The Quiche of Death (5 page)

"I felt out of place," said Agatha bleakly. "I wanted to make my mark on the village."

He laughed happily, his eyes closing into slits. "You've done just that. Mrs. Cummings-Browne knows now you cheated and so
does Fred Griggs, the local bobby, and he's a prize gossip."

Agatha felt too humiliated to speak. So much for her dream home. She would need to sell up. How could she face anyone in the
village?

He looked at her sympathetically. "If you want to make your mark on the village, Mrs. Raisin, you could try becoming popular."

Agatha looked at him in amazement. Fame, money and power were surely the only things needed to make one's mark on the world.

"It comes slowly," he said. "All you have to do is start to like people. If they like you back, regard it as a bonus."

Really, what odd types they had in the police force these days, thought Agatha, surprised. Did she dislike people? Of course
she didn't. Well, so far the only people she had taken a dislike to in Yokel Country, she thought savagely, were old fart-face
next door and Mrs. Cummings-Browne and the dear deceased.

"How old are you?" she asked.

"Twenty-three," said Bill.

"Chinese?"

"Half. Father is Hong Kong Chinese and Mother is from Evesham. I was brought up in Gloucestershire." He rose to go but for
some reason Agatha wanted him to stay.

"Are you married?" she asked.

"No, Mrs. Raisin."

"Well, sit down for a moment," said Agatha urgently, "and tell me about yourself."

Again a flicker of sympathy appeared in his eyes. He sat down and began to talk about his short career in the police force
and Agatha listened, soothed by his air of certainty and calm. Unknown to her, it was the start of an odd friendship. "So,"
he said at last, "I really must go. Case finished. Case solved. Nasty accident Life goes on."

The next day, to escape from the eyes of the villagers, eyes that would accuse her of being a cheat, Agatha drove to London.
She was anxious about Mr. Economides. Agatha, a regular take-away eater, had frequented Mr. Economides's shop over the years.
Perhaps some of Bill Wong's remarks had struck home, but Agatha had realized Mr. Economides, although their relationship had
been that of customer and salesman, was as near a friend as she had got. The shop contained two small tables and chairs for
customers who liked to have coffee, and when the shop was quiet, Mr. Economides had often treated Agatha to a coffee and told
her tales of his numerous family.

But when she arrived, the shop was busy and Mr. Economides was guarded in his answers as his competent hairy hands packed
quiche and cold cuts for the customers. Yes, Mrs. Cummings-Browne had called in person to assure him that she would not be
suing him. Yes, it had been a tragic accident. And now, if Mrs. Raisin would excuse him . . . ?

Agatha left, feeling rather flat. London, which had so recently enclosed her like a many-coloured coat, now stretched out
in lonely streets full of strangers all about her. She went to Foyle's bookshop in the Char­ing Cross Road and looked up a
book on poisonous plants. She studied a picture of cowbane. It was an innocuous-looking plant with a ridged stem and flower
heads composed of groups of small white flowers. She was about to buy the book when she suddenly thought, why bother? It had
been an accident, a sad accident.

She pottered around a few other shops in London before returning to her car and joining the long line of traffic that was
belching its way out of London. Reluctant to return to the village before dark, she cut off the motorway and headed for Oxford
and parked her car in St. Giles and made her way to the Randolph Hotel for tea. She was the only customer, odd in that most
popular of hotels. She settled back in a huge sofa and drank tea and ate crumpets served to her by a young maiden with a Pre-Raphaelite
face. Faintly from outside came the roar of traffic ploughing up Beaumont Street past the Ashmoleum Museum. The hotel had
a dim ecclesiastical air, as if haunted by the damp souls of dead deans. She pushed the last crumpet around on her plate.
She did not feel like eating it. She needed a purpose in life, she thought, an aim. Would it not be marvelous if Cummings-Browne
turned out to have been murdered after all? And she, Agatha Raisin, solved the case? She would become known throughout the
Cotswolds. People would come to her. She would be respected. Had it been an accident? What sort of marriage had the Cummings
Brownes really had where she could come home and trot off to bed while her husband lay dead behind the sofa? Why separate
bedrooms? Bill Wong had told her that. Why should Mr. Economides's excellent and famous quiche suddenly contain cowbane when
over the years he had not had one complaint? Perhaps she could ask around. Just a few questions. No harm in that.

Feeling more cheerful than she had for a long time, she paid the bill and tipped the gentle waitress lavishly. The sun was
sinking low behind the trees as she motored through the village and turned off at Lilac Lane. Shefished out the spare door
key and then she heard her phone ringing, sharp and insistent.

She swore under her breath as she fumbled with the key. It was the first time her phone had rung. She tumbled in the door
and felt her way towards it in the gloom.

"Roy here," came the famillar mincing voice of her ex-assistant.

"How lovely to hear from you," cried Agatha in tones she had never used before to the young man.

"Fact is, Aggie, I was hoping I could come down and see you this weekend."

"Of course. You're welcome."

"I've got this Australian friend, Steve, wants to see the countryside. Do you mind if he comes too?"

"More the merrier. Are you driving here?"

"Thought we'd take the train and come down Friday night."

"Wait a bit," said Agatha, "I've got a timetable here." She fumbled in her bag. "Yes, there's a through train leaves Paddington
at six-twenty in the evening. Don't need to change anywhere. Gets in at Moreton-inMarsh—"

"Where?"

"Moreton-in-Marsh."

"Too Agatha Christie for words, darling."

"And I'll meet you at the station."

"It's the May Day celebrations at the weekend, Aggie, and Steve wants to look at maypoles and morris dancers and all that
sort of thing."

"I haven't had time to look at any posters, Roy. I've been involved in a death "

"Did one of the clodhoppers try to mumble with you with his gruttock, luv?"

"Nothing like that. I'll tell you all about it when I see you."

Angela whistled to herself as she cracked open one of her cookery books and began to prepare the fish she had bought the day
before. There seemed to be so many exotic recipes. Surely one just fried the stuff. So she did and by the time it was ready,
realized she had not put the potatoes on to boil or cooked the cauliflower. She threw a packet of mircrowaveable chips in
the micro and opened a can of bright-green peas. It all tasted delicious to Agatha's undemanding palate when she finally sat
down to eat.

The next day, she called in at Harvey's and studied the posters at the door. Yes, there was to be morris dancing, maypole
dancing, and a fair in the village on the Saturday. People nodded and smiled to her. No one said "quiche" or anything dreadful
like that. Cheerfully Agatha trotted home but was waylaid by Mrs. Barr before she could get to her own garden gate.

"I thought you would have been at the inquest yesterday at Mircester," said Mrs. Barr, her eyes cold and watchful.

"No one asked me," said Agatha. "It was an accident. I suppose the police evidence was enough."

"Not enough for me," said Mrs. Barr coolly. "Nothing came out about the way you cheated at that competition."

Curiosity overcame rancour in Agatha's bosom. "Why not? Surely it was mentioned that it had been bought in a shop in Chelsea?"

"Oh, yes,
that
came out but not a word of condemnation for you being a cheat and a liar. Poor Mrs. Cummings-Browne broke down completely.
We don't need your sort in this village."

"And what was the verdict?"

"Accidental death, but you killed him, Agatha Raisin. You killed him with your nasty foreign quiche, just as much as if you
had knifed him."

Agatha's eyes blazed. "I'll kill you, you malicious harridan, if you don't bugger off."

She marched to her own cottage, blinking tears from her eyes, appalled at her own shock and dismay and weakness.

Thank God Roy was coming. Dear Roy, thought Agatha sentimentally, forgetting she had always considered him a tiresomely effeminate
young man whom she would have sacked had he not had a magic touch with the peculiar world of pop music.

There came a knock at the door and Agatha cringed, wondering if some other nasty local was about to berate her. But when she
opened it, it was Bill Wong who stood on the step.

"Came to tell you about the inquest," he said. "I called yesterday but you were out."

"I was
seeing friends"
said Agatha loftily. "In fact, two of them are coming to stay with me for the weekend. But come in."

"What was the Barr female on about?" he asked curiously as he followed Agatha into her kitchen.

"Accusing me of murder," mumbled Agatha, putting groceries away in the cupboards. "Like a cof­fee?"

"Yes, please. So the inquest is over and Mr. Cummings-Browne is to be cremated and his ashes cast to the four winds on Salisbury
Plain in memory of his army days."

"I believe Mrs. Cummings-Browne collapsed at the inquest," said Agatha.

"Yes, yes, she did. Two sugars please and just a dash of milk. Most affecting."

Agatha turned at looked at him, her interest suddenly quickening. "You think she was acting?"

"Maybe. But I was surprised he was so generally mourned. There were quite a lot of ladies there sobbing into their handkerchiefs."

"With their husbands? Or on their own?"

"On their own."

Agatha put a mug of coffee down in front of him, poured one for herself and sat down at the kitchen table opposite him.

"Something's bothering you," said Agatha.

"Oh, the case is closed and I have a lot of work to do. There's an epidemic of joy-riders in Mircester."

"What time did Mrs. Cummings-Browne go to bed, the night her husband died?" asked Agatha.

"Just after midnight or thereabouts."

"But the Red Lion closes sharp at eleven and it's only a few minutes' walk away."

"She said he often stayed out late, drinking with friends."

Agatha's eyes were shrewd. "Oho! And weeping women at the inquest. Don't tell me old jug ears was a philanderer."

"There's no evidence of that."

"And yet Mrs. Cartwright always won the competition. Why?"

"Perhaps her baking was the best."

"No one bakes quiche better than Mr. Economides," said Agatha firmly.

"But you are the incomer. More natural to give a prize to one of the locals."

"Still..."

"I can see from the look in your eye, Mrs. Raisin, that you would like it to be murder after all and so clear your conscience."

"Why did you call to tell me about the inquest?"

"I thought you would be interested. There's a paragraph about it in today's
Gloucestershire Telegraph."

"Have you got it?" demanded Agatha. "Let me see."

He fished in his pocket and pulled out a crumpled newspaper. "Page three."

Agatha turned to page three.

"And blah, blah, blah," said Agatha, putting the paper down. "Hardly a paragraph."

"You're lucky," said Bill Wong. "If there hadn't been riots on that estate in Mircester and two deaths, I am sure some enterprising
reporter would have been around to find out about the cheating incomer of Carsley. You got off lucky."

Agatha sighed. "I'll never live it down, unless I can prove it was murder."

"Don't go looking for more trouble. That's why there's a police force. Best let everyone forget about your part in the death.
Economides is lucky as well. With all this going on in Russia, not one London paper has bothered to pick up the story."

"I still wonder why you came?"

He drained the last of his coffee and stood up.

"Perhaps I like you, Agatha Raisin."

Agatha blushed for about the first time in her life. He gave her an amused look and let himself out.

FOUR

The weather was calm but still cold. The train, oh, miracle of miracles, was actually on time. Roy descended and rushed to
embrace her. He was wearing jeans and a T-shirt which bore the legend i HAVE BEEN USED. Following him came a slight young
man. He had thick black hair and a heavy moustache and wore a light-blue denim jacket, jeans, and high-heeled cowboy boots.
Butch Cassidy comes to Moreton-in-Marsh. This then was Steve. He gave her a limp handshake and stood looking at her with doggy
eyes.

"Welcome to the Cotswolds " said Agatha. "Roy tells me you're Australian. On holiday?"

"No, I am a systems analyst," said Steve in the careful English accents of an Eliza Doolittle who hadn't yet quite got it.
"I work in the City."

"Come along, then," said Agatha. "The car's parked outside. I thought I would take you both out for dinner tonight. I'm not
much of a cook."

"And neither you are, ducks," said Roy. He turned to Steve. "We used to call her the queen of the microwave. She ate most
of her meals in the office and kept a microwave oven there, awful things like the Rajah's Spicy Curry and things like that.
Where are we going to eat, Aggie?"

"I thought maybe the Red Lion in the village."

She unlocked the car door but Roy stood his ground. "Pub grub?" he asked.

"Yes."

"Steak and kidney pie and chips, sausage and chips, fish and chips and lasagne and chips?"

"Yes, so what?"

"So what? My delicate little stomach cringes at the thought, that's what. My friend Jeremy said there was ever such a good
restaurant in the Horse and Groom at Bourton-on-the-Hill. Don't you just love these place names, Steve? See, he's drooling
already." Steve looked impassive. "They're Basque and do all those sort of fishy dishes. I say, Aggie, have you heard the
one about the fire at the Basque football game? They all rushed to get out of the stadium and all got crushed in the exit
and do you know what the moral of that is, my loves? Don't put all your Basques in one exit. Get it?"

"Stop wittering," said Agatha. "All right. We'll try the place, although if it's that good they may not have a table left."

But it turned out the Horse and Groom had just received a cancellation before they arrived. The dining-room was elegant and
comfortable and the food was excellent. Agatha asked Steve to tell her about his work and then regretted it bitterly as he
began a long and boring description of his job in particular and computers in general.

Even Roy grew weary of his friend's monologue and cut across it, saying, "What's all this about you being involved in a death,
Aggie?"

"It was an awful mistake," said Agatha. "I entered a spinach quiche in a village competition. One of the judges ate it and
died of poisoning."

Roy's eyes filled with laughter. "You never could cook, Aggie dear."

"It wasn't my cooking," protested Agatha. "I bought a quiche from The Quicherie in Chelsea and entered that."

Steve looked at her solemnly. "But surely in these sort of home-baking competitions you're supposed to cook the thing yourself."

"Yes, but—"

"But she was trying to pull a fast one as usual," crowed Roy. "Who was the judge and what did he die of?"

"Mr. Cummings-Browne. Cowbane poisoning."

"Struck down by a bane of cows? What is it? One of those peculiar agricultural diseases like swine fever or violet-root rot?"

"No, cowbane is a plant. It must have got mixed up in the spinach that Mr. Economides of the deli used."

Steve put down his fork and looked gravely at Agatha. "So you murdered him."

Roy screeched with laughter. He kicked his heels in the air, fell off the chair and rolled around the dining-room carpet,
holding his stomach. The other diners studied him with the polite frozen smiles the English use for threatening behaviour.

"Oh, Aggie," wheezed Roy when his friend had picked up his chair and thrust him back into it, "you are a one."

Patiently Agatha explained the whole sorry business. It had been a sad accident.

"What do they think about you in the village?" asked Roy, mopping his streaming eyes. "Are they calling you the Borgia of
the Cotswolds?"

"It's hard to know what they think," said Agatha. "But I had better sell up. The whole move to Carsely was a terrible mistake."

"Wait a minute," said Steve. He carefully extracted a piece of lobster and popped it in his mouth. "Where does this cowbane
grow?"

"In the West Midlands, and this, as the police pointed out, is the West Midlands."

Steve frowned. "Does it grow in farms among the regular vegetables?"

Agatha searched her memory for what she had read about cowbane in the book in Foyle's. "It grows in marshy places."

"I've heard the Cotswolds are famous for asparagus and strawberries . . . oh, and plums and things like that," said Steve.
"I read up on it. But not spinach. And how could a marshy plant get in among a field of spinach?"

"I don't know," said Agatha, "but as I recall, it grows in other parts of the British Isles as well. I mean, the stuff at
Covent Garden comes from abroad and all over the place in Britain."

Steve shook his head slowly, his mouth open as he contemplated another piece of lobster. "Are you wondering if there's an
aargh in the month?" demanded Roy. "You look like one of those faces at the fairground where you've to try and toss a ball
into the mouth."

"It just doesn't happen," said Steve.

"What?"

"Well, look here. A field of spinach is harvested. For some reason a marshy plant gets caught up with the spinach. Right?
So how come no one else dropped dead? How come it all got into one spinach quiche? Just the one. Surely a bit of it would
have got into
another
quiche. Surely another one of this Economides's customers would bite the dust."

"Oh, the police will have looked into all that," said Roy a trifle testily. He felt Steve was taking up too much of the conversation.

Steve shook his head slowly from side to. side.

"Look," said Agatha. "Be sensible. Who was to know I would walk off in a huff and leave that quiche? Who would even know that
the CummingsBrownes would take it home? The vicar could have taken it and given it to some old-age pensioner. Lord Pendlebury
could have taken it."

"When did you take your quiche to the competition?" asked Steve.

"The night before," said Agatha.

"So it was just lying there all night, unattended, in this hall? Someone could have baked another quiche with cowbane in it
and substituted it for Agatha's quiche."

"We're back to motive," said Agatha. "So say someone replaced a poisoned quiche for mine. Who's to know Cummings-Browne would
take it? I didn't even know I was going to walk off and leave it until the last minute."

"But it could have been meant for you," said Steve. "Don't you see? Even if you had won that competition, only a Little slice
was taken out for the judging, and then you would have taken the rest home." He leaned forward. "Who hates you enough?"

Agatha thought uneasily of Mrs. Barr and then shrugged. "This is ridiculous. Do you read Agatha Christie?"

"All the time," said Steve.

"Well, so do I, but delightful as those detective stories are, believe me, murders are usually sudden and violent and take
place in cities, some drunken lout of a husband bashing his wife to death. Don't you see, I would
like
it to be murder."

"Yes, I can see that," said Steve, "because you have been exposed as a cheat."

"Here, wait a minute—"

"But it all looks very odd."

Agatha fell silent. If only she had never tried to win that stupid competition.

Again a feeling of loneliness assailed her as she paid the bill and ushered her guests out into the night. She had a whole
weekend in front of her entertaining this precious pair, and yet their very presence emphasized her loneliness. Roy had no
real affection for her of any kind. His friend had wanted to see rural England and so he was using her.

Roy pranced around the cottage, looking at everything. "Very cute, Aggie," was his verdict. "Fake horse brasses! Teh! Teh!
And all that farm machinery."

"Well, what would you have?" said Agatha crossly.

"I dunno, sweetie. Looks like a stage set. Nothing of Aggie here."

"Perhaps that's understandable," said Steve. "There are people who do not have personalities that transfer to interior decorating.
You need to be a homebody."

"You can go off people, you know," commented Agatha waspishly. "Off to bed with both of you. I'm tired. The village festivities
don't begin until noon, so you can have a long lie."

The next morning Roy took over the cooking when he found Agatha was about to microwave the sausages for breakfast. He whistled
happily as he went about the preparations and Agatha told him he would make someone a good wife. "More than you would, Aggie,"
he said cheerfully. "It's a wonder your health hasn't crumbled under a weight of microwaved curries."

Steve came down wrapped in a dressing-gown, gold and blue stripes and with the badge of a cricket club on the pocket. "He
got it at a stall in one of the markets," said Roy. "Don't bother talking to him, Aggie. He doesn't really wake up until he's
had a jug of coffee."

Agatha read through the morning papers, turning the pages rapidly to see if there was anything further about the quiche poisoning,
but there wasn't a word.

The morning passed amicably if silently and then they went out to the main street, Roy doing cartwheels down the lane past
Mrs. Barr's cottage. Agatha saw the lace curtains twitch.

Steve took out a large notebook and began to write down all about the festivities, which started off with the crowning of
the May Queen, a small pretty schoolgirl with a slimly old-fashioned figure. In fact all the schoolchildren looked like illustrations
in some long-forgotten book with their innocent faces and underdeveloped figures. Agatha was used to seeing schoolgirls with
busts and backsides. The Queen was drawn by the morris men in their flowered top hats, the bells at their knees jingling.
Roy was disappointed in the morris dancers, possibly because, despite the flowered hats, they looked like a boozy Rugby team
and were led by a white-haired man who struck various members of the audience with a pig's bladder. "Supposed to make you
fertile," said Steve ponderously and Roy shrieked with laughter and Agatha felt thoroughly ashamed of him.

They wandered around the stalls set up in the main street. Every one seemed to be selling wares in support of some charity
or other. Agatha winced away from the home-baking stand. Roy won a tin of sardines at the tombola and got so carried away,
he bought ticket after ticket until he managed to win a bottle of Scotch. There was a game of skittles which they all tried,
a rendering of numbers from musicals by the village band, and then the morris dancers again, leaping up into the sunny air,
accompanied by fiddle and accordion. "Don't you know you are living in an anachro­nism?" said Steve ponderously, scribbling
away in his notebook.

Roy wanted to try his luck at the tombola again and he and Steve went off. Agatha flicked through a pile of secondhand books
on a stall and then looked sharply at the woman behind the stall. Mrs. Cartwright!

She was, as Agatha had already noticed, a gypsy-looking woman, swarthy-skinned among all the pink-and-white complexions of
the villagers. Her rough hair hung down her back and her strong arms were folded across her generous bosom.

"Mrs. Cartwright?" said Agatha tentatively. The woman's dark eyes focused on her. "Oh, you be Mrs. Raisin," she said. "Bad
business about the quiche."

"I can't understand it," said Agatha. "I shouldn't have bought it, but on the other hand, how on earth would cowbane get into
a London quiche?"

"London is full of bad things," said Mrs. Cart­wright, straightening a few paperbacks that had tumbled over.

"Well, the result is that I will have to sell up," said Agatha. "I can't stay here after what happened."

" 'Twas an accident," said Mrs. Cartwright placidly. "Reckon you can't go running off after an accident. Besides, I was ever
so pleased a London lady should think she had to buy one to compete with me."

Agatha gave her an oily smile. "I did hear you were the best baker in the Cotswolds. Look, I would really like to talk about
it. May I call on you?"

"Any time you like," said Mrs. Cartwright lazily. "Judd's cottage, beyond the Red Lion on the old Station Road."

Roy came prancing up and Agatha moved on quickly, afraid that Roy's chattering and posturing might put Mrs. Cartwright off.
Agatha began to feel better. Mrs. Cartwright hadn't accused her of cheating, nor had she been nasty.

But then, after Steve and Roy had rejoined her and as they were leaving the May Day Fair, they came face to face with Mrs.
Barr. She stopped in front of Agatha, her eyes blazing. "I am surprised you have the nerve to show your face in the daylight,"
she said.

"What's got your knickers in a twist, sweetie?" asked Roy.

"This woman"—Mrs. Barr bobbed her head in Agatha's direction, "caused the death of one of our most respected villagers by
poisoning him."

"It was an accident," said Roy, before Agatha could speak. "Bugger off, you old fright. Come on, Aggie."

Mrs. Barr stood opening and shutting her mouth in silent outrage as Roy propelled Agatha past her.

"Miserable old cow," said Roy as they turned into Lilac Lane. "What got up her nose?"

"I lured her cleaning woman away."

"Oh, that's a capital crime. Murder has been committed for less. Take us to Bourton-on-the-Water, Aggie. Steve wants to see
it and we don't need to eat yet after that enormous breakfast."