Agatha Raisin and the Fairies of Fryfam

TWO

ANOTHER sunny morning and Agatha, ashamed of her night-time fears, decided to drive into Norwich, buy a microwave, have breakfast, and then return to tackle the estate agent over the lack of central heating.

Being in Norwich brightened up the feelings of city-bred Agatha immensely. She bought a microwave and a further supply of microwavable meals in Marks & Spencer, had a large cholesterol-filled breakfast, bought a cheap glass vase, and returned to Fryfam in a confident frame of mind.

After she had unpacked her shopping and fed her cats, she walked to the estate agent's.

She pushed open the door of Bryman's and walked in. To her intense irritation, she saw the droopy figure of Amy Worth sitting behind a computer screen. "Why didn't you tell me you worked here?" complained Agatha.

"There didn't seem much point," said Amy defensively. "I'm just the typist. I don't have anything to do with the renting of the houses."

"So who do I speak to?"

"Mr. Bryman. I'll get him."

Secretive about nothing at all, fumed Agatha. Amy reemerged and held open the door to an inner office. "Mr. Bryman will see you now."

Agatha walked past her. A youngish man with a sallow face, thick lips and wet eyes stood up and extended his hand. "Welcome, Mrs. Raisin."

Agatha shook his hand, which was clammy. What a damp young man, she thought. He was in shirt-sleeves and there were patches of sweat under his armpits. There was also an unpleasant goaty smell emanating from him. Amy, Agatha had noticed, was wearing the same clothes she had worn the day before. Perhaps no one in Fryfam bothered about baths.

Agatha sat down. "You should have warned me there was no central heating," she began.

"But the logs are free," he protested. "Stacks of logs."

"I do not want to have to set and clean all those fireplaces when the weather turns cold."

"We'll let you have a couple of Calor gas heaters like the one in the kitchen. I'll bring them round today."

"Don't you have anywhere else?"

"Not to rent. For sale only. Quite a lot of the houses in Fryfam are second homes. People leave them empty in the winter. Only come down for the summer months. There's always a demand for second homes. You'll find there's few of us here in the winter."

"Okay, I'll take the heaters. Now, there's something else."

He raised his eyebrows in query.

"I checked the inventory yesterday. There was definitely a stone vase in the sitting-room. Well, it's disappeared. I saw these lights at the end of the garden and went to investigate and when I came back the vase had gone."

"Oh, I think we can overlook that, Mrs. Raisin. It's just an old vase."

"I am not going to overlook it," said Agatha stubbornly. "Is there a policeman here? There must be. I phoned the police to get your name."

"There's PC Framp, but I wouldn't bother-"

"I will bother. Where is he? I didn't see a police station."

"It's out a bit on the road to the manor house."

"Which is where?"

"North of the village green. The road that goes out of the village the opposite way to the one you arrived on."

"Right. When will you be arriving with the heaters?"

"I've got a spare key. I'll leave them in the hall if you aren't in."

"Don't upset my cats."

"I didn't know you had pets, Mrs. Raisin. You didn't say anything about cats."

Agatha rose to her feet and looked at him truculently. "And you didn't say anything about not having them. No cats, no rental."

She turned and marched out. She ignored Amy. She was fed up with the whole bunch of them. And she had only just arrived!

She decided to drive. She returned home to get in her car and saw a square envelope lying inside the door. She opened it up. There was a note on stiff parchment. "We would like to welcome you to the village. Please come for tea this afternoon at four o'clock. Lucy Trumpington-James."

Summoned to the manor house, thought Agatha. Well, God knows, I've got nothing better to do.

She phoned Mrs. Bloxby in Carsely. "Haven't heard from James," said the vicar's wife promptly. "I wasn't phoning about that," lied Agatha. "Just wondered how everyone was getting on."

"Same as ever." said Mrs. Bloxby cheerfully. "What's that place in Norfolk like?"

"Weird," said Agatha. "It's a small village and I gather a large proportion of the population only use their houses in summer, which is enough to turn anyone Communist when you think of the housing shortage."

"Well, your house is going to be empty for the winter. Would you like me to find a homeless family?"

"No, don't," said Agatha, repressing a shudder.

"I thought not." Was the saintly Mrs. Bloxby being catty? Perish the thought.

"It's about these strange lights." Agatha told her all about them and about the locals' reluctance to even discuss them.

"You've a mystery to solve," said Mrs. Bloxby.

"I'm supposed to be meeting my destiny here, according to that fortune-teller."

"It's early days. You've only just arrived. I'm sure you'll stir something up. Oh, Charles phoned. Wanted to know where you were."

Agatha thought briefly of Sir Charles Fraith, lightweight, tightwad, fickle. "No, if my destiny is to meet some fellow, I don't want him hanging around."

"So, any eligible men around?"

"Apart from some gnarled old codger who put his hand on my knee and a sweaty estate agent, I haven't met any. And this cottage has no central heating, nothing but log fires."

"The weather can get grim over there. Are you sure you don't want to come back? You could use the lack of central heating as an excuse."

"Not yet, but you're right. I can leave this place any time I want. I meant to tell that estate agent I was leaving, but I'll hang on a bit longer."

After she had rung off, Agatha felt much cheered. Of course, she could simply pack up and go. But first, see what the local copper had to say.

She drove out of the village a little way and soon saw the police station. She parked outside and went and rang the bell. There was a police car on the short drive at the side, so she was sure PC Framp was at home.

After some minutes, the door was opened. PC Framp was a tall, thin man with receding hair above a lugubrious face. He had an apron on and was holding a frying pan.

"It's my day off," he said defensively.

Agatha ignored that. "My name is Agatha Raisin and I have just rented Lavender Cottage. There have been peculiar lights at the bottom of my garden and a vase is missing."

"Come in," he said wearily. "But don't mind if I cook my lunch."

Agatha followed him through the police office, and then along a corridor to a stone-flagged kitchen. It was amazingly dirty and smelt of sour milk. It was also very hot. The policeman put the frying pan on top of an Aga cooker, poured in oil, cracked in two eggs, then added two rashers of bacon and two slices of bread. A fine mist of fat rose from the pan and covered the already greasy black top of the cooker.

She sat down at a crumby plastic-topped kitchen table. She leaned her elbows on it and then realized she had put one elbow in a smear of marmalade. At last Framp shoveled the mess out of the frying pan onto a chipped and cracked plate and sat down opposite her.

"So," began Agatha impatiently, "what about these lights?"

"Some kids playing pranks."

"So you know that for a fact?"

"Educated guess." He stabbed the corner of a piece of fried bread into the yolk of an egg and shoved it in his mouth.

"So you don't really know?"

He chomped steadily, filled a mug with tea, took a great swallow, wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and then said, "Nothing important's ever taken. Just bits and pieces. A worthless picture, a cream jug, three forks, things like that."

"Why don't you come round to my cottage and fingerprint the place?"

"I don't fingerprint things. CID does that and they ain't going to come running over with their kit and the forensic boys over a load of junk."

"It doesn't seem to bother you that someone is frightening the village with their antics. They won't talk about it."

"Well, no, they wouldn't. Not to you."

"Why?"

"They think it's fairies."

Agatha stared at him and then said, "Oh, come on. Fairies at the bottom of the garden!"

"Fact."

"Fairies are not fact! And you've got egg on your chin. Look, the women I've met are not inbred peasants. They wouldn't believe in fairies."

"That they do. Some have been putting salt round their houses to keep the fairies away, others are leaving gifts like saucers of milk and things like that."

Agatha looked at him, puzzled, and then her face cleared. "Oh, I know what it is. You're pulling my leg."

"No. I'm telling you, Mrs. Raisin. This is a very old part of Britain and strange things do happen here."

"I don't believe in fairies and I don't think you do either." Agatha got to her feet. "I won't waste any more of your time. I'll solve the mystery myself. I am by way of being a detective."

She turned at the kitchen door and looked back, but he was dunking the last of his fried bread in the remaining egg.

Agatha got in her car in a bad temper. She drove slowly along until she came to a lodge-gate. This then must be the manor. She checked her watch. Three-thirty. Too early. She lowered the windows. The village of Fryfam nestled in pine woods and the air was sweet with the scent. A lazy bee blundered into the car, as if bewildered by all this late sunshine and warmth. Agatha wondered whether to swat it, but then realized she could not. She shrank back in her seat until it blundered out again.

Fairies, indeed! She decided furiously that the lazy policeman was probably trying to take the mickey out of a tourist.

Her thoughts turned to the vicar's wife, Mrs. Bloxby. Agatha knew that Mrs. Bloxby did not approve of her ongoing love for James Lacey and felt irritated. She should be sympathetic, understanding and supportive. Still, surely the whole reason for her flight to Norfolk, apart from the fortune-teller's prophecy, was to get James out of her hair. Not for a moment would she admit to herself that the real reason was because she wanted him to return to Carsely, find her gone and miss her.

She tried to jerk her thoughts back to the mystery of the dancing lights, but they kept returning to the way she would behave when she saw him again and what she would say. So immersed was she in her thoughts that it was with a start of surprise she realized the clock on the dashboard was registering five minutes past four. She started the car and turned into the drive. The pine trees were thick on either side. She was just wondering if she would ever reach the house when she turned a bend in the drive, and there it was, a square eighteenth-century building like a hunting-box, with a Victorian servants' wing stuck on one side. It had a small porticoed entrance with a very new coat of arms stuck on top. Two heraldic beasts supported a shield. Agatha squinted up as she got out of the car but could not make out the details. What had the Trumpington-Jameses put on their shield? Bathroom showers rampant?

She rang the bell at the side of the door. Lucy TrumpingtonJames answered the door wearing a gold silk Armani suit and a quantity of gold jewellery, chains round the neck and bracelets on her thin wrists.

"Come in," she said. "Tolly's in the drawing-room."

Agatha followed her across a dark hall with console tables topped with Chinese vases of autumn leaves. Harriet's work?

The drawing-room came as a shock to Agatha, who had been expecting something country-house with chintz, Persian rugs, and oil paintings. There were two large oatmeal sofas in front of the fire, the sort you made up of blocks of chairs. In front of them was an oblong black-lacquered table. The walls were painted blood-red and the fitted carpet was a gleaming expanse of white. The paintings were modern abstracts. The side tables were of white lacquer and covered with photo frames holding pictures of the Trumpington-Jameses out hunting, at parties, at Henley, at Ascot and various other fashionable places. A black-lacquered wall unit held a television set, a CD player and very new and unread-looking books. The fire was one of those electric fake-log ones. The room was bright; lit by a crystal chandelier overhead, and by angular brass standard lamps in corners.

"Do sit down, Mrs. Raisin," said Tolly Trumpington-James, rising to meet her. He was wearing a hacking jacket and cavalrytwill trousers. His Tattersall shirt was open at the neck.

"Call me Agatha," said Agatha, sitting down. She scanned the room for signs of an ashtray but could see none. She gave a little sigh, but at least it would keep her off fags for an hour.

Lucy rang a bell in the wall beside the fireplace. Its summons was answered, not by a neat maid, but by a fat, surlylooking woman in a stained gingham pinafore.

"We'll have tea now, Betty," said Lucy.

"And then I'm off," said surly Betty. "You'll need to clear up yourselves." She clumped off in a pair of battered boots.

"Help these days," said Lucy, raising her eyes. "Do you have trouble with help, Agatha?"

Not so long ago, the old Agatha, intimidated at being in a manor house, would have invented colourful stories about a whole regiment of servants. Now she simply said, "I don't have any trouble back home. I have an excellent cleaning woman who comes in twice a week."

"Lucky you," sighed Lucy. "I sometimes wish we had never come here."

"Why did you?" asked Agatha curiously.

"Made my pile," said Tolly. "Wanted a bit of country life. Get a bit of hunting."

"And because he wants to act the squire, we're stuck here," said Lucy with a light laugh.

Her husband flashed her an angry look, but the door opened and Betty lumbered in with a large tray which she deposited on the low table in front of them. Besides tea, there was a plate with a few chocolate biscuits-no sandwiches, no fruit-cake.

"That will be all, Betty," said Tolly imperiously.

"Should think so, too," grumbled Betty and off she went.

"Such a character," murmured Lucy, clanking her bangles.

People who would not pay good wages and put up with surly help were usually tight with money, thought Agatha.

"We had such a nice place in London. Kensington," said Lucy, pouring tea. "Help yourself to milk and sugar, Agatha. Do you know Kensington?"

"Yes, very well. I used to live in London. I had a public relations business. I took early retirement to move to the Cotswolds."

"Don't you miss London?"

"I did when I first moved to the country, but then a lot of exciting and scary things happened, and Carsely-that's where I live-began to seem more interesting than London."

There was a slight snore. Tolly had fallen asleep, his teacup resting on his paunch.

Lucy sighed, rose and took the cup from him.

"If only we could get back to London," she mourned. "But he wants to be the country gentleman. Doesn't work. None of the county invite us unless they want money for some charity or other. I tried to get that coat of arms taken down."

"Doesn't it come from the College of Arms or something?"

"No, he had an artist make it up for him. He got some poncey interior designer to do this room. Isn't it foul?"

"It's a bit ... modem."

"It's vulgar."

"Could you rent in London for the winter?"

"He won't think of it. He likes to keep me trapped here. So tell me, what on earth could be exciting about living in the Cotswolds?"

Agatha chattered on happily about her amazing detective abilities until she realized she was boring Lucy, so she finished by saying, "You have an interesting mystery here in Fryfam."

"Like what?" Lucy stifled a yawn.

"The fairies. The dancing lights."

"Oh, those. I'm telling you, once the second-home people go back to London, you're left with a lot of inbred peasants who'd believe anything."

"But I met the women's group members. They seem intelligent."

"Yes, but they're all from Fryfam, don't you see? You've never spent a winter here, have you?"

Agatha shook her head.

"It's so black and bleak and grim, you'll end up believing in fairies yourself."

Lucy yawned again.

Agatha rose to her feet. "I must go."

"Must you? Can you find your own way out?"

"Sure. Perhaps you would like to have tea with me?"

"Too kind. I'll let you know."

Agatha hesitated in the hall, looking in her handbag for her car keys. "Wake up, Tolly," she heard Lucy say sharply. "She's gone."

"Thank God for that. Another plain woman and not quite one of us."

"Not quite one of who?" demanded Lucy shrilly. "It's because of your snobbery that we're stuck in this dump."

Agatha walked quickly away, her face flaming. She had moved a long way away from the Birmingham slum of her upbringing, but at weak moments she thought that people could still sniff it out.

She got in the car and drove home and phoned Mrs. Bloxby. "You can give Cbarles my number and address and tell him if he's at loose ends, I've got a spare room."

"I'll tell him. How are those mysterious lights?"

"The locals believe they are fairies."

"How interesting! You're in the Breckland area of Norfolk, aren't you?"

"Am I?"

"Yes, I looked it up on the map. Very old part. There are tumuli and old flint quarries called Grimes Graves. Old places often make people superstitious. I think it's something in the soil."

"Well, I don't believe in fairies. Probably kids."

"Children? Got a lot of them in the village?"

"Come to think of it, I haven't seen one."

"Good hunting. Alf's just come home."

Alf was the vicar, who did not approve of Agatha Raisin.

"Right, talk to you soon." Agatha said goodbye and rang off. Then she felt petty. She had only wanted Charles to come to throw a baronet in Tolly's vulgar face.

Then she noticed two Calor gas heaters tucked at the side of the hall. She was beginning to think that all these tales of a grim winter were probably exaggerations and hoped she hadn't made a fuss about nothing.

She took a look in the back garden. Barry was mowing the lawn. It was a bit too late to put through a load of washing and hang it out. She wondered what the weather forecast was. She had not switched on the television set or the radio since her arrival.

Barry waved through the window to her and left. Agatha decided to try that book again. She wrote the title, "Death at the Manor." She had been to the manor, so that was a start. She would start by describing Lucy and Tolly., and their vulgar drawing-room and go on from there.

To her surprise, she had managed to write four pages before the doorbell rang. Amy stood on the doorstep. "I came to say how sorry I am that I didn't tell you I worked for the estate agents.' But you see, if anything was wrong, I thought you would blame me."

"Come in," Agatha said reluctantly. She saved what she had written and switched off the computer.

"Oh, I've interrupted your writing," said Amy. "You must be furious with me."

"Not at all. Come through to the kitchen." Agatha squinted at her watch. Six-thirty in the evening. "Do you want some dinner? I haven't eaten."

"If you're sure ..."

"No, it's frozen Marks's stuff. Sit down. Don't you have dinner with your husband?"

"Jerry's in the pub." Amy's eyes filled with tears.

"Oh, dear. The beautiful Mrs. Wilden?"

"Yes." Amy took out a small square of handkerchief and blew her nose fiercely. "She's taken away all our husbands. Harriet wants her tarred and feathered."

Agatha fished out a bottle of Gordon's gin she had brought with her. "Drink?"

"Please."

Agatha made two large gin and tonics. Then she took out two frozen packets of lasagna and put the first one in the microwave, and when that was done, put in the second, then gave the first an extra twirl.

She served the meals and then, sitting down opposite Amy, asked, "What does your husband do?"

"He works for a seed company just outside Norwich."

"And is he having an affair with Mrs. Wilden?"

"Oh, no."

"Then what's the problem?"

"It's just that he goes to the pub every night, and so does Henry Freemantle and Peter Dart."

"Harriet's and Polly's husbands, too?"

"Yes." Amy gave a dismal sniff and poked at her lasagna.

"And all they do is go to look at the fair Mrs. Wilden?"

Amy nodded.

"And does she encourage them?"

"I don't think Rosie Wilden has to do anything special. She just is."

"So why don't you and Harriet and Polly go to the pub?"

"We couldn't do that!"

"Why?" asked Agatha patiently.

"It's an old-fashioned village. They don't mind women in the pub at lunchtime, but they're frowned on in the evening."

"I've never heard anything more ridiculous. I'll phone Polly and Harriet. We'll all go."

"The husbands will be furious."

"Time they were."

Agatha went through to the phone, which was in a small table in the hall. She called through to Amy, "What are their phone numbers?"

Amy gave the numbers but then started to protest. Agatha ignored her. She phoned Harriet first and said curtly that Amy was crying her eyes out, so she was taking her to the pub, and did Harriet want to come and bring Polly.

There was a silence and then Harriet said harshly, "Do you know what you are doing?"

"Well, yes. I don't see why you should all be stuck at home while your husbands are in the pub. Into battle, Harriet."

"All right," said Harriet. "I'll do it. Damn it. I'll do it."

"See you both there in half an hour." Agatha rang off and returned to the kitchen.

"Right, Amy," she said. "Upstairs with me. I'm going to make your face up."

"But I never wear make-up. Jerry doesn't like me wearing make-up."

"I think your trouble is you always do what Jerry wants. Upstairs."

Agatha deftly worked on Polly's face-foundation cream, powder, blusher, mascara, eye-shadow and lipstick. "There!" she said a last. "You look more like a human being."

She jerked open her wardrobe door and took out a black dress. "Pop this on. What size of shoes do you wear?"

"Fives. But-"

"You need heels. Nothing like heels to give you confidence. Get a move on."

Amy, used to bending to any will stronger than her own, meekly put on the little black dress and a pair of high-heeled shoes. Agatha put some gold jewellery round her neck. "Now, straighten your shoulders. Right. Great. Forward march!"

Harriet and Polly were waiting outside the pub. "You look glamorous, Amy," said Harriet. This was a wild exaggeration, but had the effect of making Amy smile with delight.

"Here we go," said Agatha Raisin and pushed open the door.

Behind the bar, in the low, smoky room full of men, Rosie Wilden glowed like a jewel. She was wearing a soft white chiffon blouse with a plunging neckline.

Agatha found a table in a corner for her new friends. Silence had fallen at their entrance and the silence continued as Agatha walked to the bar and said to Rosie Wilden, "Have you any champagne?"

"I do indeed, Mrs. Raisin."

"Two bottles," ordered Agatha. "That's for starters."

"Big occasion?"

"Yes, my birthday," lied Agatha.

She returned through the still silent men to the table. "Our husbands are glaring at us," whispered Amy. "That's the three of them, over at the bar."

"Good," said Agatha. "Now when the champagne arrives, I want you all to sing `Happy Birthday to You.' "

"Is it your birthday?" asked Polly.

"No, but they don't know that and you don't want to look as if you've come in to check on them."

Rosie Wilden came round the bar with a tray of glasses. Then she turned and shouted, "Barry, could you be a love and bring the bottles and ice bucket over here?"

Agatha's gardener came up with the bottles and ice bucket. He was not overwhelmingly handsome, but, decided Agatha, he was the best-looking man in the pub. "Barry," cried Agatha. "Do join us. It's my birthday."

Barry grinned and shuffled his feet. "I'm with me two mates."

"Bring them over. We'd better have two more bottles, Mrs. Wilder."

Barry returned with his two friends and they crammed in round the table. Rosie deftly opened the first bottle. To Agatha's delight, Barry, unprompted, began to sing "Happy Birthday to You" in a strong baritone. He was joined by his friends, and then Harriet, Polly and Amy joined in.

"You have a lovely voice, Barry," said Agatha. "Know anything else?"

Barry, who had been already well oiled before he started on the champagne, got to his feet and proceeded to give them an Elvis Presley impersonation, "Jailhouse Rock," complete with gyrating hips and pretend guitar.

The three women, aware of their glaring husbands over by the bar, laughed and cheered. One of Barry's friends, Mark, a weedy youth with a rolled-up cigarette hanging from the corner of his mouth, said, "Don't half cheer the place up, a bit of a song. What about one of you ladies?"

To Agatha's amusement, Polly, slightly red about the nose-must have had a few to bolster her, thought Agatha-rose to her feet and belted out "The Fishermen of England," while they all drank steadily and more champagne appeared. The locals, hungry for a free drink, began to crowd round the table until the errant husbands were left isolated at the bar.

"Why don't those three join the party," shouted Agatha.

"That's our husbands," said Harriet.

"Your husbands!" Agatha affected amazement. "What on earth are they doing on their own? Do they come to ogle the barmaid?"

The three promptly came over but could not get near the table for the crowd. Agatha called for more songs and more champagne and kept the party going until Rosie called, "Time, gentlemen, please."

They all crowded out into the night. "What a marvellous evening," said Agatha loudly. "See you here tomorrow night, girls?"

The "girls" were now flanked by their glaring husbands, but Harriet said gamely, "Same time, same place, Agatha."

Agatha saw the lank figure of the village policeman crossing the green and decided to leave her car where it was. She walked home, somewhat unsteadily, let herself in and swallowed as much cold water as she could to try to stave off next morning's hangover.

Next morning, she was awakened by a furious ringing of her doorbell. She put on a dressing-gown and struggled downstairs. The clock in the hall said eight o'clock.

She opened the door, blinking in the strong sunlight, and focused on the wrathful face of Henry Freemantle.

"We want you to leave our wives alone," he said truculently.

"What on earth are you talking about?"

"That pub is for men."

"Apart from the delicious Rosie?"

He reddened. "I'm warning you."

"See this door?" said Agatha. "Take a good, close look at it."

She slammed it in his face.

What time-warp have I landed in, she thought angrily, but she felt hung over and shaken. Once more she toyed with the idea of packing up and going home. She fed the cats and let them out into the garden and went back to bed and immediately fell asleep, not waking until noon.

She showered and dressed, feeling much better. A good walk was what she needed. This glorious weather would not last forever.

She walked out on the road leading past the police station and the manor lodge. The air was sweet with the scent of pine. A hill wound upwards. She reached the top and paused in amazement. The road before her dipped down to flatland as far as the eye could see. An enormous sky stretched out over her head. She walked down and along the straight ribbon of road. She walked until she came to a broad lake bordered by reeds. A light breeze ruffled its glassy surface, which mirrored the small puffy clouds in the blue sky above. She sat down on a rock. Behind her, a stone plover called. Agatha did not know the name of the bird, only that the sound made her feel lonely and isolated.

But then the bird fell silent and after a time the loneliness ebbed, leaving her enfolded in a strange feeling of peace. She lit a cigarette and then promptly stubbed it out. Cigarettes tasted foul in fresh air. The old Agatha would have chucked the unsmoked cigarette into the lake. The new Agatha put it in her pocket, not wanting any passing duck to gobble it up.

A skein of geese flew far overhead. Agatha sat dreaming about not much in particular, soothed by the lapping of the water and the breeze rusting through the tall reeds.

At last she rose and stood up. She felt slightly stiff and all her ease left her. She was suddenly sharply aware of being middle-aged. Was it worth all the effort to keep age at bay with exercise and anti-wrinkle creams? There was always the temptation to let it all go, let the hair grow in grey, let the chin sag and come to terms with age.

She looked towards the horizon, shading her eyes. There was a black line of cloud and thin wisps of cloud were streaming out from it like the fingers of approaching winter. The air had become cold. Diminished now by the grandeur of the spacious landscape, Agatha headed homewards, glad as she walked back up the hill again and found herself enclosed on either side by the whispering pine trees, the bleak immensity of the flatland behind her now blotted out. Her stomach rumbled, reminding herself that she had not eaten anything.

She was walking up to her cottage when she came across Lucy Trumpington-James. "I've been looking for you," she said abruptly. "What's all this about your birthday party in the pub? You might have told me."

"Come in," said Agatha, leading the way up the garden path and remembering at the same time that her car was still parked outside the pub. She unlocked the door. "I'll let you into a secret, Lucy. It wasn't really my birthday. I was just trying to cheer up the local ladies. Their husbands had deserted them to gawk at the charms of Rosie Wilden."

Lucy followed her into the kitchen and sat down at the kitchen table. "That trollop."

"Are you sure she's a trollop? She seems kind. She can't help it if she's pretty."

"Oh, yeah? Well, I think she's having an affair with Tolly."

"Have you asked him?"

"Yes, but he denies it, of course."

"So what proof do you have?"

"Rosie makes her own rose perfume. Sickly stuff. I came back from the hairdresser in Norwich and the smell of the stuff was in our bedroom, and Tolly had changed the bed and washed the sheets. When did Tolly ever wash sheets? He said some woman from the hunt committee had been round and had used our bathroom, which is off our bedroom, to repair her make-up. He pointed out that Rosie gives the perfume all round the village."

"And the sheets?"

"He says this woman took a drink up with her and spilt some on the bed."

"Oh, dear."

"I asked for her name and he went into a fury and said I was always picking on him and he wants a divorce."

Agatha plugged in the electric coffee percolator. "But I mean, wouldn't divorce be a good idea? Then you could move back to London."

"I need proof. I need good, solid proof that he's been messing about and then I can take him to the cleaner's."

"Don't you have any money of your own?"

"No." A bitter little no.

"What did you do before you were married?"

"I modelled. Not top-flight or even the second landing. Catalogue stuff, TV ads for sanitary towels, that sort of thing."

"How did you meet Tolly?" Agatha took down two mugs and took out the milk and sugar.

"At an Ideal Home Exhibition. Me and another model were hired to wear bath towels and decorate his stand. He took me out for dinner, and that was that."

Agatha poured two cups of coffee. "Help yourself to milk and sugar." She lit a cigarette.

"Mind if I have one of those?" asked Lucy.

"Sure." Agatha pushed the packet forward. "I thought you didn't smoke. Couldn't see any ashtrays in that house of yours."

"Tolly won't let me. He used to smoke sixty a day."

"Oh, one of those. How long have you been married?"

"Five years."

"Five years? Were you married before?"

"Not me." Lucy shrugged. "Always waiting for Mr. Right. Anyway, the reason I called is this. I want you to get proof for me of his philandering. You said you were a detective. I've got some money squirrelled away. I'll pay you."

"It's not the sort of thing I like to do," said Agatha slowly. "Messy and dirty business."

Lucy surveyed her impatiently. "What else have you got to do in this God-alive place where they believe in fairies?"

"I'm writing a book." Agatha had forgotten until then about her book. She was suddenly eager to get back to it.

"Think about it," urged Lucy. "I'm desperate."

"I tell you what, I'll ask around," said Agatha. "A few of the women here seem bitter about Rosie."

If I did a bit more investigating, thought Agatha, it would be good for the book. It's based on this unlovely couple anyway.

Her mind returned to the fairies. "Any children in this village?" she asked.

"A few. Not many young couples, so the others have children who are grown up and married and living elsewhere. There isn't a council house estate here, so no young mothers. Betty Jackson, over in the cottage beyond the estate agent's, has four, but like all kids these days, after they get bussed back from school, they're usually stuck in front of the television set."

"I wonder how whoever it is gets in houses so easily to take stuffy"

"A lot of people don't lock their doors, or they leave the key under the doormat or on a string hanging through the letterbox. Forget about fairies, Agatha. Try to get something on Tolly."

After she had left, Agatha decided to go back to writing her book. Determined not to read a word of it until she had completed one chapter, she ploughed on. It was only when the light started fading outside that she realized she was ferociously hungry and that she had promised to meet the women at the pub.

She put a frozen curry in the microwave, and when it was ready, ate it quickly and went up to change her clothes.

The pub was relatively empty. Harriet, Amy, and Polly were there with their husbands. When Agatha showed signs of joining them, Henry Freemantle gave her a venomous glare. No one offered to buy her a drink.

Agatha was suddenly fed up with the lot of them. "What can I get you, Mrs. Raisin?" asked Rosie Wilden. Her blond hair was piled up on her head, apart from one errant curl straying down to a creamy bosom, almost down to the nipple exposed by another plunging blouse, black this time.

"A bottle of arsenic," said Agatha sourly.

Rosie let out a peal of laughter. "You are a one."

"Aren't I?" said Agatha. "Are you having an affair with Tolly Trumpington-James?"

Rosie's good humour was undented. "Mrs. Raisin, dear, according to the local gossip, I'm having a affair with every man in this village. Tolly don't even come in here. Too common for him."

"I think I'll change my mind about ordering a drink," said Agatha. "I don't want to go and sit with that lot."

"Suit yourself. Sit somewhere else?"

"No, tell them I've left something in the oven."

Agatha made her escape, walking straight past the table where her new friends and their husbands were sitting.

This time, she remembered to pick up her car. She drove home. Her cats were in the garden. They came in on stiff legs, backs arched, fur standing out. Agatha looked down at them. Then she looked down the garden. Those lights were dancing around again.

With a roar of rage, she ran down the garden. The lights flickered and disappeared.

She ran back into the house and through it and out to her car, where she got a torch.

Then she hurried back to the garden again and began to search every inch of ground where she had seen those lights. The grass was springy and uncut, being a wild area beyond the drying green which Barry had mowed.

Baffled, she returned to the house. She took out the inventory and began to check everything carefully. Nothing seemed to be missing.

But she felt frightened and uneasy.