Agatha Raisin and the Wizard of Evesham

Mavis.
    ‘And you believed her?’ Charles reached across the table and fished a cigarette out of Agatha’s packet.
    ‘Why not? She seemed a straightforward, honest woman. Her home was clean and tidy. It had the atmosphere of a happy family home.’
    ‘I’d like to meet her.’
    ‘Why?’
    ‘She just sounds too good to be true.’
    ‘Oh, well, I suppose you won’t be satisfied until you’ve met her. I never checked to see if you’d packed and taken your clothes away.’
    ‘No, I rushed off and left them. I’ll go and dress and we’ll be off.’
    ‘I wonder if she’ll be at home,’ said Agatha as she turned off the by-pass and into the Four Pools Estate. ‘Perhaps we should have phoned first.’
    ‘Better to surprise her,’ said Charles. ‘Got another cigarette?’
    ‘We’re nearly there and if you’re going to take up smoking in earnest, then I suggest you buy your own.’
    ‘Filthy habit. There’s this hypnotist in Gloucester, said to work wonders.’
    ‘I might try that,’ said Agatha. ‘I heard about him. But if I do give up smoking, I hope to God I don’t turn into one of those morons who goes around making smokers’ lives hell. Here we are. You see, you didn’t have time for another cigarette.’
    As they walked up the path, a curtain twitched. The door opened before they could even ring the bell and Mavis stood there, smiling a welcome.
    ‘How nice to see you again!’ she cried. ‘Come in. This your husband?’
    I like this woman, thought Agatha. It was flattering to be considered Charles’s wife, as Charles was much younger than she.
    Agatha introduced Charles and they both followed Mavis inside. Mavis bustled off to make tea while Charles walked around the room, peering at photographs. ‘Now here’s a thing, Aggie,’ he whispered. ‘Our Mavis was on the stage in her youth.’
    ‘So?’
    ‘So her acting abilities might have fooled you.’
    ‘I’m a good judge of character,’ said Agatha huffily.
    ‘Except when it comes to men.’
    Agatha was glaring at him as Mavis tripped in bearing the tea-tray.
    After she had served tea, Mavis asked brightly, ‘So what brings you back?’
    Agatha looked helplessly at Charles, who smiled at Mavis and said, ‘Aggie here told me what you had said and I wondered why you had lied to her.’
    Mavis goggled at him and Agatha stared at Charles in surprise.
    Then Mavis’s face cleared and she laughed. ‘Oh, all that stuff about my Betty being a drug addict.’
    ‘No,’ said Charles. ‘I believe that was a lie. But I happen to know that Shawpart was blackmailing you.’
    There was a shocked silence. ‘Mam!’ called a child shrilly out on the street. A car drove past, a gust of wind rattled the leaves of the wisteria outside the window and then the room was quiet again.
    At last Mavis said in a thin voice, ‘So that letter wasn’t burnt in the fire.’
    Agatha looked to Charles for help, but he was studying Mavis, waiting for her to go on.
    ‘If my husband finds out,’ said Mavis, ‘it’ll be the end of our marriage.’
    ‘He won’t,’ said Agatha fiercely. ‘Tell her, Charles!’
    But Charles waited patiently.
    ‘It was like this,’ said Mavis. ‘He flattered me. He said I should never have left the stage. Oh, he worked on me. He got me when I was feeling down and bored and he supplied a bit of excitement. At first it was just sneaky little coffee meetings and then he said we couldn’t talk freely when we were frightened that someone would see us. He invited me to his house. We drank a lot of champagne and he told me . . . he told me he loved me. He was so passionate, he seemed so sincere. And I thought I was the actor! So I went to bed with him. I was so infatuated, I was prepared to run away with him.’
    She began to cry. They waited until she had blown her nose and composed herself.
    ‘Then he did not get in touch with you,’ prompted Agatha.
    ‘Yes, and I was desperate. I thought I had done or said something. I wrote to him. When he phoned and said he wanted to meet me, I was over the moon. Then he told me unless I paid him he would send the letter to my husband.’
    ‘I thought you didn’t have any money of your own,’ said Agatha.
    ‘I lied. I had a bit put by. But then what seemed like a miracle happened. He was murdered. No, it wasn’t me, although I dreamed of it. Don’t go to the police.’
    ‘We won’t go to the police,’ said Agatha. ‘And there’s no evidence. All the evidence was burnt