wondered in that moment whether Agatha had guessed that Maddie had sent him to find out what he could and then decided that love was making him paranoiac.

‘I’d best be going.’ Bill got to his feet.

‘See you around,’ said Agatha. James showed him out.

Bill stood outside the cottage for a moment, irresolute. He had not received his usual welcome. It was unlike both Agatha and James not to offer him a drink or a cup of coffee. He wondered for a
moment whether he should go back and tell Agatha the truth, that he had not come near her before this because Maddie had urged him to do so. He took half a step back towards the door and then gave
his round head an angry little shake and went towards his car instead.

So the three amateur detectives inside were free to start their investigations, unhampered by any help from the police.

Agatha was silent on the drive to London the following morning. James, used to Agatha’s holding forth on every subject under the sun, found this unnatural silence was
making him uneasy. Furthermore, Agatha was wearing trousers and a sweater and no make-up and sensible walking shoes. No perfume either. He was obscurely piqued that for the first time Agatha should
appear to make no effort whatsoever on his behalf.

The last known address for Help Our Homeless was in a basement in Ebury Street in Victoria. They had found it in James’s very out-of-date set of London telephone directories. James wished
they had tried to phone first, for it turned out to be now a minicab firm.

They found the boss of the minicab firm, a large West Indian, lounging back with his feet on the desk.

‘We’re looking for Help Our Homeless.’

‘You an’ everyone else, guv,’ said the West Indian. ‘Tell you what I told them. Don’t know. Don’t care.’

‘Why is everyone else looking for them?’ asked James.

‘Same reason as what you are, guv. Money owing.’

‘So you have no idea where Mrs Gore-Appleton is now?’ asked Agatha.

‘Search me.’ He heaved his shoulders in a massive shrug, picked up a coffee cup, took a gulp of the contents and appeared to forget their very existence.

‘Did you buy this place from her?’ pursued James.

The man’s dark eyes focused impatiently on them again. ‘I bought it from Quickie Photocopying and Printing. Before that it was the Peter Pan Temp Agency, before that, Gawd knows.
Nobody stays here long. Business rates are diabolical, trust me, guv That Help Our Homeless died about four years ago.’

They gave up and left. James stood on the pavement head down, scowling furiously. ‘If Help Our Homeless was a charity, then surely this Gore-Appleton must have been in the press, opening
something, talking about something. Do you know a helpful reporter?’

‘I used to know lots of journalists, but they were usually fashion editors or show-biz.’

‘But they would have access to the records. Can we ask?’

Agatha searched her brain for a journalist she knew who might not hate her too much. When she had been a public relations officer, the press had regarded her as a pain in the neck and usually
featured her clients just to get rid of her.

‘I know the show-biz editor of
The Bugle,’
she said reluctantly. ‘Mary Parrington.’

‘Let’s go and see her.’

They drove slowly down to the East End. Fleet Street was no more. The big papers had all relocated to cheaper, larger sites.

At last they stood in the sterile steel-and-glass hall of
The Bugle,
waiting to see whether Mary Parrington would grant them an audience.

Fortunately for Agatha, the news editor had been passing Mary’s desk just as she was telling her secretary, ‘Tell that awful old bat, Agatha Raisin, I’m dead or gone, or
anything.’

‘Wait a bit,’ said the news editor. ‘That’s the female involved in the Cotswold murder. Get her up here and introduce me. No reporter’s been able to get near
her.’

The idea of throwing Agatha to the lions of the news desk greatly appealed to Mary, and so Agatha and James were shown up.

As he was introduced to the beaming news editor, a Mike Tarry, James reflected that he had accused Agatha of being naïve over the house sale, and yet he himself had walked straight into a
newspaper office without pausing to think that he and Agatha were news themselves.

‘Well, Agatha,’ said Mike, after having practically strong-armed them into his office – ‘I may call you Agatha?’

‘No,’ said Agatha sourly.

‘Ha ha. Mary told me you were a tough character. How can we be of help? You must be anxious to clear your name.’ The offices had windows overlooking the reporters’ desks. Mike
waved an arm. The door of his office opened and a photographer came in, followed by a reporter.

‘What is this?’ demanded Agatha.

‘You help us and we’ll help you,’ said Mike.

‘I’m off,’ said Agatha, heading for the door.

‘Wait a minute,’ called James. Agatha turned back reluctantly.

‘We do need help, Agatha,’ said James, ‘and we should have realized they would want a story. They’ve been pestering us since the murder. We’ve got nothing to hide.
We want to find this Gore-Appleton woman. Why don’t we just tell them what we know?’

‘And then the police will wonder why we didn’t tell
them
what we’ve found out,’ pointed out Agatha.

‘We would have told them sooner or later. May as well get it over with, Agatha. You’re in the lions’ den now, and even if you walk out, that photographer is going to bash off a
picture of you before you get out of the office.’

‘Let him,’ said Agatha truculently.

‘Agatha, you haven’t any make-up on.’

And that clinched it.

The interviews and photographs had to wait until Agatha was ferried off to the shops by a ‘minder’ to buy make-up and a smart dress and high heels.

Then they both told what they knew, and Agatha and James posed for photographs, Agatha having extracted a promise that the art department would use the airbrush generously on her picture.

But when the reporter searched the files for details about Mrs Gore-Appleton, he found practically nothing, only one mention of her making a speech on the homeless at a charity event. No
photograph. Agatha felt cheated until James pointed out that the publicity would be the one thing to flush out Mrs Gore-Appleton.

There seemed nothing left to do but allow themselves to be entertained to lunch, return to Carsely, and find out what the article in the following morning’s paper would bring.

Agatha struggled awake the next morning out of a heavy sleep. Someone was banging on her bedroom door. She put on her dressing-gown and then stood, irresolute. The someone
would be James, of course. The article must be in the paper. She debated whether to ask him to wait until she changed, but then shrugged. The days of dressing up for James had gone.

She opened the door. He was brandishing a copy of
The Bugle.
‘Would you believe it!’ he raged. ‘Not a bloody word!’

‘Come down to the kitchen,’ said Agatha. ‘Are you sure you didn’t miss it?’

‘Not a word,’ he repeated angrily.

Agatha sat down wearily at the kitchen table and spread out the newspaper. The headline screamed, FREDDIE COMES OUT OF THE CLOSET! A comedian, the pet of British audiences for his clean humour,
had declared he was gay. The other story on page one was about a
Bugle
reporter who had been shot by the Bosnian Serbs.

‘We never heard a word about these stories when we were in the office,’ said Agatha. ‘They must have broken in the afternoon and knocked our story out of the paper.’

‘Maybe they’ll run it tomorrow.’

Agatha shook her head, wise in the way of newspapers. ‘They won’t use it now,’ she said gloomily. ‘If they had had the story right at the time of the murder, they would
have used it no matter what. But now it’s sort of yesterday’s news.’

‘I’ll phone up that editor and give him a piece of my mind.’

‘Wouldn’t do any good, James. We’ll need to think of something else.’

He paced up and down the kitchen. ‘I feel frustrated,’ he said. ‘I want to do something
now.’

‘That health farm,’ said Agatha. ‘The one Jimmy went to. We could go there and perhaps get a look at the records and see who was there at the same time, pick out the people
Jimmy might have thought of blackmailing.’

James brightened. ‘Good idea. What’s the name of the place?’

‘I’ve got Roy’s notes in the living-room. Look there. They might be cagey about letting us see their records, so perhaps we’d best check into this health farm as guests
and under false names.’

‘We’ll check in as man and wife. Mr and Mrs Perth, that’ll do.’

James hurried off, leaving Agatha to marvel at the sheer insensitivity of men. Husband and wife, indeed, and without a blush!

Agatha went back upstairs to wash and dress. She longed to be in her own home again. Perhaps she should call on Mrs Hardy one more time.

Mrs Hardy answered the door to Agatha half an hour later. She was as muscular and tweedy as ever, and a truculent look lit up her eyes when she saw Agatha.

‘Look,’ said Agatha, ‘I wondered if you would reconsider letting me have my cottage back. I would pay you a generous sum.’

‘Oh, go away,’ said Mrs Hardy. ‘I am working to settle in here and could do without these tiresome interruptions from such as you. I hear you were once a businesswoman. Behave
like one.’

She slammed the door in Agatha’s face.

‘Stupid old trout!’ raged Agatha to James when she returned to join him and told him about Mrs Hardy’s continued refusal to sell the house.

‘Why bother?’ said James. ‘There are other houses, you know. I heard in the village that the Boggles are thinking of moving to an old folks’ home. That means you could
buy their house.’

Agatha gazed at him, aghast. ‘But the Boggles live in a
council
house.’

‘What’s wrong with that? Some of these council houses are very well built. And the Boggles’ place would be quite roomy once you got the junk out.’

Agatha wondered if he thought a council house was all she was good enough for and then considered in time that James did not know of her low beginnings and was merely being infuriatingly
practical.

‘Buy it yourself,’ she muttered.

‘I might at that. Get packed. I’ve booked us in at the health farm. It’s called Hunters Fields. We’re expected there this evening. I’ll take Roy’s notes with
us. Don’t look so miserable. Forget about your cottage for the moment. We’ll think of something.’

‘What? Snakes through the letterbox?’

‘Something like that.’

Agatha went to call on Mrs Bloxby before they left. ‘So you and James do seem to be getting on very well,’ said the vicar’s wife.

‘The only reason we are getting on well is because James has all the sensitivity of a rhinoceros,’ said Agatha drily. ‘He’s checking us into this health farm as man and
wife.’

‘Perhaps he is using that as an excuse for you to really get together again,’ ventured Mrs Bloxby. She looked at Agatha’s set face and added hurriedly, ‘Perhaps not. He
is a most unusual man. I think he keeps his mind in little compartments. The compartment of romantic Agatha has the door firmly shut on it while the compartment with Agatha as friend is open.
It’s better than nothing, or is it agonizing?’