Agatha Raisin and The Murderous Marriage

Bill Wong came in and stopped short, surprised to see Roy.

'I thought they would have killed you.'

'Aggie and I are old friends,' said Roy defensively. 'I only wanted to give her Jimmy's death certificate as a wedding present.'

Bill gave a him a slanting cynical look. 'If you say so.'

Roy picked up the papers, which James had left on the table, and thrust them into his brief-case.

'What's that?' asked Bill.

'PR stuff,' said Roy. 'I came down here to get Agatha's help.'

Bill looked around at the three faces. There was a wary, almost hostile atmosphere in the room. He decided ruefully that James and Agatha must be under a great strain. He should have called before this.

'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 that 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 Nicholl's 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 looks like an old school tie but isn'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.

THREE

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 set of London directories dated 1984. 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 Photo-Copying 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 this 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