Pushing Up Daisies (12 page)

“The gangster. Yes. Found shot in his garden five years ago.”

“I was on that. His missus, Gloria, claimed Devere raped her. Hell of a scandal. Finally hushed up. Devere resigned but with an honourable discharge as they say in the army. Wouldn't have got away with it now with all this new puritanism.”

“I wouldn't call all these recent allegations of sexual harassment puritanism,” said Agatha.

“Well, you wouldn't. Bloody women!”

“Run me off a copy,” said Agatha, “and get me Gloria's current address, and, yes, I'll remember you when the story breaks.”

“You'd better.”

*   *   *

Mad Max Harrison's wife lived in a flat in Chelsea Harbour. “It's very quiet here,” commented Agatha, “and most of the apartments look empty.”

“I heard somewhere that very rich foreigners buy them as investments,” said Charles. “It's been an odd day so far. It wouldn't surprise me in the least to find that Gloria has turned into a fellow. How did you get to know a crime reporter? Surely in your PR days, you dealt with fashion editors and so on.”

“My first client ever was a murder suspect,” said Agatha. “Oh, here we are. I'll tell you about it someday. Thank goodness, the woman's on the ground floor. Do you ever watch the Montalbano series on television? I always want to book a holiday in Sicily every time I watch it, but then Inspector Montalbano always seems to be running up and down steep steps and my legs ache just…”

“Agatha! Stop babbling and ring the bloody woman's bell.”

She ran the doorbell, which chimed out the theme from
The Godfather
. Agatha had envisaged a stereotype of a gangster's wife: leopard-print top, backless mules, face paint so thick you could skate on it and dead black hair scraped up on top of her head. So Gloria, who looked pretty much like that, came as no surprise.

But her voice was. In a glacial upper-class voice, Gloria demanded, “Who are you and what do you want?”

Agatha introduced them and explained they were investigating the background of Gerald Devere.

“You'd better come in,” she said. “The salon's through here.”

The salon, as she had called it, had been designed by a soulless expert. No curtains. White linen blinds at the window. White nubbly material sofa and armchairs. Glass-topped coffee table. A huge stone vase of autumn leaves, dipped in glycerine to preserve them, stood in front of the empty grey stone hearth. Weak sunlight shone on the marina outside where yachts bobbed at anchor. Little sunlight waves flickered across the ceiling.

She ordered them to sit down and asked, “What do you want to know about Gerald? It's all old hat.”

“We have learned,” said Agatha, “that you accused him of raping you.”

“So what's that got to do with anything?” asked Gloria. She had a heavy pendulous face and thick-lidded eyes.

“We're investigating the murder of a woman in the village of Carsely, where Mr. Devere has just moved to. If he did indeed rape you, then it follows that he's capable of violence.”

“Get your drift.” Gloria lit a cigarette. “Fact is, he was set up. Max wanted him to stop snooping around, and Gerald had this reputation for being after anything in a skirt. So I was told to come on to him, and the minute he got my knickers off, to start yelling rape. Well, Gerald got off the charge, and Max was furious because he had told me to get him to rough me up first and so there was no real evidence. But Gerald had such a reputation with the ladies that his bosses never quite believed him, so Max got rid of him after all.”

“So Gerald was not capable of being violent?”

“Don't think so. But Max used to say a lot of coppers become like villains, know what I mean?” Traces of a Cockney accent were beginning to show through.

“It's very quiet here,” said Charles. “I would have thought you would have preferred somewhere livelier.”

“Billy likes it. He likes a bit o' posh. Here! I'm forgetting, he'll be home soon. I wear my own sort of clothes when he's not around, but I'd better change. Can you stay a bit? You're a ‘Sir.' He'll be ever so pleased to find a sir here. The bar's through that door over by the windows. Help yourselves.” She hurried out of the room.

“I'm going to have a gin and a cigarette,” said Agatha. “What a weird day.”

“I'll join you,” said Charles. “When in Looking-Glass Country, always fortify yourself. What do you think Billy will be like?”

“Probably another gangster or used car dealer,” said Agatha. “What a well-stocked bar!”

Just as they were carrying their drinks back into the salon, they heard the scrape of a key in the front door. “Billy,” whispered Agatha. “Wonder what he's like?”

Billy walked into the room. He came as a surprise. He was a small fussy man dressed in pinstriped trousers and a dark jacket, striped shirt and silk tie. He was about fifty or so: thick grey hair, sharp nose, small mouth and eyes.

Charles and Agatha explained who they were and why they had called. “Ah, Max,” said Billy. “Used to be a client of mine down at the Old Bailey.”

“You are a barrister!” exclaimed Agatha.

“William Baxter, ma'am. All sorts of villains defended. So you want to know about Devere? I wouldn't mind having been on the prosecution for that one, but I'm strictly defence.”

Gloria came quietly back into the room. She was wearing a pale blue cashmere twinset over a tweed skirt. She had loosened her hair and tied it back with a thin velvet ribbon.

“Get me a drink,” ordered Billy. “The usual. Hop to it.”

“Yes, dear.”

“I heard about Gerald. Nothing unsavoury except a habit of seducing his fellow officers' wives. Max was always as thick as pig shit, and if Gerald had kept it in his pants, he would have kept his job as well.”

Gloria came back with Billy's drink on a little silver tray. “Nuts!” he barked. “Where are the nuts?”

“Right away.” Gloria scuttled off, head bent, figure slightly to the side, reminding Charles of a geisha.

When Gloria came back with a bowl of nuts, Charles and Agatha decided to leave. At the front door, Agatha whispered to Gloria, who had been ordered to see them out, “You have my card. I can help in divorces.”

“We aren't married.”

“Then walk, girl!”

“Whatever do you mean?”

“Gloria!” came Billy's peremptory voice.

“Gotta go,” she said.

Outside, a blustery wind was rocking the boats in the marina. “Why?” asked Agatha.

“Oh, I don't know,” said Charles. “Maybe it's the same as getting a bride from the Philippines or the Ukraine. Looking for the old-fashioned idea of the domestic slave. I guess some villains' wives have to be like that.”

“What a day!” said Agatha. “Thank goodness there aren't so many weirdos in the country.”

“You mean all those people bumping each other off is normal?”

Back in Carsely, Agatha was overtaken by a desire to beg Charles to stay the night. But he pecked her on the cheek and scampered off to his own car before she could summon up the courage. She told herself it was a relief, that she was not into casual sex, although a jeering voice said, “Oh, really? These days, you're not into sex at all!”

She went in and let her cats out into the garden. The doorbell rang. It was Jake. “Mind if I have a word,” he said.

“Come in. I could do with a coffee. What about you?”

“Fine.”

Agatha switched the electric kettle and spooned instant coffee into two mugs.

“So what's your problem?” she asked. “I gather you do have a problem.”

“It's this supermarket job with Simon. I caught two shoplifters today, and on each occasion when I was about to march them up to the manager's office, Simon said, ‘You stay on lookout.' When we were finishing for the day, the manager shook Simon's hand and said, ‘Well done, young man.' Simon gave me no credit whatsoever.”

Agatha put a cup of coffee down in front of Jake. “Simon had a thing for Toni, and although I believe it's over, he will still be jealous of you and not want you to get the kudos for anything. I should have thought of that. I'll give you something to start doing on your own tomorrow. Okay?”

“Thanks. How did you get on today?”

Agatha began to describe her adventures, and Jake began to laugh and laugh until Agatha joined in. “It was all so weird,” said Agatha. “First the transvestites and then the villain's missus.”

Then Agatha asked him why he had failed at so many previous jobs. “I was a bit of a rebel, but then, Pa is very controlling. I got a good second in English Literature, but, I mean, that doesn't qualify you for a job, so I said I was going to be an apprentice plumber and learn the trade, and Pa hit the roof. I said plumbers made a lot of money, and I wanted my own money. He bullied me into several jobs in businesses belonging to his friends, and like a spoilt brat I just behaved as badly as possible until they sacked me. I think I could be good at this detective job, but not with Simon.”

“I'll put you with Toni tomorrow. Don't get any ideas there.”

“I won't. But why?”

“Talking about controlling parents,” said Agatha with a sigh. “I suppose I look on Toni as a daughter, and I don't want to see her getting hurt. Now, have you eaten?”

“No.”

“We'll go to the White Hart Royal in Moreton. They do a very good lamb and mint pie.”

*   *   *

Mr. and Mrs. Ian Frimp were new to the village of Carsely. They were dining that evening in the White Hart Royal. Ruby Frimp scowled over her menu at Agatha. “There's that detective woman,” she whispered. “She flirting with a
boy!
”

“Good luck to her,” said her husband.

“But she's corrupting a minor!”

That made her husband put down his menu and take a look. “Ruby, that chap is in his late twenties, I should guess, and good luck to the woman. Now, choose something to eat and shut up. It was your idea to move from Manchester to this living grave. No one bothers about the neighbours in Manchester. But all you do is poke and pry.”

“The vicar's wife shall hear about this,” muttered Ruby.

Agatha and Jake were enjoying each other's company enormously. They drank two bottles of wine. Jake began to think Agatha was the sexiest thing on two legs he had seen in a long time.

They decided to take a taxi to Carsely because they were over the limit. In the taxi, Jake put an arm around Agatha and kissed her on the cheek. Agatha fought down her rising conscience. What had she got to feel guilty about? She was free. He was free. Okay, she was a bit older. Years older, screamed her conscience. Agatha's conscience and hormones joined in the battlefield of her mind, and her hormones won. Then she began to take inventory. Her legs were shaved. But should she have had a Brazilian? Nope. They said that men who liked women shaved down there were latent paedophiles.

As the taxi drew up outside Agatha's cottage, she saw with a feeling of acute disappointment mixed with relief that the lights were on in the living room.

“We've got company,” she said. “Charles is here, which means the spare room will be occupied. You'll need to sleep on the couch.”

“Suits me,” said Jake. “Then I'll drive you down in the morning to pick up your car.”

Charles rose to meet them. He had been at a dinner party at a mansion nearby and had decided to drop in on Agatha on his road home. But one look at the tipsy pair made him decide to stay. There was nothing for Agatha in an affair with that young man but hurt, he thought.

*   *   *

Agatha walked slowly into the kitchen in the morning with a sore head and a mouth like a gorilla's armpit. Jake rose to meet her. “I've collected your car,” he said. “So we can get started.”

“Not without coffee.”

“You're late,” said Jake. “I put some in a thermos. You can drink it at the office. I'll drive you in your car.”

“Okay,” said Agatha weakly. “I didn't know it was so late.”

“Don't worry. With me driving, we'll be there on time.”

How could I ever be mad enough to even think about going to bed with this young man, thought Agatha. I feel a hundred this morning.

In the office, as she was beginning to send her staff off on their respective jobs, she had a sudden idea. “Toni. I would like you and Jake here to go back to Harby Hall and then to the village. See if there is anything at all you can find out. Toni, you'll need to use your car. Jake's is at my place.” Then Agatha found to her fury that she was blushing.

 

Chapter Seven

Simon went off to the supermarket, seething with rage. Harby Hall was the prime investigation. This upstart newcomer, Jake, should not have been allowed anywhere near it. Also, it was being forcefully borne in on Simon that his pursuit of Alice was beginning to make him look ridiculous. And so his thoughts turned to Toni again. She had been looking particularly pretty that morning in a cherry red sweater.

Jake was happily thinking the same thing as he sat next to Toni in her small car. It was a bright sunny day with the colourful leaves of autumn dancing in front of them on the country roads.

“I had a marvellous evening out with the boss last night,” he said. “She's quite a lady. Never come across anyone like her before. I like a woman to wear French scent and make-up. She is so feminine.”

“Yes, we all like Agatha, and are very protective of her,” said Toni. “She has made mistakes with some awful men in the past, and so we all try to make sure she is never hurt again.”

“I wouldn't call Charles awful.”

“No, he isn't. And I think Agatha might have a chance; that is, if she didn't keep falling for unsuitable men.”

“You're driving over the limit,” said Jake.