hair was now dyed blonde and she was skilfully made up. She was wearing a black trouser-suit of expensive cut. Agatha briefly reflected that Emma now looked like one of those well-preserved, ginny, big-toothed women one occasionally saw at game fairs. Agatha forgot that Emma had claimed to be ill.
“So, Patrick,” she said, “how on earth did you get on to him?”
“I saw this Mrs. Blandford, a widow who lives in Herris Cum Magna. She knew him slightly. She gave him a cup of tea. She said he was sore at being left out of the engagement party. I said that was because his son didn’t know where he was and she said that Harrison had told her that his son had been in touch with him but had said that Mrs. Laggat-Brown had refused to invite Harrison.”
“The old cow. She never told me that.”
“I asked where Harrison was now and she got all shifty and said if she’d known that, she’d have told the police. I picked up that she’d a soft spot for Harrison. At last she said he’d said something about having a room in a pub in Evesham. I checked out the pubs that let rooms—very few of them—armed with a description and traced him to The Hereford.”
“Well done,” said Agatha. “Let’s get along there.”
As they drove towards Evesham, Patrick said uneasily, “Eve got a bad feeling about this. I feel we should have turned the whole thing over to the police.”
“Patrick, Mrs. Laggat-Brown is paying heavily for my services. If the police get to him first, she may give them all the credit and cut back on my fee and I’m just beginning to show a profit.”
“I know, I know. Just got a bad feeling in my water.”
The Hereford was situated near Evesham railway station. Patrick parked in the car-park. “The pub’11 still be closed,” said Agatha.
“It’s all right. You get to his room up a side staircase.”
“No security,” commented Agatha as Patrick opened the side door. “Anyone could walk in.”
“Well, they’re hardly expecting burglars in a dingy pub in Evesham. His room is number two.”
They mounted the uncarpeted staircase which smelt of stale beer. Patrick knocked on the door. “Harrison? It’s me. Patrick Mullen. Open up.”
There was no reply.
“Damn,” said Patrick. “Maybe he’s flown. I should have told the police last night, Agatha.” “Try the door,” urged Agatha.
He turned the handle and the door swung open. It was a small dark room furnished only with a wardrobe, a wash-basin, a table and chair and narrow bed.
And on that bed lay a man, face-down.
FIVE
“WAIT!” ordered Patrick as Agatha would have rushed forwards. He drew out two pairs of thin plastic gloves. “Put these on.”
Agatha did as she was told, whispering, “He’s not dead, is he?”
Patrick went to the figure on the bed and felt the neck. Then he straightened up. “There’s no pulse.”
They looked around. An empty bottle of sleeping pills and an empty bottle of vodka stood beside the bed. Against the vodka bottle was propped a folded sheet of paper. Patrick picked it up and opened it carefully.
“What does it say?” asked Agatha.
Patrick read: “I tried to kill Cassandra because I wanted Jason to get her money and give some to me so I could start my own business. Now I can’t live with myself. I threw the rifle in the river.”
“Typewritten?” asked Agatha.
“There’s his computer and printer on the table. Blast. We’ve got to get out of here. If we go to the police now, they’ll charge us with tampering with an investigation and I promised the Bland-ford woman I wouldn’t get her into trouble.”
“What about security cameras outside?”
“None. I checked. Come on. Let’s go.”
Once they were in the car and heading out of Evesham, Agatha said, “Anyone could have written that note.”
“Nice thought,” said Patrick, “but I’ve found that real-life cases are not like detective stories. If he said he did it, he did it. Don’t tell anyone in the office about this.”
“They were all listening when we were discussing going along.”
Patrick stopped in a lay-by with a phone-box. “Ed better give the police an anonymous call and then get the hell back on the road because they can trace calls immediately they’re made these days.”
Agatha waited while Patrick went into the phone-box. He spoke briefly and then jumped back in the car. “Off we go,” he said, “and as fast as possible. Now when we get to the office, we tell a white lie and say he’s dead and the police got there before us, so we turned about.”
“They’re all very loyal. We could swear them to secrecy.” “I don’t trust anybody.”
“Okay, we’ll do it your way. Means the end of working for Mrs. Laggat-Brown.”
He shrugged. “Who needs her anyway? Cases are coming in by the day.”
Agatha suddenly missed Charles. She felt uneasy aboutHarrison’s death. She felt she could think more clearly if she discussed it with Charles. Still, Roy was coming and he was always a good listener.
Mrs. Laggat-Brown phoned later that day to tell Agatha that Harrison had been found and that it was all such a relief. She ended by saying, “I should have followed Jeremy’s advice and left the whole thing to the police and saved myself a lot of money.”
Agatha longed to say that if it hadn’t been for her agency’s investigation, the case might never have been solved.
She phoned Charles, but his aunt said he had gone abroad.
Agatha sat and drummed her fingers on the desk. Then her eyes lit up. If by any chance it should turn out that there weren’t any fingerprints on the vodka bottle or on the glass, then that would mean someone had faked the suicide.
She phoned Patrick on his mobile. “I’ll check it out, Agatha,” he said. “But I’m afraid you’re going to have to get back to dogs, cats, divorces and missing teenagers.”
Miss Simms entered, flushed with success, having not only found the missing teenager she had been looking for but having delivered the girl back to her parents.
“Oh, well done,” said Agatha. “Let me build up a little more profit and I’ll get another girl to do the secretarial work and put you on the road.”
“You look lovely, Emma,” said Miss Simms brightly. “What have you been doing to yourself? Got yourself a fella?”
Emma blushed. “Just felt like smartening up,” she mumbled.
On Friday evening, Agatha picked up Roy from the station at Moreton-in-Marsh.
The young man was all in white—white raw-silk suit, white panama hat and white high-heeled boots.
“Now what are you supposed to be?” asked Agatha. “You look like the man from Del Monte.”
“It’s the cool look, sweetie,” said Roy. “It’s the ice cream look. This weather’s been so hot. I assure you, I’m the new black.”
“Do you want to eat out or in?”
“Out,” said Roy, who had sampled Agatha’s microwave cooking several times.
“What do you feel like eating?” “Chinese.”
“There a great one in Evesham. That’s if you don’t mind driving. I’m tired. It’s been a gruelling week.”
Between mouthfuls, as they picked their way with chopsticks through a large Chinese meal, Agatha told him all about the Laggat-Brown case and the suicide of Harrison Peterson.
Her story took her right through the meal until the pot of green tea was being served.
“Well,” said Roy, leaning back and patting fussily at his mouth with his napkin, “it all seems odd. I mean, he makes an appointment with this detective of yours and then kills himself.”
“That’s what I thought. But Patrick has contacts in the police and if there had been anything fishy, he’d let
