As the Pig Turns

Chapter Four



Agatha arrived back at her cottage to find Bill Wong waiting for her. ‘I’ve been hanging around for ages,’ complained Bill, seated in the kitchen with one cat round his neck and another on his lap. Agatha was glad to find the heat was back on.

After explaining that she had been at police headquarters and why, Agatha asked, ‘Why are you here? Any more questions?’

‘No, I haven’t heard about your latest, but I have heard about Paul Finlay.’

‘What?’

‘He was married until two years ago. His wife divorced him on grounds of cruelty. She got custody of their two children.’

‘Was it mental cruelty, or physical cruelty?’

‘Both.’

Agatha covered her face with her hands. ‘I’m in bad trouble.’

‘You’re in bad trouble? What about Toni? We’ve got to warn her.’

‘Yes, yes. It’s not only that. I’ve done a bad thing.’

‘Again?’

‘It’s not funny. Young Simon Black who worked for me was keen on Toni. She’s too young to get married, Bill!’

‘And you didn’t want to lose a good detective,’ said Bill cynically.

‘I told Simon to wait three years and then I wouldn’t stand in his way. He joined the army and he’s now in Afghanistan.’

‘Agatha, are you sure your jealousy of Toni doesn’t make you think up these horrible plots?’

‘No, no. I care for the girl. There was something unstable about Simon.’

‘Then let’s hope anyway he doesn’t die a hero. Tell me the latest.’

Agatha glanced at her watch. ‘I hope to visit Amy this evening. I’d better go. I want her to think I’m off to Florida and then I’ll go underground.’

‘She’ll see you around.’

‘I’ll disguise myself. But I must get a look at this husband of hers. What are we going to do about Toni?’

‘I’ll go right now and see her. I’ve got the evening off.’

‘Don’t tell her about Simon!’

‘No, I think that’s up to you.’

Paul Finlay mounted the narrow stairs to Toni’s flat with a feeling of excitement. He felt the fact she had asked him for dinner and had said she had something important to tell him was propitious in the least. Toni was all he desired: young, pretty and surely malleable. A woman’s duty was to support her husband at all times and agree with him.

He had never been in Toni’s flat before and expected dolls on the sofa and posters of pop groups on the walls. But although it was small, it was furnished in excellent taste. Bookshelves on one wall were full of paperbacks and hardbacks. Two framed prints decorated the opposite wall, a Paul Klee and a Cotswold landscape by an artist he did not recognize. A round table was set at the window.

‘Hello, Paul,’ said Toni nervously. ‘Want a drink before dinner?’

‘What have you got?’

‘Beer or wine.’

‘Wine will be fine. What’s that?’ He took the bottle from her. ‘My dear innocent – Blockley Merlot!’ Blockley was a village near Moreton-in-Marsh.

‘It’s a local company who imports it and bottles it. Have you been to the village store in Blockley? It’s fabulous, all the things they have there. Charles says this wine is very good.’

‘I’ll stick to beer,’ said Paul ungraciously.

Toni shrugged. She opened a bottle of beer and poured him a glass. She was wearing cut-off jeans and a faded T-shirt.

‘I thought this was to be an occasion,’ said Paul, surveying her clothes.

‘Rather a sad one,’ said Toni. ‘Do sit down.’

He sat down on a two-seater sofa and patted the space beside him, but Toni drew up a hard chair and sat opposite. Toni had been out on only two dates with him since the murder. On each occasion, he had lectured her on the dangers of her job when he was not pontificating about the importance of his own. Toni wondered what she had ever seen in him. Maybe a psychiatrist would say she had been looking for a substitute father.

‘It’s like this, Paul,’ she said. ‘I am devoted to my job and I haven’t got time to go out on dates.’

His face became distorted with fury. ‘Are you dumping me?’

‘That’s a pretty harsh way of putting it,’ said Toni. ‘All I’m trying to say – well . . . it’s just that we’re not suited.’

‘Little girls like you need a good slap on the bottom.’ Before Toni quite realized what was happening, he had jerked her off her chair, over his knee, and had begun to spank her. She reached down between their bodies and grabbed his balls and squeezed as hard as she could. He screamed and threw her off and then rolled on to the floor.

At that very opportune moment, the door opened and Bill Wong walked in.

He helped Toni to her feet. ‘What happened? Did he assault you?’

‘He smacked my bottom because I said I didn’t want to see him any more.’

Bill hauled the still-squirming Paul to his feet and clipped handcuffs on him. He read him his rights and charged him with assault.

‘She attacked me!’ Paul howled.

‘Let’s just forget it,’ said Toni.

Bill looked at her. ‘He’s done it before and he will do it again. His ex-wife divorced him because of physical and mental cruelty. He broke her ribs on one occasion and her jaw on another. You know the score, Toni.’

‘Okay,’ said Toni. ‘Just take him away.’

‘Are you going to be all right? Is there anyone you could phone?’

‘No, I’ll be all right now,’ said Toni.

Agatha at that moment was telling Amy that she was going to Florida. ‘Isn’t your husband at home?’ she asked.

‘He should be here at any moment,’ said Amy nervously.

‘You seem on edge,’ said Agatha.

‘I keep wondering if whoever killed poor Gary might come after me.’

‘Only if they think you know something.’

The doorbell rang. ‘That’ll be my Bunchie!’ cried Amy, leaping to her feet.

‘Doesn’t he have a key . . . ?’ began Agatha. But the door to the living room opened and Amy entered, followed by a small, square man. He was expensively dressed in grey worsted. He had oily brown hair, a florid face and a long clown’s mouth.

‘This is my Bunchie!’ cried Amy. ‘Good luck on your trip. Keep in touch.’

‘If I could just have a few words with your husband, please.’

‘Oh, now is not the time. My poor Bunchie is so tired.’

Somehow Agatha found herself propelled towards the door.

‘It’s all very odd,’ Agatha told the privet hedge outside. She settled into her car and drove off a little way down the street where she could still get a good view of the entrance to the house from the streetlamp outside. The cold was intense, but she did not feel like switching on the engine. I wonder if this Bunchie really is her husband, she thought. He didn’t have a door key.

After an hour, the door opened and Bunchie appeared. He scuttled into a black BMW and set off. Agatha followed him. He drove through Mircester and out to the northern end of the town where there were large villas set back from the road.

Agatha got out of her car and walked slowly along. He walked up the path of one of the villas, took out keys and unlocked the door. A child’s voice could be heard crying shrilly, ‘Mummy, Daddy’s home!’

Now, thought Agatha, retreating to her car, either Amy is on the game or dear Bunchie is a bigamist. If I tell Bill, he’ll put a watch on the house and then call her in for questioning. Amy’s paying me and I need the money. Expose Amy and I won’t get any. But if I continue to watch Amy, there might be some connection there to her ex-husband’s murder.

Her plans for choosing some disguise to pretend she had actually gone to Florida while keeping a watch on Amy’s house were nearly sabotaged by a letter arriving in the morning post that declared she had been appointed as one of the nominees for the award of Mircester’s Woman of the Year.

Agatha glowed. She must slim. She must book a series of nonsurgical face-lifts. But after looking more closely at the invitation, she realized it was not due to take place until June. And usually the nominees for Woman of the Year were announced the year before. The choice of her name looked a bit last minute. She must find out the names of the other nominees.

But in the meantime, it was back to business.

Heavily disguised, Agatha drove into Mircester and checked the electoral roll for the address where she had followed the man who had left Amy’s. To her amazement, opposite the address was the name Mr T. Richards. So it looked as if he was a bigamist! But she could not confront him. She had phoned Amy earlier and had told her that she was about to board a flight to Miami.

Agatha called Bill on his mobile. A sleepy voice answered her and said crossly, ‘You woke me up.’

Agatha looked at her watch. ‘It’s ten o’clock in the morning.’

‘And I’ve been working all night,’ said Bill. ‘What is it?’

‘Can I come round and see you? I have some important news.’

‘Okay.’

‘I’m in diguise.’

Fifteen minutes later, Mrs Wong opened the door to a woman with heavy black hair and plump cheeks, wrapped in several layers of clothing and wearing large glasses.

‘We’re not buying,’ she said. The door began to close.

Bill appeared behind his mother, wearing pyjamas and a dressing gown. ‘It’s all right, Mum,’ he said. ‘I know who this is. It is you, isn’t it?’

‘Yes.’

‘Come on in.’

Mrs Wong retreated, angrily muttering about folks who wouldn’t let her boy sleep.

Bill led the way into the living room. ‘It’s a good disguise, Agatha. Out with it. I’m so tired, your information better be good.’

Agatha told him what she had found out about Richards.

Bill listened in amazement. ‘How did he think he would get away with it in the middle of a murder inquiry? Good work. We’ll pull him in.’

‘And you’ll keep me up to date on anything you find out?’ asked Agatha anxiously.

‘You have my word. Did Toni tell you I arrested Paul Finlay?’

‘No, she never said a word. What happened?’

Bill told her.

‘Why on earth didn’t Toni tell me?’ wondered Agatha.

‘Perhaps she feels you are too interested in her private life, Agatha.’

Agatha thought dismally of Simon in Afghanistan and blushed. Bill surveyed her in amazement. He could not remember ever having seen Agatha blush before.

By the end of another week, Agatha was tired of her surveillance of both Richards and Amy and driving in disguise to wait for long hours at a time outside their respective houses. Tom Richards spent most of his evenings and nights with Amy and only about two with his children.

It was therefore with relief that she hailed Bill Wong, who was waiting for her at the end of what seemed to Agatha like a very long week of waiting.

‘Come in,’ said Agatha, ‘and tell me, please, that I can get rid of this disguise. The wig’s so heavy, and these pads in my cheeks make me feel like a chipmunk.’

‘They also make you sound drunk,’ said Bill, following her into the kitchen. ‘Make me a cup of coffee and I’ll tell you all about it.’

Agatha plugged in the percolator after tearing off her wig and clawing the pads out of her cheeks. ‘I can’t wait,’ she said over her shoulder. ‘Start talking.’

‘Tom Richards was divorced amicably from his wife a year ago. He married Amy six months later. She begged for a makeover, face-lift, the works, so he sent her to Los Angeles. She was never in Florida. Asked why she had made up this fairy tale about this Art Mackenzie, it turns out she’s a bit of a fantasist, and it was all in a plot she had seen in some soap opera over there. Asked why she had lied, she said that if she had said that she had asked poor Bunchie to pay up so much money for her cosmetic surgery, it would make her look grasping and vain. Thanks.’

He took a mug of coffee from Agatha. ‘Richards supports her story, and yes, he did pay for everything.’

Agatha sat down beside him and nursed a cup of coffee. One cat, Hodge, climbed on Bill’s lap, and the other, Boswell, tried to lie across his head. He gently lifted both of them on to the floor.

‘Something’s wrong here,’ said Agatha. ‘You didn’t tell her that I had spilled the beans?’

‘No, we told her we had been checking up on her marital status, that the FBI in Florida had no records of an Art Mackenzie, and she came out with the truth.’

‘There’s something wrong here.’ Agatha lit a cigarette. ‘It’s like this. The one thing I believe that Amy told me is that Beech abused her. She said her father had beaten her. She said she liked masterful men. I wonder if the face-lift was really her idea, or was Richards being controlling and manipulating. I wonder whether he tried to get his ex to get a face-lift. Then the money from the divorce from Beech. She said he paid her a generous amount. I wonder if he paid her in cash. I’d like to speak to the former Mrs Richards.’

‘It’s a bit far-fetched, Agatha. I mean, he may not look like much, but he’s very, very rich. Rich men can usually get themselves arm candy easily enough.’

‘Pig! Pig!’ said Agatha.

‘Are you insulting . . . ?’

‘No, no. The pig whatsit.’

‘Oh, Pygmalion.’

‘That’s the chap.’

‘No, you’re getting a bit carried away. He seems to dote on her.’

‘But she showed me a photo of herself before the face-lift. She wasn’t even pretty.’

‘I’d backpedal for a bit,’ said Bill. ‘Don’t want you blundering around in the middle of a police investigation.’

Agatha bristled. ‘She’s paying me to find out who killed Gary, and I need the money. That’s a point. Money. Beech evidently paid her generously to give him a divorce. Now where does a mere plod get the money to be generous to anyone?’

‘We’re looking into that. His bank balance only contained a few hundred pounds, but Detective Constable Alice Peterson pointed out when we visited Gary’s home that it held some expensive antiques. We traced the antiques dealer. Yes, Gary bought several expensive pieces of furniture and paid cash. So he was up to something on the side.’

‘Maybe he targeted people the whole time and charged them with this and that and then took bribes.’

‘No, I don’t think so. He delighted in getting people into court.’

Bill had just left when Toni arrived. ‘I want a word with you, Mrs Raisin,’ she said.

‘Come in,’ said Agatha. ‘What’s up?’

Toni marched straight through to the kitchen and slammed a wedding invitation down on the table. ‘This is what’s up, you interfering old bag.’

Agatha read the invitation. Lance Corporal Simon Black was to wed Sergeant Susan Crispin in Mircester Abbey on June the tenth.

‘So?’ demanded Agatha. ‘What the hell has this to do with me?’

‘This letter that came with the invitation.’ Toni handed her an airmail.

Agatha read: ‘Dear Toni, I would like you to come to my wedding because I have fond memories of the work we did together. I would have married you then, but Agatha told me you were too young and to go away and think about it for three years. I couldn’t bear to go on snubbing you and seeing you hurt. So I joined the army. Luckily I met Susie, who’s the girl for me, so maybe Agatha was right all along not to trust me. Love, Simon.’

‘Thanks to your interference, he could be blown up out there,’ said Toni. ‘I am eighteen years old, not a child. Do not interfere in my life again. Oh, and take a month’s notice.’

Agatha sank down into a chair as Toni stormed out.

‘Anyone home?’ came Charles’s voice.

‘Oh, do walk in and stamp all over my feelings,’ howled Agatha, and burst into tears.

Charles waited until Agatha had finished crying and said gently, ‘I saw Toni driving off like a bat out of hell. Has she found out about Simon?’

Agatha sniffed miserably. ‘She forgot these.’ She pushed the wedding invitation and the letter in front of him.

Charles read both carefully. ‘I see.’

‘And she’s given a month’s notice.’

‘You shouldn’t have interfered.’

‘I know, I know. It wasn’t all selfish. It wasn’t all because I didn’t want to lose a good detective. But there was something unstable about Simon. I sensed it.’

‘You should have let her find out for herself.’

‘What about Paul Finlay? If I hadn’t found out from Bill he was a wife beater and if Bill hadn’t gone round to her flat, she would not have been rescued from a beating.’

‘Didn’t she try to defend herself?’

‘Well, yes,’ admitted Agatha. ‘She grabbed him by the balls.’

‘Toni can fight her own battles. She’s been taking classes in judo. I think maybe Bill arrived in the nick of time to rescue Paul.’

‘What about the time that creep took her to Paris and she begged me for help? Who got her out of that mess? Me! That’s who. She’s just going to lurch from one hopeless man to another.’

‘Like you, Aggie.’

‘What on earth do you mean?’

‘Your first husband was a drunk, your second husband is a coldhearted confirmed bachelor type, and you nearly married a control freak and I had to come and rescue you.’

‘That’s different.’

‘It’s not. Oh, let’s not quarrel. How are you going to get Toni to stay?’

‘Try giving her the top jobs and nothing else. Keep out of her way.’

The next day in the office, Agatha greeted her staff breezily as if nothing had happened. ‘Toni,’ she said, ‘I want you to give whatever jobs you have to Patrick and Phil. I’ve got a big one for you. Let me outline the case to date.’

They all listened intently. When Agatha had finished, she said, ‘Toni, I want you to go and see the first Mrs Richards. Try to find out if Richards wanted her to have a face-lift. I’m working on the theory that he might be a nasty, manipulative man.’

‘Give me the address,’ said Toni.

Agatha handed it to her. ‘I’m going to type out what I’ve just told all of you so it can be checked on the computer at any time. Patrick, if you have any spare time today, I want you to get on to your old police contacts and find out if they have any suggestions how Beech could have been making money on the side.’

Toni gathered up her belongings and left the office. Agatha looked wistful as she watched her go.

Toni felt emotionally numb as she drove in the direction of the Richardses’ villa. She pushed out of her mind all the times Agatha had come to her rescue, beginning with saving her from her alcoholic brother and finding her a flat and a job.

The Richardses’ home was an imposing villa screened from the road by a thick thorn hedge and a stone wall. She opened the gate and walked up a short gravel drive to the front door.

A woman answered the door, a fairly elderly woman wearing an old-fashioned floral apron. ‘Mrs Richards?’

‘No, I’m just the cleaner. Her’s out.’

‘Do you know when she’ll be back?’

‘Around the time the children get out o’ school.’

‘Is there anywhere in Mircester I might find her?’

‘Her might be at that new health bar for lunch. Rubbish, I calls it. Pay a fortune for a bit o’ lettuce.’

Toni thanked her and left. She knew where the health bar was. A chill wind was blowing from the northeast, and lowering clouds threatened snow. What a day for rabbit food, thought Toni. More like a day for soup and steak and kidney pie. Her stomach rumbled.

She had been so upset over Simon’s wedding that she only had a cup of coffee for breakfast.

She parked in the main square and, bending her head before the rising wind, picked her way gingerly through the rapidly freezing slush to Barry Wynd, where she knew the health bar was located. She cursed the weather, which seemed to be involved in a vicious cycle of thaw and freeze.

The bar was called Green Happiness. The windows were steamed up, so Toni could not see who was inside. She pushed open the door and went in. There were very few customers. The people of Mircester preferred cholesterol and loads of it.

A sullen waitress with a bad case of acne approached Toni after she had taken a table in the corner, facing the door. Toni looked at the menu and ordered vegetable soup, to be followed by cauliflower and cheese and a glass of an elderberry drink.

To her relief, the soup was accompanied by bread rolls and butter. She looked around. Two women, quite elderly, were sitting by the window. The only other customer apart from Toni herself was a severe-looking man with glasses and a long beard.

The door opened just as Toni was finishing her meal with a cup of dandelion coffee. The woman who entered was tall and dressed in pseudocountry wear: a Barbour worn over a cashmere sweater and corduroy knee breeches, thick woollen stockings and stout brogues. She had a long, mild face that reminded Toni of a sheep. The rings on her fingers were many and sparkled in the light.

When she called over the waitress and gave her order, her voice was revealed as coming from someone who was trying desperately to sound posh, and failing. The other customers had left. Now there was only Toni and what she hoped was Mrs Richards.

She smiled vaguely in Toni’s direction. Toni boldly rose and went to join her.

‘I thought I recognized you,’ said Toni. ‘Are you Mrs Richards?’

‘I was. If you’re from the press, you want the present wife.’

A small dessert bowl of a salad consisting mostly of bean sprouts was placed in front of Mrs Richards.

‘I’m not from the press,’ said Toni. ‘Excuse me, but on this freezing day, is that all you’re going to eat?’

‘Yes. My ex-husband says I have to watch my figure.’

‘What’s it got to do with him?’ asked Toni. ‘He’s your ex.’

‘He’s the father of our children, and I rely on him for maintenance. Now, go away.’

‘I am a detective,’ said Toni, passing over her card. ‘Now, our agency is supposed to be working for the present Mrs Richards, but I feel there is something very odd about her.’

‘Nothing odder than common little slut.’

‘Why don’t we discuss this over lunch?’

‘I’m having lunch.’

‘No, you are not. You are punishing yourself. You are slim enough. Leave the rabbit food alone and come with me to the nearest pub and we’ll have steak and kidney pie and a good bottle of wine.’

Mrs Richards poked dismally at her salad. ‘What if he finds out?’

‘I won’t tell him, you won’t tell him. Look, I think you’ve been through a lot,’ said Toni, ‘and that no one ever listens to you. But I’m here. Come on. Live a little.’

Over steak and kidney pies and a good bottle of Merlot, Mrs Richards thawed, unlike the weather outside. As Mrs Richards ate hungrily, Toni talked generally about the weather and told several funny stories of trying to recover lost animals. ‘I was asked to help find a lost cat called Napoleon. I at last found the animal actually up in the branches of a tall horse chestnut tree in the woman’s garden. I climbed up. It was difficult because the wind was blowing strongly and the cat was almost at the top. Just as I was reaching out for it, the wretched animal promptly nipped down to the ground, branch by branch. I followed and chased that cat and finally caught it by taking it in a rugby tackle.’

Ms Richards giggled, a surprisingly girlish giggle. ‘You can’t rugby tackle a cat.’

‘Oh, yes, you can,’ said Toni. ‘What about a brandy with the coffee?’

‘Oh, maybe I shouldn’t . . .’

Toni raised her voice and called for two brandies.

‘Did you know the present Mrs Amy Richards?’

‘Oh, yes. Look, call me Fiona. We worked in the same supermarket. She was on the till and I stacked the shelves.’

‘Seems a rather menial job for you. What about the care of your children?’

‘We had . . . have . . . an excellent nanny for the two youngest: that’s Carol, aged four, and Josie, aged five. My eldest, my boy, Wolfgang, is at Mircester High. He’s thirteen.’

‘Wolfgang is an odd name for a British child.’

‘Tom’s father is German. He insisted the boy was named after him. He’s called Wolf at school, so he doesn’t mind. My husband thought I should understand the workings of his business empire from the ground up. I didn’t mind the shelf stacking. It was a peaceful, mindless job. I got to know Amy. The others knew I was the boss’s wife and thought I had been put there to spy on them, but Amy would chatter away to me.

‘I invited her back one afternoon for tea. We both had the same day off. I thought Tom was away on business, but he turned up. He started questioning Amy about how much she thought was being sold and what were the most popular items. Soon they were deep in conversation and seemed to have forgotten I existed.

‘A few weeks later, Tom asked me for a divorce. At first I was shattered, but when he explained he would pay maintenance, the thought that I could jack in my job and stay at home with the children suddenly seemed like a road out of hell. Goodness, what a listener you are. I shouldn’t be criticizing Tom.’

‘I just wondered,’ said Toni cautiously, ‘whether Tom ever suggested improvements to your appearance.’

‘Night and day,’ said Fiona Richards gloomily. ‘He wanted me to go out to LA and get a face-lift. He always chose my clothes, but that was one thing too far. I tried to laugh and say I wanted to reach an elegant old age and . . . and . . . he hit me.’

‘Didn’t you go to the police?’

‘He would have hired the best lawyers. I felt I wouldn’t have a chance. So I bought a tape recorder and I began to record all the vicious rows and the sound of the beatings. My small salary was paid into an account in my name. I went to that bank and hired a safe-deposit box and put copies of all the tapes into it. Then I told him I was going to the police with the evidence.

‘He stormed out of the house, but when he came back, he said that he had fallen in love with Amy and would give me a divorce. I couldn’t believe my luck until he finally moved out. He comes back regularly to see the children. Oh, he’s all right with them. I bumped into Amy before she got her cosmetic alterations. She was very friendly, but she said an odd thing just as she was leaving. She said, “I miss Gary. Gary would have sorted him out.”’

‘So it looks as if she was off her new husband before she even went to the States,’ said Toni.

‘Now, how am I to get home? I’m over the limit.’

‘I’ll get you a cab,’ said Toni. ‘Is there anyone who can come and get your car?’

‘Yes, the nanny, Mrs Drufus.’ She leaned forward and looked earnestly at Toni. ‘Do you think Tom killed Gary?’

‘If it had just been a blow on the head, I could believe it,’ said Toni. ‘But to kill a man – he was evidently knifed to death – and then to cut off his head and try to get him roasted as a pig – no. It sounds to me like the work of several people.’

‘Would you keep in touch with me?’ asked Fiona plaintively. ‘You’re such a good listener. Now, if I had a daughter like you . . . Oh, well.’

She rose somewhat unsteadily to her feet. Toni found her a taxi and sent her on her way.

Agatha cursed under her breath. The girl’s report on Fiona Richards was so good. Toni, with her youth and air of innocence, could winkle stories out of people who would otherwise have clammed up when faced with Agatha herself.

After leaving a note on Toni’s desk thanking her for her work, along with Simon’s letter and wedding invitation, Agatha went out into the freezing cold. The time had come to ask Amy Richards why she had lied. Agatha realized she would need to tell the truth and confess she had never gone to Florida.

Amy answered the door. She wasn’t wearing her contact lenses, showing her eyes were brown. She looked as if she had been crying.

‘Oh, it’s you,’ she said bleakly.

Agatha shivered. ‘Let me in.’

She pushed past the slim figure of Amy and into the living room. Agatha removed her heavy coat and a shawl that made her feel she looked like Mother Machree, cursing all antifur activists under her breath. Mink were vermin. They should be clothing her back instead of marauding around the countryside, killing off the native species.

‘Amy, I haven’t been to Florida.’ Agatha sat down on a sofa, and Amy sat in an armchair facing her. Between them was a glass coffee table holding glossy magazines – OK!, Celebrity, Vogue and colour supplements from various Sunday papers.

‘Why?’ asked Amy in a croaky voice.

‘I’m sorry to say this, Amy, but I did not believe you. A police contact told me that you have confessed that you were lying, that you were never in Florida and it was Tom Richards who paid for you to go to LA for the transformation. I naturally began to wonder if you wanted me out of the way and why.’

‘I told the police the truth this time. I didn’t want them to think I was a gold digger. I mean, it takes an awful lot of money to look like this.’

Hadn’t Dolly Parton once said something like ‘It takes an awful lot of money to look this cheap,’ thought Agatha, for there was something rather tawdry about Amy that day. She was wearing high-heeled pink shoes, a tight pink sweater and pink pedal pushers.

‘So it was not your husband that suggested you have plastic surgery?’

‘No, of course not.’

‘But he suggested it to his previous wife. Is he a bully?’

‘Oh, no, my Bunchie’s the sweetest, dearest man.’

‘Okay. Let’s get back to Gary. You said he gave you a lot of money for the divorce. A cheque?’

‘No, it was cash.’

‘How much?’

‘I c-can’t remember.’

‘Amy!’

‘It was about ten thousand in an envelope. He said, “Take it and come with me to the lawyer’s, but don’t mention the money. Tell him you don’t want anything from me. Get it!” So I went along with it.’

‘But you surely had a lawyer of your own.’

‘There was one in the same building.’

‘Who are these lawyers?’

‘Crumley, Fatch and Blinder.’

‘And where are they?’

‘They’re out in the industrial estate. Lot thirty-one.’

‘That’s a damned odd place for lawyers’ offices. But you produced the divorce papers when you went to register your marriage to Tom Richards.’

‘That’s the oddest thing. I couldn’t find them anywhere. I asked Gary and he said he gave them to me and I must have lost them. My passport was still in my maiden name and Bunchie said that and my birth certificate would be enough.’

‘Didn’t you go to the lawyer and ask for a copy?’

‘Bunchie said there was no need to bother.’

‘When Gary gave you the ten thousand, where did he get it from? Did he have a safe?’

‘Nothing like that. He just produced an envelope. He said he wanted the house for himself.’

‘And where did Bunchie really meet you?’

‘At the supermarket. I knew the money wouldn’t last all that long these days. I got a room at the Y.’

‘Amy, think carefully. Gary did not earn much as a copper. How could he be getting extra money?’

‘I dunno. He kept telling me he was doing a lot of overtime.’ Amy waved her slim arm and a heavy silver bracelet with several objects dangling from it flashed in the electric light.

‘Here’s an odd thing. May I see your bracelet?’

‘Okay. I had a friend make it up for me. She’s ever so clever. She just uses all little odd bits of silver.’

Agatha studied the bracelet carefully, turning it in her fingers. ‘There’s a key here,’ she said. ‘An odd-shaped key. It looks like my bank deposit key.’

‘Well, I never.’

‘Where did Gary bank?’

‘I think it was at the Mircester and General.’

‘Did Gary make a will?’

‘Yes, I’ve got a copy of it somewhere. It’s one of those wills you do yourself. He left everything to me, but under my maiden name, Amy Tubb. He said he made it out just before we got married.’

‘And your passport is still in your maiden name?’

‘Yes, I never got around to changing it.’

‘Right. Get your coat. We’ll try the bank first. Bring the will and the death certificate and your passport.’

Agatha waited impatiently while Amy teetered about on her high heels, opening and shutting drawers. Eventually she found everything in a file in the bottom drawer of her husband’s desk.