Free Agatha Raisin and the Day the Floods Came by MC Beaton Page A

it for a few days.’
    He looked at the clock. ‘Goodness. It’s one in the morning. I’d better let you get some sleep.’
    And that’s that, thought Agatha. She racked her brains trying to think of a way to keep him or suggest another meeting, but she was too shaky and tired.
    He rose to his feet. ‘I tell you what: why don’t you leave everything to Sunday, and I’ll come with you and we’ll talk to this McCoy fellow on Sunday morning, when he’s off work.’
    ‘Thank you,’ said Agatha. ‘What time?’
    ‘I’ll pick you up at nine in the morning.’
    Then Agatha’s face fell. ‘Your face is on the jacket of one of your books in Evesham. You’ll be recognized. I didn’t know what you looked like until I saw your photo. You see, when you arrived on my doorstep, carrying that Bible, I thought you were a Mormon.’
    He laughed. ‘What have you got against the Mormons?’
    ‘Nothing at all. I’m sure they are splendid people. I just don’t like being preached at on my own doorstep.’
    ‘I have no intention of going in disguise,’ he said. ‘You can say you have drafted in a celebrity author to help you with the script. I have done television scripts before.’
    ‘Then I’ll see you Sunday.’
    After he had gone, Agatha went upstairs, undressed, washed, put on a voluminous nightgown and crawled under the duvet. The events of the evening now seemed like a dream. He was a handsome man. How old was he? Despite his looks, probably around fifty. But men who kept their looks and figures after the age of forty were usually gay. Still, she found the thought of his support comforting. And, she told herself firmly, she had no intention of starting to think romantically about him.
    She fell asleep and woke two hours later, suddenly sweating with fear. The old cottage creaked and the wind sighed around outside. Agatha switched on the bedside light and then got out and switched on the overhead light as well. Her cats, who usually slept downstairs in their basket, appeared in the bedroom at that moment and climbed on to the bed. She settled down with a cat on either side of her and their purring soon soothed her back to sleep.
    ‘How old do you think John Armitage is?’ Agatha asked Mrs Bloxby when the vicar’s wife called on her the next day.
    ‘Older than he looks. Miss Simms said she read an article about him. He’s actually fifty-three.’
    ‘I think he’s gay,’ said Agatha.
    ‘Despite the fact that he’s been married? Why?’
    ‘Heterosexual men let themselves go.’
    ‘Not necessarily. Look at my husband. Alf’s in good shape.’
    Agatha thought of the vicar – grey-haired, glasses, scholarly, slightly stooped – and reflected that love was indeed blind.
    ‘But to get back to the attempt on your life,’ said Mrs Bloxby. ‘That really worries me. Couldn’t you even tell Bill Wong about it?’
    ‘Bill Wong is a dear friend, but he’s a policeman, first and last. He would feel obliged to put in a report.’
    ‘Anything to do with drugs is highly dangerous,’ cautioned Mrs Bloxby.
    ‘I can’t understand it,’ said Agatha, half joking. ‘I thought all the drug barons had gone over to smuggling cigarettes. They keep jacking up the price so it’s getting a bit like the States during prohibition. Do you know, there was an item on the news that said that twenty-five per cent of the British population bought their cigarettes on the black market. No one’s ever approached me.’
    ‘I think you’re in enough trouble as it is without buying contraband cigarettes,’ said Mrs Bloxby severely. ‘Anyway, I thought you were giving them up.’
    ‘I will, I will.’ Agatha lit a cigarette. ‘When this case is over.’
    ‘If you’re still alive. Why don’t you believe Phyllis’s story that she and Zak had sex?’
    ‘Because she’s a nasty bitch and a compulsive liar.’
    ‘Still . . . Let’s think about Zak. It appears Kylie was a decent girl and her mother is a sterling woman. What