The door opened. Agatha blinked. ‘Is Mrs Richards at home?’
‘I’m Mrs Richards. You can call me Amy. You’re Agatha Raisin?’
‘That’s right.’
‘Come in.’
Amy Richards was a petite blonde with a genuine tan and a perfect figure. She had a heart-shaped face and wide blue eyes. When she let Agatha into a living room on the ground floor and the white light from the snow outside fell on Amy’s face, Agatha realized that she was older than she looked and that she’d probably had a face-lift. It was because of Amy’s eyes. Clever plastic surgery can restore an appearance of youth, but nothing changes the expression of age and experience in the eyes. She was wearing a blue cashmere sweater, the exact colour of her eyes – no, not her eyes, thought Agatha, her contact lenses – and form-fitting grey cashmere trousers over ankle boots with high heels.
‘Take a pew,’ said Amy in a soft Gloucestershire accent. ‘Drinkie?’
‘Nothing,’ said Agatha. She pulled a notebook out of her capacious handbag. ‘I was amazed to learn that your husband divorced you. Why?’
‘I think there was someone else.’
Agatha looked at the vision in front of her and then thought of the squat and ugly Beech.
‘I find that hard to believe,’ she said. ‘I saw your ex when he gave me a ticket. Hardly an Adonis.’
‘Wait. I want to show you something.’
Amy left the room and returned after a few minutes with a photograph, which she handed to Agatha. ‘That’s me and Gary on our wedding day.’
The Amy in the photograph was small and plump, with brown hair and teeth that stuck out. ‘I was hardly a beauty,’ she said.
‘How did the transformation take place? Was it due to your present husband?’
‘No, it was like this. Gary was mean. He used to beat me. But I did love him. I’ve always fallen for masterful men. But he gave me a good lot of money in the divorce settlement. I was that broke up, I went to Florida on a holiday. The airline had made a mistake with my booking, so as a compensation, they upgraded me to first class. I met this businessman, Art, ever so kind he was. His wife had just dumped him. He was going to finalize the divorce when he got to Miami. I told him all about Gary and he said, “Get a makeover and let him see what he’s been missing.” I said that surely it cost a lot of money.
‘He said he would fund it, but I had to meet up with him afterwards and go with him to meet his ex-wife because he wanted to make her jealous.’
‘What was his full name?’
‘Art Mackenzie the Third. He said he was in hedge funds. I thought he meant he was a gardener. He tried to explain, but I couldn’t understand it.’
‘What puzzles me is why he just didn’t buy the services of some beauty in Florida.’
‘He said I reminded him of his mother.’
Stark, raving bonkers, thought Agatha. But she prompted, ‘Go on.’
‘Well, it took over three months and I had the works. He must have spent a fortune on me. When I was finished, he said he was delighted, so I said, “When do we meet your wife?” He said, not yet. But he said I should do some work for him. He said he ran a big escort agency and some Arabs were coming to town. He said all I had to do was act pretty and see they had plenty of drinks in their penthouse suite. He had changed. Before I started all the cosmetic surgery and that, he cried a lot and said I was a comfort to him. But afterwards, he had gone sort of hard and businesslike and kept rabbiting on about how much I had cost him.
‘Well, I was pretty green but not that green, and I knew he wanted me to do some whoring for him. I felt sick. I was sitting in this hotel lounge, crying, because I had no money to get a plane home.’
‘You could have gone to the British consul,’ said Agatha.
Her eyes widened. ‘I never thought of that. I’d never been out of England before. But that was when I met Bunchie.’
‘Who’s Bunchie?’
‘Mr Richards. His name is really Tom, but I call him Bunchie. It’s a pet name. Anyway, he came up to me and asked what was the matter, and the minute I heard his English voice, I cried even harder. He said I should go to the police, but I said they’d think I was nothing more than a tart for taking his money in the first place and they might arrest me for prostitution. So he said he had to catch the plane home, and do you know, when he said he lived in Mircester, I thought, There really is a God, cos I’d been praying ever so hard. And he said he’d take me with him. We got married two weeks after we got back.’
‘Have you considered,’ said Agatha, ‘that this Art may have come to England looking for you and taken his spite out on Gary?’
She bit her collagen-enhanced lips. ‘I dunno.’
‘What does your husband think about paying my agency to find out what happened to Beech? I mean, it’s nothing to do with him.’
‘Oh, he’d do anything for me. He’s got oodles of money and gives me a very generous allowance, which is just as well, because I suppose I’ll have to pay to send you to Florida.’
‘Let’s get back to your marriage to Gary. How did you meet?’
‘He came into the supermarket regular like, to buy his beer. Then he asked me out. He took me to all the best places. Fair bowled off my feet, I was.’
‘Did you never worry where he got the money from? Surely you must have known that a copper’s pay doesn’t amount to all that much?’
‘I asked once and he took his belt to me and told me not to ask questions again.’
‘My dear girl, why didn’t you leave him?’
‘Well, Dad used to beat me something awful. I thought it was something that men did. Then Gary started to stay out all night, and I thought there was someone else. One night when he was asleep, I got the key to his desk and began to search it, looking for love letters. He caught me. Broke my ribs, he did. Then he said he was getting rid of me and he’d be generous if I just got the hell out.’
‘Let me see if I have this right. This man beat you, abused you, divorced you, and you still want to find out what happened to him?’
‘I have to know. I think it was something to do with that other woman.’
‘But you have no proof there was another woman.’
‘Well, several times when the phone rang and I answered it, whoever it was just hung up.’
‘Have you told the police about the man in Florida?’
‘I didn’t like to. Didn’t want to sound like a tart.’
Agatha thought quickly. She really ought to urge her to go to the police. The FBI in Florida would surely ferret out this Art Mackenzie, if that really was his name. Was Amy as naïve as she seemed?
‘I want this Art made to suffer,’ said Amy. ‘Have you ever had cosmetic surgery? Silly me. Of course you haven’t. Well, it’s damn painful, and what with getting my teeth straightened and the liposuction and all that, I’d like to get a bit of my own back.’
‘I still wonder why he picked you,’ said Agatha. ‘He could have found plenty of pretty girls in Florida without having to go to all the expense of making them over.’
‘I do think he loved me for a bit,’ said Amy. ‘And do you know, when he showed me a picture of his mother, I did look a bit like her.’
‘Well,’ said Agatha, looking out of the window at the freezing day outside, ‘I may as well start with Florida. You will be billed for all expenses plus a daily fee.’
‘Oh, yes, your Mrs Freedman told me that and got me to sign the papers.’
‘Don’t you think it might be a good idea if I talked to your husband as well?’
‘He’s awfully busy.’
‘What does he do?’
‘He owns Richards Supermarkets.’
Agatha recognized the name. The supermarkets were all over the country.
‘Let me think this over,’ said Agatha. ‘I’ll get in touch with you soon.’