by M C Beaton
‘Just look at the weather,’ said Roy bitterly as a flaming sunset settled over the Cotswold Hills and the first stars glimmered faintly in a perfect sky.
‘There’s a curse on the whole venture,’ said Agatha gloomily. ‘Perhaps, after dinner, we should go for a long walk and tire ourselves out.’
‘I’m tired already.’ Roy yawned.
‘I mean I want to be exhausted when I go to bed or I’ll keep seeing dead Robina.’
They parked in the square at Mircester and walked to the Chinese restaurant. Agatha grabbed Roy’s arm before he could go in and hissed, ‘Look who’s sitting at the window.’
Roy looked and saw a middle-aged Chinese man with a droopy moustache and what appeared to be a typical Gloucestershire housewife.
‘So?’
‘That’s Bill Wong’s parents.’
‘The father’s Chinese, surely. Good sign.’
‘No, it’s not. They like terrible food.’
‘Oh, well, where to? I’m not really hungry.’
‘Me neither. Let’s walk for a bit.’
They set off in a westward direction, glancing aimlessly in shops, both wrapped in their own thoughts.
Finally they reached the suburbs and walked along a quiet street lined with villas.
‘Am I seeing things?’ asked Agatha, breaking the silence. ‘Or is that Mary Owen just turning in at that gate?’
Under the light of a street lamp a little way ahead, the tall figure certainly looked like Mary Owen.
Agatha quickened her pace. ‘Mary!’ she called.
The woman stopped, her hand resting on the gate, and looked back at them.
‘Mary!’ said Agatha again.
‘I am Mary’s sister,’ said the woman. ‘I am Mrs Darcy, and who are you?’
‘I am Agatha Raisin, and this is Roy Silver.’
‘I have heard of you. You’re that interfering busybody who fancies herself a detective. Good evening.’ Mrs Darcy went in and shut the gate with a clang. Agatha and Roy walked on.
‘Did you notice the remarkable resemblance?’ said Agatha excitedly. ‘They could be twins. Why didn’t Bill say something about it?’
‘So what?’
‘That’s how the alibi could have been established. The neighbours could have thought they were seeing Mary when in fact they were seeing Mrs Darcy.’
‘Wait a bit. The curtains were drawn back on the evening of the murder. They were seen dining together.’
‘But dinner doesn’t take all evening.’ Agatha gave a skip of excitement.
‘When was it you went to the spring?’
‘It was nearly midnight. They’re vague about the time of death, but put it somewhere earlier in the evening. Now, when you and I think about dinnertime, we think about eight o’clock or after, but a lot of people have it much earlier.’
‘We could ask the neighbours.’
‘I’ve a feeling if we did that, Mary and her sister would report us for intrusion of privacy. We’ll ask Bill tomorrow. Roy, I’d begun not to care who committed the first murder. But two! And James going ahead and investigating without me! By God, I’d like to find out who did it just to see his face.’
‘I’m really tired now,’ complained Roy, ‘and hungry. Look at the time, Agatha.’ He thrust his Rolex watch in front of Agatha’s eyes. ‘Eleven o’clock. A lot of the pubs are shut. We’ll be lucky to find anywhere open.’
They trudged the long way back into the centre of Mircester. ‘The Chinese is still open.’
‘Oh, let’s just have a bowl of something, then,’ said Agatha.
The restaurant was nearly empty. ‘Let’s just order one of the set meals,’ said Agatha. ‘I’m too weary to wade through the menu.’
The food was delicious. ‘So we wandered around for nothing,’ said Roy.
‘Not nothing. We know now that Mary looks remarkably like her sister.’
‘Can I have something to drink? You’re driving.’
‘I thought you’d gone off alcohol.’
‘It’s the stress.’
‘You know what they say – once you start saying you need a drink, you’re in trouble.’
‘But that’s your favourite line, Aggie dear.’
‘Well, these are exceptional circumstances.’ Agatha called the waiter over and asked for the wine list. ‘We’ll get a cab home. James can drive us in the morning.’
‘Oho! I thought you wanted nothing to do with him.’
‘We’re in competition now and I want to know what he’s up to.’
Agatha slept heavily and awoke to find it was nine in the morning. She let out a squawk of alarm and phoned James.
‘Yes, what is it, Agatha?’ Crisp, very crisp.
‘I’ve left my car in Mircester and wondered if you could give me and Roy a lift over to Mircester this morning.’
There was a short silence and then James said curtly, ‘I’ll pick you up at ten.’
Agatha shot upstairs, calling on Roy to wake up as she did so. She washed and made herself up with care.
Roy and Agatha walked along to James’s cottage promptly at ten. He got in beside the wheel of his car. Roy made as if to get into the front passenger seat, but Agatha jerked him back.
‘Only trying to save you embarrassment, Aggie,’ muttered Roy, getting into the back seat.
‘So who do you think is committing these murders?’ asked James.
‘I favour Mary Owen.’
‘Why?’
‘Just a hunch.’
‘It’s more than that,’ said Roy eagerly. ‘We took a walk in Mircester last night and we came across that sister, Mrs Darcy. She’s the spitting image of Mary.’
I’ll kill you, Roy, thought Agatha, who had been hoping to keep back that bit of information.
‘But Bill said something about the neighbours having seen them having dinner together.’
‘But Aggie didn’t find Struthers’s body until near midnight. Mary could have driven over from Mircester, bumped him off somewhere and dumped the body at the spring. Or she could have been helped by her sister.’
‘I don’t like that idea,’ said James. ‘I would like to know more about the Freemonts.’
‘You can’t think it’s them,’ said Agatha.
‘Why not? They may have known Struthers was going to vote against the water.’
‘But what about Robina?’ asked Agatha.
‘Well, she could have changed her mind.’
‘Too late to do that,’ Roy pointed out. ‘She must have signed something and that speech of hers – or rather the notes for it – if there had been anything about stopping the water company, it would have been in those notes and the police would have said something.’
‘True.’ James negotiated a bend too quickly and Agatha was thrown against him. She struggled upright. That touch of her shoulder against James’s had sent an electrical charge through her body. ‘What is the background of the Freemonts, Agatha?’
‘Business in Hong Kong. Rag trade. Moved over here.’
‘I know all that. Anything else? Either of them married or been married?’
‘Guy isn’t married,’ said Agatha quickly. ‘I don’t know about Peter.’
‘How do you know Guy isn’t married?’
‘I just know,’ said Agatha crossly. ‘Oh, look out!’
James braked suddenly. A small deer darted in front of the car and vanished into the dappled shade of a wood at the side of the road.
James drove on more slowly. ‘I mean,’ Agatha continued, ‘he hasn’t tried to hide me off in obscure restaurants.’
‘His wife need not be living in the area,’ said James.
‘I still think the murderer is one of the parish council,’ said Roy ‘They all seem pretty nasty.’
‘If there is one thing I hate,’ said Agatha, ‘it’s environmental groups, them with their open-toed sandals and open-toed minds.’
‘They can be a pain.’ James accelerated along the Fosse. ‘But someon
e’s got to put the brakes on some of the time. Do you know what they did with some of those lovely old Georgian houses in Mayfair? They’re supposed to preserve the façade, so they take down the building behind in such a way that the whole thing collapses. Oops! Sorry, they say, and build some horrible modern box instead. Then take Greenpeace.’
‘Please,’ muttered Roy sotto-voce from the back seat.
‘They often come across as a bunch of publicity seekers who never actually do anything constructive, and yet it was their complaints about the filth of British beaches that started the clean-up.’
‘Interesting discussion.’ Agatha sighed. ‘It’s not getting us any nearer finding out who murdered Robina or Struthers.’
‘Could you not,’ said James, ‘get them all together in one room? I mean, Agatha, as a rep of the water company, you could send out invitations to a get-together. A sort of bury-the-hatchet meeting? Offer them champagne and a buffet. Something that’ll draw them.’
‘It might work.’ Agatha thought quickly. ‘They’ll all feel under suspicion and that might draw them together. I’ll think about it. I know, my garden’s looking pretty nice. I could hold a garden party.’
‘I’ll pay half,’ said James. ‘I shouldn’t think the water company would stump up.’
‘They might.’ Agatha sounded cautious. ‘I mean, they still want me to work for them, so I might put it to them that it would be a goodwill gesture. In fact, after we’re finished at the police station, we could drive over to the company and I’ll suggest it.’
So much for competing with James, thought Roy. But he knew if Agatha worked a little longer for the company, then his firm would get a substantial cut and he would be the golden boy.
To Agatha it seemed strange that she and James, who had only recently been at loggerheads, should be conversing so amiably. But then James had always been like that.
As she made her statement at the police station, she could not help remembering the other times she had made statements to the police along with James. Did he think of that? Did he think ever of the times they had made love?
It was always hard to tell with James.
After they had made their statements, they drove out to the water company. It was a hive of activity, not the semi-deserted place it had been when Agatha had first arrived.
While James parked, Agatha whipped out her powder compact and peered anxiously at her face in the little mirror, all her fear of wrinkles returning now that she was to see Guy.
In reception they waited until Portia came to fetch them. She smiled at James and Roy but not at Agatha. She was wearing a tailored jacket over tailored shorts which exposed her long, long legs in sheer black tights.
She led them into the boardroom. Guy and Peter were waiting for them.
‘What’s this delegation?’ asked Guy.
Agatha explained that they had all gone together to police headquarters to make statements and since Roy was her house guest and from head office, and James Lacey, her neighbour, had kindly driven them, she had just brought them along.
‘So are you going to work for us for a bit longer?’ asked Peter.
‘That’s what I want to discuss with you. These murders have caused a lot of bad feeling in Ancombe. I thought it might be good public relations to throw a garden party for the members of Ancombe Parish Council.’
Guy looked amused. ‘I can’t see the press turning up for anything like that.’
‘It’s more of a goodwill mission than a press party,’ said Agatha.
‘I appreciate your motives,’ said Peter, ‘but we’ve already done enough for that village and we have to work to our budget. I cannot see the point of funding anything that doesn’t get us in the newspapers.’
‘Then I’ll do it myself,’ said Agatha. With James beside her, she wanted more than ever to distance herself from Guy. ‘And as a matter of fact, I’m going to stop representing you. The launch is over. The water’s on the market. There is really no need any longer to engage me.’
Portia, who had been sitting at the end of the table, said suddenly, ‘I’ve been telling you and telling you, I am perfectly capable of doing the public relations job. The launch was a fiasco.’
‘I didn’t plan the rain, the murder or The Pretty Girls scandal,’ said Agatha.
‘I said, didn’t I, Guy, that The Pretty Girls were a bad idea?’ said Portia. ‘I mean, one heard murmurs.’
‘Murmurs that you didn’t bother telling me about.’ Agatha glared.
Portia shrugged her elegant shoulders.
‘We don’t want to lose you,’ said Guy.
‘That’s very flattering.’ Agatha got to her feet. ‘But I’m going to be too busy. Give the job to Miss Sunshine over there.’
Guy rushed to hold the door open for her. ‘Dinner tonight?’ he asked.
‘Can’t,’ said Agatha. ‘Got Roy staying. I’ll phone you.’
Portia led them out to reception. Agatha nodded to her curtly and walked away. To her horror, she heard James ask Portia, ‘Are you free for dinner one evening?’
Agatha stopped in her tracks, her shoulders rigid.
She heard Portia laugh and say, ‘I don’t think my boyfriend would approve, but why don’t you give me your phone number anyway?’
Agatha, with Roy behind her, walked out to James’s car and stood fuming.
‘He’s sure one of the Freemonts did it,’ said Roy in a soothing voice. ‘That’s why he asked her out.’
But Agatha’s mind was full of pictures of James dining by candle-light with the beautiful Portia, James taking Portia home, James staying the night.
‘So do we still go ahead with the garden party?’ asked James when he joined them.
‘May as well. I’ll try to get them here for next Sunday. Will you stay on for that, Roy?’
‘Think, if you don’t mind, I’d better get back to London tonight,’ said Roy. He was considering that it was one thing to stay on with Agatha Raisin, prize PR for the water company, but quite another, in his boss’s eyes, to stay on with plain unemployed Mrs Raisin.
Agatha flashed him a cynical look. Roy’s job would always come first.
James dropped them at Agatha’s car and they followed him home.
When they arrived back in Carsely, James said, ‘When are we going to discuss the arrangements for this garden party, Agatha?’
Roy had got out of the car first and was waiting on Agatha’s doorstep.
James and Agatha were standing outside their cars on the pavement.
‘If you want to work with me,’ said Agatha in a low voice.
‘Truce,’ said James. ‘Let’s just forget all the hard things we’ve been saying to each other. We’ve worked well together in the past.’
‘Okay,’ said Agatha, half-torn between elation and dread, dread that she was being sucked back down into all the miseries caused by proximity to James. ‘So maybe we should get on the phone and invite them all?’
‘All right. We’ll use my phone.’
‘Right, I’ll tell Roy to pack. I’ll see you in a few minutes.’
‘I’m going to James’s to make some phone calls,’ said Agatha. ‘I’ll leave you to pack.’
To her surprise, there was no argument from Roy about being left out. But Roy was glad of an opportunity to phone his boss on his own without Agatha listening. If there was any credit to be got out of the launch, he would take it; if there was any blame, then Agatha could shoulder it.
Agatha walked along to James’s cottage. The door was standing open and she walked into the book-lined living-room. ‘Sit down and I’ll bring the coffee,’ shouted James from the kitchen.
Agatha took out her compact and dusted her nose with powder.
She stuffed it back in her handbag as James came in carrying a tray with two mugs.
‘Now,’ said James, ‘let’s see who we’ve got. Against the water company we have Mary Owen, Bill Allen and Andy Stiggs. For, we have Jane Cutler, Angela Buckley and Fred Shaw.
’ He produced a notebook. ‘I’ve got their names and phone numbers here. Drink your coffee and we’ll start phoning. Who’s going to do the phoning?’
‘I think you’d better,’ said Agatha. ‘I seem to bring out the beast in them.’
‘And what’re we having? And how do we know the weather will be fine for a garden party?’
‘I’ll tell you why the weather’ll be fine,’ said Agatha bitterly. ‘Because it’s done its worst to drown out the launch and the long-range forecast is good. Do you think they will come? Mary Owen’s bound to refuse. I keep wondering who could have murdered Robina. Was it all really because of the water? I wonder who gets her cottage and her money?’
‘I heard someone say she had a son. Anyway, here goes. I’ll start with the worst. Mary Owen.’
‘Good luck. But I don’t think you’ll get very far. Do you know her?’
‘Yes, as a matter of fact, I called on her before I went off to join Save Our Foxes. We got on all right.’
‘You might have told me!’
‘We’re having a truce – remember?’
‘Oh, all right, but I want a cigarette. I’ll take it out into the garden. Are we just going to have the people from the parish council? It might be viewed as a bit of a snub by our friends in the village if they’re not invited.’
‘Don’t let them know you’ve resigned from the water company, then. Let them think it’s business.’
Agatha went out into James’s small front garden, sat down on the doorstep and lit a cigarette.
She listened to him talking on the phone. That easy laugh of his! There was a lot of the actor in James. When he had finished phoning, should she confront him, say something like ‘Where do we stand now, James?’
But he might answer something to the effect that they stood nowhere, nowhere at all.
‘Mary,’ she heard him say in a cajoling voice, ‘it’s just a get-together, champagne and eats, all paid for by the water company. Look at it this way: you’ve all got to put this behind you and work together for the better good of the parish. Yes, a good opportunity to mend fences. What time? Oh, twelve or twelve-thirty. Good, see you then.’
So Mary was coming.
Agatha finished her cigarette and threw the stub over the hedge and out into the road, where it landed at the feet of Mrs Darry, who picked up the stub and threw it back. ‘Don’t you have an ashtray?’ she demanded angrily. ‘We’re not in London now.’