Agatha Raisin and the Murderous Marriage (14 page)

Soon the thin beam from his torch was flickering over the chaos of the bedroom. Drawers hung open at crazy angles and the wardrobe stood open as well.

‘Someone has been here before us,’ said Agatha. ‘The police?’

‘I think it’s panic-packing. You sit on that chair over there by the window and peer through the curtains and keep a lookout and I’ll search around.’

After searching through letters and papers in the dressing-table drawers, James gave a muffled exclamation and brought a letter over to Agatha. ‘Get down on the floor while I shine the
torch on this,’ he said. ‘It’s worth reading.’ Agatha squatted down on the floor and read the letter.

The letter had been typed on business paper, a Mircester firm called Potato Plus.

Agatha looked up in amazement. ‘So what was all that about the ruined marriage when she could have had it all back? She must have gone off with him.’

‘Looks like it. But let me have another look.’

After an hour he said, ‘No, nothing else. I think we’d better leave it at that. Give me that letter, Agatha, and I’ll put it back exactly as I found it.’

As they went down the stairs, Agatha suddenly grabbed his arm, making him jump.

‘The living-room. She’s got an answering machine. Let’s check it for messages before we go.’

‘All right,’ said James. ‘But I doubt if we’ll learn more than we have. That letter from the husband was dated three days ago. It’s clear to me she’s gone off
with him.’

They went into the living-room. James played back the answering machine. ‘This is Jane,’ said a voice. ‘I’m sorry I was out when you called, Gloria. Yes, I’ll look
after your garden. I’ve still got your keys. Have a good trip. Bye.’

Then a man’s voice. ‘Hello, Basil here, sweetheart. I’ve got the tickets and I’ll see you at Heathrow at four thirty at the check-in. Don’t be late.’

They looked at each other in surprise. ‘Basil?’ exclaimed Agatha. ‘But her husband’s name is Geoffrey. And she must have phoned him after we left to arrange the trip
because he says nothing about Madrid, only that he’s got the tickets.’

‘Let’s just get out of here before our luck runs out,’ said James. ‘I’m tired of whispering.’

‘Will it take ages for you to lock up?’

‘No, that’s the easy bit.’

Soon they were walking out of Ancombe, towards their car. ‘I’ve been thinking,’ said James as they drove off, ‘that we’ve been concentrating on people who were
blackmailed or used by Jimmy Raisin. We never really thought of the partners or spouses, except perhaps Lady Derrington. Look at it this way. Mrs Comfort is upset by our visit, though I don’t
know why. Her husband wants her back. But she phones Basil, someone she’s obviously close enough to so that he promptly arranges they head off for Spain, just like that.’

‘The police said she hired a car in Madrid. They didn’t say anything about anyone being with her. Of course, this Basil could be married. They could have travelled separately on the
plane, she hires the car and picks him up outside the airport. Easy. Oh, God, James, stop the car!’

He screeched to a halt. ‘What’s up?’

‘That call from Basil was the last one. There were only two calls on that answering machine. If that was the very last call she got, we could dial 1471 and find out this Basil’s
phone number.’

‘Agatha! That would mean picking those locks again. I daren’t risk it. Look, this Jane female should be easy to find. We’ll go back to Ancombe tomorrow. She’ll probably
know who it was.’

‘But she might not be a close friend. She might just be some woman who looks after people’s houses and gardens when they’re away. Please, James.’

He set off again. ‘No, Agatha, absolutely not. Trust me. This Jane will know.’

They found Jane easily enough after inquiring at the church the next morning. The verger told them that Jane Barclay was the lady they were looking for and directed them to her
cottage.

Jane Barclay was a powerful, masculine-looking middle-aged woman with cropped grey hair.

It took them only a short time, during which Agatha slid the silk scarf from her neck and put it in her pocket, to establish that Jane Barclay was not an intimate friend of Mrs Gloria
Comfort.

‘The real reason we have come,’ gushed Agatha, while James looked at her in surprise, ‘is because I left my scarf at Gloria’s yesterday. She told me you looked after the
garden and the way she talked about you made us believe you were a close friend and might know exactly where in Spain she had gone. But you do have the keys. Could you be an angel and let us in so
that I can look for it?’

‘I suppose so,’ said Jane. ‘Who did you say you were?’

‘Mr and Mrs Perth,’ said James quickly, before Agatha could say anything. He was frightened that if she heard Agatha’s name, she might be more cautious about letting the wife
of a murdered man into that cottage.

‘Have you any identification?’

Agatha’s heart sank, but to her amazement James fished a card-case out of his inside pocket and extracted a card.

‘Colonel and Mrs Perth,’ Jane read aloud. ‘From Stratford. She never mentioned you, but then I don’t know her all that well. Come along. Don’t take too long about
it.’

They walked with her the short distance to Mrs Comfort’s cottage. James kept glancing down at Agatha, guessing that she wanted to get to that phone. When they entered the living-room,
Agatha looked around brightly. ‘Now where did I put my scarf. I know I left it here.’

James crossed to the window and looked out. ‘The dahlias haven’t been damaged by frost yet,’ he said. ‘They make a fine show.’

Jane Barclay crossed to join him. ‘I planted those,’ she said proudly. ‘Mrs Comfort – Gloria – really doesn’t know a thing about gardening.’

Agatha took the scarf from her pocket and thrust it down between the cushions of the sofa.

‘I’ve found it,’ she cried, fishing it out as Jane turned round. ‘It must have slipped between the cushions.’

James was still at the window. ‘Some of those roses could do with being cut back.’

‘What? Where?’ demanded Jane angrily. ‘Those are the best-tended roses in the Cotswolds. I’ll show you.’

‘You go ahead,’ said Agatha. ‘I’ll just powder my nose.’

Jane wasn’t even listening to her. She was too angry at this slur on her gardening capabilities.

When they both walked out, Agatha quickly crossed to the phone and dialled 1471. She made a rapid note of the last caller’s number and then went out to the garden, where James was saying
plaintively, ‘Well, bless me, what a splendid job you’ve done. Forgive me, Miss Barclay. It’s my damned eyesight. Not as good as it was.’

Jane was mollified enough to talk for what seemed to Agatha an unconscionable time about gardening.

At last they thanked Jane and went back to their car. As soon as they were out of earshot, Agatha said excitedly, ‘I got the number.’

‘It may not be this mysterious Basil’s number.’ James drove a little way along the road and then stopped. ‘Let me see it.’

Agatha gave him the slip of paper with the number on it. ‘It’s a Mircester number,’ said James, ‘but it could also belong to any of the villages just outside Mircester.
How are we going to find out the address that goes with it?’

Agatha sat scowling horribly. ‘I’ve got an idea,’ she said at last. ‘Any time I’ve been to police headquarters in Mircester to talk to Bill Wong or someone about a
case, I’ve been put in an interview room and had to wait ages. The interview room has a phone. I could phone the operator and say I was a police detective, and before they get suspicious say
something like, “Phone me back immediately at police headquarters on this extension.”’

‘Agatha, I forbid you to do anything so insane!’

‘You
what?
Who the hell do you think you are to order me around?’

‘See sense, woman. The one time someone will come to see you immediately is just when you don’t want it. The phone will ring and someone like the dreadful Maddie will pick it up and
promptly charge you with trying to impersonate a police officer.’

‘One has,’ said Agatha Raisin haughtily, ‘to take risks in this business.’

‘Oh, don’t get carried away. All we’ve done so far is create mayhem. I’ll drop you off home. I’m going to the market in Moreton to get fish for dinner. If time lies
heavy on your hands, you might try a little weeding,
dear.
It has not escaped my notice that you treat my place like a hotel.’

‘That’s because it is your place,’ said Agatha, deeply hurt. ‘I can’t wait to get my own home back.’

‘Can’t wait either,’ said James, and they completed the drive home in bitter silence.

James went off to Moreton-in-Marsh and Agatha let herself in, smarting with hurt and fury. So this is what marriage would have been like? Being ordered about? How dare he. Well, she’d show
him.

She went back out and got into her own car and drove as fast as she could to Mircester.

Feeling a bit nervous now, she approached the desk sergeant at Mircester police headquarters and said sweetly, ‘I would like to see someone in connection with the murder of Jimmy
Raisin.’

‘It’s Mrs Raisin, isn’t it?’

‘Yes.’

He lifted the flap, came round the desk and ushered her into an interview room off the entrance hall.

‘Shouldn’t be long,’ he said cheerfully. ‘Like a cup of tea?’

‘No, thank you.’

He left and shut the door. Agatha seized the phone and dialled the operator. Nothing happened. Then she realized she probably had to dial 9 for an outside line and, hoping it was 9, tried again.
The operator came on the line.

‘This is Detective Sergeant Crumb,’ said Agatha, quickly taking her alias from the remains of a biscuit on a plate on the desk. She gave the operator the number she had culled from
Mrs Comfort’s phone, asked for the name and address that went with it, and then gave her the number of the extension on the desk.

‘We’ll call you back,’ said the operator.

And Agatha waited and waited.

Then panic took over. She lifted the phone off the desk and put it on the floor. She seized the desk and pushed it across the floor and rammed it against the door. She had just finished doing
that when two things happened at once. Someone tried to get in and the phone rang.

Agatha dropped to her knees on the floor, grabbed the receiver and muttered hoarsely into it. ‘Yes?’

‘Detective Sergeant Crumb?’

‘Yes, yes,’ hissed Agatha as she heard Maddie’s voice calling from the other side of the door, ‘Mrs Raisin? Are you in there? This door’s jammed.’

‘The name and address you require is Basil Morton, number six, The Loanings, London Road, Mircester.’

‘Thanks,’ said Agatha.

She moved the desk and lay down alongside the door, just as she heard Maddie shouting, ‘Dave, come and help me with this door.’

Agatha groaned theatrically. ‘Are you all right?’ Maddie called, her voice sharp more with suspicion than with concern.

‘I fainted,’ called Agatha. ‘I’ll move. I’m blocking the door.’

She got to her feet and stood back as Maddie, with a policeman behind her, opened the door. Maddie’s eyes went straight to Agatha’s flushed face and then to the phone, which was
lying on the floor.

‘You don’t look at all like a woman who has just recovered from a faint,’ snapped Maddie. ‘And what’s that phone doing on the floor? And didn’t I hear it
ringing?’

‘I must have dragged it off the desk when I fell. It only rang a couple of times and then stopped.’

‘And it landed right side up with the receiver still in place?’

‘Odd, that,’ said Agatha. She put her hand to her head. ‘I feel very hot. Could I have a glass of water?’

‘Get it,’ Maddie ordered the policeman. ‘It’s probably a menopausal hot flush.’

Agatha glared at her, hating her.

‘So let’s cut the crap, Mrs Raisin. Why are you here?’

‘If that’s your attitude, I think I’d rather speak to Bill.’

‘Bill’s out on a job, and either you speak to me or I’ll have you for wasting police time.’

‘It’s a wonder you ever solve anything,’ said Agatha, ‘considering the way you put people’s backs up.’

The policeman came in with the glass of water and handed it to Agatha. She took it from him with a murmur of thanks, sat down, and began to drink it thirstily. Maddie watched her crossly and
then said, ‘Out with it, Agatha.’

‘Mrs Raisin to you.’ The glass of water had given Agatha time to improvise. She hadn’t prepared a story, thinking that they would surely send Bill to see her.

‘I have reason to believe,’ she said, ‘that Help Our Homeless was a scam and not a properly organized charity.’

‘We know that,’ said Maddie to Agatha’s amazement. ‘The police went to close the place down four years ago, but the office was closed and the Gore-Appleton woman had
disappeared.’

‘Why didn’t you tell me?’

‘Why should I?’ Maddie was barely able to conceal her contempt. ‘The trouble with you women who don’t work is you’re always poking your nose into other
people’s affairs. You’ve been told and told to leave matters to the police. I’ll tell you something else. I think you were using that phone. Let’s just try the call-back
number and see what you were up to.’

Agatha thought quickly. Maddie would only get that operator number. But she would ask everyone in the station if anyone had dialled the operator from the number in the interview room and find
that no one had. Then, Agatha worried, she would phone the operator and find out what the inquiry had been about. But just at that moment, the phone rang.

Maddie picked it up. ‘Hello, Bill,’ she said crossly. ‘Are you back in the building? You’re not? You’re phoning from outside.’ Bill’s voice at the other
end quacked busily. ‘Well, listen to this,’ said Maddie. ‘Your darling Mrs Raisin is in the interview room and I think she was using this phone and I was about to get the
call-back to tell me who it was phoned her, but because you found out I was in the interview room and decided to get through on an outside line, I can’t find out now. Why didn’t you
just let the switchboard put you through?’