He left grumbling. “I’ll call you tomorrow,” he said, “but you don’t deserve my concern.”
The next day was almost chilly and the residents of Carsely, like the rest of the British Isles who had been bitching for weeks about the heat, began to bitch instead about the cold.
Agatha dressed carefully in a tailored suit and silk blouse and headed for Evesham. Her dreams of the day before had faded and would have stayed faded had John not immediately taken her in his arms when she arrived and given her another of those warm, passionate kisses full on the mouth.
She felt quite weak at the knees as she sat down. His bruises appeared to be fading fast and his eyes were as blue, as intensely blue, as ever.
“Have you thought any more about my business proposition?” he asked.
Agatha flexed her public relations muscles. She described how she thought they should go big from the word go, open in Bond Street, say. She outlined how she would go about rousing interest so she could get it into as many newspapers as possible. “And do you know what we’ll call it?”
“I thought just Mr. John.”
“No, we’ll call it the Wizard of Evesham.”
He looked at her thoughtfully and then began to laugh. “I like that. It’s catchy. I like it a lot.”
All afternoon, they talked busily. Then he sent out for Chinese food. Before dinner, he opened a bottle of pills and popped two in his mouth. “Is that your medicine?” asked Agatha.
“No, they’re vitamin pills, a multi-vitamin called Lifex. I swear by them. I keep a supply in the shop. You should try them.”
Agatha picked up the bottle and shook one out. “I’m not very good at swallowing pills,” she said, looking at the large brown gelatine capsule in her hand. “I would choke on something this size. What do they do for you?”
“I find they give me a lot of energy. Let’s eat.”
They talked busily over dinner, firing ideas for their new venture back and forth across the table. Agatha at last said reluctantly that she should get home.
If he had asked her to stay with him, Agatha probably would have succumbed, but he only gathered her back into his arms as he said good night and again sent her senses spinning with one of those kisses, fuelling the hopelessly romantic side of Agatha to boiling point.
She decided as she drove dreamily home that all her suspicions of him had been unfounded. What were they based on after all? One frightened village woman who had probably had a crush on him, had probably written him a silly love letter or something like that and her bad-tempered husband had found out.
There was a message from Charles on her Call Minder but she did not want to phone him, did not want anything to burst the rosy bubble in which she floated. Mr. John-no, John-stop calling him that silly hairdresser’s name-had said he had taken the liberty of making an appointment for her for the following day. Soon she would see him again.
Agatha in love meant an Agatha who could not make up her mind what to wear. Although she started her preparations early the next day, she at last left in a rush, wearing a coat over a sweater and skirt and having torn off more dressy ensembles, feeling she looked as if she were trying too hard.
She would need to steer him to a good interior decorator, she thought, looking round the salon in a proprietorial way. And no receptionist like the dreadful Josie, but no one too glamorous either.
She was shampooed and with a dithering feeling of anticipation was led through to Mr. John.
“Agatha,” he said, giving her a warm smile. He pressed her shoulders and then gripped them hard.
She looked, startled, at his reflection in the mirror. Under the bruises, his face was an unhealthy red colour.
“Excuse me,” he muttered. He fled to the toilet. The tape deck was playing a selection of sixties pop. The Beatles were belting out “She’s got a ticket to ride,” filling the salon with noisy sound. The number finished and then Agatha and everyone else could hear retching sounds coming from the toilet.
Agatha went through and knocked at the door and called, “What’s the matter?”
Another bout of dreadful retching answered her. She was joined by the assistant, Garry.
“He sounds terribly ill,” said Agatha. She rattled the door handle.
“John! John! Let me in.”
She was answered by a loud tearing groan. Then crashing noises.
“Break open the door!” she shouted at Garry.
The willowy Garry threw himself against it but succeeded only in hurting his shoulder.
Agatha was joined by the other customers. Maggie was amongst them, she noticed.
“Get me a screwdriver or chisel,” said Agatha. “Quick. Josie, phone for an ambulance.”
Garry went into the nether regions and came back with a tool-box. Agatha seized a chisel and stuck it into the door jamb at the lock and jerked it sideways. There was a splintering and cracking as the flimsy lock gave way.
Mr. John was lying on the floor. He was now stretched out, immobile, his eyes staring upwards. His pale grey eyes. God, even his eyes have changed colour, thought Agatha wildly.
She knelt down and felt for his pulse, only finding a faint flutter. In the distance, she could hear the wail of the ambulance siren. Thank God, the hospital was quite near.
She gagged at the smell. Vomit was everywhere.
“Ambulance is here!” shouted Josie. Everyone except Agatha rushed to the door. She stared helplessly down at John, wishing she knew first aid. And then she saw his keys had fallen out of his pocket. She scooped them up and put them in the pocket in her skirt.
The ambulance men came in. They told everyone to stand clear. After what seemed to Agatha like an interminable wait he was carried out to the ambulance with a drip in his arm and an oxygen mask over his face.
The police arrived and took notes. “Might be food poisoning, by the sound of it,” said one.
“Can I go home now?” asked the woman called Maggie. Her face was paper-white. “I’ve had a terrible shock.”
“I suppose so,” said one. “We’ll just take a note of your names and addresses and then you can go. But you can’t leave until then.”
There were exclamations of dismay from some of the other customers who, although they were half-way through perms and tints, just wanted to leave as quickly as possible. Maggie sat down and began to cry.
Agatha felt the keys burning a hole in her pocket. Why had she taken them?
Because, she thought, her brain sharpened by fear, perhaps he was a blackmailer, perhaps I’ve been as silly as Charles thinks I am. If he were a blackmailer, then he might have something on Mrs. Friendly in his house. Poor Mrs. Friendly. Why should she suffer more? Agatha did not realize that she had become a true villager: Although Mrs. Friendly was nothing more than an acquaintance, she felt she should be protected, even if it meant breaking the law.
She gave her name and address to one of the policemen. Her hair was still wet but she didn’t care. She wanted to find out what was in that house and then somehow return with the keys and hide them somewhere in the salon. Besides, when Mr. John recovered from his bout of food poisoning, which was what it had looked like, then she would know definitely one way or the other whether he was a villain or simply a very good hairdresser with nothing sinister about him to worry her. Her mind jumped to murder. Could it be murder? The police would not search his house because of simple food poisoning.
Oh yes, they would, she suddenly thought. They’ll want to go through everything and find out what he ate. The Chinese meal! She hoped it wasn’t that. But he would have developed symptoms of food poisoning before today and she herself would have fallen ill.
Feeling naked and exposed, she parked in the back streets behind the Cheltenham Road and set off on foot for the villa. The neighbours might be watching and although they might not spot her, they might remember the make and registration number of any car parked outside the house. The day was so dark and still. As she cautiously approached the villa by way of the side street which ran along the side of it, she glanced nervously to right and left but no face glimmered at her through a window and no one was working in their garden.
After putting on a pair of gloves and fumbling with several of the keys, she found the right one and let herself in.
