The Quiche of Death (15 page)

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

"That'U be the second cottage along Mill Pond Edge," said the woman behind the till. "Do be uncommon hot, Mrs. Raisin."

"Screw the weather," said Agatha furiously. "Where's MiU 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, "but 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 findingMr. 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 neatlyfiled 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, "as 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."

"AU 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 Utter 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 spyhole 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 crossly.

"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, "and 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
unhairy. 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, "you 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 onto 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 Ud of the freezer. There
were all sorts of goodies: tarts, angel cakes, chocolates cakes, sponges and—she shuddered—even quiche.

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 Ud 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, "perhaps 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
word processor. "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 herfirst 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 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, take 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.

TWELVE

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, 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."

AU very odd. He wondered if Agatha was wanted for some crime or had simply been discovered missing from some 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. AU 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 Westgate 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 kitten 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—"looks exactly like cowbane, 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 cbuld 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-coiffed 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 actually 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 cowbane in Devon. So you told the police you had decided to forgive him and
not press charges. You said you did not know what cowbane 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 cowbane already in one of your
floral arrangements. So that's how it was done!"

Agatha trumphantly 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 his own supposed 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 teU 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 tinder-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 s e e . . . 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 dick 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 onto the
blazing carpet. Whimpering and sobbing, she crawled away from the roaringfire, 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 onto the kitchen floor, unconscious.