Agatha Raisin and Kissing Christmas Goodbye by M. C. Beaton Read Free Book Online Page A

We’ll go along after work and you can actually move in tomorrow.
I’m paying rent for it until the sale goes through.’
    Toni was worried. Agatha was paying her a good salary. Agatha had found her a flat. She felt the weight of gratitude and obligation. She hoped against hope she would prove lucky with this
divorce case.
    Mr Horrington worked as sales director of a shoe company out on the industrial estate. Toni cycled out to the estate. The day was still sunny and the radio that morning had announced a hosepipe
ban.
    Her heart sank as she cycled around the industrial estate. The ground around the shoe factory was bare of bushes and trees. Nowhere to hide. How had the others managed to watch him? If he left
in his car, she could hardly keep up with him on her bicycle because, unlike the centre of town, the roads around the industrial estate did not carry much traffic.
    She took out her notes and found his home address and headed there instead. Mrs Horrington opened the door and scowled at the young girl with the fading black eye. ‘Go away. I’m not
buying anything,’ she said.
    She was a carefully preserved woman with expensively blonded hair. Her make-up was quite thick and her lipstick a scarlet slash across her mouth.
    ‘I’m from the agency,’ said Toni. ‘I am working on your divorce.’
    ‘This is an outrage,’ exclaimed Mrs Horrington. ‘Wait there!’
    She marched indoors and Toni waited.
    At last the door opened again and a mollified Mrs Horrington said, ‘You’d better come in. Mrs Raisin says you are not only brilliant but lucky. I’ll go along with it for the
moment.’
    ‘I wanted to know if your husband had a favourite restaurant for lunch,’ said Toni.
    ‘I believe he goes to La Nouvelle Cuisine,’ she said. ‘Why?’
    ‘I wondered if he might take someone there.’
    Mrs Horrington gave a contemptuous laugh. ‘He would hardly parade anyone in front of the business community. They all lunch there.’
    ‘How did you guess he was having an affair?’
    ‘New underwear. Smells of scent. Looks guilty as hell.’
    ‘Have you challenged him?’
    ‘Oh, yes. He said it was all nonsense. He said he would take me on a cruise for a second honeymoon. No sign of him booking anything.’
    ‘Do you have a photograph of him? I couldn’t find one in the file.’
    ‘I gave one to that Raisin woman. Oh, wait here.’
    After a few minutes, Mrs Horrington came back with a photograph. It showed a plump middle-aged man with thinning grey hair and a paunch.
    ‘He’s dyed his hair black since that was taken,’ said Mrs Horrington. ‘Another sign.’
    ‘I’ll get back to you,’ said Toni.
    ‘You’d better do it quick. If you don’t have any results by the weekend, I’m employing another agency.’
    Toni pedalled under the unseasonally hot sun into the centre of Mircester. She propped her bike outside the restaurant and went in, the camera slung round her neck.
    A pleasant wave of air conditioning hit her. A formidable maître d’ approached. ‘I am taking pictures for a new magazine called Gloucester Food,’ said Toni, trying
to imitate Charles’s polished vowels as best as she could.
    ‘I don’t know that my customers would like having their meals interrupted by photographs,’ said the maître d’.
    Toni noticed there was a service hatch from the kitchen. ‘I could shoot a few photographs through that service hatch,’ she said. ‘I’ll be very discreet. It’s best
to take photographs when the restaurant is as busy as this.’
    The maître d’ hesitated only a moment. Although the lunch hour was still busy, attendance in the evenings had been falling off. The restaurant could do with the publicity.
    ‘Just for a little while,’ he said. ‘We don’t use the service hatch any more. The waiters carry the food straight in from the kitchen.’
    He led Toni into the kitchen. She raised the service hatch and then stood back. She wanted anyone looking over to get used to seeing