Agatha Raisin and the Terrible Tourist

such a good time in ma life. So Rose says, “Why are you stuck up there in Glasgow? You should be down in Essex with us.” Trevor said he could find me a wee place near to them and so I moved south. Now Rose is gone, and ah’m telling you this, Agatha, ma life is just one desert.’
    A tear rolled down his old cheek.
    ‘Why did you never marry?’ asked Agatha.
    ‘I came from poor people. I was very ambitious. I got a wee shop after working in the shipyards and saving every penny. It was just a shop selling sweeties and newspapers and things like that. But I made it work and saved everything until I was able to buy another, and then another. I ’member when I got ma first big shop right in the middle o’ Glasgow . . . I didnae have any time for romancing, and by the time I did, I was too shy to romance the ladies.’
    ‘Sometimes your accent is very broad and sometimes almost English,’ said Agatha.
    ‘Oh, that was Rose. She said no one south could understand me and sent me to elocution lessons.’
    ‘Didn’t think of taking any herself?’
    ‘Rose had a beautiful voice,’ said Angus, looking at Agatha in surprise.
    Love is blind, thought Agatha, and deaf as well.
    ‘What are you two talking about?’ called Olivia.
    ‘Rose,’ said Agatha. ‘I was asking Angus how he had first met Rose and Trevor.’
    ‘And did you tell her what great friends we all became?’ demanded Trevor, seeming to rouse himself from the alcoholic stupor into which he had suddenly sunk.
    ‘Yes, I was remembering how we had first met at the Hilton,’ said Angus.
    ‘That was Rose all right,’ said Trevor. ‘“Looks like a fat cat,” she said.’
    ‘I don’t understand,’ said Angus heavily.
    ‘No? Well, my lovely Rose was the most mercenary bitch on God’s earth,’ said Trevor viciously. ‘She liked money, so long as she never had to go out and earn it, but when it came to handing over any, she was tight-fisted. “Ask Angus,” she kept saying. “He’s loaded.” So I asked you, didn’t I, Angus? And you said’ – here Trevor produced a terrible parody of Angus’s Scottish voice – ‘“Ah’ve worked all ma life, laddie, and stood on ma ain two feet and Rose will agree wi’ me that you should dae the same.”’
    ‘But if Rose had any money, then you’ll inherit it,’ said Agatha bluntly, and James kicked her furiously under the table.
    Trevor thrust his face forwards across the table, half-rising, one hand pressing into a dish of olives. ‘Are you saying I killed my wife to get her money?’ he shouted.
    ‘No,’ said Agatha. ‘Not at all. Please sit down, Trevor. It was a clumsy remark.’
    Olivia stood up and went to Trevor. ‘There now,’ she said. ‘No one could ever say our Agatha had any tact. Forget it, do. Have a drink.’
    Trevor subsided. ‘I want to go home,’ he said. ‘I feel I’ll never get home again.’
    There was a long silence. Agatha could feel James’s eyes boring into the side of her face.
    ‘Now, isn’t this food delicious?’ cried Olivia brightly. ‘James, you said you were writing a military history. How’s it going?’
    ‘Very slowly,’ said James. ‘I sit down at the laptop and get out my research notes and then something will happen – the phone will ring, or I’ll decide I heard an odd noise in the kitchen that needs investigating, and by the time I return to the computer I don’t feel like doing anything.’
    ‘Then why bother?’ asked George. ‘You’re retired, aren’t you? Why not just say to yourself, “I’m never going to do this”?’
    ‘Oh, I’ll get there in the end,’ said James. ‘I don’t like to give up on anything.’
    ‘Neither does Agatha,’ said Olivia. ‘She pursued you here.’
    ‘Can we change the subject?’ said James frostily. ‘Here’s the fish.’
    Agatha wanted to say something rude to Olivia but felt she was in such deep disgrace already that she was frightened to open her mouth. She suddenly remembered a married colleague in the public relations business telling her that she dreaded going out on social occasions with her husband because of the post-mortem afterwards: ‘Why did you say that?’ ‘Did you see so-and-so’s face when you said that?’ ‘Couldn’t you have found something better to wear? God knows you spend enough on clothes.’ And man-less Agatha had replied cheerfully, ‘Why don’t you stand up to him? Why don’t you tell him to go and get stuffed?’
    And now here she was dreading