Agatha Raisin and the Quiche of Death ar-1

by M C Beaton

  "Me. Bill Wong."

  Agatha opened the door. Bill Wong stood there with Fred Griggs, the local policeman, behind him. "There'll be reinforcements along soon," said Bill. "Fred, you'd best get back and block off that bit of the road where the attack took place. I'm slipping. I should have thought of that. Wilkes will have my guts for garters."

  Bill and Agatha went into the living-room. Thank God you happened along," said Agatha. "What were you doing on a bike?" "I'm too fat," said Bill. "I saw you on yours and took a leaf out of your book. I was coming to pay you a visit. Now, I happen to know you were over in Upper Cockburn asking where Miss. Maria Borrow lives, and Miss. Borrow was the woman in that photograph you gave me. Not only that, you had lunch in the pub where John Cartwright acts as part-time cook." "You've been checking up on me," said Agatha hotly.

  "Not I. Word gets around."

  Agatha shivered. "It was that Borrow woman, I'll swear. She's quite mad. She says Cummings-Browne promised to marry her."

  "I'm beginning to think Cummings-Browne was a bit touched himself," said Bill drily. "Anyway, Wilkes will soon be here and you will be asked all sorts of questions. But I think I can tell you now who had a go at you."

  "Barbara James? Maria Borrow?"

  "No, I think it was John Cartwright, and do you know why?"

  "Because he killed Cummings-Browne."

  "No, because you've been ferreting about. I swear he knows his wife had an affair with Cummings-Browne and he doesn't want it to get out."

  "Then the logical way to put a stop to it would have been to kill Cummings-Browne in the first place!"

  "But he is not a logical man. He's a great ape. Now begin at the beginning and tell me what happened." So Agatha told him about the wire stretched across the road, about how someone had brought something crashing down near her which would have struck her if she hadn't rolled away.

  "But look," ended Agatha, ' horrible Boggles, a couple of pensioners I took out for the day, they knew about the affair, so surely it was generally known in the village about the goings-on between Ella Cartwright and Cummings-Browne."

  "Look at it this way. Cartwright may have suspected something was going on but he could never prove it. She would deny it. Then Cummings-Browne dies, so that's over. But you turn up asking questions, and he gets scared. That sort of man couldn't bear the idea of his wife having an affair no, I mean the idea of anyone else knowing. Pride does not belong exclusively to the upper classes, you know. Here's the rest of them arrived. You'll need to answer questions all over again."

  Detective Chief Inspector Wilkes and Detective Sergeant Friend came in.

  "We did as you suggested and went straight to Cartwright's house," said Wilkes. "He's gone. Dived in the door, the wife says, grabbed a few clothes, shoved them in a bag, and off he went. Took that old car of theirs. She says she doesn't know what's going on. She says he was getting a bee in his bonnet about Mrs. Raisin here and kept saying he would shut her mouth. Anyway, we searched the house. She said we needed a warrant but I told her I could get that, so she may as well let us save time. In the bedroom upstairs we found a stack of cash in a box, a sawn-off shotgun, and one of those giant bottles filled with change, the kind they have in bars for charity. This one was for Spastics. There was a robbery last month from the Green Man over at Twigsley. Masked man with sawn-off shotgun emptied the till and swiped the charity bottle off the bar. Looks like Cartwright did it. Ella Cart-wright broke down. Her husband thought Mrs. Raisin here was on to that and that was the reason she was snooping around. So much for all your theories about the cheated husband. We've put out a call for him but I'll bet that car of his is found abandoned quite near. He did time over in Chelmsford in Essex ten years ago for armed robbery, and it was assumed he'd gone straight. Funny, we'd never have got on to him if this hadn't happened. It was Ella Cart-wright who told us about the prison sentence."

  "But when Mr. Cummings-Browne died," exclaimed Agatha, ' you looked to see if anyone in the village had a record?"

  "Even then, it would have meant nothing. Before we knew it was an accident, we would have been looking for a more domestic poisoner."

  Agatha stared at him. It was as if the blow to her head had cleared her brain. "Of course," she said, "Vera Cummings-Browne did it. She saw the opportunity when I left my quiche at the competition. She took it home, threw it away, and substituted one of her own."

  Wilkes gave her a pitying look. That was the first thing we thought of. We checked her dustbin, her cooking utensils, every surface of her kitchen, and her drains. Nothing had been cooked in that kitchen the day before Cummings-Browne was found dead. Now, will you just describe to us what happened this evening, Mrs. Raisin?"

  Wearily, Agatha went over it all again.

  At last Wilkes was finished. "We should be thankful to you, Mrs. Raisin, for leading us to Cartwright. He might have killed you, although I suspect he only meant to beat you up." Thanks a lot," said Agatha bitterly.

  "On the other hand, I am sure we would have caught up with him sooner or later. You really must leave investigations to the police. Everyone has something to hide, and if you are going to go around shoving your nose into affairs which do not concern you, you are going to be hurt. Now, do you wish to be taken to hospital for an examination?"

  Agatha shook her head. She hated and feared hospitals quite illogically, for she had never been treated in one.

  "Very well. If we have any further questions, we will call on you tomorrow. Have you a friend who can stay the night with you?"

  Again, Agatha shook her head. She wanted to ask Bill to stay but, off duty or not, he was obviously expected to leave with his superiors. He threw her a sympathetic look as he went out.

  When they had gone, she switched on every light in the house. She felt as weak as a kitten. She turned on the television and then switched it off again, fearing that the sound would drown out the sounds of anyone creeping up on the house. She sat by the fire, clutching the poker, too frightened to go to bed.

  And then she thought of Mrs. Bloxby, the vicar's wife. She rang up the vicarage. The vicar answered. "Could I speak to your wife? It's Agatha Raisin."

  "It's a bit late," said the vicar, ' I don't know ... oh, here she is."

  "Mrs. Bloxby," said Agatha in a timid voice, "I wonder if you can help me." "I hope so," said the vicar's wife in her gentle voice.

  So Agatha told her of the assault and ended up bursting into tears.

  There, there," said Mrs. Bloxby. "You must not be alone. I will be along in a minute."

  Agatha put down the phone and dried her eyes. She felt suddenly silly.

  What had come over her, crying like a child for help, she who had never asked anyone for help before?

  But soon she heard a car drawing up outside and immediately all her fears left her. She knew it was Mrs. Bloxby.

  The vicar's wife came in carrying a small case. "I'll just stay the night," she said placidly. "You must be very shaken. Why don't you go to bed and I'll bring you up a drink of hot milk and sit with you until you go to sleep?"

  Gratefully Agatha agreed. Soon she lay upstairs until Mrs. Bloxby came into the bedroom carrying a hot-water bottle in one hand and a glass of hot milk in the other. "I brought along the hot-water bottle," she said, ' when you have had a fright, no amount of central heating seems to warm you up."

  Agatha, with the hot-water bottle on her stomach and the hot milk inside her, and Mrs. Bloxby sitting on the end of her bed, felt soothed and secure. She told the vicar's wife all about John Cartwright and how they had found the money from the robbery in his house. "Poor Mrs. Cart-wright," said Mrs. Bloxby. "We will all need to call on her tomorrow to see what we can do. She will need to get a job now. He did not allow her very much money but it would be very good for her to have something to do, other than playing bingo. We will all rally round. Try to sleep now, Mrs. Raisin. The weather forecast is good and things look so much simpler when the sun is shining. We have a meeting of the Carsely La
dies' Society at the vicarage tomorrow night. You must come. Mr. Jones you do not know him, such a charming man and a gifted photographer is going to give us a slide show of the village past and present. We are all looking forward to it."

  Agatha's eyelids begin to droop and with the sound of Mrs. Bloxby's gentle voice in her ears, she fell fast asleep.

  She awoke once during the night, immediately gripped with terror. Then she remembered the vicar's wife was in the spare bedroom across the landing and felt the fear and tension leaving her body. Mrs. Bloxby's goodness was a bright shining weapon against the dark things of the night.

  The next day, Agatha went along to Mrs. Cartwright's, mindful of her promise to Mrs. Bloxby that morning to help out. But in the clear light of a sunny day, she felt sure Ella Cartwright would be more interested in money than sympathy.

  "Come in," said Ella Cartwright wearily. "Coppers are crawling around upstairs. Have a gin." "This must have been a sad blow," said Agatha, finding it hard to find the right words after a lifetime of not bothering.

  "It's a bloody relief." Mrs. Cartwright lit a cigarette and then rolled up the sleeve of her cotton dress. "See these bruises? That was him, that was. Never marked my face, the cunning sod. I hope the p'lice catch him before he comes snooping back round here. I told him you only wanted to know about Reg, but he thought you'd got wind of the robbery. Fair paranoid, he was."

  Agatha accepted a pink gin. "I felt guilty about Mr. Cummings-Browne's death, that was all," she said. "And there was a rumour that you and he were ... friends."

  Mrs. Cartwright grinned. "Oh, Reg liked his bit o' slap and tickle.

  No harm in it, is there? Took me out to a few posh restaurants. Said he'd marry me. I laughed like a drain. He wanted women to be crazy about him, so he usually made a pass at spinsters and widows. Didn't quite know what to make of me at first. We was good pals, for he knew I didn't believe a word he said."

  "Weren't you worried about his wife finding out?"

  "Nah. I s'pose her knew. Didn't bother her, none of it, I reckon."

  "But you said they hated each other."

  "I was trying to give you your money's worth. Tell you something, though. You never can tell what a married couple really think about each other. One says one thing, tother says something else. Fact is, they got along pretty well. They was two of a kind."

  "You mean, she had affairs as well?"

  "Nah. She liked to play lady of the manor and he liked to play Lord Muck, judging competitions, trying to rub shoulders with the aristocracy. You should have seen the pair of them if someone had a title. Scraping and simpering and my-lording the chap to death."

  "What will you do now?"

  "Get a job, I reckon. Mrs. Bloxby's coming to run me over to Mircester. There's a new Tesco's supermarket and they're hiring people. Don't want to go but you find you're doing what Mrs. Bloxby wants whether you wants to do it or not."

  Agatha finished her gin and took her leave. Somehow what Ella had said about the Cummings-Brownes' marriage made sense. There was no reason for any further investigation. Agatha realized that, deep in her heart, she must have thought Vera Cummings-Browne the murderess all along. This time she really would take Bill Wong's advice.

  But as she walked back to her own cottage, she saw to her surprise that there was a large FOR SALE notice outside Mrs. Barr's cottage. Mrs. Barr saw her coming and stood at her garden gate waiting for her.

  "You have driven me away," said Mrs. Barr. "I cannot continue to live next door to a murderess."

  "Fat chance you'll have of selling it," said Agatha. "No body's buying these days, and who the hell is going to want a twee cottage called New Delhi anyway?"

  She marched to her own cottage and went in and slammed the door.

  But Agatha felt bleak. She had poked a stick into the village ponds and stirred up a lot of mucky feelings.

  That evening, before the Carsely Ladies' Society meeting, she went to the Red Lion for dinner. The landlord, Joe Fletcher, gave her a cheerful good evening and then asked her what all this business about John Cartwright trying to kill her had been. Immediately several of the villagers crowded around to hear the story. Agatha told them everything about the wire across the road and how Bill Wong had come to her rescue and how the police had found the money from the robbery in Cartwright's house while they all pressed closer, occasionally making sure her glass was refilled. "I gather his last crime was in Essex," said Agatha. "Does that mean he wasn't from here?"

  "Born and brought up here," said a large farmer called Jimmy Page.

  "Decent people, his folks were. Lived down the council houses. Died a whiles back. Couldn't do a thing with him, not since he was so high.

  Got Ella in the family way and her father came after him with a shotgun and that's how they got married. Kept going off to make his fortune, he said, and sometimes he'd come back flush and sometimes he wouldn't.

  Bad lot."

  Agatha realized dimly that she had not eaten but she did not want to leave the bar and the company. She knew also that she was sinking an unusually large amount of gin.

  "I see Mrs. Barr has put her house up for sale," she remarked.

  "Oh, aye, her's been left a bigger cottage over Ancombe way," said the farmer. "Aunt of hers died."

  "What!" Agatha stared. "She let me believe it was to get away from me." "Wouldn't pay no heed to her," said Farmer Page comfortably. A small man popped his head over Mr. Page's beefy shoulder. "Her hasn't been the same since that play." His voice rose to a falsetto. '"Oh, Reg, Reg, kiss me."

  That be enough now, Billy!" admonished another man. "We all makes a fool o' ourself sometime or tother. No cause to throw stones. Turning into a scorcher of a summer, ain't it?"

  In vain did Agatha try to find out about Mrs. Barr. Gossip was over for the night. Farming and the weather were the subjects allowed. The old grandfather clock in the corner of the pub gave a small apologetic cough and then chimed out the hour.

  "Goodness!" Agatha scrambled down from the bar stool. "I'm late."

  She felt very tipsy as she hurried to the vicarage. "You're not terribly late," whispered Mrs. Bloxby after she had opened the door to her. "Miss. Simms has just finished reading the minutes."

  Agatha accepted a cup of tea and two dainty sandwiches and sat down as near to the rest of the eats as she could get.

  "Now," said Mrs. Mason, ' guest of the evening, Mr. Jones."

  Polite applause while Mr. Jones set up a screen and a slide projector.

  He was a small spry man with white hair and horn-rimmed glasses.

  "For my first slide," he said, ' is Bailey's grocery store in the 1920s." A picture, at first fuzzy, came into focus: a store with striped awnings, and grinning villagers standing in front of it.

  Delighted cries from the older members. "Reckon that's Mrs. Bloggs; you see that liddle girl standing to the right?"

  Agatha stifled a yawn and slowly reached out in the gloom for a hefty slice of plum cake. She felt sleepy and bored. All the frights of the past few weeks which had kept her adrenalin flowing had faded away. The attacks on her had been made by a burglar who was now on the run. Maria Borrow was a crazy old fright. Barbara James was a pain in the neck. Something nasty had happened in the wood-shed of Mrs. Barr's past. Who gave a damn? And what was she, the high-powered Agatha Raisin, doing sitting in a vicarage eating plum cake and being bored to death?

  Slide followed slide. Even when photos of ' village prize-winners' jerked on to the screen, Agatha remained in a stupor of boredom. There was Ella Cartwright being presented with a ten-pound note by Reg Cummings-Browne, looking as long dead as the old photos of villagers she had already seen. Then Vera Cummings-Browne getting a prize for flower arranging, then Mrs. Bloxby getting a prize for jam. Mrs. Bloxby? Agatha looked at the photo of the vicar's wife standing with Reg Cummings-Browne and then relapsed back into her torpor. Mrs. Bloxby? Not in a hundred years!

  And then she fell asleep and in her dreams she cycled down into
Carsely in the fading light and standing in the middle of the road waiting for her and brandishing a double-barrelled shotgun was Mrs. Barr. Agatha awoke with a shriek of fear and found the slide show was over and everyone was looking at her.

  "Sorry," she mumbled.

  "Don't worry," said Miss. Simms, who was next to her. "It was that nasty fright you had."

  When Agatha made her way homeward, she decided to get some sort of alarm system installed the very next day and then wondered why.

  Somewhere at the back of her mind, she had decided to leave the village.

  The next day, she phoned a security firm and placed an order for their best of everything in the way of burglar-proofing and then went around opening the doors and the windows to try to get a breath of cool air.

  The heat was building up. Before, when it had been fine, the days had been sunny and the nights cool, but now the sky burnt blue, deep blue above the twisted cottage chimneys and the sun beat down. By lunch-time, the heat was fierce. She took a small thermometer outside and watched as it shot up over the 100 degrees Fahrenheit mark and disappeared. Mrs. Simpson was vacuuming busily upstairs, having changed her cleaning day to fit in a dentist's appointment. Agatha remembered the talk about Mrs. Barr and climbed the stairs. "Can I have a word with you?" she shouted over the noise of the vacuum. Mrs. Simpson reluctantly turned the machine off. She was proud of doing a good job and felt she had already wasted too much time earlier hearing Agatha's adventures.

  "I was asking in the pub last night why Mrs. Barr was selling up and I heard an aunt had died and left her a larger cottage over Ancombe way'

  "Yes, that's right." Doris Simpson's hand hovered longingly over the vacuum switch.

  "Why don't you come down to the kitchen and have a cup of coffee, Doris?"

  "Got too much to do, Agatha."

  "Skip for once. I'm still getting over my fright and I want to talk," said Agatha firmly.

  "I meant to clean the windows."

  "It's too hot. I'll hire a window cleaner. Doris!"