Agatha Raisin and the Wellspring of Death (6 page)

‘Cutler,’ said Agatha slowly. ‘Percy Cutler? Your son?’

‘No, my late husband.’

‘But –’

‘Oh, there was an age difference, I admit, but what does that matter when there is real love? When poor Percy died of cancer, that bitch Angela said I had known that he had cancer and had
only married him to get my hands on his money.’

‘How dreadful,’ said Agatha faintly.

‘I pointed out to her that the husband before Percy, my Charles, had been very rich and I had no need to marry again for money.’

‘How many husbands have you had?’ blurted out Agatha.

‘Just the three.’

‘And what did the first two die of?’

‘Cancer. So sad. I nursed them all devotedly.’

It might be considered a brand-new way of gold digging, thought Agatha. Marry a man who knows he’s got cancer and not long to live.

‘So you think,’ she said aloud, ‘that perhaps Angela or her father might have murdered Mr Struthers. But why? How would that give them the land?’

‘Because the son and the father never got on. The son, Jeffrey, was always nagging his father to sell them the land. They’ll get it now.’

There was a silence while Agatha digested this news. ‘Anyone else have it in for old Struthers?’

‘Well, everyone knows about Andy Stiggs.’

‘Not me,’ said Agatha fervently.

‘Of course, you’re one of those incomers from . . . where? Birmingham, maybe?’

Agatha coloured angrily. She had been brought up in a Birmingham slum and had done her best with clothes and accent to bury her past forever.

‘London,’ she snapped.

‘Really? I could have sworn there was a trace of Brummie there. Anyway, the late Mrs Struthers, away back before God was born, was the belle of Ancombe. I never saw it. One of those rather
common blowsy creatures with a loud laugh, you know – the kind you see on a bar-stool in a road-house, skirt hitched up, laughing insanely when not taking sips out of one of those drinks that
come with an umbrella sticking out of the glass. Andy Stiggs was passionately in love with her and swore Robert Struthers had lured her away.’

‘So does anyone know which way Mr Struthers meant to vote?’

‘Oh, who cares? We all got tired of him nodding his stupid head and saying, “I’ll make up my mind when the time comes.” Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to change. I
am expecting a gentleman caller.’

Feeling quite stunned by all this gossip, Agatha made her way out. She got into her car and was about to drive off when she was suddenly overcome with curiosity to see who this gentleman caller
might be. She drove as far as the end of the road and parked under a lilac tree where she could still command a good view of Jane Cutler’s front door.

She waited and waited and after three quarters of an hour was just beginning to decide that Jane had used a fiction of a gentleman caller to get rid of her when she saw a familiar car drawing up
outside her house and a familiar figure got out. James Lacey!

Agatha’s hand tightened angrily on the steering wheel. So he, too, had begun investigations!

She drove along the village street, stopped at the newspaper shop and asked for directions to the Buckley farm, and headed off.

Agatha was wary of farms, considering them full of livestock of which she knew nothing and snapping dogs. The farmhouse was more of a country mansion, being a Georgian building four storeys
high, well maintained.

The door was standing open. There came the sound of voices from within.

‘Hello!’ shouted Agatha.

The voices stopped, then there was the sound of a chair being scraped back, then booted feet.

Angela Buckley appeared. ‘It’s our heroine,’ she cried. ‘Come along in.’

Agatha followed her into a stone-flagged kitchen. Three men sat at the table with cups of tea. ‘That’s my father,’ said Angela, jerking her head at a grey-haired man,
‘and that’s Joe and Ben, they work for us. Sit down and have a coffee. This lot were just going back to work.’

The farmer picked up a cap from the back of his chair and put it on. ‘Saw you the other night, Mrs Raisin,’ he said. ‘You told ’em.’

He went out, followed by the two men. Angela and Agatha sat down at the table.

‘I’ve just been to see Jane Cutler,’ said Agatha.

‘Oh, the slurry with the fringe on top. Why did you go to see her?’

Agatha decided to plunge right in. ‘I wanted to see if I could find out anything about the murder.’

‘What’s that got to do with you? That’s police business.’

‘But as I am working for the water company, it is in their interest to get this murder cleared up as quickly as possible.’

‘So what did the raddled old bitch have to say for herself?’

‘She more or less said you did it.’

‘There’s no end to that woman’s venom. She’s had so many face-lifts and been so stretched that every time she opens her mouth her arsehole gapes. What reason should I
have for murdering old Struthers?’

‘The paddock.’

‘Oh, that. It had become a bit of a joke between us. He would say, “You’ll need to wait until I’m dead.” Oh, lor’. Doesn’t that sound awful?’

‘But there was no real feeling about it?’

‘There was from time to time. He didn’t need that paddock, and he was a stubborn old codger. But actually he’d call round here quite a lot. We were friends.’

‘So who could have done it? Was it to stop him voting for or against? Did any of you know which way he meant to vote?’

‘No, he enjoyed teasing us.’

‘What about Mary Owen? Tell me about her.’

‘She always wanted to head the parish council but we wouldn’t let her. She’s so bossy. I think in her way she kept us all together, despite our differences. We all hated
her.’

Agatha wondered whether to broach the subject of the late Percy Cutler, but decided against it. Her own heartache over James had made her unusually sensitive to another woman’s
feelings.

‘We’ve always had fights over something or another,’ Angela was saying, ‘but they all die away after a while.’ She looked at Agatha and her round weather-beaten
face suddenly turned hard. ‘Drop this amateur murder investigation. All you’ll do is stir up a lot of muck . . . and you might get hurt.’

‘Is that a warning?’ asked Agatha, gathering up her handbag.

‘Yes, it is. A friendly warning.’

Agatha said goodbye and went out to where her car was parked in the farmyard. As she drove off, she looked in the rear-view mirror. Angela was standing, her hands on her hips, watching her go.
Her face was grim.

Agatha went home and phoned Bill Wong and told him of both conversations, the one with Jane Cutler and the one with Angela. Bill groaned. ‘This opens up a messy field of
research. Let me know if you find out anything else.’

‘What, no warning to keep out of it?’

‘I need all the help I can get on this one.’

James Lacey phoned Bill Wong later. ‘I went to see that Cutler woman as a start,’ he said. ‘I’m afraid there’s nothing there. According to her the
members of the parish council all love one another. I must admit I found her very charming.’

’That’s not what our Agatha found out,’ said Bill gleefully.

There was a short silence and then James said, ‘What do you mean?’

Bill repeated what Agatha had told him.

‘Mrs Cutler said nothing of that to me,’ complained James.

‘Probably she reserves all her nice manners for us gentlemen. I found her charming as well. You should join forces with Agatha.’

‘I’ll think about it,’ said James curtly.

But he took several days to think about it and by that time Guy Freemont had phoned up Agatha and invited her out for dinner.

‘I’m afraid I’m busy tonight, James,’ said Agatha, noticing with irritation that her hand holding the telephone receiver was trembling. ‘Got a dinner
date.’

‘Oh, well, what about if I pop round this afternoon?’

‘Got an engagement for this afternoon,’ said Agatha. ‘Look, I’ll call you. Bye.’

She sat down on the stairs. Why, oh, why had James decided to contact her just when she was booked to have dinner with Guy and had made an appointment with a beautician in Evesham for that
afternoon?

James was the same age as she, and if she had been going out with him, then she would not be rushing off to the beautician to have electrodes put on her face and neck to try to reduce the
wrinkles.

This was what came of dating a much younger man and a handsome man at that. Somehow, with the work for the water company, and then the prospect of going out with Guy, she had not thought much
about the murder, nor had she investigated it further.

But the gloss of that date with Guy had been definitely tarnished and it was a gloomy Agatha who drove into Evesham. She had picked out a beautician from the Yellow Pages.

Evesham was an odd town, reflected Agatha, as she made her way up a narrow staircase to the beautician’s. All over the town, shops had closed down and the boarded-up fronts had been
decorated with paintings of old Evesham shops by a local artist. If this goes on, thought Agatha, Evesham will soon be a town of paintings. No shops. And yet, here was this beautician who appeared
to have the latest in beauty treatments, and along the road, a drugstore was doing a brisk trade in cut-price French perfume. It should have been a bustling, prosperous town. So much traffic, so
many houses being built. But quite a lot of people were on the dole and didn’t seem much interested in getting off it. A local fruit-packing company was bussing in workers from Wales because
the locals wouldn’t take up the jobs.

Agatha opened the door of the beautician’s and went in.

The beautician, called Rosemary, was refreshingly maternal and non-threatening. Agatha, who had been expecting some anorectic creature who would make her feel frumpy, began to relax.

That was until the electrodes were attached to her face and neck and switched on. ‘It’s a good thing I know this is a beauty treatment,’ muttered Agatha. ‘If I was in a
police station in a totalitarian state, I would think it was torture and tell them everything.’ But she booked up a further nine appointments.

For good measure, she had her eyebrows shaped and her eyelashes dyed. She walked down the stairs and along the High Street, squinting sideways at her reflection in shop windows to see if she
looked any younger.

It seemed to take ages to get home, because she had forgotten about the building of the Broadway bypass and the traffic lights on Fish Hill. The bypass would surely benefit Broadway by taking
away all the huge rumbling trucks that daily shook the old buildings of the village, and yet it was very sad to see the trees on Fish Hill cut down for the new road and the scarred earth on either
side where sheep so lately had peacefully grazed.

Once home, she began the long preparation necessary to any middle-aged woman who is dating a younger man, although she kept reminding herself fiercely that it was only a business
partnership.

By the time, she had applied the last of her make-up and stood before the mirror wondering if the low-cut fine wool red dress was too gaudy, she felt a wrench of real pain. Instead of going
through all this, she could have been talking to James about the case, building bridges, getting back to the old warmth and closeness.

When Guy called to pick her up, she had lost all interest in him.

Guy drove her to Oxford, parked in the underground car park in Gloucester Green and then escorted her to a French restaurant. It turned out to be one of those ones with a delicious menu and
lousy food. A good way of dieting, thought Agatha, would be just to enjoy the prose on the menu and then not order anything.

Agatha had ordered breast of duck stuffed with spinach on a bed of warm rocket which translated itself into a piece of rubber stuffed with decaying vegetable matter, and rocket must be surely
the most overrated vegetable in the world. It always tasted to Agatha like weeds.

They talked about various journalists and which would be more inclined to give them a good show. Agatha had already arranged various lunches in London with journalists. Guy said the new colour
brochures advertising the water would be ready in a couple of days’ time and that he would save Agatha a trip to Mircester and run over with them.

They drank a bottle of highly priced indifferent wine, but there was enough alcohol in it to mellow Agatha. After coffees and two brandies, she felt happy to be in the company of this
well-tailored and handsome man.

When the bill was presented, Guy began patting his pockets. Then he gave Agatha a rueful boyish smile. ‘Damn, I’ve left my wallet at home.’

‘It’s all right, I’ll pay,’ said Agatha, thinking not for the first time that the majority of Englishmen were as tight as the bark on the tree.

He drove her back home. James heard the car arrive and leaped for the side window of his cottage. Guy, his black hair gleaming in the light over Agatha’s door, took her keys from her and
unlocked the door for her. James held his breath. Then Guy followed Agatha in. James waited and waited. He drew a chair up to the window and waited. Lights from the downstairs window shone out into
Agatha’s small square of front garden. At last they went off and the hall light went on. Then the hall light was switched off and the light on the stairs switched on. Then the light from
behind the drawn curtains of Agatha’s bedroom lit up the garden.

‘Silly woman,’ he muttered, but still he waited. When the light in Agatha’s bedroom was switched off and no Guy could be seen leaving the house, James went to bed.

Agatha came awake suddenly the next morning. She couldn’t believe she had actually had sex with Guy. What on earth was up with her? Was she trying to prove that at her
age she could still do it without a map?

She lay and listened to the silence of the house. Please let him be gone! That was the hell about being middle-aged. There was all the fear of trying to get to the bathroom to slap on make-up
before he caught a glimpse of her unadorned face. But there was no sound but the wind blowing through the heavy purple lilac blossoms outside the window.

She got out of bed, feeling stiff and sore. After a deep bath, she felt better. She made up carefully and dressed, and then ripped the sheets off the bed and carried them down to the washing
machine in the kitchen. She fed her cats and let them out into the sunshine of the garden.