Agatha Raisin and the Love from Hell

the telly. Another of her fantasies.’ He strode off before the fulminating Agatha could answer him.
    ‘So that’s put you in your place,’ said Charles. ‘Let’s grab a bite to eat. Give me some money, Aggie, and I’ll get it.’
    ‘No,’ said Agatha. ‘ Yo u get it.’
    ‘I told you, I forgot my wallet.’
    She leaned across quickly, thrust her hand inside his jacket, and pulled out his wallet. ‘There you are.’
    ‘Bless me, I was sure I had forgotten it.’
    ‘Good try, Charles. Get food.’
    He came back with two ploughman’s, those bread-and-cheese rolls which are the cheapest thing on a pub menu.
    ‘So we haven’t got very far,’ said Charles. ‘Except maybe for the Miss Marple bit. I mean, what if Melissa, fancying herself a detective, had dug up something that someone didn’t want her to know?’
    ‘Could be,’ said Agatha, opening up her roll and looking gloomily at a piece of sweating cheese and a leaf of limp lettuce. ‘It all seems hopeless, but I’ve got to go on. Somehow, if I stop ferreting around, I’ll sink back into misery again.’
    ‘I know,’ said Charles. ‘When we finish this, we’ll call in at police headquarters and ask for Bill. Maybe he’s heard something.’
    Agatha ate what she could. Charles finished his and then ate what she had left on her plate.
    ‘Getting hot,’ he said as they emerged into the sunlight.
    They walked to police headquarters, asked for Bill Wong and were told to wait. Some attempt had been made a long time ago to brighten up the reception area, but various potted plants were dying or dead and the magazines on the scarred table in front of them were years old.
    Finally the desk sergeant called them over and pressed a buzzer so they could go through to the back. Bill was waiting for them in the corridor. ‘We’ll use this room,’ he said, pushing open the door of an interview room. When they were seated, he asked, ‘What’s new?’
    ‘We came to ask you that,’ said Agatha.
    He spread his hands. ‘Nothing. No news of James at all. His photo’s been in all the newspapers and on television. We’ve checked the ports and airports. Nothing.’
    ‘Are you concentrating solely on him?’ asked Agatha. ‘I mean, if you do that, you’ll be letting the real murderer escape.’
    ‘We’ve interviewed everyone we can think of. I mean, we don’t understand it. Those villages like Carsely are gossip shops. Yet, we get this murder, Lacey is attacked, no one sees a thing. Agatha, are you sure you didn’t just have one of your rows with James and throw something at him?’
    ‘No, I did not. And I was away all that evening.’
    ‘So you were.
    ‘You bugging my phone?’
    ‘If we were, I wouldn’t tell you. But I don’t know. I’m still too low down the ranks to know that sort of thing. If someone’s phone is bugged, they need to get permission from the Home Office.’
    ‘We’ve got a likely suspect,’ said Agatha.
    ‘I thought I told you two not to interfere. Anyway, who is it?’
    ‘Luke Sheppard.’
    ‘Oh, him. He’s got an alibi for the time James was attacked. We cannot exactly pin-point the time of Melissa’s death, but it was sometime during the night five days before her body was found.’
    ‘And what was Luke Sheppard’s alibi for the evening James disappeared?’
    ‘He was at a Rotary Club meeting all that evening.’
    ‘And the night Melissa was killed?’
    ‘He and his missus were having a romantic night in the Randolph Hotel in Oxford. It was her birthday celebration.’
    ‘Rats!’ Agatha stared at him moodily.
    ‘We were trying to build up a picture of Melissa,’ said Charles. ‘You know, trying to find out if there was anything in her character or behaviour that would cause someone to murder her. Did you find out anything?’
    ‘Only that she was regarded as the perfect village lady. Divorced two times and both amicable divorces.’
    ‘What we did find,’ said Charles, ‘was that, according to Sheppard, she was a fantasist, acted out roles she saw on television. She was addicted to soaps and detective series, and fancied herself as bit of a Miss Marple. She may just have dug up something that someone didn’t want her to find out.’
    ‘It’s a possibility, but a remote one. If only we could find James Lacey, we might have a clearer picture. But we are trying. We haven’t given up on the case. So keep out of it.’
    ‘You didn’t use to be like this before,’ said Agatha mournfully. ‘You