Agatha Raisin and the Day the Floods Came (14 page)

They discussed everything over and over again without coming to any firm idea of who might have done it.

When they had finished their meal and were driving back, Bill said, ‘I can tell you’re not in love with this John Armitage.’

‘No, I’m not.’

‘Well, there’s no use flying off the handle with someone who isn’t a boyfriend, is there? Yes, they should have invited you, but I’ll bet John thought he might have been able to get more out of her without you. I told you that already. You’ve been involved with men since I’ve known you who’ve treated you badly, so you automatically think any man is rejecting you. Forget it, Agatha. It’s bad policy to quarrel with neighbours anyway.’

‘I’ll think about it,’ said Agatha sulkily. ‘Want to come in for more coffee?’

‘No, I’d best be getting back. Mother sits up until I get home.’

Agatha, not for the first time, wanted to point out to him that his mother was a possessive bag who drove off all his young girlfriends, but she knew Bill would be deeply hurt. He adored his parents.

She said goodnight to him and waved him goodbye and went indoors. A few minutes later, there was a ring at the door. She looked through the spyhole. John Armitage.

Let him rot, thought Agatha mulishly.

Agatha awoke next morning to find a letter pushed through her door. She opened it while Boswell dug his claws into the hem of her housecoat and tugged hard. She carried it into the kitchen, dragging the cat along with her.

Agatha sat down and, after dislodging Boswell’s claws from her housecoat, she opened the envelope, noticing as she did so that it was unstamped.

‘Dear Agatha,’ she read, ‘I am so sorry about last night. I could see that you were angry because I had not included you in the invitation to dinner. I thought that perhaps Joanna would tell me some more details if we were on our own. As it turned out, she had nothing new to add. Yours, John.’

Agatha felt she had been churlish. It might be an idea to phone Roy Silver first and ask about work. But she would not rush next door immediately. She would take her time and read the morning papers.

In a copy of the morning
Bugle
, she found an article by a celebrity who had given up smoking through hypnosis. ‘It worked,’ Agatha read. ‘The first thing I noticed was that I had more energy. Then friends started commenting on the clearness of my skin. I’m so glad I quit. My looks are important to me. You can always tell a middle-aged woman who smokes. They’ve got these nasty wrinkles on their upper lips. I didn’t want to end up like that.’

Agatha’s hand strayed nervously to her upper lip. She remembered she had the phone number of a hypnotist in Gloucester. She had always been meaning to go, but had kept putting it off. She phoned the hypnotist, who said he could see her if she could be at his consulting rooms in an hour and a half’s time, as he had just received a cancellation. Agatha agreed to be there and then rushed to get ready. The day was dry but misty. Agatha drove steadily through a grey world. Water dripped from the trees beside the road.

She managed to find a parking place near the hypnotist’s consulting rooms. She was five minutes early, so she celebrated with what she swore would be her last cigarette.

Half an hour later, it was all over. He had told her that from now on every cigarette she smoked would taste terrible, like burning rubber.

With a feeling of having actually done something for her health and well-being, she drove back home.

As she parked outside her cottage, she saw a familiar figure standing on her doorstep. Freda Stokes. What now? thought Agatha as she got out of the car. Another row? She pinned a smile of welcome on her face.

Freda greeted her with a cry of ‘Oh, Agatha. I’m so sorry.’

‘Come inside,’ said Agatha, opening the door. ‘Come through to the kitchen. Sit down. I’ll make some coffee.’

Agatha plugged in the percolator and sat down at the kitchen table opposite Freda.

‘I didn’t want to believe what you told me. I
couldn’t
believe what you told me,’ said Freda. ‘The police called on me. Mr Barrington has admitted paying Kylie – my Kylie! – to keep her quiet. I’m beginning to wonder if I knew my daughter at all. She was always like a child to me. Innocent. “I’m not like those other girls, Mum,” she’d say. “I don’t sleep around. I’m saving myself for my wedding day.”’

‘Did she need a lot of money?’ asked Agatha, wondering if Kylie had indeed had a drug habit.

‘She was always asking me for money. It was a bit hard for me, for I don’t make that much. But she was my only child. I couldn’t refuse her. Now I remember things about her, like she would wear clothes for a few months and then take them back to the shop and try to get her money back. She had this raincoat, oh, for about eight months, and she took it back to the shop and tried to say she had just bought it. But they wouldn’t take it back. So she asked me to take it to the dry-cleaners. I did that and gave her the coat. She took it into her bedroom and then she came out with it and it was covered in grease spots. She said the cleaners had ruined it and I had to take it to them and demand the price of the coat. They paid up in the end but they accused me of having put the grease stains on myself. They said there was no way it could have happened otherwise.’ Freda looked tearfully at Agatha. ‘Do you think Kylie was
greedy
?’

‘Perhaps,’ said Agatha cautiously.

‘And then there were times when there was money missing from my purse. I had a young girl working at the stall with me during the school holidays. I thought it must be her and fired her. Now I think it might have been Kylie. Where did I go wrong?’

By pretending nothing was happening, thought Agatha.

Aloud she said, ‘I have to ask you this. Do you think she’d been taking drugs?’

‘No! But then, I didn’t know about the blackmail or anything,’ wailed Freda. ‘Maybe she took that overdose herself and the people that gave her the stuff panicked.’

‘That’s possible except for the fact that she was wearing that wedding dress and slipped out late at night. Someone asked her to let them see it.’

Agatha stood up and poured two mugs of coffee and put one, along with milk and sugar, in front of Freda. ‘Was she very proud of the wedding dress?’

‘No, that’s the thing. It was my sister, Josie’s, girl’s gown. Josie’s daughter, Iris, had only worn it once and it cost Josie a mint. Lovely gown, it was. Kylie said she wanted a new one, but I dug my heels in on that. What’s the point, I said to her, of paying out all that money on a gown you’ll only be wearing once? And then Iris and Kylie were the same size.’

Agatha’s interest quickened. ‘If she was worried about it, she might have said to someone that she didn’t want to wear it and they said, “Well, bring it round and let me have a look.” That suggests another woman. When she got home, did she make a phone call or have any phone calls?’

‘She went straight to her room and then I heard her playing a CD. She had a mobile phone. But the police took that away and checked all phone calls to and from the house. She didn’t make a phone call that evening.’

‘Does this mean you want me to go on investigating?’ asked Agatha.

‘Yes, please. I feel I know the worst about my daughter now and nothing else can shock me.’

‘Did she keep a diary?’

‘No. I bought her one once, but she never bothered to write anything in it.’

‘Letters from anyone?’

‘None of those. Young people seem to use the phone these days.’

‘I’ll keep in touch with you,’ said Agatha. ‘I’ll do my best, but the police have warned me off.’

After Freda had left, Agatha phoned John Armitage. ‘You’d better drop round,’ she said. ‘There’s been a new development.’

When John arrived, Agatha told him about the visit from Freda and what she had said.

‘We need to find out more about that hen party,’ said John. ‘We need to find out if one of them volunteered to look at the dress, and there’s another thing.’

‘What?’

‘No phone calls. But what about e-mails? Someone could have sent her an e-mail to her address at the firm. Joanna could check that for us.’

‘Oh, her,’ said Agatha.

‘Yes, her. She’s bright and she’s clever and she knows your real identity, which the other girls don’t. I don’t chase young girls, Agatha.’

‘I’m not interested if you do,’ said Agatha crossly. She automatically lit up a cigarette and then scowled in distaste and stubbed it out.

‘What’s up?’

‘I went to a hypnotist,’ said Agatha. ‘He said every cigarette I would now smoke would taste like burning rubber and he was right.’

John burst out laughing. ‘There’s one thing about you, Agatha – no one could ever call you boring.’

‘That’s me. A laugh a minute,’ said Agatha gloomily.

‘And I’ll take you for lunch to make up for last night.’

Agatha brightened. ‘I’ll go and change while you phone Joanna.’

She went upstairs and changed into a trouser suit and a tailored blouse, noticing with delight that the trouser waistline was quite loose. She carefully made up her face and sprayed herself liberally with Champagne perfume before going downstairs to join him.

‘Joanna said she would check Kylie’s machine after all the others have gone for the night. If we wait round the corner in the Little Chef, she’ll join us there about seven o’clock this evening.’

‘Aren’t you coming, Joanna?’ demanded Marilyn Josh as the other girls put on their coats.

‘I’ve just got a couple of bills to send out,’ said Joanna. ‘I’d better get them done now.’

‘Please yourself,’ said Phyllis nastily. ‘But it’s no use sucking up to the boss. He’s not in.’

Joanna shrugged and pretended to concentrate on her computer. It was, she thought uneasily, as if the others suspected she was up to something. They seemed to take a long time to leave. She stayed at her desk until she heard them all disappear at last into the night. Then, just as she was about to rise from her desk, Sharon Heath came back in. ‘Still here?’ she said. ‘Won’t be a mo. I left something in me desk.’

Joanna typed steadily, glad she had taken the precaution of leaving her computer switched on. She heard Sharon behind her, opening and shutting drawers and muttering, ‘Now, where did I put that dratted thing?’ Then a grunt of satisfaction. ‘See ya,’ said Sharon. The office door banged shut and Joanna could hear her high heels clacking off down the corridor.

She had a sudden impulse to shut down her computer and leave. The silence of the office seemed threatening. But if she found something, John would be pleased with her. He
was
very attractive. She wondered if there was anything going on between him and that Raisin woman. No. Definitely not. No vibes there. She had enjoyed her dinner with him. Older men were so much more attractive. She cocked her head to one side and listened. She rose again. She heard footsteps in the corridor and sat down again hurriedly. The door opened. George, who manned the front desk, put his head round the door. ‘I want to lock up. How long you going to be?’

‘Give me five minutes,’ said Joanna.

‘Right. Give me a shout on your way out.’

She waited again until all was silent. Get on with it, she told herself.

Joanna took a deep breath and crossed the office floor to Kylie’s desk. She switched on the computer.

The screen lit up, bright blue. ‘Hurry up and warm up,’ urged Joanna. She got into the e-mail and began to read. ‘Ah, now we have it,’ she said.

The blow that struck her on the back of the head was vicious and sudden. She slumped forward on the keyboard.

Agatha and John fidgeted restlessly in the Little Chef. ‘It’s now seven-thirty,’ said John. ‘She’s had plenty of time. I hope nothing’s gone wrong.’

‘I’ll wait here,’ said Agatha. ‘Why don’t you drive along past Barrington’s and see if there’s still a light on in the office.’

John left and Agatha waited anxiously. What if John decided to take Joanna off on his own again with the excuse that he’d get more out of her that way? I should have given him my mobile phone number, she thought.

She waited ten minutes and then sighed with relief as she saw John’s car turning into the car park once more.

He sat down and leaned forward and said urgently, ‘There was an ambulance. She was being carried out.’

‘Dead? Oh, God, not dead.’

‘No, there was breathing apparatus over her face. The police were there and that George fellow was talking to them. They didn’t see me. What with the ambulance and the police cars, a crowd had already gathered. I stood at the back.’

‘We’ll need to find out which hospital they’ve taken her to.’

‘Where would that be? Here in Evesham? Worcester? Redditch? Have you got your phone?’

‘In my bag.’ Agatha opened her handbag, took out her mobile phone and handed it to him.

She fretted and fidgeted as he made several phone calls.

‘It’s early yet,’ she finally interrupted him. ‘She may not have arrived at whatever hospital they’ve taken her to. Let’s go home and then try again.’

John tried again from Agatha’s cottage. At last he found out that Joanna had been taken to the Alexandra Hospital in Redditch. Agatha was all for rushing there, but John said, ‘We should wait until the morning.’

‘Did they say what was up with her?’

‘No, just that she had been admitted.’

Agatha gave a click of annoyance and took the phone from him. She dialled the Alexandra Hospital, introduced herself as Joanna’s aunt and asked to be put through to the sister in charge of the ward where Joanna was.

She asked several sharp questions and then put the phone down. ‘She’s got a bad concussion and is not allowed visitors until further notice. Now what do we do?’

‘There’s nothing we can do. In fact I think we’ve done enough. We should never have involved that poor girl.’

‘And I can’t question the other girls now that I’ve given up my disguise. You’ll need to do that.’

‘Agatha, one woman is dead and another concussed. All we seem to do is put innocent people in peril.’

‘But will the police guess about checking Kylie’s e-mail?’

‘We can hardly phone them up now. They told us to stay out of it.’