Agatha Raisin and the Murderous Marriage

hard-faced bitch?
    James looked at Agatha’s gloomy face on her return and demanded to know what had upset her.
    Wearily, Agatha told him of the overheard conversation.
    James listened, his blue eyes intent. Then he said, ‘You cannot blame Bill for falling in love with an ambitious woman detective. I don’t think it’ll last long. You can’t choose his girlfriends for him.’
    ‘When he calls this evening,’ said Agatha huffily, ‘I’m not speaking to him.’
    ‘And what good will that do? He’s our only contact with the police. Instead of going into a huff, Agatha, you should simply tell him what you overheard. Maddie said some nasty things about you, but Bill said none.’
    ‘I don’t want to speak to him again!’
    ‘Agatha, be sensible.’
    ‘I’m sick and tired of being sensible,’ shouted Agatha and burst into tears.
    He gave her a clean handkerchief, he fetched her a stiff brandy, he suggested she lie down.
    And Agatha, who had suddenly and desperately wanted a shoulder to cry on, a shoulder to lean on, pulled herself together and said on a sob that, yes, she would see Bill.
    She would have been comforted could she have known that James felt as if he could cheerfully strangle both Bill Wong and Maddie, but James showed none of this as he returned to his computer. Agatha went up to bed for a nap, James tried to work, but his doorbell sounded shrilly. He thought it must be some persistent member of the press. Normally he would not have answered the door, but he had a desire to relieve his feelings on somebody, even if that somebody was Bill Wong.
    So he opened the door and found Roy Silver on the step.
    James took the hapless Roy by the throat and shook him hard. ‘Get the hell away from here, you little worm,’ he roared. James gave him a final shake and then a push and Roy staggered backwards and fell into the hedge.
    ‘I only came to help,’ said Roy shrilly. ‘Honest. I’ve got information about Jimmy Raisin. I’ve found out things which might explain why someone murdered him. I did it to help Aggie.’
    James, who had been about to slam the door, hesitated. ‘What are you talking about?’
    Roy extricated himself from the hedge and tittuped forward cautiously. ‘I hired a detective to find out about Jimmy Raisin. I’ve got her report.’ He held up the briefcase he had managed to hang on to during James’s assault on him.
    ‘Oh, very well,’ said James. ‘Come in and I’ll see if Agatha’s prepared to listen to you.’
    When Agatha came down the stairs, Roy backed nervously behind a chair. He had blonded his hair, which somehow made his face look weaker and whiter.
    But Agatha had had time to think. If Roy had any worthwhile information, then she and James might solve the case and that would leave Bill and his precious Maddie with egg all over their faces.
    ‘Sit down, Roy,’ she said. ‘If you’ve got anything of importance, I’d like to hear it, but don’t think I’m ever going to forgive you for what you did to me.’
    ‘He stopped you from committing bigamy,’ said James.
    Agatha glared at both of them.
    ‘Let’s hear what he has to say,’ said James mildly.
    Agatha nodded. Roy edged round the chair and sat down nervously, his briefcase on his lap. ‘I assume,’ said Agatha, ‘that you initially hired this detective out of spite to find out if I was still married, and hired the detective again because you couldn’t live with yourself, you creep!’
    Roy cleared his throat. ‘Always looking for the worst motives, aren’t we, Aggie? I thought your husband was dead and I thought you would thank me if I gave you conclusive proof of that death as a wedding present. And you can huff and puff but that’s the truth, or may God strike me dead!’
    Agatha looked at the beamed ceiling. ‘I’m waiting for the thunderbolt to fall on you, Roy.’
    ‘This is getting us nowhere,’ said James sharply. ‘Let’s hear your report.’
    Roy opened the briefcase and took out a sheaf of papers.
    ‘I wondered how it was that Jimmy had managed to live so long,’ he said. ‘But it seems that at one time a philanthropist, a Mrs Serena Gore-Appleton, had taken Jimmy up as a worthwhile cause and borne him off to an expensive health farm. Although the place was hardly the Betty Ford Clinic and more a place where rich boozers went to dry out to recover and drink another day, it seemed to have worked for Jimmy, who became clean and sober and subsequently worked as a