M Beaton - Agatha Raisin and the Terrible Tourist

“I would advise you to be careful, Mrs. Raisin. It would be as well if you kept away from the other suspects until this murder is solved.”

“I can’t be a suspect,” said Agatha. “Someone’s been trying to kill me.”

“Ah, if I were a cynical man, which I am not, I might say there is no evidence of that, only your word.”

“But the rock!”

“As I say, that could have been children. I will be talking to you soon.”

James saw him out. When he returned to the kitchen, Agatha said, “Before you start jeering about baronets: Like I told Pamir, I went to look for the others, heard they’d gone to Bellapais, and took Charles’s offer. I’m tired. Right now I want to forget about the whole thing. Maybe you’d better investigate on your own. Charles blew it for me.”

“What do you mean?”

“Charles told them I wasn’t investigating anything. He called them a dreary, poisonous bunch of people.”

James smiled for the first time. “And so they are. I wouldn’t let that stop you. For some reason the Debenhams are staying friends with Trevor and Angus when they would, in ordinary circumstances, walk on the other side of the road if they saw them coming. You’ve only to show up and smile and apologize for Charles’s outburst and they’ll be all over you like a rash. Why didn’t you come back earlier?”

“I was shaken and hungry and I decided to take up Charles’s offer of lunch, only he turned it into my offer by skating off to the toilet when the bill arrived. He’s a cheapskate.”

James smiled again. “You’ll know to keep clear of him in future.”

“So what did you really get up to in Nicosia?”

“That’s my business. I don’t want you interfering in it.”

“All I’ve heard today is ‘stop interfering,’” said Agatha. “I’m going to have a bath.”

“There’s water,” said James, “and when you’ve had it, have a rest and then we’ll go and make friends with our suspects.”

“Are we going to confront Trevor with the fact we know he inherits-or probably inherits-Rose’s money?”

“Not yet. No point in driving them away from us. We’ll go along and charm them later.”

Agatha lay in the bath and stared up at the louvered window above it through which came the roaring sound of the Mediterranean. The events of the day remembered seemed small and bright and not quite real, as if they were all something she had seen in a film.

She was suddenly engulfed in a wave of homesickness. In Carsely she would have had her support group of friends: Mrs. Bloxby, Bill Wong and the members of the Carsely Ladies Society. The trees would be beginning to turn red and gold and the roads around the village would be full of pheasants who seemed well aware that the shooting season had not yet begun. She missed her cats. She hoped Doris Simpson was looking after them properly.

Above, all, she wanted to get away from James. The therapy-speakers would ask, “Why are you letting someone live rent-free in your head?” Well, the plain answer to that was that she still liked the lodger. She thought briefly of Charles and then her mind winced away from him.

She climbed out of the deep bath and dried herself. In the bedroom, she switched on the radio in her room, which was tuned to a local English-speaking station which played records. Then the remorselessly bright DJ, a woman with a nasal Essex voice, sang along with the records in a flat monotone, and the records were mostly rap. But as Agatha reached out to switch it off, the music died away and an interview with some member of the north Cyprus National Trust was announced. Agatha decided to listen while she chose something glamorous for the evening ahead. She picked up a little black dress and held it against her. Black could be very ageing. A well-modulated English voice on the radio was talking about snakes, explaining that the poisonous snakes were in the mountains and the harmless snakes at the coast. “But,” went on the voice, “the other day I found one of those harmless snakes in my kitchen sink in Kyrenia. I decided just to leave it and after some time it emerged with a rat in its mouth, which all goes to show you what useful creatures snakes are.”

Lady, I wouldn’t even have a cup of tea in your kitchen, thought Agatha with a shudder.

She tried on the black dress. It was a simple sheath and short enough to show plenty of leg. Perhaps some gold jewellery to brighten it up? Agatha sat down and carefully made up her face in her “fright” mirror, one of those magnifying ones which showed every pore. Then she walked through the bathroom and into James’s room where there was a long mirror. Her make-up looked like a thick beige mask and the dress was a mistake. She went into the bathroom and scrubbed off her make-up. Time to start again.

It was only when James shouted up the stairs, “Agatha, are you ready?” that Agatha at last made up her mind what to wear. She put on a white satin blouse and a black pleated skirt, high heels and restrained make-up, and hung some gold chains round her neck. Not exciting, but all she could think of in the final rush.

“I think we should take both cars,” she said when she joined James, who was waiting impatiently.

“Why?”

“In case we have to split up for some reason.”

“You mean, in case you go off with Charles.”

“Don’t be so silly.”

“It was a practical observation based on events, Agatha.”

Agatha felt herself beginning to blush, but she said, “I have no intention of going off with Charles But something may happen-we may become separated.”

“I don’t want to stand here arguing all night. Take your own bloody car if you want!”

They both left the villa in angry silence and went to their respective cars.

When Agatha got to the end of the road, she saw the petrol gauge was registering empty and so turned right towards Lapta to the nearest garage, instead of left towards Kyrenia. Two huge trucks were blocking the petrol pumps and she had to wait patiently until one of them left. Then she found, because she had taken a smaller bag for evening rather than the large one she usually carried, that she had left all her money back at the villa. She explained, apologized and hurried back to find some money. Then, when she got back to the garage, the proprietor was on the phone and so she had to wait again until he had finished his call. She paid and set out on the road to Kyrenia.

Somehow the homesickness she had felt earlier would not leave her. She longed to be driving down the winding country lanes that led to Carsely, to her thatched cottage, to all the comforts of home. She was almost beginning to dislike James, and yet somehow that craving for love from him would not go away. She hit the steering wheel angrily with her hand. “I wish he would die” she said out loud.

She parked on the pavement outside a house. A man opened his front door and stared at her car, which was blocking it.

“I’m sorry,” said Agatha, who had just got out. “I’ll move it.”

The man smiled, showing gold teeth. “No problem,” he said cheerfully.

How easygoing they were, marvelled Agatha. If someone drove up on the pavement and blocked my gateway back home, I’d give them a mouthful and call the police.

Bert Mort, the Israeli business man, was just checking out of the hotel when Agatha arrived. He threw her a guilty look.

“Where is your wife?” asked Agatha sweetly.

“Gone back home ahead of me. Look, Agatha, I’m truly sorry.”

Agatha relented. “What puzzles me, Bert, is how you could even look at an old bag like me with such a gorgeous wife.”

He gave a rueful smile. “Don’t put yourself down, Agatha. You’ve got great legs.”

“Agatha!” James stood there, glowering.