Agatha Raisin and the Quiche of Death

Agatha backed off in case he should see her. He stood there, sampling wine for a long time until the terrier racing was announced. He said something to the reporter and they headed off to the arena. Agatha followed them and waited until they were in the arena. She retreated to a stand and bought herself a waxed coat and a rain-hat. The rain was still drumming down. It was going to be a long day. The terrier racing was followed by show jumping. Agatha lurked at the edge of the thinning crowd, but feeling that the hat and coat she had just put on disguised her somewhat.

At the end of the show jumping, the rain stopped again and a chill yellow sunlight flooded the fair. Heart beating hard, Agatha saw the photographer wind the film from his camera, pop it in his case, and then reload with another. Slowly she took off her coat. The photographer and reporter headed out of the arena and back to the local wine stand. Try the birch wine," the woman serving was urging them as Agatha crept closer. She dropped her coat over the camera case, mumbled something and bent and seized the handle of the camera case and lifted it up and scurried off round the back of a tent. She opened the case and stared down in dismay at all the rolls of film. Too bad. She took them all out after putting on her coat again so that she could stuff the rolls of film into her pocket.

She heard a faint yell of "Police!" and hurried off, leaving the camera case on the ground. She felt sure that the woman serving the wine had not noticed her and the photographer and reporter had not even turned round. She felt lucky in that they were not from a national paper, otherwise they would have concentrated on her and Barbara James and would have referred back to the quiche poisoning. But local photographers and reporters knew that their job at these fairs was to get as many faces and prize-winners on their pages as possible so as to boost circulation. But if the picture of her brandishing a knife in the beer tent had turned out well, she knew they would use it, along, no doubt, with quotes from the enraged Barbara James.

She was just driving out of the car-park when a policeman flagged her down. Agatha let down the window and looked at him nervously. "A photographer has had his camera case stolen," said the policeman. "Did you notice anything suspicious?" He peered into the car, his eyes darting this way and that. Agatha was painfully conscious of her coat pockets bulging with film. "No," she said. "What a terrible thing to happen."

There came a faint cry of "We've found it." The police man straightened up. That's that," he said with a grin. These photographers are always drinking too much. Probably just forgot where he left it."

He stood back. Agatha let in the clutch and drove off. She did not once relax until she was home and had lit a large fire. When it was blazing, she tipped all the rolls of film on to it and watched them burn merrily. Then she heard a car drawing up.

She looked out of the window. Barbara James!

Agatha dived behind the sofa and lay there, trembling. The knocking at the door, at first mild, became a fusillade of knocks and kicks. Agatha let out a whimper. Then there was silence. She was just about to get up when something struck her living-room window and she crouched down again. She heard what she hoped was Barbara's car driving off. Still she waited.

After ten minutes, she got up slowly. She looked at the window. Brown excrement was stuck to it, along with wisps of kitchen paper. Barbara must have thrown a wrapper full of the stuff.

She went through to the kitchen and got a bucket of water and took it outside and threw it at the window, returning to get more water until the window was clean. She was going back inside when she saw Mrs. Barr standing at her garden gate, watching her, her pale eyes alight with malice.

Her rumbling stomach reminded Agatha that she had not eaten. But she did not have the courage to go out again. At least she had bread and butter. She made herself some toast.

The phone rang shrilly. She approached it and gingerly picked up the receiver. "Hello," came Roy's mincing voice. That you, Aggie?" "Yes," said Agatha, weak with relief. "How are you?"

"Bit fed up."

"How's Steve?"

Haven't seen him. Gone all moody on me."

Buy him a book on village customs. That'll make his eyes light up."

The only way to make that one's eyes light up," said Steve waspishly 'is to shine a torch in his ear. I've been given the Tolly Baby Food account."

Congratulations."

On what?" Roy's voice was shrill. "Baby food's not my scene, ducky.

They're doing it deliberately. Hoping I'll fail. Mre your line."

"Wait a bit. Isn't Tolly Baby Food the stuff that some maniac's been putting glass in and then blackmailing the

They've arrested someone, but now Tolly wants to restore their image."

Try going green," suggested Agatha. "Suggest to the advertising people a line of healthy baby food, no additlves, and with a special safety cap. Get a cartoon figure to Pr rrvote it. Throw a press party to show off the new varuial-proof top. "Only Tolly Baby Food keeps baby safe," that sort of thing. And don't drink yourself. Take any j utnalist who has a baby out for lunch separately."

They don't have babies," complained Roy. "They give birth to bile."

There are a few fertile ones." Agatha searched her memory" There Jean Hammond, she's got a baby, and Jeffrey Corbie's wife has just had one.

You'll find out more if you try. Anyway, women journalists feel obliged to write about babies to show they're normal. They have to keep trying to identify with the housewives they secretly despise you know Jill Stamp who's always rambling on her godson? Hasn't got one.

All part of the "I Wish you were doing it," said Roy. "It was fun working for you, Aggie. How's things in Rural Land?" Agatha hesitated and then said, "Fine."

This was greeted by a long silence. It suddenly struck Agatha with some amazement that Roy might possibly want an invitation.

"You know all that tat in my living-room?"

"What, the fake horse brasses and things?"

"Yes, I'm auctioning them all off in the name of charity. On the tenth of June, a Saturday. Like to come down and see me in action?"

"Love to."

"All right. I'll meet the train on Friday evening, on the ninth.

Wonder you can bear to leave London."

"London is a sink," said Roy bitterly.

"Oh, God, there's a car outside," yelped Agatha. She looked out of the window. "It's all right, it's only the police."

"What have you been up to?"

"I'll tell you when I see you. Bye."

Agatha answered the door to Bill Wong. "Now what?" she asked. "Or is this just a friendly call?"

"Not quite." He followed her into the kitchen and sat down at the table.

"You were at the Ancombe Fair, I gather," said Bill.

"So?"

"You were seen in the beer tent waving a knife at Miss. Barbara James."

"Self-defence. The woman tried to strangle me."

"Why?"

"Because I believe she had been having an affair with Cummings-Browne and she learned my name and saw red."

He flipped open a small notebook and consulted it. "Photographer Ben Birkin of the Cotswold Courier snapped a picture and lo and behold, his camera case was snatched. No cameras taken but all the rolls of film." "Odd," said Agatha. "Coffee?"

"Yes, please. Then I had a call from Fred Griggs, your local bobby. He had a report that a woman answering to Barbara James's description threw shit at your windows." "She's mad," said Agatha, thumping a cup of instant coffee in front of Bill. "Quite mad. And you still claim the death of Cummings-Browne was an accident. I regret that scene in the beer tent. I'm glad that photographer lost his film. I've suffered enough without having my photo on the front of some local rag. Oh, God, I suppose they'll run the story even if they don't have the picture to go with it."

He looked at her speculatively. "You are a very lucky woman. The editor was so furious with Ben Birkin that he didn't want to know about two women fighting in the beer tent. Furthermore, it so happens that John James, Barbara's father, owns shares in the company which owns the newspaper. The editor's only interested in cramming as many names and pictures of the locals into his paper as he can. Luckily, there were several amateur photographers at the fair and Bill was able to buy their film. Do you wish to charge Barbara James with assault or with throwing what possibly was dog-do at your window?"

Agatha shuddered. "I never want to see that woman again. No."

I've been making more inquiries about Cummings-Browne," said Bill.

"Seems he was quite a Lothario. You wouldn't think it to look at him, would you? Pointy head and jug ears. Oh, I've found the identity of the woman who was glaring at you at Warwick Castle."

"Who is she?"

"Miss. Maria Borrow, spinster of the parish, not this parish, Upper Cockburn."

"And was she having an affair with Cummings-Browne?"

"Seems hardly believable. Retired schoolteacher. Gone a bit batty.

Taken up witchcraft. Sixty-two."

"Oh, well, sixty-two. I mean, even Cummings-Browne could hardly'

"But for the past three years she has won the jam-making competition at Upper Cockburn, and Mr. Cummings-Browne was the judge. Now don't go near her. Let well alone, Mrs. Raisin. Settle down and enjoy your retirement."

He rose to his feet, but instead of going to the front door he veered into the living-room and stood looking at the fire. He picked up the long brass poker and shifted the blazing wood. Little black metal film spools rattled through the fire-basket and on to the hearth.

"Yes, you are very lucky, Mrs. Raisin," said Bill. "I happen to detest Ben Birkin." "Why?" asked Agatha.

"I was having a mild flirtation with a married lady and I was giving her a cuddle behind the abbey in Mircester. Ben took a photograph and it was published with the caption: "Safe in the Arms of the Law". Her husband called on me and I had a job to talk my way out of that one."

Agatha rallied. "I'm not quite sure what you are getting at. I found a pile of old unused film in my luggage and I was burning it."

Bill shook his head in mock amazement. "One would think all your years in public relations would have taught you how to lie better. Mind your own business in future, Agatha Raisin, and leave any investigation to the law."

The squally rain disappeared and clear blue skies shone over the Cotswolds. Agatha, shaken by the fight with Barbara James, put her bicycle in her car and went off to drive around the Cotswolds, occasionally stopping at some quiet lane to change over to her bicycle.

Huge festoons of wisteria hung over cottage doors, hawthorn blossoms fell in snowy drifts beside the road, the golden stone of houses glowed in the warm sun and London seemed very far away.

At Chipping Campden, she forgot her determination to slim and ate steak and kidney pie in the antique cosiness of the Eight Bells before sauntering down the main street of the village with its green verges and houses of golden stone with gables, tall chimneys, archways, pediments, pillars, mullioned or sash windows, and big flat stone steps. Despite the inevitable groups of tourists, it had a serene, retiring air. Full of steak and kidney pie, Agatha began to feel a little sense of peace. In the middle stood the Market Hall of 1627 with its short strong pillars throwing black shadows on to the road.

Life could be easy. All she had to do was to forget about Cummings-Browne's death.

During the next few days, the sun continued to shine and Agatha continued to tour about, occasionally cycling, occasionally walking, returning every evening with a new feeling of health and well-being. It was with some trepidation that she remembered she was to accompany the Carsely ladies to Mircester.

But no angry faces glared at her as she climbed aboard the bus. Mrs. Doris Simpson was there, to Agatha's relief and surprise, and so she sat beside the cleaning woman and chatted idly of this and that. The women in the bus were mostly middle-aged. Some had brought their knitting, some squares of tapestry. The old bus creaked and clanked along the lanes. The sun shone. It was all very peaceful.

Agatha assumed that the entertainment to be provided for them by the ladies of Mircester would take the form of tea and cakes, and meant to indulge herself to the full, feeling all the exercise she had taken in the past few days merited a hinge on pastry. But when they alighted at a church hall it was to find that a full-scale lunch with wine had been laid on. The wine had been made by members of the Mircester Ladies' Society and was extremely potent. Lunch consisted of clear soup, roast chicken with chips and green peas, and sherry trifle, followed by Mrs. Rain-worth's apple brandy. Applause for Mrs. Rainworth, a gnarled old crone, was loud and appreciative as the brandy went the rounds.

The chairwoman of the Mircester Ladies' Society got to her feet. "We have a surprise for you." She turned to Mrs. Bloxby. "If your ladies would take their bus to the Malvern Theatre, they will find seats have been booked for them." "What is the entertainment?" asked Mrs. Bloxby.

There were raucous shouts from the Mircester ladies of "Secret! You'll see." "I wonder what it is," said Agatha to Doris Simpson as they climbed aboard their coach again. It was now Doris and Agatha.

"I don't know," said Doris. "There was some children's theatre giving a show. Might be that."

"I've drunk so much," said Agatha, "I'll probably sleep through the lot."

"Now that is a surprise!" exclaimed Doris when their ancient bus clanked to a halt outside the theatre. "It says, "All-American Dance Troupe. The Spanglers."

"Probably one of these modern ballet companies," groaned Agatha.

"Everyone in black tights dancing around what looks like a bomb site.

Oh, well, I hope the music's not too loud."

Inside, she settled herself comfortably with the other members of the Carsely Ladies' Society.

To a roll of drums, the curtain rose. Agatha blinked. It was a show of male strippers. The music beat and pulsated and the strobe lights darted here and there. Agatha sank lower in her seat, her faced scarlet with embarrassment. Mrs. Rainworth, the inventor of the apple brandy, stood up on her seat and shouted hysterically, "Get ' orf."

The women were yelling and cheering. Agatha was dimly glad of the fact that Doris Simpson had taken out some knitting and was working away placidly, seemingly oblivious to what was going on on the stage or in the audience. The strippers were tanned and well-muscled. They did not strip completely. They had an arch teasing manner, more like bimbos than men. Naughty but nice. But most of the women were beside themselves. One middle-aged dyed blonde, one of the Mircester ladies, made a wild rush to the stage and had to be pulled back.

Agatha suffered in silence. But when the show finished, her agony was not over. Members of the audience who wanted their photographs taken with one of the strippers could do so for a mere fee of ten pounds. And with a few exceptions, the Carsely ladies all wanted photographs taken.

"Did you enjoy the show, Mrs. Raisin?" asked the vicar's wife, Mrs. Bloxby, as Agatha shakily got on board the bus.

"I was shocked," said Agatha.

"Oh, it was only a bit of fun," said Mrs. Bloxby. "I've seen worse on television." "I'm surprised you should find it amusing," said Agatha.

"They're such good boys. Do you know they did a special show for the Kurdish refugees and raised five thousand pounds? And all that money for the photographs goes towards restoring the abbey roof." "How clever of them," said Agatha, who recognized good PR when she heard it. By donating occasionally to charity, the troupe of male strippers had made themselves respectable and allowed licensed lust to flourish in the breasts of the Cotswold ladies, who would turn up by the busload to cheer them on. Perhaps these Americans had started an English tradition, mused Agatha sourly. Perhaps in five hundred years' time there would be male strippers performing in the squares of the Cotswold villages while tour guides lectured their clients on the beginnings of this ancient ritual.

Back to the church hall and down to business. Once more they were a large group of staid worthy women, discussing the arrangements of this fete and that to raise funds for charity. Mrs. Bloxby got to her feet and said, "Our Mrs. Raisin is running an auction on June tenth to raise money for charity. I hope you will all come and help to drive up the bidding. We are very grateful to Mrs. Raisin and hope you will all do your best to support her." Agatha cringed, waiting for someone to say, "Not that Mrs. Raisin, not the one who poisoned poor Mr. Cummings-Browne," but all she got was a warm-hearted round of applause.

Agatha felt quite weepy as she stood up and bowed in acknowledgement.

Bill Wong was right. Retirement would be highly enjoyable just so long as she forgot all about Reg Cummings-Browne and that wretched quiche.

Chapter Eight.

Agatha kept to her determination to mind her own business as far as the death of Cummings-Browne was concerned. Instead, she turned her energies again on the local newspapers and dealers, rousing interest in the auction. The editors published paragraphs about the auction just to keep Agatha quiet, as journalists had done in the not so very long ago when she was selling some client or product.

In their good-natured way, the Carsely Ladies' Society contributed books, plates, vases and other worn-looking items which they had bought over the years at other sales and were now recycling. As the day of the auction approached, Agatha began to receive more and more visitors.

Mrs. Mason, the chairwoman of the group, called regularly with several of the other ladies with their contributions, until Agatha's living-room began to look more and more like a junk shop.

She was so engrossed in all this that she almost forgot about Roy's visit and had to rush to meet the train on the Friday evening. She wished he were not coming. She was beginning to feel part of this village life and did not want outrageous Roy to damage her new image of Lady Bountiful.

To her relief, he descended from the train looking as much a businessman as several of the other London commuters. He had a conventional hair-style, no earrings, and wore a business suit. Hanging baskets of flowers were ornamenting Moreton-in-Marsh station and roses bloomed in flower-beds on the platform. The sun was blazing down on a perfect evening.

"Like another world," said Roy. "I thought you'd made a ghastly mistake coming here, Aggie, but now I think you're lucky." "How's the baby-food thing going?" asked Agatha as he got in the car.

"I did what you said and it was a great success, so I've leaped to respectability with the firm. Do you know who the latest client is?"

Agatha shook her head.

"Handley's nursery chain."

Agatha looked bewildered. "More babies?"

"No, dear. Gardens. They've even given me a dress allowance, tweed sports jacket, cords and brogues, can you believe it? Do you know, I thought I quite liked flowers, but they've got all these poisonously long Latin names, like chemical formulas, and I never took Latin at school. It's all so boring; garden sheds and gnomes and crazy paving as well."

"I might like a gnome," said Agatha. "No, not for me," she added, thinking of Mrs. Simpson.

"We'd better sit in the kitchen," she said when they arrived home. The living-room is chock-a-block with all the stuff for the sale." "Are you cooking?" asked Roy nervously.

"Yes, one of the members of the Carsely Ladies' Society, Mrs. Mason, has been giving me some lessons."

"What is this ladies' society?" Agatha told him and then gave him a description of her outing to Mircester and he laughed till he cried.

The dinner consisted of vegetable soup, followed by shepherd's pie and apple crumble. "Keep it simple," Mrs. Mason had said.

"This is remarkably good," said Roy. "You're even wearing a print dress, Aggie." "It's comfortable," said Agatha defensively. "Besides, I'm battling with a weight problem."

'"Wider still and wider, shall her bounds be set," quoted Roy with a grin.

"I never believed in the middle-aged spread before," said Agatha.

thought it was just an excuse for indulgence. But the very air seems to make me fat. I'm tired of bicycling and exercise routines. I feel like giving up and becoming really fat."

"You can't get thin eating like this," said Roy. "You're supposed to snack on lettuce leaves like a rabbit."

After dinner, Agatha showed him the pile of goods in the living-room.

"A delivery van is coming first thing in the morning," she said, ' then, after they've dropped the whole lot off at the school hall, they'll go to Cheltenham and pick up the new stuff. Perhaps when you learn about plants you can tell me what to do about the garden." "Not too late even now to put things in," said Roy, airing his new knowledge. "What you want is instant garden. Go to one of the nurseries and load up with flowers. A cottage garden. All sorts of old-fashioned things. Climbing roses. Go for it, Aggie."

"I might. That is, if I really decide to stay."

Roy looked at her sharply. "The murder, you mean. What's been happening?" "I don't want to talk about it," said Agatha hurriedly. "Best to forget about the whole thing."

In the morning, Agatha stood with her hands on her hips and surveyed the school hall with dismay. The contents of her living-room looked sparse now. Hardly an event. Mrs. Bloxby appeared and said in her gentle voice, "Now this looks really nice."

"The hell it does," said Agatha. "No suggestion of an occasion. Not enough stuff. What about if the ladies put some more stuff in, anything at all? Any old junk."

"I'll do what I can."

"And the band, the village band, should be playing. Give a festive air. What about some morris dancers?" "You should have thought of this before, Mrs. Raisin. How can we organize all that in such a short time?"

Agatha glanced at her watch. "Nine o'clock," she said. The auction's at three." She took out a notebook. "Where does the bandmaster live?

And the leader of the morris dancers?"

Bewildered, Mrs. Bloxby supplied names and addresses.

Agatha ran home and roused Roy, who had been sleeping peacefully.

"You've got to paint some signs quick," said Agatha. "Let me see, the signs for the May bay celebrations are stored at Harvey's, because I saw them in the back room of the shop. Get them and paint over them.

Put, "Bargains, Bargains Bargains. Great Auction. Three o'Clock.

Teas. Music. Dancing." Put the signs up on the A44 where the drivers can see them and have a big arrow pointing down to Carsely, and then you'll need more signs in the village itself pointing the way."

"I can't do that," protested Roy sleepily.

"Oh yes, you can," growled the old Agatha. "Hop to it."

She got out the car and drove to the bandmaster's and ruthlessly told him it was his duty to have the band playing. "I want last-night-of-the-prom stuff," said Agatha, '"Rule, Britannia", "Land of Hope and Glory", "Jerusalem", the lot. All the papers are coming.

You wouldn't want them to know that you wouldn't do anything for charity."

The leader of the morris dancers received similar treatment. Mrs. Doris Simpson was next on the list. To Agatha's relief, she had taken a day off work for the auction. "It's the hall," said Agatha feverishly. "It looks so drab. It needs flowers."

"I think I can get the ladies to do that," said Doris placidly. "Sit down, Agatha, and have a cup of tea. You'll give yourself a stroke going on like this."

But Agatha was off again. Round the village she went, haranguing and bullying, demanding any items for her auction until her car was piled up with, she privately thought, the most dismal load of tat she had ever seen.

Roy, sweating in the already hot sun, crouched up on the A44, stabbing signs into the turf. The paint was still wet and his draughtsmanship was not of the best, but he had bought two pots of paint from Harvey's, one red and one white, and he knew the signs were legible. He trudged back down to the village, thinking it was just like Agatha to expect him to walk, and started putting up signs around the village.

With a happy feeling of duty done, he returned to Agatha's cottage, meaning to creep back to bed for a few hours' sleep.

But Agatha fell on him. "Look!" she cried, holding up a jester's outfit, cap and bells and all. "Isn't this divine? Miss. Simms, the secretary, wore it in the pantomime last Christmas, and she's as slim as you. Should be a perfect fit. Put it on."

Roy backed off. "What for?"

"You put it on, you stand up on the A44 beside the signs and you wave people down to the village. You could do a little dance."

"No, absolutely not," said Roy mulishly.

Agatha eyed him speculatively. "If you do it, I'll give you an idea for those nurseries which will put you on the PR map for life."

"What is it?"

"I'll tell you after the auction."

"Aggie, I can't. I'd feel ever such a fool."

"You're meant to look like a fool, man. For heaven's sake, you parade through London in some of the ghastliest outfits I've ever seen. Do you remember when you had pink hair? I asked you why and you said you liked people staring at you. Well, they'll all be staring at you. I'll get your photo in the papers and make them describe you as a famous public relations executive from London. Look, Roy, I'm not asking you to do it. I'm telling you!"

"Oh, all right," mumbled Roy, thinking that at times like this Agatha Raisin reminded him forcefully of his own bullying mother.

"I'll tell you one thing," he said, making a bid for some sort of independence, "I'm not walking all that way back in all this heat. I'll need your car."

"I might need it. Take my bike."

"Cycle all the way up that hill? You must be mad."

"Do it!" snapped Agatha. "I'll get you the bike while you put on your costume."

Well, it wasn't too bad. It wasn't too bad at all, thought Roy later as he capered beside the road and waved his jester's sceptre in the direction of Carsely. Motorists were honking and cheering, a busload of American tourists had stopped to ask him about it, and hearing the auction was ' of rare antiques', they urged their tour guide to take them to it.

At ten minutes to three, he got on Agatha's bike and free-wheeled down the long winding road to the village. He had meant to remove his outfit, but everyone was looking at him and he liked that, so he kept it on. Outside, the morris dancers were leaping high in the sunny air.

Inside, the village band was giving "Rule, Britannia' their best effort, and lo and behold, a sturdy woman dressed as Britannia was belting out the lyric. The school hall was jammed with people.

Then the band fell silent and Agatha, in a Royal Garden Party sort of hat, white straw embellished with blue asters, and wearing a black dress with a smart blue collar, stood at the microphone.

Agatha planned to start with the least important items and work up.

She sensed that the crowd had a slightly inebriated air, no doubt thanks to old Mrs. Rainworm from Mircester, who had set up a stand outside the auction and was selling her apple brandy at fifty pence a glass.

Mrs. Mason handed Agatha the first lot. Agatha looked down at it. It was a box of second-hand books, mostly paperback romances. There was one old hardback book on top.

Agatha picked it up and looked at it. It was Ways of the Horse, by John Fitzgerald, Esquire, and all the S's looked like F's, so Agatha knew it was probably eighteenth-century but still worthless. She opened it up and looked at the title page and affected startled surprise. Then she put the book back hurriedly and said, "Nothing here. Perhaps we should start with something more interesting."

She looked across the hall at Roy, who instinctively picked up his cue.

"No, you don't," he shouted. "Start with that one. I'll bid ten pounds."

There was a murmur of surprise. Mrs. Simpson, who, along with others, had been asked to do her best to force up the bidding, cheerfully called, "Fifteen pounds." A small man who looked like a dealer looked up sharply. "Who'll offer me twenty?" said Agatha. "All in a good cause. Going, going ... " Mrs. Simpson groaned audibly. The little man flapped his newspaper. "Twenty," said Agatha gleefully. "Who'll give me twenty-five?"

The Carsely ladies sat silent, clutching their handbags Another man raised his hand. Twenty-five it is," said Agatha. The box of worthless books was finally knocked down for fifty pounds. Agatha was unrepentant. All in a good cause, she told herself firmly.

The bidding went on. The tourists joined in. More people began to force their way in. Villagers began to bid. It was such a big event that they all wanted now to say they had contributed. The sun beat down through the windows of the school hall. Occasionally from outside came the sound of fiddle and accordion as the morris dancers danced on, accompanied by the occasional raucous cry of old Mrs. Rainworm, "Apple brandy. Real old Cotswold recipe."

Midlands Television turned up and Agatha spurred herself to greater efforts. The bidding was running wild. One by one, all the junk began to disappear. Her sofa and chairs went to a Gloucestershire dealer, even the fake horse brasses were snapped up and the Americans bid hotly for the farm machinery, recognizing genuine antiques in their usual irritatingly sharp way.

When the auction was over, Agatha Raisin had made 25,000 for Save the Children. But she knew that she now had to soothe the savage breasts of those who felt they had been cheated.

"I must thank you all," she said with a well-manufactured break in her voice. "Some of you may feel you have paid more than you should. But remember, you are helping charity. We of Carsely thank you from the bottom of our hearts. Now, if you will all join me in singing "Jerusalem"."

The famous hymn was followed by Mrs. Mason leading the audience in "Land of Hope and Glory'. The vicar then said a prayer, and everyone beamed happily in a euphoric state.

Agatha was surrounded by reporters. No nationals, she noticed, but what did it matter? She said to them, facing the Midlands Television camera, "I cannot take the credit for all this. The success of this venture is thanks to the freely given services of a London public relations executive, Roy Silver. Roy, take a bow."

Flushed with delight, Roy leaped nimbly up on to the stage and cavorted in his cap and bells for the camera. The band then played selections from Mary Poppins as the crowds dispersed, some to the tea-room, some back to the apple-brandy stall, the rest to watch the morris dancing.

Agatha felt a pang of regret and half wished she had not given Roy the credit. He was beside himself with joy and, followed by the television camera, had gone out to join the morris dancers, where he was turning cartwheels and showing off to his heart's content.

"Pity it won't make the nationals," mourned Roy as he and Agatha sat later on Agatha's new furniture.

"If you make the locals, you'll be lucky," said Agatha, made waspish by fatigue. "We'll need to wait now until Monday. I don't think there's a local Sunday paper, and then there's hardly any news coverage on television at the weekends." "Put on the telly," said Roy. They do the Midlands news for a few minutes after the national."

"They only do about three minutes in all," said Agatha, ' they're hardly going to cover a local auction."

Roy switched on the television. The local news covered another murder in Birmingham, a missing child in Stroud, a pile-up on the M6, and then, "On a lighter note, the picturesque village of Carsely raised a record sum ... " And there was Roy on the road waving down motorists and then a shot of Agatha running the auction, the singing of "Jerusalem' and then a quick shot of Roy with the morris dancers, "Roy Silver, a London executive and Roy stopping his cavorting to say seriously, "One does what one can for charity."

"Well," said Agatha, ' I'm surprised."

"There's another news later," said Roy, searching through the newspaper. "Must video it and show it to old Wilson." "I looked fat," said Agatha dismally.

"It's the cameras, love, they always put pounds on. By the way, did you ever discover who that woman was, the one on the tower of Warwick Castle?"

"Oh, her. Miss. Maria Borrow of Upper Cockburn."

"And?"

"And nothing. I've decided to let the whole thing rest. Bill Wong, a detective constable, seems to think that the attacks on me have been caused by my Nosy-Parkering."

Roy looked at her curiously. "You'd better tell me about it." Wearily, Agatha told him what had been happening since she had last seen him.

"I wouldn't just let it go," said Roy. Tell you what, if you can borrow a bicycle for me, we could both cycle over to this village, Upper Cockburn, and take a look-see. Get exercise at the same time."

"I don't know ... "

"I mean, we could just ask around, casual like."

"I'll think about it after church," said Agatha.

"Church!"

"Yes, church service, Roy. Early tomorrow."

"I'll be glad to get back to the quiet life of London," said Roy with feeling. "Oh, what about the idea for my nurseries?"

"Oh, that! Well, what about this. Get some new plant or flower and name it after Prince William."

"Isn't there a rose or something already?"

"There's a Charles, I think. I don't know if there's a William."

"And they usually do things like that at the Chelsea Flower Show."

"Don't be so defeatist. Get them to find some new plant of any kind.

They're always inventing new things. Fake it if necessary."

"Can't give gardeners fakes."

Then don't. Find something, call it the Prince William, hold a party in one of the nurseries. Anything to do with Prince William gets in the papers."

"Wouldn't I need permission?"

"I don't know. Find out. Phone up the press office at the Palace and put it to them. Take it from me, they're not going to object. It's a flower, for God's sake, not a Rottweiler."

His eyes gleamed. "Might work. When does Harvey's open in the morning to sell newspapers?"

They open for one hour on Sundays. Eight till nine. But you won't find anything, Roy. The nationals weren't at the auction."

"But if the locals have a good photo, they send it to the nationals."

Agatha stifled a yawn. "Dream on. I'm going to bed."

When they walked to church the next morning, Agatha felt she ought to tie Roy down before he floated away. A picture of him had appeared in the Sunday Times. He was dancing with the morris men. Three old village worthies with highly photographable wizened faces were watching the dancing. It was a very good photo. It looked like a dream of rural England. The caption read, "London PR executive, Roy Silver, 25, entertaining the villagers of Carsely, Gloucestershire, after running a successful auction which raised 25,000 for charity." It was all my work, thought Agatha, regretting bitterly having given Roy the credit.

But at the morning service, the vicar gave credit where credit was due and offered a vote of thanks to Mrs. Agatha Raisin for all her hard work. Roy looked sulky and clutched the Sunday Times to his thin chest.

After the service, Mrs. Bloxby when appealed to said she had an old bicycle in the garden shed which Roy could use. The least I can do for you, Mrs. Raisin," said Mrs. Bloxby gently. "Not only did you do sterling work but you let your young friend here take all the credit."

Roy was about to protest that he had stood for hours on the main road looking like an idiot in the name of charity, but something in Mrs. Bloxby's gentle gaze silenced him.

Upper Cockburn was six miles away and they pedalled off together under the hot sun. "Going to be a scorcher of a summer," said Roy. "London seems thousands of miles away from all this." He took one hand off the handlebars and waved around at the green fields and trees stretched out on either side.

Agatha suddenly wished they were not going to Upper Cockburn. She wanted to forget about the whole thing now. There had been no further attacks on her, no nasty notes.

The tall steeple of Upper Cockburn church came into view, rising over the fields. They cycled into the sun-washed peace of the main street.

There's a pub," said Roy, pointing to the Farmers Arms. "Let's have a bite to eat and ask a few questions. Did this Miss. Borrow go in for village competitions?"

"Yes, jam-making," said Agatha curtly. "Look, Roy, let's just have lunch and go home."

Think about it."

The pub was low and dark, smelling of beer, with a flagged floor and wooden settles dark with age. They sat in the lounge bar. From the public bar Tina Turner was belting something out on the juke-box and there came the click of billiard balls. A waitress, in a very short skirt and with long, long legs and a deep bosom revealed by the low neck of her skimpy dress, bent over them to take their orders. Roy surveyed her with a frankly lecherous look. Agatha gazed at him in dawning surprise.

"What's made your friend, Steve, moody?" she asked.

"What? Oh, woman trouble. Got involved with a married woman who's decided that hubby is better after all."

Well, thought Agatha, these days, with women looking more like men and men looking more like women, you never can tell. Perhaps in thousands of years' time there would be a unisex face and people would have to go around with badges to proclaim their gender. Or maybe the women could wear pink and the men blue. Or maybe.

"What are you thinking about?" demanded Roy.

Agatha gave a guilty start. "Oh, about the Borrow woman," she said mendaciously.

Roy took her now empty gin glass and went to the bar to get her a refill. Agatha saw him talking to the landlord.

He came back, looking triumphant. "Miss. Maria Borrow lives in Pear Trees, which is the cottage to the left of this pub. There!"

"I don't know, Roy. It's such a lovely day. Couldn't we just take a look around the village and then go back?"

"I'm doing this for your own good," said Roy severely. "Gosh, this steak and kidney pudding is great. You know, there's nothing like these English dishes when they're done well."

"I should have had a salad," mourned Agatha. "I can feel every calorie."

I'm weak-willed, she thought when she had eaten every scrap of the steak and kidney pudding and she realized she had let Roy talk her into a helping of hot apple pie with cream, real cream, and not that stuff like shaving soap.

The waitress came up when they had finished the pie, her high heels clacking on the stone flags of the floor. "Anything else?" she asked.

"Just coffee," said Roy. That was an excellent meal."

"Yes, I reckon the part-timer on Sundays does a better job than our Mrs. Moulson during the week," she said.

"Who's your part-timer?"

That's John Cartwright from over Carsely way."

She clacked off. "What's the matter?" asked Roy, seeing Agatha's startled face.

"John Cartwright's the husband of Ella Cartwright, who was having an affair with Cummings-Browne. Who ever would have thought he could cook? He's a great dirty ape of a man. You see, it could have been done. Someone could have replaced my quiche with one of their own."

"Again, I have to point out that you would be intended as the victim," said Roy patiently.

"Wait a bit. Maybe it was intended for Cummings-Browne. Why not?

Everyone knew he was to be the judge. Perhaps there wasn't enough cow bane in that little piece he nibbled at the show."

"I'm sure any murderer would have thought of that."

"But John Cartwright struck me as having the IQ of a plant."

The waitress brought coffee. When she had gone again, Roy said, "Have you ever wondered about Economides?"

"What? Why should the owner of The Quicherie, who didn't even know Cummings-Browne or where I was taking the quiche, decide to put cow bane in it?"

"But from what I've gathered," said Roy, "Economides didn't shriek and complain. Did he demand to see the quiche?"

T don't think so. But he would want to let the matter drop. Perhaps the John Cartwright in the kitchen is another John Cartwright?"

"Finish your coffee," urged Roy, ' let's stroll round the back of the pub and take a look in the kitchen door."

Agatha paid the bill and they walked together into the sunlight. "How do you know the kitchen's at the back?" she asked.

"Just a guess. We'll try to the right because the car-park's to the left."

They walked round the building. Agatha was about to enter a small area of dustbins and outhouses when she drew back with a yelp and collided into Roy. "It is John Cartwright," she said. "He's standing outside the kitchen door smoking a cigarette."

"Let me see." Roy pushed her aside and peered cautiously round the corner of the building. John Cartwright was leaning against the doorway, holding a home-made cigarette in one large dirty hand. His apron was stained with grease and gravy. The sun shone on the tattoos on his black hairy arms.

"I feel sick," said Roy, retreating. "He looks filthy. Food poisoning oozing out of every dirty pore." T think we've done enough for one day said Agatha. "Let's leave this Borrow woman alone." "No/ said Roy stubbornly. "We're so close."

Maria Borrow's cottage was low and thatched and very old. The small diamond-paned windows winked in the sunlight and the little garden was a riot of roses, honeysuckle, snapdragons, delphiniums and busy Lizzies. Roy nudged Agatha and pointed to the brass door-knocker, which was in the shape of a grinning devil.

"What are we going to say?" asked Agatha desperately.

"Nothing like the truth retorted Roy, seizing the door knocker The low door creaked open, and Miss. Maria Borrow stood there. Her greyish hair was scraped up into a knot on the top of her head. Her eyes were pale. They looked past Roy to where Agatha stood cringing behind him.

"I knew you would come she said and she stood aside to let them enter.

They found themselves in a low-beamed living-room crowded with furniture and photographs in silver frames. From the beams hung bunches of dried herbs and flowers. On a low table in front of a chair on which Maria Borrow placed herself was a crystal ball.

Roy giggled nervously. "See us coming in that?" he asked.

Maria nodded her head several times. "Oh, yes." She was wearing a long purple woollen gown despite the heat of the day. "You have come to make amends she said, turning to Agatha. "You and your fancy man." "Mr. Silver is a young friend said Agatha. Tn fact, Mr. Silver is considerably younger than I."

"A lady is as young as the gentleman she feels said Roy and cackled happily. "Look/ he said, becoming serious, ' were visiting Warwick Castle and took a video on one of the towers. When we ran it, there you were, glaring at Aggie here like poison. We want to know why."

"You poisoned my future husband said Maria.

There was a silence. A trapped fly buzzed against one of the windows and from the village green outside came muted shouts and the thud of cricket ball on bat.

Agatha cleared her throat. "You mean Mr. Cummings-Browne."

Maria nodded her head madly. "Oh, yes, yes; we were engaged to be married."

"But he was married already exclaimed Roy.

Maria waved a thin hand. "He was divorcing her."

Agatha shifted uneasily. Vera Cummings-Browne was not much of a looker, but she was streets ahead of Maria Borrow, with her greyish face, thin lips, and pale eyes.

"Had he told her?" asked Roy.

"I believe so."

Agatha looked at her uneasily. Maria seemed so calm.

"Were you lovers?" asked Roy.

"Our union was to be consummated on Midsummer's Eve," said Maria. Her pale eyes shifted to Agatha. "I am a white witch but I know evil when I see it. You, Mrs. Raisin, were an instrument of the devil."

Agatha rose to her feet. "Well, we needn't keep you any longer," she said. She felt claustrophobic. All she wanted to do was to escape into the sunlight, into the sights and sounds of ordinary village life.

"But you will be punished," went on Maria, as if Agatha had not spoken.

"Evil deeds are always punished. I will see to that."

Roy forced a light note. "So if anything happens to Aggie here, we'll know where to look."

"You will not know where to look," said Maria Borrow, ' it will be done by the supernatural powers I conjure up."

Agatha turned on her heel and walked out. There was a game of cricket taking place on the village green, leisurely, placid, with little knots of spectators standing about.

"I'm scared," she said when Roy joined her. The woman's barking mad."

"Let's walk away from the cottage a bit," said Roy. "I'm beginning to think that Reg Cummings-Browne would have screwed the cat."

"He probably took what he could," said Agatha. "He was hardly an Adonis. We shouldn't have come, Roy. Something always happens to me after I've been asking questions. Let's just enjoy the rest of the day."

They went to get their bikes, which were chained to a fence beside the pub. As they were mounting, John Cart-wright came around the side of the pub. Lunch-time was over. He had discarded his apron. He stopped short at the sight of them and glowered. They pedalled off as fast as they could.

On the road home, Roy struck a rock and catapulted over the handlebars, fortunately landing on the soft grass at the side of the road. He was winded but unhurt. "You see what can happen?" he said. "You really ought to wear a cycling helmet, Aggie."

The rest of the day passed pleasantly, until Agatha ran him into Oxford and waved goodbye to him at the station.

The next day, she remembered his remark about cycling helmets and bought one at a shop in Moreton-in-Marsh. Although she had a cottage cheese salad for lunch and a chicken salad for dinner, she still felt fat. Exercise was called for. She put on her new helmet and got out her bike and pedalled up out of the village, having to get off several times and push. The light was fading as clouds were beginning to build up in the evening sky. At the top of the road, Agatha turned her bike about, looking forward to the long free-wheeling ride down into Carsely. The air was warm and sweet. Tall hedges and trees flew past.

She felt she was flying, flying like a witch on her broomstick.

So exhilarated was she by the feeling of speed and freedom that she did not see the thin wire stretched chest-high across the road. Her bike went flying on as she crashed on her head on the road. She was dimly aware of rapid footsteps approaching her and her terrified mind registered that the wire had been no accident and that someone was probably coming now to kill her.

Chapter Nine.

Dazed, Agatha sensed rather than saw her assailant coming nearer and something made her summon up all her efforts and roll across the hard surface of the road just as a heavy weapon smashed down where she had been lying.

"Stop!" shouted a voice. Agatha's attacker ran off and she dizzily hoisted herself up on one elbow. She got a glimpse of a dark figure breaking through a gap in the hedge at the side of the road and then she was blinded with the light of a bicycle lamp.

Bill Wong's voice came loud and clear. "Where did he go?" "Over there," said Agatha faintly, waving an arm in the direction in which her assailant had fled. Bill left his bike by the side of the road and then plunged off through the hedge.

Agatha slowly moved her arms and legs, then she sat up and groggily took off her helmet. Her first coherent thought was, Damn Roy, why didn't he let me leave things as they were? She slowly got up on her feet and then was violently sick. Shakily she inched along the road until she came to her bike. She picked it up and then stood trembling.

An owl sailed across in front of her and she yelped with fear. The heavy silence of the countryside pressed in on her. Suddenly she knew she could not wait for Bill Wong to return. Hoping her bike was undamaged, she mounted and free-wheeled slowly down into Carsely. No one was about the deserted village. She turned into Lilac Lane, noticing that there were no lights burning in Mrs. Barr's cottage.

She let herself into her own and then shut and locked the door. How flimsy that Yale lock now looked. She would get a security firm to put in burglar alarms and those lights which came on the minute anyone even approached the cottage. She went into her living-room and poured herself a stiff brandy and lit a cigarette. She tried to think but her mind seemed numb with fright. A knocking at the door made her start and spill some of her brandy. She didn't even have a spy hole "Who is it?" she quavered.

"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 Ladies' 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!"

"Oh, all right," said Doris ungraciously.

Would anyone in this day and age believe you had to beg a cleaner to leave her work? marvelled Agatha.

Once in the kitchen and with coffee poured, Agatha said, "Now tell me about Mrs. Barr."

"What's to tell?"

"Someone in the pub said something about her having disgraced herself and then said in a high voice as if imitating her, "Reg, Reg, kiss me."

'

"Oh, that!"

"Oh, what, Doris? I'm dying of curiosity." "Curiosity killed the cat," said Doris sententiously. "Well, there was this young chap over at Campden and he wrote a play, sort of old-fashioned type thing it were, you know, where they has long cigarette holders and talks like them old British war films. He was a protege of Vera Cummings-Browne. Anyway, Mrs. Cummings-Browne said she would get the dramatic society to put it on. Two of the parts were about a middle-aged couple remembering the passion of their youth, or that's how the programme put it. This was played by Mrs. Barr and Mr. Cummings-Browne. Dead boring that whole play was. Anyway, they were supposed to be on a liner and there they was sat, in deck chairs and with travel rugs over their knees saying things like, "Remember India, darling?"

"Sort of fake Noel Coward?"

"I s'pose. I wouldn't know. Anyways, Mrs. Barr suddenly turns to him and says, "Reg, Reg, kiss me." Well, that war en in the scrip' and what's more, the character Mr. Cummings-Browne was playing was called Ralph. He muttered something and she threw herself at him, his deck chair went over, and we all cheered and laughed, thinking it was the first funny thing that evening, but the playwright screamed awful words and tried to climb up on the stage and Mrs. Cummings-Browne closed the curtains. We could hear the most awful row going on backstage and then Mrs. Cummings-Browne came out in front of the curtains and said the rest of the play was cancelled."

"So Mrs. Barr must have been having an affair with Cummings-Browne!"

"You know, I often wonder if that one did more than have a bit of a kiss and cuddle. I mean, take Ella Cart-wright; for all she looks like a slut, all she really cares about is getting money for the bingo. Now can I go back to work?"

The security firm arrived and Agatha paid over a staggering sum and then they began to fit lights and alarms and pressure pads.

"Going to be like Fort Knox here," grumbled Doris.

Agatha went out and sat in the garden to get away from the workmen, but the sun was too fierce. The air of the Cotswolds is very heavy and on that day the sun seemed to have burnt all the oxygen out of it. She felt as isolated as if she were on a desert island, even with Doris working away and men bustling about fixing the alarm system. She moved her chair into a patch of shade. She would not make any rash decisions. She would see how quickly Mrs. Barr sold her house and try to find out how much she got for it. If the sale was a healthy one, then she would put her own cottage on the market. She would move back to London and start all over again in the PR business. She would try to lure Roy away from Pedmans. He was shaping up nicely.

Although the news bulletins said the tar was melting on the streets of London under the heat, she saw it under rainy skies with the pavements glistening in the wet, reflecting the colours of the goods in the shop windows. She had become used to the international population of London, to the different-coloured faces, to the exotic restaurants.

Here she was surrounded by Anglo-Saxon faces and Anglo-Saxon ways. The scandal of John Cartwright was over, she knew that. Already plans were being made for the annual village band concert, money to Famine Relief this time. Apart from sending money off to the distressed of the outside world, the villagers were not much concerned with anything that went on which disturbed the slow, easy tenor of their days.

Suffocating! That's what it was. Suffocating, thought Agatha, striking the arm of her chair.

"Someone to see you," called one of the workmen.

Agatha went into the house. Bill Wong was standing at the front door.

"Come in," called Agatha. "Have they caught him?"

"Not yet. See you're getting every security system going."

They've started, so they may as well finish," said Agatha. "Let's hope it adds to the price of the house, for I mean to leave."

He followed her into the kitchen and sat down. "Leave? Why? Anyone else been trying to murder you?"

"Not yet." Agatha sat down opposite him. "I'm bored."

"Some would think you were leading a very exciting life in the country."

"I don't fit in here," said Agatha. "I mean to go back to London and start in business again."

His almond-shaped eyes studied her without expression. Then he said, "You know, you haven't given it much time. It takes about two years to settle in anywhere. Besides, you're a different person. Less prickly, less insensitive."

Agatha sniffed. "Weak, you mean. No, nothing will change my mind now.

Why are you here?"

"Just to ask after your health." He fished in the pocket of the jacket which he had been carrying over his arm when he arrived and which was now on the back of the chair. He produced a jar of home-made jam.

"It's my mother's," he said awkwardly. "Thought you might like some.

Strawberry." "Oh, how lovely," said Agatha. "I'll take it up to London with me."

"You're surely not leaving right away!" "No, but I thought while you were talking that it would do me good to take a short holiday from Carsely book into some hotel in London."

"How long for?"

"I don't know. Probably a week."

"So this means your life as an amateur detective is over." "It never really got started," said Agatha. "I thought the fuss I was causing was because there was a murderer in the village. But all I was doing was riling people up."

Bill studied her for a few moments and then said, "Perhaps you might find you have changed. Perhaps you will find London doesn't suit you any more."

"Now, that I very much doubt," laughed Agatha. "I tell you what I'll do when I get back. I'll invite you for dinner." She looked at him, suddenly shy. That is, if you want to come."

"I'd like that ... provided it isn't quiche."

After he had gone, Agatha paid Doris Simpson and told her she would be away the following week but gave her a spare key and got the head workman to instruct both of them in the mysterious working of the burglar alarms. Then she phoned up a small but expensive London hotel and booked herself in for a week. She was lucky they had just received a cancellation, and as it was, she had to reserve a double room.

Then she began to pack. The evening brought little respite from the heat and a good deal of nuisance. The news that all the lights outside Agatha's cottage went on when anyone passed on the road quickly spread amongst the village children, who ran up and down with happy swooping screams like giant swallows until the local policeman turned up to drive them away.

Agatha went along to the Red Lion. "We all need air-conditioning," she said to the landlord.

"Happen you're right," he said, ' what's the point of the expense?

Won't see another summer like this in England for years. Fact is, maybe we'll get a bad winter. Old Sam Sturret was just in here and he was saying how the winter's going to be mortal bad. We'll be snowed up for weeks, he says."

"Don't the snow-ploughs come around?"

"Not from the council, they don't, Mrs. Raisin m'dear. Us relies on the farmers with their tractors to try to keep the roads clear."

Agatha was about to protest that considering what they paid in council tax, they ought to have proper gritting and salting lorries, not to mention council snow-ploughs, and was about to say she would get up a petition to hand in to the council when she remembered she would probably be living in London by the winter.

One by one, the locals began to drift into the pub. The landlord told them all he had put out tables in the garden and so they moved out there and Agatha was asked to join them. One man had brought along an accordion and he began to play and soon more villagers came in, drawn by the sound of the music, and then all began to sing along. Agatha was surprised, when the last orders were called, to realize she had been out in the pub garden all evening.

As she walked home, she felt muddled. That very afternoon, the burning ambition she had lived with so long had returned in full force and she had felt her old self again. Now she began to wonder whether she wanted to be her old self again. Her old self didn't sit singing in pubs or, she thought as she saw Mrs. Bloxby outside her cottage door under the glare of the new security lights, get visits from the vicar's wife.

"I heard you were leaving for London tomorrow," said Mrs. Bloxby, ' came to say goodbye."

"Who told you?" asked Agatha, unlocking her front door.

That nice young detective constable, Bill Wong."

"He always seems to be about. Doesn't he have any work to do in Mircester?"

"Oh, he often calls round the villages," said Mrs. Bloxby vaguely. "He also said something very distressing about you leaving us for good."

"Yes, I plan to go back into business. I should never have retired so early."

"Well, that's a great pity for Carsely. We planned to make more use of your organizing skills. You will be back by next Saturday afternoon?" "I doubt it," said Agatha, when they were both seated in the living-room. "Why next Saturday afternoon?"

That's the day of the village band concert. Mrs. Mason is doing the cream teas. Quite an event."

Agatha gave her a rather pitying smile, thinking that it was a sad life if all you had to look forward to was a concert by the village band.

They talked for a little longer and then Mrs. Bloxby left. Agatha packed a suitcase, carefully putting the pot of strawberry jam in one corner. She lay awake for a long time with the bedroom windows wide open, hoping for a breath of air, but buoyed up by the thought of London and a return from the grave that was Carsely.

Chapter Ten.

London! And how it smelt! Awful, thought Agatha, sitting in the dining-room of Haynes Hotel. She lit a cigarette and stared bleakly out at the traffic grinding past through Mayfair.

The man at the table behind her began to cough and choke and flap his newspaper angrily. Agatha looked at her burning cigarette and sighed.

Then she raised a hand and summoned the waiter. "Remove that man from the table behind me," she said, ' find him somewhere else. He's annoying me."

The waiter looked from the man's angry face to Agatha's pugnacious one and then bent over the man and said soothingly that there was a nice table in the corner away from the smoke. The man protested loudly.

Agatha continued to smoke, ignoring the whole scene, until the angry man capitulated and was led away.

Imagine living in London and complaining about cigarette smoke, marvelled Agatha. One had only to walk down the streets to inhale the equivalent of four packs of cigarettes.

She finished her coffee and cigarette and went up to her room, already suffocatingly hot, and phoned Pedmans and asked for Roy.

At last she was put through to him. "Aggie," he cried. "How are things in the Cotswolds?" "Hellish," said Agatha. "I need to talk to you. What about lunch?"

"Lunch is booked. Dinner?"

"Fine. I'm at Haynes. See you at seven thirty in the bar."

She put down the phone and looked around. Muslin curtains fluttered at the window, effectively cutting off what oxygen was left in the air.

She should have gone to the Hilton or somewhere American, where they had air-conditioning. Haynes was small and old-fashioned, like a country house trapped in the middle of Mayfair. The service was excellent. But it was a very English hotel and very English hotels never planned on a hot summer.

She decided, for want of anything better to do, to go over to The Quicherie and see Mr. Economides. The traffic was congested as usual and there wasn't a taxi in sight, so she walked from Mayfair along through Knightsbridge to Sloane Street, down Sloane Street to Sloane Square, and so along the King's Road to the World's End.

Mr. Economides gave her a guarded greeting, but Agatha had come to expect friendship and set herself to please in a way that was formerly foreign to her. The shop was quiet and relatively cool. It was the slack part of the day. Soon the lunch-time rush of customers would build up, buying coffee and sandwiches to take back to their offices.

Agatha asked about Mr. Economides's wife and family and he began to relax perceptibly and then asked her to take a seat at one of the little marble-topped tables while he brought her a coffee.

"I really should apologize for having brought all that trouble down on your head," said Agatha. "If I hadn't decided to cheat at that village competition by passing one of your delicious quiches off as my own, this would never have happened."

At that moment, for some reason, the full shock of the attack on her by John Cartwright suddenly hit her and her eyes shone with tears.

"Now, then, Mrs. Raisin," said Mr. Economides. "I'll tell you a little secret. I cheat, too."

Agatha dabbed at her eyes. "You? How?"

"You see, I have a sign up there saying "Baked on the Premises", but I often visit my cousin in Devon at the weekends. He has a delicatessen just like mine. Well, you see, sometimes if I'm going to be back late on a Sunday night after visiting him and I don't want to start baking early on Monday, I bring a big box of my cousin's quiches back with me if he has any left over. He does the same if he's visiting me, for his trade, unlike mine, is at the weekends with the tourists, while mine is during the week with the office people. So it was one of my cousin's quiches you bought." "Did you tell the police this?" asked Agatha.

The Greek looked horrified. "I didn't want to put the police on to my cousin." He looked at Agatha solemnly.

Agatha stared at him in bafflement and then the light dawned. "Is it the immigration police you're frightened of?"

He nodded. "My cousin's daughter's france came on a visitor's visa and they married in the Greek Orthodox Church but haven't yet registered with the British authorities and he is working for his father-in-law without a work permit and so ... " He gave a massive shrug.

Agatha did not know anything about work permits but she did know from her dealings with foreign models in the past that they were paranoid about being deported. "So it was just as well Mrs. Cummings-Browne didn't sue," she said.

A shutter came down over his eyes. Two customers walked into the shop and he said a hurried goodbye before scuttling back behind the counter.

Agatha finished her coffee and took a stroll around her old haunts. She had a light lunch at the Stock Pot and then decided an air-conditioned cinema would be the best way to pass the afternoon. A little voice in her head was telling her that if she was determined to move back to London, she should start looking for a flat to live in and business premises to work from, but she shrugged the voice away. There was time enough, and besides, it was too hot. She bought an Evening Standard and discovered that a cinema off Leicester Square was showing a rerun of Disney's Jungle Book. So she went there and enjoyed the film and came out with the pleasurable prospect of seeing Roy, feeling sure that he would galvanize her into starting her new business.

It was hard, she thought, when she descended to the hotel bar at seven thirty, to get used to the new Roy. There he was with a conventional haircut and a sober business suit and an imitation of a Guards regimental tie.

He hailed her affectionately. Agatha bought him a double gin and asked him how his nursery project was going and he said it was coming along nicely and that they had made him a junior executive and had given him a private office and a secretary because they were so impressed by his getting his photo in the Sunday Times. "Have another gin," said Agatha, wishing that Roy were still unhappy at Pedmans.

He grinned. "You forget I've seen the old Aggie in action. Fill ' up with booze and then go in for the kill over coffee. Break the habit, Aggie. Hit me with whatever is on your mind before we get to dinner." "All right," said Agatha. She looked around. The bar was getting crowded. "Let's take our drinks to that table over there."

Once they were both settled, she leaned forward and looked at him intently. "I'll come straight out with it, Roy. I'm coming back to London. I'm going to set up in business again and I want you to be my partner."

"Why? You're through with the mess. You've got that lovely cottage and that lovely village ... "

"And I'm dying of boredom."

"You haven't given it time, Aggie. You haven't settled in yet."

"Well, if you're not interested," said Agatha sulkily.

"Aggie, Pedmans is big, one of the biggest. You know that. I've got a great future in front of me. I'm taking it seriously now instead of camping about a few pop groups. I want to get out of pop groups. One of them hits the charts and then, two weeks later, no one wants to know. And you know why? The pop business has become all hype and no substance. No tunes. All thump, thump, thump for the discos. Sales are a fraction of what they used to be.

And do you know why I want to stick with Pedmans? I'm on my way up and fast. And I plan to get what you've got a cottage in the Cotswolds.

"Look, Aggie, no one wants to live in cities any more. The new generation is getting Americanized. Get up early enough in the morning and you don't need to live in London. Besides, I'm thinking of getting married."

"Oh, pull the other one," said Agatha rudely. "I don't think you've ever taken a girl out in your life."

That's all you know. The thing is that Mr. Wilson likes his execs to be married."

"And who's the lucky girl?"

"Haven't found her yet. But some nice quiet girl will do. There are lots around. Someone to cook the meals and iron the shirts." Really, thought Agatha crossly, under the exterior of every effeminate man beats the heart of a real chauvinist pig. He would find a young girl, meek, biddable, a bit common so as not to make him feel inferior.

She would be expected to learn to host little dinner parties and not complain when her husband only came home at weekends. They would learn to play golf. Roy would gradually become plump and stuffy. She had seen it all happen before.

"But as my partner, you could earn more," she said.

"You've lost your clients to Pedmans. It would take ages to get them back. You know that, Aggie. You'd have to start small again and build up. Is that what you really want? Let's go in for dinner and talk some more. I'm famished."

Agatha decided to leave the subject for the moment and began to tell him about the attack on her by John Cart-wright and how he had turned out to be a burglar.

"Honestly, Aggie, don't you see London would be tame by comparison.

Besides, a friend tells me you're never alone in the country. The neighbours care what happens to you." "Unless they're like Mrs. Barr," said Agatha drily. "She's selling up. The cow had the cheek to claim I had driven her off, but in fact she was left a bigger cottage by an aunt in Ancombe." "I thought she was an in comer said Roy. "Now you tell me she's had at least one relative living close by."

"If you haven't been born and brought up in Carsely itself, take it from me, you're an in comer reported Agatha. "Oh, something else about her." She told Roy about the play and he shrieked with laughter. "Oh, it must be murder, Aggie," he gasped.

"No, I don't think it was any more, and I don't care now. I visited Economides today and the reason he's glad to let the whole business blow over is that the quiche he sold me was actually baked on his cousin's premises down in Devon and the cousin has a new son-in-law working for him who doesn't have a work permit."

"Ah, that explains that, and the bur glaring John Cart-wright explains his behaviour, but what of the women that Cummings-Browne was philandering with? What of the mad Maria?"

"I think she's just mad, and Barbara James is a toughie and Ella Cartwright is a slut and Mrs. Barr has a screw loose as well, but I don't think any of them murdered Cummings-Browne. Here I go again.

Bill Wong was right."

"Which leaves Vera Cummings-Browne."

"As for her, I was suddenly sure she had done it, that it was all very simple. She thought of the murder when I left my quiche. She went home and dumped mine and baked another."

"Brilliant," said Roy. "And she wasn't found out because Economides was so frightened about work permits and things that he didn't look at or examine the quiche that was supposed to be his!"

"That's a good theory. But the police exploded that. They checked everything in her kitchen, her pots and pans, her dustbin and even her drains. She hadn't been baking or cooking anything at all on the day of the murder. Let it go, Roy. You've got me calling it murder and I had just put it all behind me. To get back to more interesting matters ... Are you determined to stay with Pedmans?"

"I'm afraid so, Aggie. It's all your fault in a way. If you hadn't arranged that publicity for me, I wouldn't have risen so fast. Tell you what I'll do, though. You get started and I'll drop a word in your ear when I know any client who's looking for a change ... not one of mine, of course. But that's all I can do."

Agatha felt flat. The ambition which had fuelled her for so long seemed to be draining away. After she had said goodbye to Roy, she went out and walked restlessly about the night-time streets of London, as if searching for her old self. In Piccadilly Circus, a couple of white-faced drug addicts gazed at her with empty eyes and a beggar threatened her. Heat still seemed to be pulsing up from the pavements and out from the buildings.

For the rest of the week, she took walks in the parks, a boat trip down the Thames, and went to theatres and cinemas, moving through the stifling heat of London feeling like a ghost, or someone who had lost her cards of identity. For so long, her work had been her character, her personality, her identity.

By Friday evening, the thought of the village band concert began to loom large in her mind. The women of the Carsely Ladies' Society would be there, she could trot along to the Red Lion if she was lonely, and perhaps she could do something about her garden. Not that she was giving up her idea! A pleasant-looking garden would add to the sale price of the house.

She arose early in the morning and settled her bill and made her way to Paddington station. She had left her car at Oxford. Once more she was on her way back. "Oxford. This is Oxford," intoned the guard. With a strange feeling of being on home ground, she eased out of the car-park and drove up Worcester Street and then Beaumont Street and so along St. Giles and the Woodstock Road to the Woodstock Roundabout, where she took the A40 bypass to Burford, up over the hills to Stow-on-the-Wold, along to the A44 and so back down into Carsely.

As she drove along Lilac Lane to her cottage, she suddenly braked hard outside New Delhi. SOLD screamed a sticker across the estate agent's board.

Wonder how much she got, mused Agatha, driving on to her own cottage.

That was quick! But good riddance to bad rubbish anyway. Hope someone pleasant moves in. Not that it matters for I'm leaving myself, she reminded herself fiercely.

Urged by a superstitious feeling that the village was settling around her and claiming her for its own, she left her suitcase inside the door and drove off again to the estate agent's offices in Chipping Campden, the same estate agent who had sold Mrs. Barr's house.

brie introduced herself and said she was putting her house on the market. How much for? Well, the same amount as Mrs. Barr got for hers would probably do. The estate agent said he was not allowed to reveal how much Mrs. Barr had got but added diplomatically that she had been asking for 400,000 and was very pleased with the offer she had received.

"I want 450,000 for mine," said Agatha. "It's thatched and I'll bet it's in better nick than that tart's."

the estate agent blinked, but a house for sale was a house for sale, and so he and Agatha got down to business.

I don't need to sell to just anyone, thought Agatha. After all, I owe it to Mrs. Bloxby and the rest to see that someone nice gets it.

The village band was playing outside the school hall. Before Agatha went to hear it, she carried a present she had bought for Doris Simpson along to the council estate. When she pushed open the gate of Doris's garden, she noticed to her surprise that all the gnomes had gone. But she rang the bell and when Doris answered, put a large brown paper parcel in her arms.

"Come in," said Doris. "Bert! Here's Agatha back from London with a present. It's ever so nice of you. You really shouldn't have bothered." "Open it, then," said Bert, when the parcel was placed on the coffee-table in their living-room.

Doris pulled off the wrappings to reveal a large gnome with a scarlet tunic and green hat. "You really shouldn't have done it," said Doris with feeling. "You really shouldn't." y "You deserve it," said Agatha. "No, I won't stay for coffee I'm going to hear the band."

Inside the school hall, stalls had been set up. Agatha went in and wandered about, amused to notice that some of the items from her auction were being recycled And then she stopped short in front of a stall run by Mrs. Mason. It was covered in garden gnomes.

"Where did you get all these?" asked Agatha, filled with an awful suspicion.

"Oh, that was the Simpsons," she said. The gnomes were there when they moved into that house and they've been meaning to get rid of them for ages. Can I interest you in buying one? What about this jolly little fellow with the fishing rod? Brighten up your garden."

"No, thanks," said Agatha, feeling like a fool. And yet how could she have known the Simpsons didn't like gnomes?

She wandered into the tea-room, which was off the main hall, to find Mrs. Bloxby helping Mrs. Mason. "Welcome back!" cried Mrs. Bloxby.

"What can I get you?" "I haven't had lunch," said Agatha, ' I'll have a couple of those Cornish pasties and a cup of tea. You must have been up all night baking."

"Oh, it's not all mine, and when we have a big affair like this, we do it in bits and pieces. We bake things and put them in the freezer, that big thing over there, and then just defrost them in the microwave on the day of the event."

Agatha picked up her plate of pasties and her teacup and sat down at one of the long tables. Farmer Jimmy Page joined her and introduced his wife. Various other people came over. Soon Agatha was surrounded by a group of people all chatting away.

"You'll know soon enough," she said at last. "I'm putting my cottage up for sale."

"Well, that's a pity," said Mr. Page. "You off to Lunnon again?"

"Yes, going to restart in business."

"S'pose it's different for you, Mrs. Raisin," said his wife. "I once went up there and I was so lonely. Cities are lonely places. Different for you. You must have scores of friends."

"Yes," lied Agatha, thinking bleakly that the only friend she had was Roy and he had only become a friend since she had moved to the Cotswolds. The heat was still fierce. Agatha felt too lazy to think what to do next and somehow she found she had accepted an invitation to go back to Jimmy Page's farm with a group of them. Once at the farm, which was up on a rise above the village, they all sat outside and drank cider and talked idly about how hot the weather was and remembered summers of long ago, until the sun began to move down the sky and someone suggested they should move to the Red Lion and so they did.

Walking home later, slightly tipsy, Agatha shook off doubts about selling the house. Once the winter came, things in Carsely would look different, bleaker, more shut off. She had done the right thing. But Jimmy Page had said her cottage was seventeenth-century. Nothing fake about it, he had said, apart from the extension.

She kicked off her shoes and reached out a hand to switch on the lights when the security lights came on outside the house, brilliant and dazzling. She stood frozen. There came soft furtive sounds as though someone were retreating quietly from the door. All she had to do was to fling open the door and see who it was. But she could not move. She felt sure something dark and sinister was out there. It could not be children. Young people in Carsely went to bed at good old-fashioned times of the evening, even on holiday.

She sank down on to the floor and sat there with her back against the wall, listening hard. And then the security lights went off again, plunging the house into darkness.

She sat there for a long time before slowly rising and switching on the house lights, moving from room to room, switching them all on as she had done before when she was frightened.

Agatha wondered whether to call Mrs. Bloxby. It was probably one of the young men of the village, or someone walking a dog. Slowly her fear left her, but when she went up to bed, she left all the lights burning.

In the morning she was heartened to see a huge removal van outside New Delhi and the removal men hard at work. Obviously Mrs. Barr did not see anything wrong in moving house on the Sabbath. Agatha was just wondering whether to go to church or not when the phone rang. It was Roy.

"I've got a surprise for you, love."

Agatha felt a sudden surge of hope. "You've decided to leave Pedmans?"

"No, I've bought a car, a Morris Minor. Got it for a song. Thought I'd drive down and bring the girlfriend to see you.

"Girlfriend? You haven't got one."

"I have now. Can we come?"

"Of course. What's her name?"

"Tracy Butterworth."

"And what does she do?"

"She's one of the typists in the pool at Pedmans."

"When will you get here?"

"We're leaving now. Hour and a half if the roads aren't bad. Maybe two."

Agatha looked in the fridge after she had rung off. She hadn't even any milk. She went to a supermarket in Stow-on-the-Wold which opened on Sundays and bought milk, lettuce and tomatoes for salad, minced meat and potatoes to make shepherd's pie, onions and carrots, peas, a frozen apple pie and some cream.

There was no need to do any cleaning when she returned. Doris had been in while she had been in London and the place was impeccable. As she drove down into Carsely, the removal van passed her, followed by Mrs. Barr in her car. They must have been at it since six in the morning, thought Agatha, making a mental note of the removal firm.

She put away her groceries when she got home, found a pair of scissors, edged through the hedge at the back into Mrs. Barr's garden, and cut bunches of flowers to decorate her cottage.

She prepared the shepherd's pie after she had arranged the flowers, thinking that she really must do something about the garden. It would look lovely in the spring if she put in a lot of bulbs but, of course, she would not be in Carsely in the spring.

As she was still an inexperienced cook, the simple shepherd's pie took quite a long time and she was just putting it in the oven when she heard a car draw up.

Tracy Butterworth was all Agatha had expected. She was thin and pallid, with limp brown hair. She was wearing a white cotton suit with a pink frilly blouse and very high-heeled white shoes. She had a limp handshake and said, "Please ter meet you," in a shy whisper and then looked at Roy with devotion.

"I see a removal van outside that awful woman's cottage," said Roy.

"What!" Agatha cast an anguished look at the vases of flowers. "I thought she'd gone."

"Relax. Someone's moving in, not out. Say something, Tracy. She won't eat you."

"You've got ever such a lovely cottage," volunteered Tracy. She dabbed at her forehead with a scrap of lace-edged handkerchief.

"It's too hot to be dressed up," said Agatha. Tracy winced and Agatha said with new kindness, "Not that you don't look very smart and pretty.

But make yourself at home. Kick off your shoes and take off your jacket."

Tracy looked nervously at Roy.

"Do as she says," he ordered.

Tracy had very long thin feet, which she wriggled in an embarrassed way once her shoes were off. Poor thing, thought Agatha. He'll marry her and turn her into the complete Essex woman. Two children called Wayne and Kylie at minor public schools, house in some twee builder's close called Loam End or something, table-mats from the Costa Brava, ruched curtains, Jacuzzi, giant television set, boredom, out on Saturday night to some road-house for scampi and chips washed down with Beaujolais nouveau and followed by tiramisu. Yes, Essex it would be and not the Cotswolds. Roy would be happier with his own kind. He too would change and take up weight-lifting and squash and walk around with a mobile glued to his ear, speaking very loudly into it in restaurants.

"Let's go along to the pub for a drink," said Agatha, after Roy had been talking about the days when he worked for her, elaborating every small incident for Tracy's benefit. Agatha wondered whether to offer Tracy a loose dress to wear but decided against it. The girl would take it as a criticism of what she was wearing.

In the pub, Agatha introduced them to her new-found friends and Tracy blossomed in the undemanding company which only expected her to talk about the weather.

The heat was certainly bad enough to be exciting. The sun beat down fiercely outside. One man volunteered that a temperature of 129 degrees Fahrenheit had been recorded at Cheltenham.

Back at the cottage Tracy helped with the lunch, her high heels stabbing little holes into the kitchen linoleum until Agatha begged her to take them off. There was some shade in the garden after lunch and so they moved there, drinking coffee and listening idly to the sounds of the new neighbour moving in.

"Don't you even want to peek over the hedge or take a cake along or something?" asked Roy. "Aren't you curious?"

Agatha shook her head. "I've seen the estate agent and this house goes up for sale next week."

"You're selling?" Tracy looked at her in amazement. "Why?"

"I'm going back to London."

Tracy looked around the sunny garden and then up to the Cotswold Hills above the village, shimmering in a heat haze. She shook her head in bewilderment. "Leave all this? I've never seen anywhere more beautiful in all me life." She looked back at the cottage and struggled to express her thoughts. "It's so old, so settled. There's some think peaceful about it, know what I mean? Of course, I s'pose it's diff'rent for you, Mrs. Raisin. You've probably travelled and seen all sorts of beautiful places." Yes, Carsely was beautiful, thought Agatha reluctantly. The village was blessed with many underground springs, and so, in the middle of all the drought around, it glowed like a green emerald.

"She doesn't like it," crowed Roy, ' people keep trying to murder her."

Tracy begged to be told all about it and so Agatha began at the beginning, talking at first to Tracy and then to herself, for there was something nagging at the back of her mind.

That evening, Roy took them out for dinner to a pretentious restaurant in Mircester. Tracy only drank mineral water, for she was to drive Roy home. She seemed intimidated by the restaurant but admiring of Roy, who was snapping his fingers at the waiters and, as far as Agatha was concerned, behaving like a first-class creep. Yes, thought Agatha, Roy will marry Tracy and she will probably think she is happy and Roy will turn out to be someone I can't stand. I wish I had never got him that publicity.

When she waved goodbye to them, it was with a feeling of relief. The time was rapidly approaching when Roy would phone expecting an invitation and she would make some excuse.

But of course she wouldn't need to bother. For she would be back in London.

Chapter Eleven.

On Monday morning, Agatha rose late, wondering why she had slept so long and wishing she had risen earlier to catch any coolness of the day. She put on a loose cotton dress over the minimum of underwear, went downstairs and took a mug of coffee out into the garden.

She had been plagued with dreams of Maria Borrow, Barbara James, and Ella Cartwright, who had appeared as the three witches in Macbeth. "I have summoned the evil spirits to kill you," Maria Borrow had croaked.

Agatha sighed and finished her coffee and went for a walk to the butcher's which was near the vicarage. The sign saying

"New Delhi' had been taken down. There was no evidence of the new owner, but Mrs. Mason and two other women were standing on the step, carrying cakes to welcome the new comer. Agatha walked on, reflecting that nobody had called on her when she had first arrived.

She was about to go into the butcher's when she stiffened. A little way away, Vera Cummings-Browne was standing talking to Barbara James, who had a Scottie on a leash. Agatha dived for cover into the butcher's shop and almost collided with Mrs. Bloxby.

"Seen your new neighbour yet?" asked Mrs. Bloxby.

"No, not yet," said Agatha, keeping a wary eye on the door in case Barbara should leap in and savage her. "Who is he?"

"A retired colonel. Mr. James Lacey. He doesn't use his title. Very charming."

"I'm not interested!" snapped Agatha. Mrs. Bloxby looked at her in pained surprise and Agatha coloured.

"Sorry," she mumbled. "I just saw Vera Cummings-Browne with Barbara James. Barbara James tried to attack me." "She always had a dreadful temper," said Mrs. Bloxby placidly. "Mrs. Cummings-Browne is just back from Tuscany She is very brown and looks fit."

"I didn't even know she was away," commented Agatha. "I'm wondering what to buy. My cooking skills are still very limited."

"Get some of those lamb chops," advised the vicar's wife, ' put them under the grill with a little mint. I have fresh mint in the garden.

Come back with me for a coffee and I'll give you some. You just cook the chops slowly on either side until they are brown. Very simple. And I shall give you some of my mint sauce, too."

Agatha obediently bought the chops but hesitated in the doorway. "Do you mind seeing if the coast is clear?"

Mrs. Bloxby looked out. They've both gone."

Over the coffee cups in the vicarage garden, under the shade of a cypress tree, Mrs. Bloxby asked, "Are you still determined to move?" "Yes," said Agatha bleakly, wishing some of her old ambition and drive would come back to her. "The estate agents should be putting a

"For Sale" board up this morning."

Mrs. Bloxby looked at her over the rim of her coffee cup. "Strange how things work out, Mrs. Raisin. I thought your being here had something to do with Divine Providence."

Agatha gave a startled grunt.

"First I felt you had been brought here for your own benefit. You struck me as a lady who had never known any real love or affection. You seemed to carry a weight of loneliness about with you."

Agatha stared at her in deep embarrassment.

Then of course there is the death of Mr. Cummings-Browne. My husband, like the police, maintains it was an accident. I felt that God had sent you here to find out the culprit."

"Meaning you think it's murder!"

"I've tried not to. So much more comfortable to believe it an accident and settle back into our ways. But there is something, some atmosphere, something wrong. I sense evil in this village. Now you are going, no one will ask questions, no one will care, and the evil will remain. Call me silly and superstitious if you like, but I believe the taking of a human life is a grievous sin which should be punished by law." She gave a little laugh. "So I shall pray that if murder has been done, then the culprit will be revealed." "But you've got nothing concrete to go on?" asked Agatha.

She shook her head. "Just a feeling. But you are going, so that is that. I feel that Bill Wong shares my doubts."

"He's the one that has been urging me to leave the whole thing alone!"

"That is because he is fond of you and does not want to see you get hurt."

Agatha turned the conversation over in her mind. The "For Sale' notice was up when she got back, giving her a temporary feeling, as if she had already left the village.

She got out a large notebook and pen and sat down at the kitchen table and began to write down everything that had happened since she came to the village. The long hot day wore on and she wrote busily, going back and back over her notes, looking for some clue. Then she tapped the pen on the paper. For a start, there was one little thing. The body had been found on Sunday. On Tuesday it must have been Tuesday, for on the Wednesday the police had told her that Mrs. Cummings-Browne did not mean to sue The Quicherie the bereaved widow had gone to Chelsea in person. Agatha sat back and chewed the end of her pen. Now wasn't that odd behaviour? If your husband has just been murdered and you are collapsing about the place with grief and everyone is talking about how stricken you are, how do you summon up the energy to go all the way to London? She could just as easily have phoned. Why? Agatha glanced at the kitchen clock. What exactly had Vera Cummings-Browne said to Mr. Economides? She went to the phone, lifted the receiver and put it back down again. Despite his confession about his relative without the work permit, the Greek had still looked guarded. The shop didn't close till eight. Agatha decided to motor up to London and catch him before he shut the shop for the evening.

She had just locked the door behind her when she found on turning round that a family consisting of ferrety husband, plump wife, and two spotty teenagers were surveying her.

"We've come to look round the house," said the man.

"You can't." Agatha pushed past the family.

"It says "For Sale," he complained.

"It's already sold," lied Agatha. She heaved the board out of the ground and dropped it on the grass. Then she got into her car and drove off, leaving the family staring after her.

The hell with it, thought Agatha, I wouldn't want to inflict that lot on the village anyway.

She made London in good time, for most of the traffic was going the other way.

She parked on a double yellow line outside The Quicherie.

She went into the shop. Mr. Economides was clearing his cold shelf of quiches for the night. He looked at Agatha and again that wariness was in his eyes.

T want to talk to you," said Agatha bluntly. "Don't worry," she lied.

"I've got friends in the Home Office. You won't come to any harm."

He took off his apron and walked around the counter.

They both sat down at one of his little tables. There was no offer of coffee. His dark eyes surveyed her mournfully.

"Look, tell me exactly what happened between you and Mrs. Cummings-Browne when she called on you."

"Can't we forget the whole thing?" he pleaded. "All ended well. No bad publicity in the London papers."

"A man was poisoned," said Agatha. "Don't worry your head about immigration. I'll keep you out of it. Just tell me."

"All right. She came in in the morning. I forget what day it was. But mid-morning. She started shouting that I had poisoned her husband and that she would sue me for every penny I'd got. She told me about the quiche you had bought. I cried and pleaded innocence. I threw myself on her mercy. I told her the quiche was not one of mine but had come down from Devon. I told her my cousin grew all the vegetables for his shop in his own market garden. Some of that cow bane must have got mixed in with the spinach. I told her about my cousin's son-in-law.

She went very quiet. Then she said she was overwrought. She said she hardly knew what she was saying. She was a different woman, calm and sad. No action would be taken against me or my cousin, she said.

"But the next day, she came back."

"What!"

Agatha leaned forward, clenching her hands in excitement.

"She said that if I ever told anyone that the quiche had come from Devon, then she would change her mind and sue and she would also report my relative to the Home Office and get him deported."

"Goodness!" Agatha looked at him in bewilderment. "She must be mad."

Two people came into the shop. Mr. Economides rose to his feet. "You will not tell? I only told you before because I thought the whole thing was over."

"No, no," gabbled Agatha.

She went out into the heat and drove off, heading automatically back to the Cotswolds, her brain in a turmoil. Vera Cummings-Browne didn't want the police to know that the quiche had come from Devon. Why?

And then the light dawned. A phrase from the book on poisonous plants leaped into her mind. "Cowbane is to be found in marshy parts of Britain ... East Anglia, West Midlands, and southern Scotland." But not Devon.

But, wait a bit. The police had been thorough. They had searched her kitchen and even her drains for traces of cow bane And they had said that Vera Cummings-Browne probably didn't know cow bane from a palm tree. But couldn't she just have looked up a book, as she, Agatha, had done? If she had, she would not only know what it looked like and where to get it, she would know it did not grow in Devon.

When she got home, Agatha wondered whether to phone Bill Wong but then decided against it. He would have all the answers. There had been no trace of cow bane in Vera's house. Her brain had been unhinged by the death and that was why she had gone to see Economides.

She put the estate agent's display board back in place and then tried to get a good night's sleep, but the days and days of heat had made the old stone walls of her cottage radiate like a furnace.

Agatha awoke, tired and listless, but dutifully got out her notes again and added what she had found out.

Cowbane. What about the local library? she thought with a jolt. Would they know whether Vera Cummings-Browne had taken out a book on poisonous plants? Would there be a record? Of course there must be!

How else could they write to people who had failed to return books?

As she trudged along to the library, Agatha reflected that her standard of dressing was slipping. In London, she had favoured power dressing and always wore crisp dresses and business suits. Now her loose print dress flopped about her and her bare feet were thrust into sandals.

The library was a low stone building. A plaque above the door stated it had originally been the village workhouse. Agatha pushed open the door and went in. She recognized the lady behind the desk as being Mrs. Josephs, one of the members of the Carsely Ladies' Society.

Mrs. Josephs smiled brightly. "Were you looking for anything in particular, Mrs. Raisin? We've got the latest Dick Francis."

Agatha plunged in. "I was upset by Mr. Cummings-Browne's death," she said.

"As were we all," murmured Mrs. Josephs.

"I'd hate a mistake like that to happen again," said Agatha. "Have you a book on poisonous plants?"

"Now, let me see." Mrs. Josephs extracted a microfiche nervously from a pile and slotted it into the viewing screen. "Yes, Jerome on Poisonous Plants of the British Isles. Number K-543. Over to your left by the window, Mrs. Raisin."

Agatha searched the shelves until she found the book. She opened it at the front and studied the dates stamped there. It had last been taken out a whole ten days before the death. Still ... "Could you tell me who was the last to take this out, Mrs. Josephs?"

"Why?" The librarian looked anxious. "I hope it wasn't Mrs. Boggle.

She will leave the pages stuck together with marmalade."

"I was thinking of getting up a lecture on local poisonous plants," said Agatha, improvising. "Whoever had it out before might show equal interest," she continued, looking at the illustrations in the book as she spoke.

"Oh, well, let me see. We still have the old-fashioned card system."

She drew out long drawers and flicked through the listed book cards until she drew out the one on poisonous plants. That was last taken out by card holder number 27. We don't have many members. I fear this is a television village. Let me see. Number 27. Why, that's Mrs. Cummings-Browne!" Her mouth fell a little open and she stared through her glasses at Agatha.

And at that moment, the library door opened and Vera Cummings-Browne walked in. Agatha seized the book and returned it to the shelves and then said brightly to Mrs. Josephs, "I'll let you know about the Dick Francis."

"You'll need to join the library first, Mrs. Raisin. Would you like a card?"

"Later," muttered Agatha. She looked over her shoulder. Vera was standing some distance away, looking through the returned books. "Not a word," hissed Agatha and shot out.

So she did know about cow bane thought Agatha triumphantly. And she certainly knew what it looked like. She saw clearly in her mind's eye the coloured illustration in the book. Then she stopped in the middle of the main street, too shocked to notice that a handsome middle-aged man had come out of the butcher's and was looking at her curiously.

She had seen cow bane recently, but in black and white. What? Where?

She began to walk home, cudgelling her brains.

And then, just at her garden gate, she had it. The slide show. Mr. Jones's slide show. Mrs. Cummings-Browne getting the prize for the best flower arrangement, an arty thing of wild flowers and garden flowers and, snakes and bastards, with a piece of cow bane right in the middle of it.

The handsome middle-aged man was turning in at the gate of what had so recently been Mrs. Barr's cottage. He was the new tenant, James Lacey.

"Mr. Jones," said Agatha aloud. "Must find Mr. Jones." Batty, thought James Lacey. I don't know that I like having a neighbour like that.

Into Harvey's went Agatha. "Where do I find Mr. Jones, the one who takes the photographs?"

"That'll be the second cottage along Mill Pond Edge," said the woman behind the till. "Do be uncommon hot, Mrs. Raisin." "Sod the weather," said Agatha furiously. "Where's Mill Pond Edge?"

"Second lane on your right as you go out the door."

"I know the heat's getting us down," said the woman in Harvey's to Mrs. Cummings-Browne later, ' there was no need for Mrs. Raisin to be so rude. I was only trying to tell her where Mr. Jones lives."

Agatha was fortunate in finding Mr. Jones at home because he was also a keen gardener and liked to spend most of the day touring the local nurseries. He had all his photographs neatly filed and found the one Agatha asked for without any trouble.

She looked greedily at the flower arrangement. "Mind if I keep this for a few days?"

"No, not at all," said Mr. Jones.

And Agatha shot off without warning him not to say anything to Mrs. Cummings-Browne.

She went to the Red Lion, clutching the photo in a brown manila envelope, her brain buzzing with thoughts.

She ordered a double gin and tonic. "Someone said as how he'd seen that detective, the Chinese one, heading your way with a basket," said the landlord.

Agatha frowned. She did not want to tell Bill anything. Not now. Not until she had it all worked out.

Bill Wong turned away from Agatha's cottage, disappointed. He glared up at the

"For Sale' sign. He felt sure she was making a mistake. A faint miaow came from inside the basket. "Shh," he said gently. He had brought Agatha a cat. His mother's cat had produced a litter and Bill, as usual, could not bear to see the little creatures drowned, so had started to inflict them on his friends as presents.

He was walking past the cottage next door when he saw James Lacey.

"Good morning," said Bill. He eyed the newcomer to Carsely shrewdly and wondered what Agatha thought of him. James Lacey was surely handsome enough to strike any middle-aged woman all of a heap. He was over six feet tall, with a strong tanned face and bright blue eyes. His thick black hair, fashionably cut, had only a trace of grey. "I was looking for your neighbour, Mrs. Raisin," said Bill.

"I think the heat's got to her," said James in a clear upper-class voice. "She went past me muttering, "Mr. Jones, Mr. Jones." Whoever Mr. Jones is, I feel sorry for him."

"Anyway, I've brought her this cat," said Bill, ' a present, and a litter tray. It's house-trained. Would you be so good as to give it to her when she returns? My name is Bill Wong."

"All right. Do you know when that will be?"

"Shouldn't be long," said Bill. "Her car's outside."

He handed over the cat in its carrying basket and the litter tray and went off. Jones, he thought. What's she up to now?"

He went into Harvey's to buy a bar of chocolate and asked the woman behind the till, "Who's Mr. Jones?" "Not you too," she said crossly. "Mrs. Raisin was in here to find out, and quite rude she was. We're all suffering from this heat, but there's no call to behave like that."

Bill waited patiently until the complaints were over and he could find out about Mr. Jones. He didn't really know why he was bothering except that Agatha Raisin had a way of stirring things up.

Agatha was quite depressed as she walked home. She thought she had solved the case, as she had begun to call it in her mind, but while in the pub, that great stumbling block had risen up in front of her again.

There was no way Vera Cummings-Browne could have cooked a poisoned quiche in her kitchen without the police forensic team finding a trace of it.

She let herself wearily into her hot house. Better put the whole business to the back of her mind and go down to Moreton and buy a fan of some kind.

There was a knock at the door. She looked through the new spy hole installed by the security people and found herself looking at the middle of a man's checked shirt. She opened the door on the chain.

"Mrs. Raisin," said the man. "I am your new neighbour, James Lacey."

"Oh." Agatha took in the full glory of James Lacey and her mouth dropped open.

"A Mr. Wong called but you were out."

"What do the police want now?" demanded Agatha "I did not know he was from the police. He was plain clothes. He asked me to give you this cat."

"Cat!" echoed Agatha, amazed.

"Yes, cat," he said patiently, thinking, She really is nuts.

Agatha dropped the chain and opened the door. "Come in," she said, suddenly aware of her loose print dress and her bare, unshaven legs.

They walked into the kitchen. Agatha knelt down and opened the basket.

A small tabby kitten strolled out looked around and yawned. "That's a sweet little fellow," he said, edging towards the door. "Well, if you'll excuse me, Mrs. Raisin ... "

"Won't you stay? Have a cup of coffee?"

"No, I really must go. Oh, there's someone at your door."

"Could you wait just for a moment," said Agatha, ' watch the kitten until I see who that is?"

She left the kitchen before he could reply. She opened the door. A woman stood there, looking as fresh as a spring day despite the heat.

She was wearing a white cotton dress with a red leather belt around her slender waist. Her legs were tanned and un hairy Her expensively dyed blonde hair shone in the sunlight. She was about forty, with a clever face and hazel eyes. She was exactly the sort of woman, Agatha thought, who would be bound to catch the eye of this glamorous new neighbour. "What is it?" demanded Agatha. "I've come to view the house."

"It's sold. Goodbye." Agatha slammed the door. "If your house is sold," said James Lacey when she returned to the kitchen, feeling more of a frump than ever, ' should get the estate agents to put a "Sold" sign up."

"I didn't like the look of her," muttered Agatha. "Indeed? I thought she looked very pleasant." Agatha looked at the wide-open kitchen door, which gave a perfect view of whoever was standing at the front door, and blushed.

"Now you really must excuse me," he said, and before Agatha could protest, he had made his escape.

The cat made a faint pleading sound. "What am I going to do with you?" demanded Agatha, exasperated. "What is Bill Wong thinking of?" She poured the cat some milk in a saucer and watched it lapping it up.

Well, she would need to feed it until she decided how to get rid of it.

She went back into the heat. Her neighbour was working in his front garden. He saw her coming, smiled vaguely, and retreated into his cottage.

Damn, thought Agatha angrily. No wonder all these women were crawling on to his doorstep with gifts. She went to Harvey's, where the woman behind the till gave her a hurt look, and bought cat food, extra milk, and cat litter for the tray.

She returned home and fed the kitten and then took a cup of coffee into the garden. Her handsome neighbour had knocked all thoughts of murder out of her head. If only she had been properly dressed. If only he hadn't heard her being so rude to that woman who wanted to see the house.

The kitten was rolling over in the sun. She watched it moodily. She, too, could have taken along a cake. In fact, she still could. She scooped up the kitten and carried it inside and then went back to Harvey's to find that it was early-closing day.

She could go down to Moreton and buy a cake, but one should really take home-baking along. Then she remembered the freezer in the school hall.

That was where the ladies of Carsely stored their home-baking for fetes to come. There would be no harm in just borrowing something. Then she could go home and put on something really pretty and take along the cake.

The school hall was fortunately empty. She went through into the kitchen and gingerly lifted the lid of the freezer. There were all sorts of goodies: tarts, angel cakes, chocolates cakes, sponges and she shuddered even quiches.

She took out a large chocolate cake, feeling every bit the thief she was, looking about her, expecting any moment to be surprised. She gently lowered the lid and slipped the frozen cake into a plastic bag she had brought with her for the purpose. Back home again.

She took a shower and washed her hair, dried it and brushed it until it shone. She put on a red linen dress with a white collar and tan high-heeled sandals. Then she gave the kitten some more milk and defrosted the cake in the microwave after taking it out of its cellophane wrapper. She arranged it on a plate and marched along to James Lacey's cottage.

"Oh, Mrs. Raisin," he said when he opened the door and reluctantly accepted the cake. "How good of you. Perhaps you would like to come in, or," he added hopefully, ' you are too busy."

"No, not at all," said Agatha cheerfully.

He led the way into his living-room and Agatha's curious eyes darted from side to side. There were books everywhere, some already on banks of shelves, some in open boxes on the floor, waiting to be stored away.

"It's like a library," said Agatha. "I thought you were an army man."

"Ex. I am settling down in my retirement to write military history."

He waved a hand to a desk in the corner which held a computer. "If you'll excuse me a moment, I'll make some coffee to go with that delicious cake. You ladies are certainly champion bakers."

Agatha settled herself carefully in a battered old leather armchair, hitching her skirt up slightly to show her legs to advantage.

It had been years since Agatha Raisin had been interested in any man.

In fact, up until she had set eyes on James Lacey, she would have sworn that all her hormones had lain down and died. She felt excited, like a schoolgirl on her first date.

She hoped the cake was a good one. How fortunate she had remembered that kitchen in the school hall.

And then she froze and clutched tightly at the leather arms of the chair. The kitchen. Did it have a cooker? It had a microwave oven, for that was where they defrosted the goodies when they were setting up the tea-room for one of their endless charity drives.

She had to go back. She shot out of her chair and out of the door of the cottage just as James Lacey entered his living-room, carrying a tray with a coffee-pot and two mugs.

He carefully set down the tray and walked to his front door and looked out.

Agatha Raisin, with her skirts hitched up, was running down Lilac Lane as if all the fiends of hell were after her.

Might be inbreeding, he thought. He sat down and cut a slice of cake.

Agatha ran into the school-hall kitchen and looked feverishly about.

There it was, what she had been hoping to see a large gas cooker. She opened the low cupboards next to the sink. They were full of cups and saucers, mixing bowls, pie dishes, pots and pans.

She sat down suddenly. That's how it could have been done. That's how it must have been done.

She racked her memory. Mrs. Mason had been in the kitchen on the day of the auction, for example, beating up a fresh batch of cakes. The kitchen was also used for cooking. But wouldn't people remember if Vera Cummings-Browne had been in there on the day of the quiche competition, cooking a quiche?

But she didn't have to be, thought Agatha. All she had to do was cook it any time before and put it in the freezer and keep an eye on it to make sure it was not used until she needed it. The remains of her, Agatha's, quiche would have been dumped with all the other rubbish left over from the tea-room. All Vera had to do was take out her poisoned quiche, carry it home, pop it in the microwave, cut a slice out of it to match the missing slice that had been taken out at the competition, wrap it up and take it with her when she went out and dump it somewhere. Agatha was willing to bet the forensic men hadn't gone through the widow's clothes looking for poisoned crumbs.

How to prove it?

Confront her with it, thought Agatha, and get myself wired for sound.

Trap her into a confession.

Chapter Twelve.

Mr. James Lacey looked uneasily out of his window. There was that Agatha Raisin woman, hurrying back. Her lips were moving soundlessly.

He shrank back behind the curtains, but to his relief she went on, and shortly afterwards he heard her front door slam.

He thought she would be back at his door, but the day wore on and there was no sign of her. Early in the evening, when he was weeding the front garden, he heard her car starting up and soon he saw her drive past. She did not look at him or wave.

He continued to work steadily, straightening up as he heard someone hurrying down the road. He looked over the hedge. And there came Agatha, on foot this time. He ducked below the hedge. On she went and again he heard her door slam.

An hour later, just as he was about to go inside for the night, a police car raced past and stopped outside Agatha's door and three men got out, one of whom he recognized as Bill Wong. They hammered at the door but for some reason the mysterious Mrs. Raisin did not answer it.

He heard Bill Wong say, "Her car's gone. Maybe she's gone to London."

All very odd. He wondered if Agatha was wanted for some crime or had simply been discovered missing from a lunatic asylum.

Inside her cottage, Agatha crouched down until the police car had gone.

She had deliberately hidden her car off one of the side roads at the top of the hill out of Carsely in case Bill Wong came calling. She had no intention of seeing him until she presented him with full proof that Vera Cummings-Browne was a murderess. She was slightly thrown when she looked out of her bedroom window to see the three of them, but assumed that it was because John Cartwright had been found. All that could wait. Agatha Raisin, detective, was going to solve The Great Quiche Mystery all by herself.

The next morning James Lacey found he was persuading himself that his front garden needed more attention, although he had already pulled up every single weed. He did find, however, that the small patch of grass needed edging and got out the necessary tools, all the while keeping a curious eye on the cottage next door.

Soon he was rewarded. Out came Agatha and walked along the road. This time he leaned over the garden gate.

"Good morning, Mrs. Raisin," he called.

Agatha focused on him, gave him a brief "Good morning," and walked on.

Love could wait, thought Agatha.

She located her car and drove to Oxford through Moreton-in-Marsh, Chipping Norton, and Woodstock while the brassy sun glared down. She parked the car in St. Giles and walked along Cornmarket and down to the West gate Shopping Centre until she found the shop she wanted. She bought a small but expensive tape recorder which she could wear strapped to her body and which could be activated by switches concealed in her pockets. She then bought a loose man's blouson with inside pockets.

"Now for it," she muttered as she drove back to Carsely. "I hope the bitch hasn't gone back to Tuscany."

As she topped a rise on the road after leaving Chipping Norton, she saw that black clouds were piling up on the horizon. She decided to drive straight home and run the risk of being visited by the police.

When she let herself into her cottage, the kitten scampered about in welcome, and Agatha found she was delaying her preparations by giving the little creature milk and food and then letting it out into the garden to play in the sun. She strapped on the tape recorder and arranged the switches in her pockets and then tested the machine to make sure it worked properly, which it did.

Now for Vera Cummings-Browne!

It came as a let-down to find there was no answer to her knock at the door of Vera's cottage. She asked at Harvey's if anyone had seen her and one woman volunteered that Mrs. Cummings-Browne had said she was going out of the village to do some shopping. Agatha groaned. All she could do was wait.

At Mircester Police Headquarters, Detective Chief Inspector Wilkes stopped at Bill Wong's desk. "Have you phoned your friend Mrs. Raisin to tell her we caught John Cartwright?" "I forgot about it," said Bill. "I was more interested in this." He held up a black-and-white photograph of Vera Cummings-Browne receiving first prize for her flower arrangement.

"What's that?"

"That is what Mrs. Raisin was after yesterday. I heard she had called on a Mr. Jones and thought I would call on him too to find out if she had stirred anything up. She had taken a photograph from him but he gave me the negative. I've just had it printed. And that' Bill stabbed a stubby finger in the middle of the flower arrangement ' exactly like cow bane the plant Mrs. Cummings-Browne professed to know nothing about. Mrs. Raisin's hit on something. Maybe I'd better get over there."

How many times, wondered Agatha, had she trekked through the stifling heat up to Vera's cottage, only to find it locked and silent? She was sweating under her blouson.

And then, at last, she saw Vera's Range Rover parked on the cobbles outside the door.

With a quickening feeling of excitement, Agatha knocked at the cottage door.

There was a long silence punctuated by a rumble of thunder from overhead. Agatha knocked again. A curtain at a side window twitched and then the door was opened.

"Oh, Mrs. Raisin," said Mrs. Cummings-Browne blandly. "I was just going out."

"I want to talk to you," said Agatha pugnaciously.

"Well, wait a moment while I put the car away. I think it's going to rain at last."

A stab of doubt assailed Agatha. Vera looked completely calm. But then Vera could not possibly know why she had called.

To be on the safe side, she followed her out and watched her put the car away in a garage at the end of the row of cottages.

Vera came back with a brisk step. "I've just got time for a cup of tea, Mrs. Raisin, and then I really must go. I am setting up a flower-arranging competition at Ancombe and someone needs to show these silly village women what to do."

She bustled into the kitchen to make tea. Take a seat in the drawing-room, Mrs. Raisin. Won't be long."

Agatha sat down in the small living-room and looked about. Here was where it had all happened. A bright flash of lightning lit up the dark room and then there was a tremendous crash of thunder.

"How dark it is in here!" exclaimed Vera, coming in with a tray of tea-things. She set them down on a low table. "Milk and sugar, Mrs. Raisin?" "Neither," said Agatha gruffly. "Just tea." Now it had come to it, she felt almost too embarrassed to begin. There was something so normal about Vera as she poured tea -from her well-coif fed hair to her Liberty dress.

"Now, Mrs. Raisin," said Vera brightly. "What brings you? Starting another auction? Do you know, it's actually getting cold. The fire's made up. I'll just put a match to it. In fact, the fire's been made up for weeks. Hasn't this weather been fierce? But it's broken now, thank goodness. Just listen to that storm."

Agatha nervously sipped her tea and wished Vera would settle down so that she could get the whole distasteful business over and done with.

Trickles of sweat were running down inside her clothes. How on earth could Vera find the room cold? The fire crackled into life.

Vera sat down, crossed her legs and looked with bright curiosity at Agatha.

"Mrs. Cummings-Browne," said Agatha, "I know you murdered your husband."

"Oh, really?" Vera looked amused. "And how am I supposed to have done that?"

"You must have had it planned for some time," said Agatha heavily. "You had already baked a poisoned quiche and put it in the freezer in the school hall along with the other goodies that the ladies use when the tea-room is in operation. You were waiting for a good chance to use it. Then I gave you that chance. You naturally did not want your husband to die after appearing to eat one of your own quiches. When I said I was leaving mine, you saw your chance and took it. You got rid of mine with the rest of the rubbish left over after the competition.

You took your own quiche home, defrosted it, and left two slices for your husband's supper. I don't know whether you checked to see whether he had died when you came home.

Then you heard I had actually bought that quiche in London. You're a greedy woman, I know that, from the way I was conned into paying for that expensive meal in a lousy restaurant in which you own part of the business. You saw an opportunity of getting money out of poor Mr. Economides, and so you went straight to London to tell him you were suing him. Who knows? You probably hoped he would settle out of court. But he confessed that the quiche had come from his cousin's shop in Devon. His cousin grew his own vegetables and there is no cow bane in Devon. So you told the police you had decided to forgive him and not press charges. You said you did not know what cow bane looked like. But you borrowed a book on poisonous plants from the library, and furthermore, I found out from a photo Mr. Jones had given me that you had used cow bane already in one of your floral arrangements. So that's how it was done!"

Agatha triumphantly drained her teacup and stared defiantly at Vera.

To her surprise, Vera's only reaction was to get up and put coal on the blazing wood on the fire.

Vera sat down again. She looked at Agatha.

"As a matter of fact, you are quite right, Mrs. Raisin." She raised her voice above the noise of the thunder. "You just had to go and cheat in that competition, didn't you, you silly bitch? So I thought I'd get some financial mileage out of it and yes, I did hope that Greek would volunteer to settle out of court. Then he let fall the bit about Devon. But at least I had him so frightened, he didn't even examine the quiche closely. I had a bad moment thinking he would and that he would say it wasn't his. So everything looked safe. I was tired of Reg's bloody philandering, but I turned a blind eye to it until that Maria Borrow came on the scene. She turned up here one day and told me Reg was going to marry her. Her! Pathetic mad old spinster. It was the ultimate shame. I knew he didn't mean to divorce me but sooner or later this Borrow fright was going to tell everyone he did and I wasn't standing for that. Do you know I thought it hadn't worked? I came home and saw the lights burning and the television on but no sign of Reg. I was a bit relieved. He'd gone out before and left everything on. So I just went to bed. When they told me in the morning he was dead, I couldn't believe I had caused it. I used to dream of getting rid of him and I almost thought that the baking of that poisoned quiche and the substitution for yours had all been in my mind and that they would tell me he'd died of a stroke. What's the matter, Mrs. Raisin?

Feeling drowsy?"

Agatha felt her head swimming. The tea," she croaked.

"Yes, the tea, Mrs. Raisin. Think you're so bloody clever, don't you?

Well, only a crass fool would drop in to accuse a poisoner and drink tea."

"Cowbane!" gasped Agatha.

"Oh, no, dear. Just sleeping pills. I found out from Jones what you had been asking, and from that woman in the library. I followed you to Oxford. I had seen your car the night before parked up in one of the lanes. I was waiting for you when you drove off. So I went to Oxford, too, to a quack I'd heard of, a private doctor who gives all sorts of pills to anyone. I said I was Mrs. Agatha Raisin and couldn't sleep.

Here are the pills." Vera dug in a pocket of her dress and held up a pharmacist's bottle. And with your name on them."

She stood up. "And so I just spread a few of these leaflets advertising the flower-arranging competition about the floor, and I help a live coal to roll out of the fire on top of them. I will tell everyone that I told you to make yourself comfortable and wait until I returned. Such a sad accident. Everything is under-dry with the heat.

You'll have quite a funeral pyre. I'll just drop what's left of these sleeping pills into your handbag and put it in the kitchen by the window and hope it survives the blaze."

It was like a dream of hell, thought Agatha. She could not move. But she could see ... just. Vera spread the leaflets about, frowned down at them, and then went into the kitchen and returned with a bottle of cooking oil. She sprinkled some of that about and then took the bottle back to the kitchen. "Such a good thing this cottage is heavily insured," she remarked.

She picked up a glowing coal from the fire with the brass tongs and dropped it on the leaflets and then stood patiently while it smouldered on the floor. With a click of annoyance, Vera struck a match and dropped it on the leaflets, which leaped into flame. She edged towards the door. There was a stack of magazines in a rack by the fire. It burst into flames. Then she locked the living-room windows. With a little smile, Vera said, "Bye, Mrs. Raisin," and let herself out of the cottage. She walked to her garage, glancing over her shoulder. She had taken the precaution of closing the curtains. She would have to get away quickly all the same.

With one superhuman effort, Agatha shoved one finger down her throat and was violently sick. She fell off the chair on to the blazing carpet. Whimpering and sobbing, she crawled away from the roaring fire, dragging herself to the kitchen. Vera had locked the front door.

No use trying that way. Agatha feebly kicked the kitchen door closed behind her. The noise in her ears was deafening. The thunder was crashing outside, the fire was roaring inside.

Agatha's weak hands scrabbled upwards until she grasped the edge of the kitchen sink. Sinks had water and behind the sink was the kitchen window, which that hellcat might have forgotten to lock.

But despite the fact she had been sick, Agatha had swallowed quite a large amount of sleeping pills, or draught, or whatever it was that Vera had put in her tea. Blackness overcame her and she made one last effort heaving herself up, gazing out of the window, her mouth silently opening to form the word "Help!" before she fell back on to the kitchen floor, unconscious.

"I don't see why we're working overtime on this Raisin woman, Bill," grumbled the detective chief inspector. "The fact that Mrs. Cummings-Browne had cow bane in her flower arrangement could be coincidence."

"I've always been sure she had done it," said Bill. "I told Mrs. Raisin to mind her own business because I didn't want her getting hurt.

We've got to ask Vera Cummings-Browne about this photograph. What a storm!"

They were cruising in the police car slowly along Carsely's main street. Bill peered through the windscreen. A flash of lightning lit up the street, lit up the approaching Range Rover, and lit up the startled face of Vera behind the wheel. Almost without thought, Bill swung the wheel and blocked the street.

"What the hell!" shouted Wilkes.

Vera jumped out of her car and began to run off down one of the lanes leading off the main street. "It's Mrs. Cummings-Browne. After her," shouted Bill. Wilkes and Detective Sergeant Friend scrambled out of the car, but Bill ran instead through the pounding rain towards Vera's cottage, cursing under his breath as he saw the fierce red glow of a fire behind the drawn curtains of the living-room.

The kitchen window was to the left of the door. He ran to it to try to force a way in and was just in time to see the white staring face of Agatha Raisin rising above the kitchen sink and disappearing again.

There was a narrow strip of flower-bed outside the cottage, edged with round pieces of marble rock. He seized one of these and threw it straight at the kitchen window, thinking wildly that it was only in films that the whole window shattered, for the rock went straight through, leaving a jagged hole.

He seized another one and hammered furiously at the glass until he had broken a hole big enough to crawl through.

Agatha was lying on the kitchen floor. He tried to pick her up. At first she seemed too heavy. The roar of the fire from the other room was tremendous. He got Agatha up on her feet and shoved her head in the kitchen sink. Then he got hold of her ankles and heaved, so that her heels went over her head and out through the window. He seized her by the hair and, panting and shoving, thrust the whole lot of her `=-81' through the broken glass and out on to the cobbles outside and then dived through the window himself just as the kitchen door fell in and raging tongues of flames scorched through the room.

He lay for a moment on top of Agatha while the rain drummed down on both of them. Doors were opening, people were coming running. He heard a woman shout, "I phoned the fire brigade." His hands were bleeding and Agatha's face was cut from where he had shoved her through the broken glass. But she was breathing deeply. She was alive.

Agatha recovered consciousness in hospital and looked groggily around.

There seemed to be flowers everywhere. Her eyes focused on the Asian features of Bill Wong, who was sitting patiently beside the bed.

Then Agatha remembered the horror of the fire. "What happened?" she asked feebly.

From the other side of the bed came the stern voice of Detective Chief Inspector Wilkes. "You nearly got burnt to a crisp, that's what," he said, ' would have been if Bill here hadn't saved your life."

"You've got to lose weight, Mrs. Raisin," said Bill with a grin.

"You're a heavy woman. But you'll be pleased to know that Vera Cummings-Browne is under arrest, although whether she'll stand trial is another matter. She went barking mad. But you did a silly and dangerous thing, Mrs. Raisin. I gather you went to accuse her of murder and then you calmly drink a cup of tea which she had made!"

Agatha struggled up against the pillows. "It's thanks to me you got her. I suppose you found her taped confession on my body."

"We found a blank tape on your body," said Bill. "You had forgotten to switch the damn thing on."

Agatha groaned. "So how did you get her to confess?" she said.

"It was like this," said Bill. T wondered what you were up to seeing this Mr. Jones. I found out about the photograph you had taken, he gave me the negative, I got it developed and found the cow bane in it.

We were heading to her cottage to ask her a few questions when we saw her driving along. I blocked the street. She got out and ran for it, and when Mr. Wilkes caught up with her, she broke down and confessed and said it would be all worth it if you died in the fire. I managed to get you out."

"What put you on to her in the first place?" asked Wilkes crossly.

"Surely not one piece of cow bane in a photograph?" Agatha thought quickly. She had not switched on the tape. There was no need for them to know that her quiche had come from Devon or anything about Mr. Economides's cousin. So instead, she told them about the school-hall kitchen and the library book.

"You should have brought information like that straight to us," said Wilkes crossly. "Bill here got his hands cut badly rescuing you and you were nearly killed. For the last time, leave investigations to the police."

"Next time I won't be so amateur," said Agatha huffily.

"Next time?" roared Wilkes. "There won't be a next time."

The thing that puzzles me," said Agatha, ' why didn't I notice the taste of the sleeping pills in the tea? I mean, if she had ground all those pills up, at least it surely would have tasted gritty."

"She got gelatine capsules of Dormaron, a very powerful sleeping pill, from some quack in Oxford who is being questioned. The stuff's tasteless. She simply cut open the capsules and put the liquid in your tea," said Wilkes. "I'll be back when you get home to question you further, Mrs. Raisin, but don't ever try to play detective again. By the way, we got John Cartwright. He was working on a building site in London."

He stomped out. "I'd better be going as well," said Bill. For the first time Agatha noticed his bandaged hands.

"Thank you for saving my life," she said. "I'm sorry about your hands."

"I'm sorry about your face," he said. Agatha raised her hands to her face and felt strips of sticking plaster. There's a couple of stitches in a cut in your cheek. But the only way I could get you out was by shoving you through the window, and I'm afraid I tore a handful of your hair out as well."

"I've given up worrying about my appearance," said Agatha. "Oh, my kitten. How long have I been here?"

"Just overnight. But I called on your neighbour, Mr. Lacey, and he offered to keep the cat until your return."

That's good of you. Mr. Lacey? Does he know what happened?"

: 181

"I hadn't time to explain. I simply handed over the cat and said you'd had an accident."

Agatha's hands flew up to her face again. "Do I look awful? Did you tear out much hair? Is there a mirror in here?" "I thought you didn't care about your appearance."

"And all those flowers? Who are they from?"

"The big one is from the Carsely Ladies' Society, the small bunch of roses is from Doris and Bert Simpson, the elegant gladioli from Mrs. Bloxby, the giant bouquet from the landlord of the Red Lion and the regulars, and that weedy bunch is from me."

"Thank you so much, Bill. Er ... anything from Mr. Lacey?"

"Now how could there be? You barely know the man."

"Is my handbag around? I must look a fright. I need powder and lipstick and a comb and I've some French perfume in there."

"Relax. They're letting you home tomorrow. You can paint your face to your heart's content. Don't forget that dinner invitation."

"Oh, what? Oh, yes, that. Of course you must come. Next week.

Perhaps I might be able to help you with some of your cases?" "No," said Bill firmly. "Don't ever try to solve a crime again." Then he relented. "Not but what you haven't done me a favour."

"In what way?"

"I confess I'd been following you around on my time off and getting the local bobby to report anything to me. Like you, I never could really believe it to be an accident. But Wilkes is more or less crediting me with solving the case because he would rather die than admit a member of the public could do anything to help. So when's that dinner?"

"Next Wednesday? Seven o'clock, say?"

"Fine. Go back to sleep. I'll see you then."

"Am I in Moreton-in-Marsh?"

"No, Mircester General Hospital."

After he had gone, Agatha fished in the locker beside her bed and found her handbag. The pills had been taken out of it, she noticed. She opened her compact and stared at her face in the mirror and let out a squawk of dismay. She looked a wreck.

"Ere!" Agatha looked across at the next bed. It contained an elderly woman who looked remarkably like Mrs. Boggle. "What you done?" she asked avidly. "All them police in '."

"I solved a case for them," said Agatha grandly.

"Garn," said the old horror. "Last one in that bed thought she was Mary Queen of Scots."

"Shut up," snarled Agatha, looking in the mirror and wondering whether the sticking plaster did not look, in fact, well, heroic.

The day wore on. The television set at the end of the beds flickered through soap opera after soap opera. No one else called. Not even Mrs. Bloxby.

Well, that's that, thought Agatha bleakly. Why did they bother to send flowers? Probably thought I was dead.

Chapter Thirteen.

Agatha was told next day that an ambulance would be leaving the hospital at noon to take her home. She was rather pleased about that.

Her home-coming in an ambulance should make the village sit up and take notice.

She took the greetings cards off the bouquets of flowers around her bed to keep as a souvenir of her time in the Cotswolds. How odd that she had volunteered to help Bill with his cases, just as if she meant to stay. She asked a nurse to take the flowers to the children's ward and then got dressed and went downstairs to wait for the ambulance. There was a shop in the entrance hall selling newspapers. She bought a pile of the local ones but there was no mention of Vera Cummings-Browne's arrest. Perhaps it all leaked out too late for them to do anything about it.

To her dismay, the '' turned out to be a minibus which was taking various geriatric patients back to their local villages. Why does the sight of creaking old people make me feel so cruel and impatient? thought Agatha, watching them fumbling and stumbling on board. I'll be old myself all too soon. She forced herself to get up to help an old man who was trying to get into the bus. He leered at her. "Keep your hands to yourself," he said. "I know your sort."

The rest of the passengers were all old women who shrieked with laughter and said, "You are a one, Arnie" and things like that, all of them evidently knowing each other very well.

It was a calm, cool day with great fluffy clouds floating across a pale-blue sky. The old woman next to Agatha caught her attention by jabbing her painfully in the toes with her stick. "What happened to you then?" she asked, peering at Agatha's sticking-plaster-covered face. "Beat you up, did he?" "No," said Agatha frostily. "I was solving a murder case for the police." "It's the drink," said the old woman. "Mine used ter come home from the pub and lay into me something rotten. He's dead now. It's one thing you've got to say in favour of men, they die before we do." "Cept me," said Arnie. "I'm seventy-eight and still going strong."

More cackles. Agatha's announcement about solving a murder case had bitten the dust. The minibus rolled lazily to a stop in a small hamlet and the woman next to Agatha was helped out. She looked at Agatha and said in farewell, "Don't go making up stories to protect him. I did that. Different these days. If he's bashing you, tell the police."

There was a murmur of approval from the other women.

The bus moved off. It turned out to be a comprehensive tour of Cotswold villages as one geriatric after another was set down.

Agatha was the last passenger. She felt dirty and weary as the bus rolled down into Carsely. "Where to?" shouted the driver.

"Left here," said Agatha. "Third cottage along on the left."

"Something going on," called the driver. "Big welcome. You been in the wars or something?"

The ambulance stopped outside Agatha's cottage. There was a big cheer.

The band began to play "Hello Dolly." They were all there, all the village, and there was a banner hanging drunkenly over her doorway which said, WELCOME HOME.

Mrs. Bloxby was the first with a hug. Then the members of the Carsely Ladies' Society. Then the landlord, Joe Fletcher, and the regulars from the Red Lion.

Local photographers were busy clicking their cameras, local reporters stood ready.

"Everyone inside," called Agatha, ' I'll tell you all about it."

Soon her living-room was crowded, with an overflow stretching into the dining-room and kitchen as she told a rapt audience how she had solved The Case of the Poisoned Quiche. It was highly embroidered. But she did describe in glorious Technicolor how the brave Bill Wong had dragged her from the burning house, ' clothes in flames and his hands cut to ribbons." "Such bravery," said Agatha, ' an example of the fine men we have in the British police force."

Some reporters scribbled busily; the more up-to-date used tape recorders. Agatha was about to hit the nationals, or rather, Bill Wong was. There had been two nasty stories recently about corrupt policemen, but the newspapers knew there was nothing people liked to read about more than a brave bobby.

Next door, James Lacey stood in his front garden, burning with curiosity. The visit from Agatha had been enough. He had called on the vicarage and told Mrs. Bloxby sternly that although he was grateful for the welcome to the village, he now wanted to be left strictly alone. He enjoyed his own company. He had moved to the country for peace and quiet. Mrs. Bloxby had done her work well. So although he had watched the preparations for Agatha's return, he did not know what she had done or what it had all been about. He wanted to walk along and ask someone but felt shy of doing so because he had said he wanted to be alone and he remembered he had added that he had no interest in what went on in the village or in anyone in it.

One by one Agatha's fan club was leaving. Doris Simpson was among the last to go. She handed Agatha a large brown paper parcel.

"Why, what's this, Doris?" asked Agatha.

"Me and Bert got talking about that gnome you gave us," said Doris firmly. Those things are expensive and we don't really have much interest in our garden and we know you must have liked it because you bought it. So we decided to give it back to you."

"I couldn't possibly accept it," said Agatha.

"You must. We haven't felt right about it."

Agatha, who had long begun to suspect that her cleaning lady had a will of iron, said feebly, "Thank you."

"Anything else?" called Joe Fletcher from the doorway.

Agatha made a sudden decision. "Yes, there is," she said. "Take that "For Sale" sign down."

At last they had all gone. Agatha sat down, suddenly shivering. The full horror of what had happened to her at Vera's hit her. She went upstairs and took a hot bath and changed into a nightgown and an old shabby blue wool dressing-gown. She peered in the bathroom mirror.

There was a bald sore red patch at the front of her hair where Bill had pulled it out. She switched on the central heating and then threw logs on the fire, lit a match and then shuddered and blew the match out. It would be a while before she could bear the sight of a fire.

There was a tentative knock at the door. Still shivering and holding her dressing-gown tightly about her, she went to open it. James Lacey stood there, holding the kitten in its basket and the litter tray.

"Bill Wong asked me to look after the cat for you," he said. He eyed her doubtfully. "I could look after it for another day if you're not up to it."

"No, no," babbled Agatha. "Come in. I wonder how Bill got the cat? Of course, he would have taken the keys out of my bag in the hospital. How very good of you."

She caught a glimpse of herself in the hall mirror. How awful she looked, and not a scrap of make-up on either!

She carried the cat into the living-room and stooped and let it out of its basket and then took the litter tray into the kitchen. When she returned, James was sitting in one of her chairs staring thoughtfully at the large gnome which Doris had returned and Agatha had unwrapped.

It was standing on the coffee-table leering horribly, like old Arnie on the minibus.

"Would you like a gnome?" asked Agatha.

"No, thank you. It's an unusual living-room ornament."

"It's not really mine. You see ... "

There was a hammering at the door. Agatha swore under her breath and went to answer it. Midlands Television and the BBC. "Can't you come back later?" pleaded Agatha, casting a longing look towards the living-room. But then she saw the police car driving up as well.

Detective Chief Inspector Wilkes had called.

The television interviewers had a more understated version of Agatha's story than the villagers had heard. Detective Chief Inspector Wilkes was interviewed saying sternly that the public should leave police matters to the police, as Mrs. Raisin had nearly been killed and he had nearly lost one of his best officers, Agatha shrewdly guessing that when that appeared on the screens, his comments would be cut down to the simple fact that he had nearly lost one of his best officers.

Everyone wanted a hero, and Bill Wong was to be the hero. Somehow in the middle of it all, James Lacey had slipped out. The television teams rushed off to find Bill Wong in Mircester, a policewoman with a recorder came in from the police car, and Wilkes got down to exhaustive questioning.

At last they left, but the phone rang and rang as various nationals phoned up to add to the stories sent in by the local men. By eleven o'clock, the phone fell silent. Agatha fed the cat and then carried it up to bed. It lay on her feet, purring gently. I'd better think of a name for it, she thought sleepily.

The phone rang downstairs. "Now what?" groaned Agatha aloud, gently lifting the cat off her feet and wondering why she had not bothered to get a phone extension put in the bedroom. She went downstairs and picked up the receiver.

"Aggie!" It was Roy, his voice sharp with excitement. "I thought I'd never get through. I saw you on the telly." "Oh, that," said Agatha. She shivered. "Can I call you back tomorrow, Roy?"

"Look, sweetie, there seems to be more publicity comes out of that little village than out of all the streets of London. The idea is this. Maybe the telly will be back for a follow-up. I'll run down there tomorrow and you can tell them how I helped you to solve the mystery. I phoned Mr. Wilson at home and he thinks it's a great idea."

"Roy, the story will be dead tomorrow. You know it, I know it. Let me go back to bed. I won't be up to seeing visitors for some time."

"Well, I must say I thought you might have mentioned me," complained Roy. "Who was it went with you to Ancombe? I've phoned round all the papers but the night-desks say if you want to volunteer a quote about me, fine, but they're not interested in taking it from me, so be a sweetie and phone them, there's a dear."

"I am going to bed, Roy, and that's that. Finish."

"Aren't we being just a bit of a selfish bitch hogging all the limelight?"

"Good night, Roy," said Agatha and put down the receiver. Then she turned back and lifted it off the hook.

"Well, I want to meet this Raisin woman," said James Lacey's sister, Mrs. Harriet Camberwell, a week later. "I know you want to be left alone. But I'm dying of curiosity. They gave a lot of play to that detective, Wong, but she solved it, didn't she?"

"Yes, I suppose she did, Harriet. But she's very odd. Do you know, she keeps a garden gnome on her coffee-table as an ornament! She walks down the street muttering and talking to herself."

"How sweet. I simply must meet her. Run along and ask her to drop by for a cup of tea."

"If I do that, will you go back to your husband and leave me alone?"

"Of course. Go and get her and I'll make the tea and cut some sandwiches."

Agatha was still recovering from the shock of being nearly burnt to death. She had not bothered about trying to see James, waiting until her cuts healed up and her hair grew back. When that happened, she thought, she would plan a campaign.

The weather had turned pleasantly warm instead of the furnace heat of the days before the storm. She had the doors and windows open and was lying in her old loose cotton dress on the kitchen floor, tossing balls of foil into the air to amuse the kitten, when James walked in.

"I should have knocked," he said awkwardly, ' the door was open."

Agatha scrambled to her feet. "I wonder whether you would like to step along for a cup of tea." "I must change," said Agatha wildly.

"I've obviously come at a bad moment. Maybe another time." "No! I'll come now," said Agatha, frightened he would escape.

They walked along to his cottage. No sooner was she seated, no sooner was Agatha admiring his handsome profile, which was turned towards the kitchen door, when an elegant woman walked in carrying a tea-tray.

"Mrs. Raisin, Mrs. Camberwell. Harriet, darling, this is Mrs. Raisin. Harriet's dying to hear all about your adventures, Mrs. Raisin."

Agatha felt small and dingy. But then women like Harriet Camberwell always made her feel small and dingy. She was a very tall woman, nearly as tall as James, slim, flat-chested, square hunting shoulders, clever upper-class face, expensive hair-style, tailored cotton dress, cool amused eyes.

Agatha began to talk. The villagers would have been amazed to hear her dull rendering of her adventures. She stayed only long enough to briefly recount her story, drink one cup of tea, eat one sandwich, and then she firmly took her leave.

At least Bill Wong was coming for dinner. Be thankful for small comforts, Agatha, she told herself sternly. But she had thought of James Lacey a lot and her days had taken on life and colour. Still, there was no need to look a fright simply because her guest was only Bill.

She did her hair and put on make-up and changed into the dress she had worn for the auction. Dinner taught this time by Mrs. Bloxby was to be simple: grilled steaks, baked potatoes, fresh asparagus, fresh fruit salad and cream. Champagne on ice for the celebration, for Bill Wong had been elevated to detective sergeant.

It was a new, slimmer Bill who walked in the door at seven o'clock. He had been keeping in shape rigorously ever since he had seen his rather chubby features on television.

He talked of this and that, noticing that Agatha's bear-like eyes were rather sad and she seemed to have lost a great deal of animation. He reflected that the attempt on her life must have hit her harder than he would have expected.

She was not contributing much to the conversation and so he searched around for another topic to amuse her. "Oh, by the way," he said as she slid the steaks under the grill, ' neighbour has given up breaking hearts in the village. He told Mrs. Bloxby he wanted to be left alone and was quite sharpish about it. Then, when the ladies of Carsely back off, he is visited by an elegant woman whom he introduces to all and sundry in Harvey's as Mrs. Camberwell. He calls her "darling". They make a nice pair. Mrs. Mason was heard to remark crossly that she had always thought him an odd sort of man anyway and that she had only taken around a cake to be friendly.

"And guess what?"

"What?" said Agatha testily.

"Your old persecutor, Mrs. Boggle, ups and asks him point-blank in the middle of Harvey's if he means to marry Mrs. Camberwell, everyone thinking her a widow. And he replies in surprise, "Why the devil should I marry my own sister?" So I gather the ladies of Carsely are now thinking that although they cannot really call on him after what he said to Mrs. Bloxby, perhaps they can get up a little party or dinner and lure him into one of their homes." Bill laughed heartily.

Agatha turned around, her face suddenly radiant. "We haven't opened the champagne and we must celebrate!"

"Celebrate what?" asked Bill in sudden suspicion.

"Why, your promotion. Dinner won't be long."

Bill opened the champagne and poured them a glass each.

"Is there anything you would like me to do, Mrs. Raisin, before dinner? Lay the table?"

"No, that's done. But you could start off by calling me Agatha, and there is something else. There's a sign in the front garden and a sledge hammer beside it. Could you hammer it into the ground?"

"Of course. Not selling again, are you?"

"No, I'm naming this cottage. I'm tired of everyone still calling it Budgen's cottage. It belongs to me."

He went out into the garden and picked up the sign and hammered its pole into the ground and then stood back to admire the effect.

Brown lettering on white, it proclaimed boldly: RAISIN'S COTTAGE.

Bill grinned. Agatha was in Carsely to stay.

LIBRAR M.C. BEAT ON is the author of the highly acclaimed Hamish Macbeth mystery series. With this novel she begins a new series with sleuth Agatha Raisin. Born in Scotland, Beaton now lives in the Cotswolds.

Jacket design by Pentacor Book Design Jacket illustration by Lee Montgomery