Agatha Raisin and the Fairies of Fryham

England!’
    ‘That, too. Don’t get mad at me, Aggie. Just think. The minute she told me about Barry Jones, I called on the police at the pub. Rosie was furious with me. She tried to claw my eyes out and called me a bastard.’
    Agatha sat down and put her hands out to the blaze. ‘But you weren’t even going to wait to tell me first. You wanted all the glory for yourself.’
    ‘I didn’t know where you were. I came back looking for you.’
    ‘I don’t think I really know you, Charles.’
    ‘Who ever knows anyone?’ he said lightly. ‘It’s all solved. Just the way you told the police. So the glory is yours. Lucy worked Barry up to murdering Tolly. You’re tired. Let’s go to bed. You’ve had a bad fright.’
    Tired as she was, Agatha lay awake for quite a long time. James. Her mind was full of James Lacey again. He was a strong man, not a lightweight philanderer like Charles, thought Agatha, forgetting that James was just as capable of philandering as Charles. She could see James in her mind’s eye – his strong face, his bright blue eyes, his tall rangy figure, his thick black hair going grey at the sides. She was suddenly desperate to get back to Carsely, to get him out of the clutches of the mysterious Mrs Sheppard.
    She was awakened at nine o’clock the following morning by Charles, shouting to her that a police car had arrived to take them to headquarters to make more statements. She hurriedly washed and dressed and went downstairs to join him, grumbling, ‘I feel I talked to them all of last night.’
    Agatha was interviewed by Detective Chief Inspector Hand. He took her all through the events of the previous day again. Then he said, ‘You are lucky Sir Charles had the good sense to contact us. You put yourself at grave risk by keeping information to yourself.’
    ‘I didn’t know anything!’ howled Agatha. ‘How could I tell you when I didn’t know?’
    ‘You nearly got killed because you told Mrs Trumpington-James that you thought Paul Redfern was a blackmailer, which happened to be the truth.’
    ‘It only just occurred to me,’ said Agatha huffily. ‘How could I tell you anything when it had only just occurred to me?’
    ‘Remember in the future to keep your nose out of police business.’
    ‘If we had kept our noses out of police business,’ snapped Agatha, ‘then you would still be looking for a murderer. If you want any more damn statements, you’ll find me in Carsely. I’m going home.’
    Agatha was still raging when she was joined by Charles. ‘Never mind,’ he said, seeing her furious face. ‘I had a rotten time of it as well. You would think they might at least have been grateful. Let’s get something to eat and then go and see Lizzie.’
    ‘Why the hell should we see Lizzie?’
    ‘Come on, Aggie, it would be a nice thing to do.’
    Agatha bitched and grumbled her way through lunch about the iniquities of the ungrateful police.
    Then, after lunch, as they were approaching Lizzie’s flat, Agatha saw Mrs Tite, the woman she had given twenty pounds to during her fictitious market-research survey into coffee. ‘Coming to see me again?’ asked Mrs Tite.
    ‘I was actually going to call on Mrs Findlay.’
    ‘Oh, nice little Mrs Findlay has left.’
    ‘Do you know where she’s gone?’
    ‘She said something about going to relatives in the country.’
    They thanked her and walked away.
    ‘I bet she’s gone home,’ said Charles suddenly.
    ‘Why on earth should she?’
    ‘I always thought she would.’
    ‘But she’d escaped. A new life.’
    ‘She’s been in chains too long,’ said Charles. ‘It’s the Stockholm syndrome. The hostage gets to love the hostage taker.’
    ‘You think you’re so right about everything. I bet you a fiver she hasn’t gone anywhere near the captain.’
    ‘You’re on.’
    Sure enough, at Breakham, Lizzie answered the door to them. She was wearing an apron and there was a dab of flour on one cheek. ‘Come into the kitchen,’ she said. ‘I’m baking for the church sale.’
    ‘Where’s the captain?’ asked Agatha nervously.
    ‘Oh, somewhere round the farm.’
    ‘Why on earth did you return to him?’ asked Agatha.
    Lizzie bent down and took a tray of little sponge cakes out of the oven. ‘I knew Tommy couldn’t do without me.’ She was wearing a pair of bright blue contact lenses and her hair was done in a soft, pretty style. ‘It’s done him the world of good.’
    ‘So you’re not going to sell the Stubbs