M Beaton: Agatha Raisin and the Haunted House

“I think they’re just checking out all the possibilities. It’s a quiet time at the moment, otherwise they might not have become so curious.”

“The stairs were shallow and carpeted.”

“I heard that. There’s something else.”

Agatha looked over at the bar. Paul was still busy trying to get the barman’s attention. She suddenly wanted to know a few facts he didn’t.

“What else?”

“She was evidently offered quite a large sum of money for the place, from Arkbuck Hotels.”

“Go on. For a cottage?”

“It’s not only quite a large cottage but there are several acres of ground at the back belonging to Mrs. Witherspoon. I gathered they planned a sort of expensive country retreat with a genuine Tudor cottage front and a new building, faked-up Tudor, at the back. But she turned down their offer.”

“Did she leave a lot of money?”

“She left close to a million pounds, plus stocks and shares.”

“The old bitch!” exclaimed Agatha. “Her poor daughter lives in a run-down council house.”

“Agatha, Agatha. I suppose it’s useless of me to tell you to stop poking your nose into police cases.”

Paul returned with the drinks in time to hear the last remark. “No use at all,” he said cheerfully. “Here’s your drink, Agatha. Bill tell you anything?”

“Not much we didn’t know,” said Agatha.

“I’ve got to get back,” said Bill. “See you.”

“So what did he say?” asked Paul.

Agatha fought a silent war with herself. Why shouldn’t she keep the information to herself and investigate herself, as she had done in previous cases? But he was wearing a sky-blue linen shirt open at the neck, and his silver hair and black eyes were such an alluring combination.

She caved in. “Buy me lunch and I’ll tell you.”

He looked up at the menu on the blackboard.

“No, you don’t,” said Agatha. “Not here!”

He grinned. “All right. There’s a French bistro on the other side of the square that’s supposed to be pretty good. Come on.”

Agatha was hungry but found to her disappointment that the bistro still favoured nouvelle cuisine, tiny amounts of food exquisitely arranged on beds of that vegetable that Agatha so loathed-rocket.

“Stop grumbling,” said Paul, “and tell me what you’ve got.”

Agatha relayed what Bill had told her. “Great!” exclaimed Paul when she had finished. “When we get home we’ll look up the headquarters of this hotel chain and go and see them.”

“Won’t take us long to finish,” said Agatha gloomily. “It’s about a mouthful per course.”

At the end of the meal, Paul blinked a little at the cost of the meal, only glad that they had not had any wine. “You and I are in the wrong jobs, Agatha,” he said as they left the restaurant. “We should open a restaurant and starve the customers at great expense.”

“Bloody French,” muttered Agatha, still hungry.

“You’re a racist, Agatha.”

“Not I. Anyway, the French are about the last race on earth you can insult because they don’t give a damn what anyone says about them.”

Back in Agatha’s cottage in Carsely, Agatha went through the London business directories without finding the headquarters of Arkbuck Hotels. “Try the Internet,” said Paul.

Agatha switched on her computer. After a few moments, she said, “I’ve got them. They’re in Bath.”

“Well, that’s not too far from here. Let’s go.”

When they reached Bath, the terraces of Georgian houses were gleaming white under a darkening sky. The head offices of Arkbuck Hotels were situated in an elegant house in the Royal Crescent.

“Posh,” murmured Paul. “I expected something a bit seedy.”

They walked into the reception area where an efficient grey-haired lady sat behind a Georgian desk, the sort of woman who, before the advent of computers, Agatha thought, could type eighty words a minute on an old Remington.

Paul introduced them and said they were interested in finding out about the bid for Mrs. Witherspoon’s cottage in Hebberdon.

Agatha expected to be told that everyone was busy, but to her surprise the receptionist said, “I think Mr. Perry is free.”

“Who is Mr. Perry?” asked Agatha.

“Our managing director. Wait here.”

She walked up an elegant staircase. Paul studied photographs of the firm’s hotels on the walls of the reception area. “Doesn’t look as if there’s anything sinister about this lot,” he said. “Converted manor-houses, that sort of thing.”

The receptionist came down the staircase again, followed by a leggy secretary, who said, “Come with me. Mr. Perry will see you now.”

The secretary was wearing a very short skirt. Agatha noticed Paul eyeing the long legs walking up the staircase in front of them and felt a stab of jealousy. It just wasn’t fair on middle-aged women. If she eyed up a young man she would be considered a harpy. But a man of the same age, provided he had kept his figure, would never be regarded with the same contempt.

The secretary led them through her office on the first landing and opened a door, ushered them in, and closed it behind them.

Mr. Perry was a man in his fifties with a smooth, glazed face, small grey eyes, and large bushy eyebrows. He was impeccably tailored and he rested his manicured hands on the desk as he rose to meet them. “What can I do to help you?” he asked in an Old Etonian accent, and Agatha’s inferiority complex gave a lurch somewhere in the region of her stomach. She sometimes wondered if it was the inferiority complexes of people like herself that kept the British class system alive and well, rather than any behaviour of the upper classes. I mean, why should she feel inferior?

She realized with a start that Paul had said something and both men were now looking curiously at her. She shut her mouth, which had a distressing tendency to droop open when she was worried about something.

“Agatha?” prompted Paul.

“What?”

“I was just explaining to Mr. Perry the reason for our interest in Mrs. Witherspoon’s cottage. And why don’t you sit down?”

Agatha sat down in a chair facing Mr. Perry.

“What you are really saying,” said Mr. Perry, “is that you believe there’s something fishy about the old woman’s death. You learned we had been trying to buy the house from her and thought, aha, sinister hotel chain will go to any lengths.”

“Something like that,” said Agatha, too taken aback to be anything other than honest. “But that was before we came here. It all seems very respectable.”

He looked amused. “The reason we wanted the place was because of the acreage at the back, and that, combined with the age of the house, made it seem ideal for our purposes.”

“But how did you even know about the place?” asked Agatha. “I mean, you wouldn’t know about that land at the back unless someone had told you.”

“Exactly.”

“So who told you?”

“I don’t remember all the details. I did not approach Mrs. Witherspoon myself. But we’ll have the file somewhere. He pressed a button on the intercom. “Susie, get me the file on…” He looked at Paul. “Name?”

“Ivy Cottage, Bag End, Hebberdon.”

“That’s Ivy Cottage, Bag End, Hebberdon,” said Mr. Perry into the intercom.

Agatha eyed a large glass ashtray on Mr. Perry’s desk. “Mind if I smoke?”

“Not in the slightest. Would you like coffee?”

“Please.”

He pressed the intercom again. “After you’ve found the file, Susie, bring us some coffee.”

“Does she mind that?” asked Agatha curiously.

“Mind what?”

“Being asked to make coffee?”

“Oh, no, we’re a very old-fashioned firm.”