As the Pig Turns - By M.C. Beaton Page 0,30

run his hands along the skirting board.

Agatha sat on the floor, feeling sore after her crash over the fence. ‘If I wanted to hide something in the skirting board,’ she said wearily, ‘it would probably be behind my bed.’

‘There’s a thought. I wonder which room he slept in.’

‘The bigger of the two, I suppose,’ said Agatha nervously. ‘Can’t we just leave?’

‘Not long now.’

James went into the larger bedroom. There were two closets in the right-hand wall. He was just making for them when they heard a car coming along the road and lights shone across the ceiling. He took a quick look out of the window. ‘It’s the police. Damn it. Someone must have seen us. Let’s get into that closet and hope when they find the doors locked that they’ll go away.’

The closet they crowded into had once been used as a wardrobe. A few steel hangers hung from a rod.

Then they heard the voices of the police outside the house. ‘Looks all locked up,’ said one voice. ‘Try round the back, Harry.’

There was a silence and then Harry’s voice. ‘Locked up round the back. Shall we leave it?’

They were joined by a woman. ‘I was walking my dog and I’ll swear I saw two people going up the side of the house.’

‘What were you doing walking your dog at this time of night?’ demanded the policeman called Harry.

‘I couldn’t sleep right, not after that horrible murder, I couldn’t,’ she said.

‘Better phone it in,’ said Harry’s companion.

‘What are you doing?’ demanded Agatha as James switched on his torch.

‘Still desperately trying to find something that might make them forgive us if they find us. There’s something down here on the floor.’

Harry’s voice sounded. ‘They’ve roused the estate agent. He’ll be along in a minute or two with the keys.’

‘Sunk,’ said Agatha.

‘There’s this odd knothole thing. I wonder if I push . . .’

The back of the closet slid open, revealing a small room beyond. ‘It’s like Narnia – The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe,’ said James excitedly. ‘We can hide in here until they’re gone.’

They sat down on the floor, huddled together, after he had shut them in. Agatha’s hormones gave a treacherous lurch. Not now, she told them.

After what seemed an age but was only a quarter of an hour, they heard the arrival of the estate agent. Then the unlocking of the front door and the clump of policemen’s boots. Then came the fretful voice of what Agatha guessed was the estate agent. ‘It’s no use looking for fingerprints or footprints,’ she said. ‘I don’t know how many people have been through this house, and believe me, they all turned out to be ghouls, wanted to look at a house where a murder had been committed.’

Footsteps came up the stairs and into the bedroom.

‘Oh, God, I’m going to sneeze,’ said Agatha.

James twisted her face round and kissed her full on the mouth. Her senses reeled. She faintly heard a voice say, ‘Nothing here.’

‘Why, James!’ said Agatha softly.

‘Anything to shut you up,’ he muttered.

Agatha’s hormones packed up their bags and left again.

They waited until the police had left the house, waited while they heard the complaints of the estate agent for having been dragged out in the middle of the night, waited while the dog-walking woman grumbled her way off down the lane, frightened to move until the police car drove off.

‘Now,’ said James, switching on the torch. ‘What have we here?’

‘There’s a light switch,’ said Agatha, ‘and no windows. We could risk switching it on.’

James went to the switch in the wall. A naked light bulb shone down on them.

Both of them looked around. The tiny secret room contained only a crumpled sleeping bag in one corner and, beside it, a ledger. ‘We could take this home and read it in comfort,’ said Agatha.

‘No,’ replied James sharply. ‘Got your gloves on? Good. We take a quick look and then, somehow, we’ve got to let the police know where to look for it.’

James gingerly opened the ledger. ‘It’s in some sort of code or something,’ he said. ‘I should have brought a camera. I know, let’s get out of here and borrow it for a bit. It means we’ll have to sneak back here and replace it. We’ll need to make sure there’s not a trace of a fingerprint or footprint. Damn, that really is messing up any police evidence. Well, we got this far and they didn’t. Might just photograph the thing and post it to them.’

Agatha