by M C Beaton
Agatha felt a pang of guilt. Poor Mary. She really did like me. And I haven't even mourned her. All I could think of after we found her dead in that terrible way was to feel shattered because James confessed to having had an affair with her.
"Mr Lacey," said the lawyer, "you must understand that what is written here is in the words of Mrs Fortune. To Mr James Lacey of 8 Lilac Lane, Carsely, Gloucestershire, I leave the sum of five thousand pounds in payment for services rendered, although said services were not really worth much.
James said, "Thank you," in a stifled voice. To Mrs Agatha Raisin of 10 Lilac Lane, Carsely, Gloucestershire, I leave five thousand pounds so that she may take herself to a reputable health farm to reduce her middle-aged bulk.
"Bitch," commented Agatha briefly.
"You will both be receiving the money in due course," said the lawyer.
"I don't want it." James's voice was harsh.
"Take your time," said the lawyer. "It is, I admit, a rather spiteful bequest. But do not reject it out of hand. We all need money."
"Are you accepting yours?" asked James as they walked up to the square.
"Oh, yes. She's not alive, is she? I mean, money's money. You know, James, if she really was as bitchy as it now seems she was, it's not surprising someone bumped her off."
"The world is full of bitches," said James, lengthening his stride so that Agatha had to hurry to keep up with him. "But no one goes about murdering them."
"Let's go and see Bill Wong," panted Agatha. "And do slow down a bit."
He stopped so suddenly, she almost cannoned into him. "Why Bill Wong? He's told you to keep out of it."
"But if we tell him about Mary's will, we might be able to ferret some information out of him."
"I don't want to tell him about the will."
"Don't you see, the police will know the contents of the will already. I'll tell him my bit. You don't need to come if you don't want to."
He stood for a moment, his hands thrust in his pockets, rocking slightly on his heels, looking at his feet. "All right," he said abruptly.
They walked to police headquarters and asked at the desk for Bill Wong. He came down the stairs after only a short wait, a smile of welcome on his face. "Just at my lunch-hour," he said cheerfully.
"If you've got the time, lunch is on me," said Agatha. "We've something to tell you."
"I hope you haven't been stirring things up with any amateur detective work," said Bill.
"No, no. Do you want to hear our news or not?"
"I'd like lunch," said Bill with a grin.
"We'll go to that restaurant James took me to the other day," said Agatha briskly.
In the restaurant, she ordered a sirloin steak with sauteed potatoes, grilled tomatoes and peas. "What happened to your diet?" asked James.
"Sod the diet," retorted Agatha. She privately thought there was no need to go on suffering. She had no one to compete with and she was no longer romantically interested in James Lacey. Of course, she had read endless articles in women's magazines about how one should slim for oneself, one should feel good about oneself. But it had never worked that way for Agatha and she doubted if it ever would.
When they were served, Bill asked, "Now what was it you wanted to tell me?"
"I'm a beneficiary in Mary's will," said Agatha.
"I know that," said Bill. "And Mr Lacey here as well."
"James," he corrected. "A very rude bequest it was, too."
"Come to think of it, she must have hated us," said Agatha. "And why make such a recent will? She must have expected to live a long time."
"Not necessarily," said Bill.
"Why?"
"I don't want you getting involved."
Agatha reached, out a hand. "I'll take that plate of steak-and-kidney pudding away from you, Bill Wong, unless you explain yourself."
"Leave it alone. I'm hungry. Oh, I suppose the press will get hold of it. When her husband asked for a divorce way back when, she tried to commit suicide."
"Emotional blackmail," said James. "Probably didn't mean to go through with it."
"She would have done the job all right - bottle of barbiturates, bottle of vodka - but for one little miracle. A neighbour whose flat overlooked hers passed his day in watching the women opposite through binoculars, although he subsequently swore to the police that he was bird-watching. So he saw Mary swallowing pills and drinking vodka and swallowing pills until she slumped over the table and he called for an ambulance and the police. She was rushed to hospital and her stomach was pumped out. She was subsequently treated several times for depression, the last being when she was living in New York. She moved there after the divorce to a flat in Washington Square in the Village."
"My cleaner, Doris Simpson, was about the only person who didn't like her when everyone else seemed to," said Agatha. "She said something like, "No warmth there. It's as if she's acting." Do you think that? Why come to the Cotswolds?"
"She is English," pointed out Bill.
"Where from?"
"Newcastle originally. Her parents are dead. A lot of outsiders move to the Cotswolds. Take you two, for example," said Bill.
"But don't you see," said Agatha, pursuing her theme, "she was acting being the perfect village lady, baking and gardening and so on. If she had lived, she might have tired of the act, moved somewhere else and adopted another role."
"Speculation," said Bill, shaking his head. "I need more solid facts. I may as well make use of you while you're here. Let's start with the people who had their gardens ruined. Mrs Bloxby? Who would have a spite against Mrs Bloxby, of all people?"
Mary, thought Agatha suddenly, but could not voice her suspicions without betraying the confidences of the vicar's wife.
But another idea struck her. She said, "James, do you remember when you were supposed to take me out for dinner in Evesham?"
"Very well indeed. That was the day I got food poisoning."
"And that was the day you visited Mary!"
"What are you getting at, Agatha? I didn't dine with her."
"But surely you had something to eat?"
"Let me see, coffee and home-made cakes, as I recall."
Agatha's eyes gleamed. "And then you were too ill afterwards to take me for dinner. I had told Mary you were taking me for dinner."
"Wait a minute," said Bill. "Just hold it there. Are you suggesting that Mary put something in the cakes so that James would be ill and would not be able to go?"
Agatha nodded.
"That's ridiculous," said James.
"Did she eat the cakes as well?"
James said slowly. "No, she didn't. She said something about being on a diet." In fact, what she had said was that she had no intention of becoming as frumpish as Agatha Raisin by letting her figure go.
Bill Wong's eyes were suddenly shrewd. "I think you're suggesting also that Mary Fortune might have been the one who ruined the gardens. Do you know something about Mrs Bloxby, say, that you're not telling us, Agatha?"
"No," mumbled Agatha.
He gave her a long look and then said, "Okay. Let's start with you, James. Now the idea was that whoever ruined the gardens wanted to put competition out of the running. But let's just give Agatha's theory a whirl. Did you upset Mary before your garden was set alight?"
"As a matter of fact, it was shortly after I had told her the affair was over."
"So let's examine the rest. Mr and Mrs Boggle?"
"Forget them," said Agatha. "They annoy everyone."
"All right. Miss Simms, then, the unmarried mother who is secretary of the Ladies' Society."
"We'd need to ask her," said Agatha. "She's not the type to irritate anyone."
"And Mrs Mason?"
"The same," said Agatha gloomily. "Need to ask."
"Mr Spott, he of the poisoned fish? I mean, if by some far-fetched chance Mary was out for petty revenge, then it need not be just plants."
"Bernard Spott adored Mary," said James. "He would never
have said a word to annoy her."
"We're getting nowhere," sighed Bill. "I don't think your argument's got a leg to stand on, Agatha. Say one of those maddened gardeners decided to get revenge on Mary, which one can you see doing it? Mrs Bloxby, Miss Simms, James here, Mrs Mason, or the Boggles or old Mr Spott?"
"Must be someone from her family or her past," said Agatha. "Was the husband in America the whole time?"
"Yes."
"But it must have been someone she knew," said James suddenly.
"Why?"
"There was no forced entry. She opened the door to whoever. She was poisoned. Someone slipped weedkiller in her drink. What drink?" he demanded, looking at Bill.
"Hard to say, but from the contents of her stomach, brandy, I think. It was a strong measure of weedkiller."
"And you've checked all the weedkiller suppliers?"
Bill groaned. "Do you know just how many places in the Cotswolds sell weedkiller? Legion. But yes, we are getting around to them all." Agatha had taken a menu from the waitress and was studying it. "Never say you are going to order pudding, Agatha?"
"Icky-sticky pudding," said Agatha firmly. "Anyone else?" They all ordered the sticky toffee-syrup-laced sponge. Why was it, thought Agatha gloomily when she had finished the last crumb, of pudding, that desserts like this, which could slip down her gullet in the old days without any effect, immediately made the waistband of her skirt as tight as a corset?
"I think the daughter is the best bet," she said over coffee. "Surely it's very simple. She inherits. She did it, or her boyfriend."
"Her own mother?" protested James.
"She could have wanted it to look like the work of some maniac," said Agatha.
"I tell you this," said Bill, "if it was a maniac, it might just have been some fellow who called at the door."
"And she let him in and offered him brandy! Not likely," said Agatha firmly.
Bill heaved a sigh. "Thanks for lunch. I've got to be getting back. It might have been done by someone from her past and we'll never find out who it is."
"Makes you want to forget about the whole thing," said James after Bill had left.
"I think people will start talking soon," said Agatha. "We could start off by calling on Mrs Mason. She's a sensible lady. All we can do is keep on asking questions until we get a lead."
Seven
At first, that afternoon, as they sat over tea and scones in Mrs Mason's living-room, it looked as if they weren't going to get very far. Mrs Mason talked in a hushed voice about 'poor Mary'. Both Agatha and James ferreted about in their minds for a way to find out what the chairwoman of the Carsely Ladies' Society actually thought about the dear deceased.
It was James, spurred to his own defence by Mrs Mason's murmur of "You, above all others, must be grief-stricken, Mr Lacey," who found an opening. "I regret to tell you, Mrs Mason," he said, leaning back in one of her velveteen-covered armchairs and stretching his long legs out in front of him, "that although I am shocked and saddened by the murder, I am not grieving. I did not know Mary very well." Mrs Mason looked startled. "But I thought..."
"I had an affair with Mary Fortune. Most people in the village seem to have known that. It finished a while ago. But despite that, I repeat, I did not know her very well and I am beginning to believe that she had a knack of putting people's backs up."
"I think," said Agatha quickly, remembering what Mrs Bloxby had said, "that she had a way of making people ashamed of themselves and so nobody confided in anyone else what she had said or done." James gave her a sharp look.
"Well, of course, put like that..." Mrs Mason adjusted her glasses and peered at Agatha. "I thought I was making too much of it."
"Too much of what?"
"She said, in the nicest way possible, that she wondered why no elections were held for the posts in the Ladies' Society. 'Whatever can you mean, Mrs Fortune?' I asked. She smiled and said that she gathered that I had been chairwoman for several years and Miss Simms had been secretary. I pointed out that nobody had complained. 'They wouldn't complain to you, dear,' she said. 'But there have been certain murmurings,' yes, that's what she said, murmurings. 'About what?' says I, getting sharpish. 'Oh,' says she as sweet as pie, 'some of the ladies would like to see new blood at the helm.' I found myself getting angry. 'Like yourself?' I says, irritated-like. And she says, 'Why not? Would you have any objections?'
'Not me,' says I, 'but it's up to the group.'"
Mrs Mason paused for breath. A red tide of colour rose up her neck. "It would have been all right if she had left it at that. But she went on to say that the Ladies' Society over at Little Raddington had a very presentable chairwoman who was quite young."
Her voice was a bad imitation of Mary's rather drawling accent. "I bought myself a new pale blue twin set - you remember, Mrs Raisin, you admired it - and I wore it with my pearls to one of the last meetings. Mrs Fortune looked at it and gave a little smile and I suddenly wished I hadn't wasted the money. She had a way of smiling, she had, that seemed to say, 'It doesn't matter what you do, you'll never look like a lady.'
"I spoke to Mrs Bloxby, who told me that no one had been complaining about me being chairwoman. It was the opposite. She heard a lot of praise for me. She told me to think no more about it. But I said I thought Mrs Fortune would make a better chairwoman and Mrs Bloxby said, 'No, that would not do at all.' I was that riled up with Mrs Fortune that when I met her in the village shop, I says to her, I says, 'I asked Mrs Bloxby if anyone had been unhappy with me being chairwoman and she said quite the opposite, so there!' And she looks at me steady-like and then says quietly, 'Mrs Bloxby is such a kind woman,' and o' course that made me feel bad all over again."
"And how soon after that was your garden attacked?" asked Agatha eagerly.
"Wait a minute, I'll need to look at my diary." She went to a veneered sideboard and drew, a leather-bound book out from the back of a knife drawer. "Let me see." She rummaged through the pages. "Ah, here's the bit about meeting her in the post office part of the village shop." She flicked over more pages. "Three days after that, it would be."
Agatha flashed a triumphant look at James. "But what's all this to do with that business about the gardens?" asked Mrs Mason.
"We're following up every lead," said Agatha obscurely.
"So you're playing detective again?"
"I'm not playing," snapped Agatha. "I'm deadly serious."
"You'll find it was one of those hooligans down from Birmingham," said Mrs Mason. "No one here would murder anyone for a few nasty remarks. Another scone?"
"The Boggles next?" suggested Agatha reluctantly. "I mean, someone sprayed their roses black."
"Must we?" asked James. "It would be more a case of the Boggles putting Mary's back up than the other way round."
"I can't stand the Boggles either," said Agatha, "but it would be interesting to find out if their roses were attacked shortly after some sort of confrontation with Mary."
"I think you're barking up the wrong tree, Agatha. All these attacks on the gardens were within days of each other. If they had been more spaced out, there would have been more of a chance to catch the culprit, but they all happened so quickly."
"Let's try the Boggles anyway. Don't leave me, James. Boggle-interviewing means I need support."
Mr and Mrs Boggle lived on the council estate at the end of the village. They had bought their council house and named it Culloden, not because either had any interest in the famous Scottish battlefield but because it was a name that had taken their fancy at the local nursery which sold signs for houses.
Usually people in villages have a soft spot for the elderly, and Mr and Mrs Boggle milked this sympathy for all it was worth. They did not go in for subtle blackmail; they demanded days out and trips to town from various people as their right.
"Now remember," cautioned Agatha, "if they want an outing, say both our cars are off the road. Go in for blatant lying, or they'll have us driving them to Bath or Bristol or somew
here. I took them to Bath once and it was a nightmare of a day."
"I think this is a waste of time," said James uneasily.
"I don't like them either," said Agatha, "but they're so blunt, they might turn out to be more useful than anyone nicer."
James rang the doorbell, which gave a brisk rendering of the 'Post Horn Gallop'. Odd shuffling noises came from inside as of elderly animals shifting in their lair.
After what seemed an age, there were the sounds of bolts being drawn back and locks being unlocked and then the door was opened on a chain and Mrs Boggle peered at them.
"Oh, it's you," she said. "What do you want?"
"We want to talk to you about Mary Fortune," said Agatha.
Mrs Boggle's elderly eyes gleamed with malice. "Why not ask him?" she said. "He must have known her better'n anybody."
"Can we come in?" asked Agatha patiently.
"Soap's on. You'll need to wait till it's finished."
The chain was dropped, the door was opened, and Agatha and James followed her dumpy figure into a fusty living-room where a television set blared from one corner. Mrs Boggle was layered in clothes topped with a woolly cardigan and print apron. Her husband, wearing an old shirt, a sweater and a cardigan and thick trousers, was staring avidly at an Australian soap. The room was full of the smell of old Boggle, a strange smell, not of the unwashed but of the decaying.
Agatha and James waited patiently until the soap ground to its syrupy end. It was one of those irritating episodes where a well-loved character has died and so there were seemingly endless close-ups of Australian faces swimming in tears. And why were the women all so tiny? wondered Agatha. What of all those goddesses one saw in films of Bondi Beach? Maybe the undersized female in Australia went in for acting.
When it was finally over, Mrs Boggle reluctantly switched it off. "Well?" she demanded.
"What did you think of Mrs Fortune?" asked Agatha.
