Agatha Raisin and the Day the Floods Came Read Online Free Page A

let him know she was on to him. But she hadn’t really noticed anything significant at all.
    Agatha sat at the ladies’ society meeting that night as Miss Simms, the secretary, in her usual unsuitable dress of tiny skirt, bare midriff, pierced navel and stiletto heels went through the minutes of the last meeting. The teacups clattered, plates of cake were passed round, and outside the rain drummed down on the vicarage garden. Mrs Anstruther-Jones turned out to be one of those well-upholstered pushy women with a loud braying voice. Agatha detested her on sight. She could feel some of her old misery creeping back again and tried the breathing exercises she had been taught and, to her amazement, felt herself beginning to relax. She would phone Roy and see if he had any work for her. James was gone and Charles was gone and Agatha Raisin was grimly determined to move on.
     
Chapter Two
    Agatha found it hard, as winter moved into spring, to keep up her spirits. It was the rain – steady, remorseless rain. Water dripped from cherry blossom trees in the village gardens and yellow daffodils drooped under the onslaught.
    And then in April, following a day of heavy cloudbursts, a watery sunshine gilded the puddles in Lilac Lane. Agatha set off for her Pilates class, to which she was now thoroughly addicted, the only healthy addiction she had ever had in her life. Just before the bridge on the Cheltenham Road in Evesham, she let out an exclamation of disgust. The police were diverting the traffic. She swung right. She was the leading car. Other cars followed her. If I make a left along here, she thought, it’ll take me down to Waterside. She cruised down the hill and then jammed on the brakes with an exclamation of dismay. Waterside had gone. The river Avon was rising up the hill before her. She signalled to the other cars that she was going to reverse, made a three-point turn and decided to head out on the ring road over the Simon de Montfort Bridge and approach Evesham from the top road.
    Cars were slowing over the bridge to look at the drowned fields on either side. She turned into Evesham and parked in the car park at Merstow Green. She decided to walk down to the Workman Bridge and view the extent of the flooding. She walked down Bridge Street, which is a steep hill leading down to the arch of the Workman Bridge. As she approached, she could see that Pont Street on the other side of the bridge was under water. Water surged past the houses on the waterfront. Two people outside Magpie Antiques were desperately hanging on to a doorway and waiting for help. Overhead, an Air Sea Rescue helicopter whirred across the sky. Agatha marvelled that the day had arrived when she could see Air Sea Rescue turning out to save the people of middle England.
    She walked to the centre of the bridge and joined the spectators. Debris and tree branches raced past on the swollen river. There was a crunching sound as a caravan which had floated loose from a nearby caravan park got jammed under the bridge.
    And then, as Agatha leaned over the bridge and stared down at the water, gilded by sunshine for the first time in weeks, she let out a gasp.
    Like Ophelia, the girl from the beauticians, who she remembered was called Kylie, floated underneath her on the flowing river. Her blond hair was spread about her. She clutched a wedding bouquet. As Agatha and the other spectators watched in horror, the body twisted and turned and sank from sight.
    Agatha pointed and tried to scream, but as in a nightmare, no scream came out. But the other spectators were shouting and yelling. A policeman spoke into a two-way radio on his lapel and then, as they all waited, a police patrol boat came speeding along underneath. More policemen appeared on the bridge, saying, ‘Move along. The bridge isn’t safe. Move along.’
    They were hustled back up Bridge Street by the police.
    Agatha felt shaken. Zak did it, she thought. Just like that chap on Robinson Crusoe Island. All