Authors: M. C. Beaton
“Come over. It’s my day off,” said Ruby.
When she rang off, she turned to her children. “I’m taking you to Granny.”
“Wicked!” cried her son, Jonathan.
And Pearl said, “We love Granny more’n you.”
Ruby shrugged and phoned her mother, who lived a few streets away. She fought down a small twinge of guilt. Her children spent more time with their grandmother than they ever did with her.
* * *
Simon drove to Oxford, praying that his dream of a warm and loving Ruby could be restored. He was about to ring the doorbell when he heard a man’s voice through the open window of the living room, saying, “Don’t you think I should stay? We’re desperate for a break in this case.”
“No, run along,” came Ruby’s voice. “The little sap is spoony about me and he might get jealous if he saw you and clam up.”
“
I
might get jealous,” said the man with a laugh.
“Don’t be an idiot. He’s just a rather boring little boy.”
Simon backed off and crouched down behind a bush. The door opened and a thickset man came out. He kissed Ruby and walked off down the path.
The door closed and there was only the sound of the strengthening wind rustling through the leaves.
Simon suddenly felt immeasurably tired, silly and depressed. He crept out from behind the bush, making sure he was not observed from the windows of Ruby’s house and made his way to his car and drove off. By the time he got back to Mircester, his phone had rung several times. Each time he recognised Ruby’s number and finally switched his phone off.
Ruby paced angrily up and down her living room, wondering what to do. She tried to remind herself that if there was anything pertaining to the murder of Tremund, it would surely come through to Thames Valley Police and all she had to do was wait.
But she was ambitious and impatient. Simon had given her his address. She decided to drive to Mircester and challenge him.
The night was very dark. The air was sticky and humid and from far away came a rumble of thunder.
Her old car did not have air-conditioning and she was tired and sweating by the time she reached Simon’s flat. Ruby rang the bell. But Simon, looking through the spy hole in his door, decided not to answer it. “The hell with her,” he muttered, and went back to bed.
Frustrated and angry, Ruby decided to drive on to Carsely and confront Agatha Raisin.
Simon’s flat was in a pedestrian area and so Ruby had left her car in the main square. Before she reached it, the heavens opened and the rain came pouring down. A flash of lightning lit up the square and she saw to her dismay that the back window of her car had been smashed. She slid into the front seat and tried to dry her sopping hair with some tissues. Police headquarters were beside the square but she decided against going in to report the window; they would consider that she was poaching on their territory. She noticed the streetlights were out. The storm must have caused a power cut.
Wearily, Ruby decided to forget about the whole thing and go home.
She was just about to switch on the engine when a wire was slid around her neck and viciously pulled tight. Ruby was a strong woman and tried to get her fingers under the wire without success. With one dying hand, she punched the hazard warning lights before everything turned black.
* * *
Bill Wong put up his umbrella as he left headquarters. Agatha Raisin had been released an hour before, after what Bill considered a merciless grilling from Wilkes, who seemed to persist in thinking that Agatha was impeding police enquiries.
As he made his way to his car, the rain suddenly switched off, as if some Olympian god had turned off a tap. Behind him he could hear the rumble of the police generator as it coped with the power cut.
He saw a car with flashing hazard lights and approached it curiously in case someone was in trouble. He rapped on the driver’s window. He could see a dim figure at the wheel through the steamed-up glass. He opened the car door and Ruby’s lifeless body and horribly contorted face slid out halfway, held by the seat belt.
* * *
Agatha Raisin was awakened the following morning by Toni with the news that Simon had been arrested for the murder of Ruby Carson. The CCTV cameras in the square had filmed her going to Simon’s flat as had the one in the pedestrian area. But after the power cut, the cameras had stopped working.
Agatha swung into action, hiring a criminal lawyer, and then arrived at police headquarters to find that an exhausted Simon had just been released. The messages from Ruby, which he still had on his mobile phone, showed he had not wanted to see her. Chief Superintendent Alistair White did not say he had been having an affair with Ruby but had said she had called him round to tell him of Agatha’s find and that she was waiting for Simon.
He backed Simon’s story that he had heard insulting remarks from Ruby about himself through the open window.
There was a tent over Ruby’s car in the car park. Simon told Agatha the police reckoned that the murderer had been tailing Ruby and had smashed the back window and climbed into the passenger seat. A garrote had been found lying on the floor. It had been made from cheese wire with polished cylindrical pieces of wood attached.
“Surely there must be more than one person involved,” exclaimed Agatha.
Despite the heat of the day, Simon shivered. He thought Ruby’s dead contorted face would haunt him until the end of his days. “I feel some twisted mind is playing cat and mouse with us and knows our every move,” he said.
Agatha stared at him. “Bugs!” she said. “I wonder if my cottage is bugged? We’ve got a radio frequency detector in the office. Go and get it, Simon, and I’ll do a sweep of my home.”
* * *
When they arrived, Charles was on the kitchen floor, playing with the cats. Agatha signalled him to be quiet and led him out into the garden where she told him about Ruby’s murder and that they were going to sweep the cottage for bugs. “And what are my cats doing back here?” she asked.
“Doris is working upstairs,” said Charles.
“What! This isn’t cleaning day?”
“She thought the moggies might like to see their home again. I asked her to change the sheets in the spare room. I’d better get her and we can ask her if anyone could have got into the house while you were away.”
Charles came back after a few minutes and led Doris to the bottom of the garden where Simon and Agatha were waiting. Asked if anyone could possibly have got in to bug the house, Doris wrinkled her brow, and then said, “There was only the telephone man. Some time ago it was. He said there was a fault on some of the village phones and they were checking them all. Oh, dear, I went upstairs and left him to it. Big heavyset man with a grey beard and glasses. One of them foreign accents. Could ha’ been Polish.”
“Anyone else?”
“Don’t call anyone to mind. I’m right sorry, Agatha. Didn’t cross my mind there would be anything up with him.”
Agatha turned to Simon. “You’d better start sweeping for bugs. Start with the garden table and chairs.”
They waited anxiously. Having finished with the garden furniture, Simon moved into the house. “Does he know what he’s doing?” asked Charles.
“Yes, I get him to sweep the office from time to time,” said Agatha.
“What puzzles me,” said Charles, “is why you haven’t been bumped off.”
“You’ve forgotten. I was sent a poisonous bouquet.”
“Maybe our murderer was sure you would recognise wolfsbane. If this place is bugged, then he would know you knew what the plant looked like. I think some psycho is playing with you, Agatha.”
“That pseudo telephone man,” said Agatha. “It sounds like someone in disguise. What about Tris Davent? He’s got technical knowledge.”
“You’d better tell the police about this, Aggie.”
“What! And have to sit in that ghastly interview room again?”
“Just phone Bill. The police may have more sophisticated equipment. Still, with any luck, Simon won’t find anything.”
The sky above was turning darker. “I hope he finishes before it rains,” said Doris.
“I’ll phone Bill if Simon finds anything,” said Agatha. “And how many times have I got to tell you not to call me Aggie! Jill’s brother is pretty stocky. Add a false grey beard and glasses and he could be our bugger. An East European accent is easy to fake.”
“‘Bugger’ being a good word to describe the horrible man, whoever he is,” said Charles.
A warm drop of rain fell on Agatha’s nose. “This is all we need,” she said. “Let’s get into the house and not say a word.”
But when they entered, Simon was arranging four tiny bugs on the kitchen table. “All done, I hope,” he said. “One in the phone, one under the computer desk, one behind the bookshelves and one behind your headboard upstairs, Agatha.”
“I’ll make us all a nice cup of tea,” said Doris.
“Forget it. I’d like a gin and tonic,” said Agatha. “Get it for me, Charles, and I’ll phone Bill. He slipped me his mobile number so I won’t need to be trapped by Wilkes.”
Bill said to wait and he would be right over to make another sweep of the cottage.
Charles returned with Agatha’s gin and tonic. She raised her hand to take the glass and Charles noticed that her hand shook. He put the glass down on the table and said gently, “Not getting the shakes, are you? Maybe not a good idea to start on the booze.”
“It’s not that,” said Agatha. “This whole case is creeping me out. Some madman is out there, laughing at me, treating me like an amateur fool. But you’re right, Charles. I am not going to start hitting the bottle. Pour it down the sink and make me a coffee instead. Are you all right, Simon?”
“That’s why Ruby was murdered,” he said wretchedly. “Someone listened in to everything I told you about her.”
“My copies of that ledger!” Agatha jumped to her feet and raced through to her desk and rummaged frantically around. She came back and announced, “It’s gone.”
“So,” said Charles, “the murderer must have got back inside somehow. Let’s ask Doris.” Doris had gone back upstairs. “I’ll get her.”
When Doris returned, Agatha asked, “Where do you leave the keys to this cottage?”
“At the foot of the stairs in my handbag,” said Doris. “Oh, Agatha, dear. I’ve got a slip of paper in there with the burglar alarm code.”
“So the bastard has been walking in and out when he felt like it,” said Charles. “He is playing with you because he could have let himself in at night and murdered you.”
Agatha phoned the security firm which had installed the burglar alarm and left a message to come as soon as possible and change the code. She then phoned a locksmith and asked him to change the locks.
* * *
The police arrived, headed by Bill and Alice, who introduced two technicians.
While the men got to work, they all moved back out to the garden, sheltering under the garden umbrella. Agatha told Bill about how the murderer had gained access to her cottage.
“You should find yourself another cleaner,” said Alice.
“Never!” cried Agatha. “It was an easy mistake. No one is more honest or hardworking than Doris.”
The only thing Asian about Bill were his beautiful almond-shaped eyes, now crinkled up in distress. “Agatha,” he said. “Go away somewhere until all this is over. It’s not safe here for you.”
“What would be the point of that?” said Agatha. “You may never find this murderer who is turning out to be the serial killer of the Cotswolds. I can’t leave my staff. They’re in danger, too.”
Agatha’s phone rang. It was Phil Marshall. “I just dropped in to the office to get another camera and there is a young man here anxious to retain your services. He says he is Justin Nichols and Ruby was his stepmother during a previous marriage.”
“I’d like to see him,” said Agatha, “but I can’t leave here just now.” She told Phil what they had discovered and then said, “Give him directions and tell him to get over here.”
When she rang off, she told Bill about Justin and then turned to Simon. “Did she say anything about being married before?”
“She said she was divorced,” said Simon. “But there may have been another marriage before the last one. I think she kept her married name, Carson, which follows that before that marriage she could have been married to someone called Nichols.”
The technicians came out to the garden to say they had finished their work and it seemed as if Simon had found all the bugs. Bill turned to Simon. “I hope you wore gloves.”
“Yes,” said Simon. “But if you plan on fingerprinting them, I bet our murderer wore gloves as well.”
“We might be able to trace where they were bought. If you don’t mind, Agatha, we’ll stay on until this young man arrives. I’d like to hear what he has to say about Ruby.”
Mrs. Bloxby arrived after the technicians had gone, saying she had been worried about village reports of police cars outside Agatha’s cottage. Agatha told her everything that had happened. Her gentle face creased with worry. “It’s as if someone is playing cat and mouse with you, Mrs. Raisin. But it does eliminate some suspects.”
“Like who?” asked Agatha. “I don’t see Gwen Simple being able to do anything so sophisticated as planting bugs,” said the vicar’s wife. “Miss Bannister is dead. Mrs. Simpson was never a suspect. Mrs. Tweedy is too old and would not have the energy or the technical know-how.”
“My money is still on Gwen Simple,” said Agatha. “She could have hired someone. I cannot believe for a moment she did not know what her murdering son was up to.”
“We’ve had a watch on Gwen Simple for some time,” said Bill. “She’s had no strange callers, only people from the village of Ancombe. She helps out in the church and does a lot of good works.”
“Humph!” snorted Agatha. “Could well be a smokescreen.”
“You’re forgetting her ex,” said Charles. “Davent runs a computer shop.”
“How are you getting on with that ledger of accounts?” asked Agatha. She did not want to say her copy was missing, knowing that the police would not appreciate her actions.
“Don’t seem to lead anywhere,” said Bill. “But an awful lot of the entries are old. The ink’s faded. There are very few new ones.”
“Any news from America? I’ll bet Jill was blackmailing one of her clients.”