Agatha Raisin and the Busy Body ar-21

by M C Beaton

  "Didn't you do that field the night before last, Andy?" asked Gerald.

  "Yes, boss. You know that. All day yesterday as well and right on into the evening after dark, it was."

  Agatha arrived with Phil and Patrick. She handed Bill Ruby's card. "You'd better send someone up to Hackney in London to fetch her to identify the body," she said.

  "There's still mud down by the millpond lane with a lot of footprints in it," said Simon.

  "Right," said Wilkes. "We'll get on to it." He turned to Agatha. "I want you to leave all this to us. We can't have private detectives cluttering up the scene."

  "You wouldn't be cluttering up the scene yourself," protested Agatha, "if my detectives hadn't found the body."

  "I want your two detectives to go back to headquarters with you, Mrs. Raisin, and make statements."

  Bill whispered to Agatha, "Call on you later."

  Agatha and her staff, with the exception of Mrs. Freedman, waited anxiously that evening in her cottage for Bill to arrive. Charles had joined them, saying he had ordered steak pies to be delivered from the pub, therefore saving everyone from a selection of supermarket curries from Agatha's freezer.

  Bill arrived just as they were finishing their dinner. "It's a right mess," he said. "Yes, it's Dan Palmer and it's worse even than you think. The preliminary autopsy shows that he was possibly unconscious but alive when the baler scooped him up and stabbed him as a final insult. He was probably smothered to death."

  "How's Mrs. Palmer taking it?"

  "Pretty easily. In fact, so easily that Wilkes got a check on her, but she was definitely back in Hackney after she left you. Also, she's too small a woman to hit a man like Dan and then somehow get his body up into the hay field. They estimate the hay was still uncut when the body was dumped but that it was placed just where the baler would be bound to pick it up. Andy swears he saw nothing. We've got men going from door to door. We cannot find Palmer's car.

  "There's another thing, Simon. Are you really sure you saw footprints in the mud in Mill Lane?"

  "Yes."

  "Something had flattened them over. Why did you think footprints in Mill Lane were particularly interesting?"

  Simon looked at Agatha. "Oh, go on, tell him," said Agatha.

  So Simon told of the attempt on his life and how he had lied to the vicar and told him he could not swim.

  "Now, listen to me carefully," said Bill. "We have set up a mobile unit again in the village and the place is swarming with detectives and police officers, not to mention the press. I want you all to keep clear. We don't want another dead body on our hands.

  "Even out of the village, in Mircester, I want you to be careful. You found the body, so the murderer might consider life safer with one of you out of the way, probably Simon. You've got other cases, haven't you? Get on with them."

  James Lacey sat in his hotel room in Singapore and watched the latest news from Odley Cruesis on BBC TV international news. Agatha was in the thick of it, as usual, he thought. He missed her. He really had to admit that he missed her. But he dreaded the contempt in her bearlike eyes when she looked at him. He wondered if she would ever forgive him for having fallen for that airhead he had so nearly married.

  After they had all left, including Charles, Agatha made herself a cup of strong black coffee and lit a cigarette. She had recently given up smoking when other people were around unless they were outside in the open air. She decided to sit up during the night and carefully read all the notes on the case of John Sunday from beginning to end. At last she struggled up to bed with a nagging feeling she had just missed something important.

  In the following two weeks, Agatha and her staff diligently went about their work, Agatha trying to put the murders of John Sunday and Dan Palmer out of her mind. The police had drained the millpond in the hope of finding Dan's car, but there was no sign of it, only the remains of Dan's listening device.

  "I daren't go back to that village," said Agatha to Mrs. Bloxby one evening, "but I would like to get another look at all of them. I know!"

  "Know what?" asked the vicar's wife uneasily.

  "Well, the Ladies Society here is always hosting other villages and they host us. Why don't we invite Odley Cruesis for . . . let me think . . . a special cream tea event in the village hall here. Teas at two pounds a head, plus coaches to bring them over. Give the money to charity. Alzheimer's could do with the money."

  "Mrs. Raisin! Think of the expense. We could not recoup enough to cover our own costs, let alone give anything to charity."

  "I'll pay for the lot. I will not let this murderer go free. Don't worry. I'll organise everything. Oh, and the village band to be hired to play jolly sounds."

  There was a ring at the doorbell. Mrs. Bloxby went to answer it and returned with Charles. "Oh, Charles," said Agatha, "I've had a great idea."

  Charles sat down on the sofa next to her and listened to her plans. "You'd better hire a couple of portaloos as well," he said. "Think of all the wrinklies that'll turn up. Think of all the weak bladders and swollen prostates. As far as I remember, the hall has only the one toilet."

  "I'll fix it," said Agatha, her eyes gleaming.

  "Agatha," said Charles plaintively, "you haven't told me why."

  "I want to be able to sit there and study the lot of them."

  "And you think your feminine intuition will kick in and you'll stand up and shout 'eureka' and point at someone. When a photo of a murderer appears in the newspapers, a lot of people say things like, 'Look at the eyes! Now, there's a killer.' Whereas before they were trapped, they probably looked very ordinary."

  "There must be something. Two weeks' time. I'll get the posters printed out tomorrow and send them over to the vicarage."

  "What if no one comes?" asked Charles. "I mean, I bet they know you live here and think there might be something fishy."

  "For a cream tea at two pounds a head and free transport, they'll come."

  "Pity it's tea and not liquor," said Charles. "Might loosen them all up a bit."

  "There's a point," said Agatha. "What's that woman's name, Mrs. Bloxby? The one who sells sloe gin and elderberry wine at the markets?"

  "Mrs. Trooly."

  "Get me her number. Good idea of yours, Charles."

  "Mrs. Raisin," said Mrs. Bloxby severely, "have you considered that an inebriated murderer might put you, for example, very much at risk?"

  "All the better," said Agatha cheerfully. "Flush 'em out! I think there's more than one."

  Mrs. Bloxby hoped it would rain on the great day, anything to stop this tea that she considered at best a waste of money and at worst, highly dangerous. But the sun shone down and the coaches bringing the visitors were all full. Agatha had hired caterers. Mrs. Trooly was moving amongst the tables, offering sloe gin and wine. The band was playing old favourites and there was a general air of good will and jollity. Even Giles Timson smiled on Agatha. "How very kind of you. Just what our villagers needed to take their minds off the horrors of the murders."

  Simon and Toni sat together at a table at the door. They had collected the money from the visitors and were now relaxing. "They do seem to be enjoying themselves," said Simon. "Even May Dinwoody was nice to me."

  "Agatha believes in stirring things up," said Toni. "What are we to do with the money?"

  "Count it up," said Simon. "Then we give it to Mrs. Freedman to put in the bank and she writes out a cheque to the Alzheimer's Society."

  "We'd better start," sighed Toni. "Some of them must have been raiding the piggy bank to pay their two pounds."

  "Agatha thinks of everything. She's left us piles of these little plastic bags from the bank, some for pennies, some for twenty pee pieces and so on. Let's see how quickly we can do it and then we'll go in there and sample the sloe gin, if there's any left."

  Penelope Timson brought over a chair and squeezed next to Agatha. "This is such fun," she said.

  "Yes," said Agatha bleakly. No one looked edgy. No one looked frighte
ned or ill at ease. "I'll just see how the young people are getting on."

  She went to the door, where Toni and Simon were putting coins into bags. "Nearly finished," said Toni cheerfully.

  "I'm going outside for a smoke," said Agatha.

  She sat down in a bench outside and lit up a cigarette. Must give these wretched things up, she thought for the umpteenth time. From inside she could hear the chatter of voices rising above the noise of the band. Charles came out and joined her. He was wearing a deep blue cotton shirt, open at the neck, and blue chinos and yet somehow looked as neat and composed as if he were in suit, collar and tie.

  "Give me one of those."

  "A cigarette, Charles? Bad for you."

  "Too right. Hand one over."

  He lit it and settled back on the bench. "Hasn't something struck you as funny?"

  "No. What?"

  "Look at it this way. We know they're a sour lot and Carrie Brother, for example, is hardly the flavour of the month in that village, and yet they're all wolfing down cream teas, gulping back sloe gin, and going on like a love-in."

  Agatha sat up straight. "You mean, they're all putting on an act?"

  "Looks like it to me."

  "But why? I mean, they must think there's a murderer amongst them."

  "Maybe they have a good idea who it is. They feel safe. Look at it from their point of view. John Sunday was an interfering pest, Dan Palmer was just asking for it, Simon was a cheat and a spy and so on. I should think every man jack of them has guessed why this sudden burst of generosity on your part and they're playing up to the hilt."

  "Well, thank goodness the proceeds are going to the Alzheimer's Society," said Agatha gloomily. "I may need their help soon. Should I stir things up? Should I go in there and say I know the identity of the murderer?"

  "And like Roy, the same thing could happen to you. Forget it. Enjoy the day."

  "Got over Sharon?" Simon asked Toni as they finally finished bagging up and recording all the money.

  "Not quite," said Toni. "I keep thinking I see her. I'll see someone ahead of me in the street, some girl with multicoloured hair wearing a boob tube and torn jeans and I want to run after her. I keep wondering if I could have done anything. I shouldn't have let Agatha turn her out of my flat."

  "And then you might have been dead as well. She'd have started inviting her biker friends back to the flat. Would you like to go to a movie with me tonight?"

  "Fine. Which one?"

  "I don't know. I'd just thought of the idea."

  The day was finally over. Not one scone or bit of strawberry jam or bowl of whipped cream was left. Mrs. Trooly had taken away the remainder of her drinks after handing Agatha a bill. The men came to take away the portaloos and complained bitterly at the state of them. "Some of them just peed on the floor," complained one of the men. "Dirty old hicks." He was a Birmingham man and considered the countryside outside the city to be peopled with inbred imbeciles.

  Agatha helped the caterers and village ladies to clean up the mess before she and Charles wearily trudged back to her cottage.

  "I'm going back to study my notes," said Agatha. "I swear there's something there."

  "I'll be off, then," said Charles.

  Agatha suddenly did not want to be left alone. "Charles, please . . ."

  He swung round and looked at her seriously. "Please what?"

  "Nothing," said Agatha gruffly. "I'll see you when I see you."

  She fed her cats and let them out into the garden and then collected her folders of notes and took them out to the garden table.

  She began to read. She found Simon's account of his trip to Cheltenham particularly amusing, as she remembered the days when she had to ferry around a horrible old couple called Boggle. Then she suddenly put the folders down on the table. Elderly . . . toilets . . . the portaloo man's complaints.

  She phoned Penelope Timson. "Oh, Mrs. Raisin. Thank you again for such a fine day."

  "I just wanted to ask you," said Agatha. "Do you have a downstairs toilet?"

  "Yes, just as you come in the front door, on the left."

  "I must come over and see you. It's terribly important."

  "Well, really . . . All right, but I plan to go to bed early."

  In the vicarage parlour, Agatha fixed Penelope with an intense gaze and said, "Now, you said that no one left the room during the evening John Sunday was murdered, except Miriam and Miss Simms. Right?"

  "Yes, and I told the police so as well. I don't see--"

  "Think! Did no one leave briefly to use the toilet?"

  "Yes, but it's just outside the door."

  "Who?"

  "This really is so embarrassing. I mean, one doesn't talk about such things. I was brought up to--"

  "Who?" shouted Agatha.

  "Let me see, I suppose Mr. Beagle and maybe Mr. Summer."

  "Right!" Agatha got to her feet and the next thing Penelope heard was the outside door slam.

  Chapter Eleven

  Agatha called an emergency meeting of her staff for eight o' clock the following morning.

  She described what she had learned and then said, "So you see it could either have been Charlie Beagle or Fred Summer."

  "But they're so old," protested Toni.

  "They're fit enough to put up all those Christmas decorations each year. One of them tips John Sunday off that there's going to be a meeting about him at the vicarage. He's a snoop, so he creeps up. Either Charlie or Fred nips out as if to go to the loo, gets in the garden, Grudge Sunday is moving up to the vicarage windows, so one of them stabs him and dives back into the house."

  Simon looked excited. "Wait a bit. Whoever it was wouldn't like to be sitting around with a bloody knife, knowing the police would be called the minute the body was found."

  "Maybe the murderer didn't expect Sunday to be found until after the confab was over," pointed out Patrick. "Whoever it was might not have expected Sunday to stagger up to the windows and die in front of everyone."

  "Yes, but even so. Where would the murderer hide a knife?"

  "In the cistern in the toilet?" suggested Phil. "But the police must have done a thorough search for the weapon."

  "But," said Agatha, practically jumping up and down with excitement, "when they were assured that no one apart from Miriam and Miss Simms had left the room, they didn't search any of us. The murderer might not have depended on that. The police were searching outside the vicarage for a weapon."

  "So we just tell the police," said Patrick, "and start them off on a new search."

  "I found this out," said Agatha stubbornly. "And I'm going to find out the rest of it. I'll get Mrs. Bloxby to go over to the vicarage with me to report on the takings from the teas. I'll go to the loo and look around and search the hall as well."

  "Who is this Miss Simms?" asked Simon. "Are you sure she couldn't have done it?"

  "Not the type. Besides, she left with Miriam and was with her the whole time."

  "You know," said Phil uneasily, "it was quite a time ago now. Our murderer has had plenty of opportunity to go back to the vicarage and get the knife back."

  Agatha's face fell. Then she said stubbornly, "I'm going to try."

  "I think you should let us know the time you're going to be in the vicarage," said Patrick, "and we'll all park somewhere nearby so you can call us if there's any danger. Remember, the vicar left for his study and the vicar is reputed to have a violent temper."

  "And I can't imagine two oldies murdering anyone over Christmas tree lights," said Simon.

  "I can," said Agatha defiantly. "Those lights were the highlight of their miserable lives."

  Agatha drove back to Carsely and told her startled friend, Mrs. Bloxby, of her plan.

  "But the police . . . ," began the vicar's wife in protest.

  "Sod the police. They'd descend in droves and clump around, alerting everybody. One of those villagers might have a nephew or a cousin in police headquarters for all we know."

  "Very
well. I'll just get the record of the money we took at the teas to make it all look respectable."

  Penelope welcomed them effusively. "Such a success! I do think good works give one a positive glow. Now, let's have a nice cup of tea in the garden. They say the weather is going to break, so this will be our last chance for a while to get some sunshine."

  Agatha waited impatiently until they were settled in their garden chairs and Penelope had brought out the tea tray, and then said, "Do excuse me."

  "It's on the first landing, if you want to powder your nose," said Penelope.

  "Haven't you got one in the hall?"

  "So dark. You'd be much better upstairs."

  "I'll be fine," said Agatha, and made her escape.

  The toilet off the hall was small and dark. It was old-fashioned with a high cistern and a long chain. There was a tiny window at the back which looked as if it had not been opened in ages. Beside the toilet was a small shelf of books of an improving nature--Is God in Your Life? Meetings with Jesus, and so on.

  Agatha carefully removed all the books but found nothing behind them. She put them back. Then the door handle of the toilet rattled. "Who's in there?" called Giles's voice.

  "Agatha Raisin. Sorry, I'm a bit constipated."

  She stood with her heart thumping until she heard him go up the stairs. Now, where else? There was a high shelf with spare toilet rolls. She stood on the seat of the lavatory pan and began to search behind them. Nothing.

  She got back down and sat down wearily on top of the lavatory. Then she studied the floor. It was covered in old green linoleum, some of it warped with damp and age. She got down on her knees and began to pull up pieces of it.

  Agatha could hardly believe her eyes when she finally ripped a lump clear from one corner and found herself looking down at a kitchen knife.

  She pulled out her phone and called Patrick. "I've found the weapon. Get the police!"

  There came a timid knock at the door. Penelope. "Are you all right, Mrs. Raisin?"

  Should she tell her? No.