Agatha Raisin and The Potted Gardener Part 6

"The daughter never visits her, even in the holidays. I a.s.sumed there was some sort of family rift there, so I didn't ask any questions. I also a.s.sumed that what you saw was what you got perfect cook, perfect gardener, perfectly turned out. Then she has charm, and charm always stops you from seeing the person underneath."

Not like me, thought Agatha. What you see is definitely what you get. And she longed for charm or mysterious depths.

They were approaching Mary's cottage. "No lights," said James. "Maybe she's gone out, Oxford or somewhere."

"That's another thing," said Agatha. "She never does leave the village, except perhaps when she is dining with you."

"Well, let's see if she's at home."

Instead of going around the back, as was usual village practice except at homes like Agatha's, they walked up through the front garden where flowers, bleached by the moonlight, crowded the borders on either side of the lawn. The air was heavy with the scent of the flowers. They walked into the front porch. James rang the bell, which echoed off into the dark silence of the house.

Down in the road behind them, a young couple walked home. The girl laughed, a high, shrill giggle. Their footsteps and voices died away, leaving night silence behind.

"That's that," said Agatha cheerfully. "We've done our bit for community life. Now back to the pub." With any luck, she thought, the crowd might have thinned out and she could have James to herself.

He hesitated. He tried the door handle. It turned easily and the door swung open. "She might be ill." He walked inside and Agatha reluctantly followed him. He fumbled around for the light switch in the hall. With a little click the small hall became flooded with light, intensifying the odd feeling of emptiness, of loneliness, in the house. They walked through the rooms, switching on the lights. No one in either the living-room, dining-room or kitchen.

James ran up the stairs, calling, "Mary! Mary!" Agatha stood in the hall, waiting uneasily. She had never considered herself a fey or even a sensitive person, but as she stood there she began to feel a creeping unease.

"Not home," said James, coming back down the narrow staircase.

"There's her conservatory at the back," said Agatha. "We may as well make a proper job of it." Afterwards she was to wonder at her sudden persistence when a moment before all she had wanted to do was forget about the whole thing and return to the pub with James. After a brief and sharp struggle with the planning authorities, Mary had gained permission to have a small conservatory attached to the back of the house.

They walked through the kitchen and James opened the conservatory door and switched on the light. A wave of steamy moist air greeted them. Mary grew tropical plants. They walked into the middle of the conservatory and stood still, shoulder to shoulder. All was still. "Let's go," said James.

And then Agatha said in a choked voice, "Look! Look over there!"

And James looked.

Someone had planted Mary Fortune.

Her head was not visible; it was covered in earth. Someone had hung her upside down by her ankles and buried her head in earth in a large earthenware pot. There were hooks on the ceiling beams for hanging plant pots. Someone had tied her ankles with rope and slung her up on to one of these hooks. She was dressed in that inevitable colour of green; green sandals, green blouse, and green shorts.

"Cut her down!" Agatha's voice was harsh with horror.

But James was bending over Mary and feeling for any life in the pulse at her neck and in her wrist.

He straightened up. "Leave everything as it is for the police. She's been murdered and she's stone-dead."

"Murder!"

"Pull yourself together, Agatha," he said sharply. "She didn't plant herself. I'll phone."

He left the conservatory. Agatha gave one last horrified look at the body and scrambled out after him on shaky legs.

James was in the living-room. He called Fred Griggs and then sat down heavily on the sofa and clutched his thick hair with both hands. "It's terrible...terrible," he said. "I slept with her, you know."

Agatha, already overset, sat down and began to cry weakly. "Don't cry," he said gruffly. "She cannot feel anything now."

But Agatha was crying from a mixture of shock and shame. All her feelings for James now seemed like some sort of dismal schoolgirl crush. She had always thought that he led a monkish life, shy of women, always unattached, and because she herself had not indulged in an affair for some time, she had found it easier to dream about him as romantically as a schoolgirl. She had been jealous of his friendship with Mary, but she had considered it just that friendship, with a bit of light flirtation, nothing more. But he had lain in Mary's bed and in Mary's arms. Her mind writhed under the weight of her miserable thoughts.

PC Griggs lumbered in. He looked like a village policeman, stolid, red-faced. One almost expected him to say, "Ello, 'ello, 'ello. What 'ave we 'ere?" But he was a shrewd and clever man in his slow way.

"Where's the body?" he asked.

James unfolded his length from the sofa. "I'll show you."

Agatha looked longingly at the drinks trolley in the corner. She felt a stiff brandy might help her to pull herself together. Just as she was wondering whether she could risk pouring one by wrapping a handkerchief around the bottle, the CID arrived. Detective Sergeant Bill Wong was part of the group. Behind them came more cars. Pathologist, doctor, forensic team, police cameraman, and the press from the local newspaper, whose enterprising editor listened in on the police radio.

Bill Wong looked at Agatha's tear-stained face and, thinking she was mourning Mary, said with quick compa.s.sion, "You go on home, Agatha. We'll be along to take a statement later. You found the body?"

"Yes, me and James Lacey."

"Is he here?"

"Yes, with the body."

"Right. He'll do for now. I'll get one of my men to take you home."

And Agatha was at such a low point that she let a policeman put a strong arm about her and lead her away.

Five.

Agatha sat nursing a gla.s.s of brandy in one hand and a lighted cigarette in the other. She noticed with a numb clinical interest that her hands were shaking slightly. She wished now she had stayed at Mary's. Her home was so quiet under its heavy thatched roof, unusually quiet. Mostly the old house creaked comfortably as it settled down for the night.

Who could have done such a thing? What had she ever known of Mary? What had she ever really known of James Lacey, for that matter? He was intelligent, handsome, in his mid-fifties, a retired colonel who had settled in the country to write military history. They had investigated a previous murder together. She knew he could be resourceful and quite ruthless in dangerous circ.u.mstances. They had talked together quite a lot then, but about books and plays, about the murder case, about people in the village. What really made him tick? Would he be capable of murder?

But whoever had done the murder had probably also mined those gardens and she could not believe for a minute that James would do something as petty and spiteful as that. It all centred on gardening, of that she was sure. Therefore, her mind ran on, whoever had destroyed the gardens and poisoned Mr Spott's fish and then murdered Mary was quite mad, and viciously so. It had not been enough just to knife Mary or strangle her. Someone had been evil enough to want her humiliated in death. Please, G.o.d, let it be someone from Mary's past.

The sound of a car drawing up outside interrupted her thoughts. She stubbed out her cigarette and carefully put her brandy gla.s.s down on a side-table, noticing with an odd sort of pride that her hands had stopped shaking. She went to answer the door. Bill Wong stood there with a policewoman.

"I'll take an initial statement from you, Agatha," he said, "and then I would like you to report to headquarters in Mircester tomorrow while we go through it again. I have asked Mr Lacey to come as well, so perhaps you can travel in together."

Agatha led Bill and the policewoman into the living-room. "Would you like coffee?"

The policewoman sat down demurely on a hard chair in the corner of the room and flicked open her notebook. "Not this time," said Bill.

"No tape recorder?"

"We'll tape your statement tomorrow, have it typed up and read it back to you. So begin at the beginning."

Agatha spoke of the start of the evening in the pub and how James had become anxious over Mary's non-appearance. She described how they had called at the cottage and found the door unlocked, gone inside, searched, and then found the body in the small conservatory.

"It would take someone of considerable strength to hoist a dead body up like that," ventured Agatha.

"Perhaps," said Bill. "The forensic chaps have taken the rope away, along with every speck of dust in that house. It's amazing what they can find out these days. Now who else was in the pub when you left with Mr Lacey?"

Agatha wrinkled her brow. "Let me see. James and I were talking to Mr Galloway. Miss Simms was over at the bar with old Mr Spott. Mrs Mason and her husband were at the bar as well, and those pests, the Boggles, were complaining about the strength of the beer in another corner. In front of the fire was my cleaner, Doris Simpson, and her husband." She half closed her eyes and continued to list the villagers. "Oh, and there was one stranger, on his own, at the far left of the bar."

"What did he look like?"

"Early twenties, jeans, designer stubble, thick sandy hair worn in a pony-tail, nondescript face. You know, two eyes, one nose, one mouth. I only noticed him because he was the only stranger there. He seemed to be waiting for someone. This is all a vague impression. You see, I was talking to James."

"Yes, I see what you mean," said Bill with a faint twinkle in his eyes. "Now, when you both approached Mrs Fortune's cottage, did you meet anyone?"

"I don't think so. Everyone in this village says h.e.l.lo. I was thinking about Mary, as a matter of fact."

"Mrs Fortune? What were you thinking?"

"I was thinking that although we were friends, I knew so little about her. I mean, she was all charm and warmth and then she would come out with some sort of b.i.t.c.hy remark."

"Such as?"

"She called you a c.h.i.n.k."

"Nothing to what I get back at the station. It's probably the sort of thing she usually said."

"No, she was out to be nasty. I was surprised that she was so overtly b.i.t.c.hy. I mean, often there was something you just couldn't put your finger on."

"Lacey must have known her better than anyone."

"Why?" demanded Agatha defensively.

"Well known in the village he was romancing her."

"Nothing to it." Agatha's heart had begun to hammer against her ribs. "He took her out for a few dinners and then that stopped. They were just friends."

Bill looked at her distressed face. Lacey had been quite open about the fact that he and Mrs Fortune had been lovers earlier in the year, but all at once he could not bring himself to tell Agatha that.

The doorbell went. "I'll get it," he said.

He answered the door and then came back followed by Mrs Bloxby, who was carrying a small travel bag.

"I thought you would feel better if someone stayed here with you for the night, Mrs Raisin."

Agatha's eyes filled with tears again and she blinked them away.

"That's all for now," said Bill. "Come along to the police station at ten tomorrow. Get a good night's sleep. I'll call on Lacey and tell him to pick you up."

Agatha escorted Bill and the policewoman to the door. Bill smiled at her. "Not like London, hey?"

"They have lots of murders in London."

"I didn't mean that. I meant that there would be no Mrs Bloxby in London to think of sitting with you."

"Oh, that. See you tomorrow."

Agatha returned to Mrs Bloxby. "Come through to the kitchen and I'll make some tea."

"Yes, but I'll make it. And then you'd better go to bed. What a dreadful experience. News travels fast here, but I found it hard to believe. Mrs Griggs, Fred's wife, phoned me to tell me that someone had planted Mrs Fortune."

"Yes, it was horrible," said Agatha. "She had been strung up by the ankles and her head had been buried in a big flowerpot. And she was wearing that d.a.m.n green like she always did. We didn't see her at first because of that green, because..." Agatha began to shake.

"There now. There now. I'll just put the kettle on. I am very distressed as well, although I did not have such a vile experience as you, Mrs Raisin."

Agatha smiled weakly. "We should not be so formal with each other. I think you should call me Agatha and I will call you...?"

"Margaret."

"Were you fond of Mary?"

"It's not that." Mrs Bloxby's thin hands busied themselves putting tea in the teapot and filling it with boiling water. "I let my personal feelings interfere with my judging of the horticultural show and I have never done that before."

Agatha blinked. "I find that hard to believe. Why?"

The vicar's wife filled two mugs with hot tea, took milk out of the fridge and waited until they were both seated at the kitchen table. She stirred sugar into her tea and then said slowly, "I was one of Mrs Fortune's admirers at first. It is so pleasant when a newcomer involves herself in helping out with church and village activities. She called at the vicarage quite a lot. She used to flirt with Alf."

Not for the first time, Agatha considered Alf quite an unsuitable name for a vicar. "I did not mind because Mary Fortune is...was...a well-travelled, pretty woman, of the kind, I thought, who flirts automatically. Then she wanted Alf to take her confession. Well, our church is quite low and Alf does not have a confessional, but he will always listen to any parishioner in trouble, so he agreed to an interview with her in his study. I do not know what happened, but he told me afterwards that he considered her not a very nice woman and somewhat unstable. Then, when she called, he always found some excuse to leave the house.

"Mrs Fortune began to make little remarks to me, little disparaging remarks. You know, it was a pity I had let myself go. She could recommend a good hairdresser and so on. I have varicose veins, but I wear my skirts long so people don't usually notice, but Mrs Fortune did. And then the next time I saw her, she would be all sweetness and light and friendship, but the poison began to seep in and I began to feel diminished and dowdy. To my horror, I began to dislike her and I never usually dislike people very strongly. One cannot like everybody and I sometimes find the Boggles, say, a sore trial, but there was something about her that got under my skin.

"She would smile at me slowly and pityingly. She would ask how many countries I had visited, and Alf and I have not been abroad in years."

Agatha began to feel better. It was a relief in a way to find that Mrs Bloxby, whom Agatha had hitherto regarded as a saint, was capable of normal human feelings.

An idea came to her and she leaned forward eagerly. "It must be like being blackmailed or conned. That's it. Conned."

"What do you mean?"

"I remember reading a case in the papers where a chap in a village had tricked various people out of their savings by pretending to be a stockbroker. He wasn't very good at it and the first couple he had conned quickly found out about it. But they did not take him to court. They were too ashamed of being gulled, don't you see. So he was able to go on for a bit, tricking other people.

"Now, when people talked to you about Mary, I am sure you murmured something nice because to say you did not like her would mean you would have to explain why, and the very explanation would make you feel more diminished. I bet she riled more than you. Why did you tell me, of all people?"

Mrs Bloxby looked at her in mild surprise. "You never judge or condemn, Agatha. I suppose that's it."

Only in my head, and nearly all the time, thought Agatha ruefully.

And then somehow it was easy for her to say, "James was having an affair with Mary."

"So I gathered."

"But no one said anything to me! James told me last night."