Part 10 (1/2)
”Her had told Mrs Bloxby she wanted to help in the community...and it's no use you two expecting tea or coffee. I've got more to do with my savings,”
Agatha ignored this. ”Go on,” she said. ”Mary asked Mrs Bloxby how she could help out in the community?”
”Yes, so she told that Mrs Fortune to take us out for the day. The painted hussy called round here, mutton dressed as lamb, if you ask me.
”I said we wanted to go to Bristol to look at the s.h.i.+ps. Didn't I, Boggle?”
”Yurse,” said Mr Boggle morosely.
”Her said, 'Oh, come now, that's too far. What about Evesham?'
”I said, didn't I, Boggle, that it was her duty to help the old get about? I told her that not all of us had money to go gallivanting around in large cars. Yes, and I told her that the way she was going on with Mr Lacey here was a fair scandal. In my day, we got married, that's what I told her. I was never one to mince my words, was I, Boggle?”
”No,” said Mr Boggle, staring at the blank television screen.
”To which Mary replied?” prompted Agatha.
”That Mrs Fortune then had the cheek to say that we would be better off in the old folks' home than leeching off people. Can you imagine? Did you ever hear the like? I told her to get out and take her trollopy ways with her.”
”Have you any idea who damaged your roses?” asked James.
”Never had any doubt,” said Mrs Boggle. ”It was her, Mary Fortune. Did it out of spite. Knew we would take first prize with them roses.”
”But you didn't get a prize,” said Agatha.
”Cause we didn't have nothing left for the show to match them roses,” said Mr Boggle suddenly and violently. He leaned forward and switched on a large electric fire and a blast of heat scorched into the already hot room. Outside, the sun was blazing down out of a clear sky. The temperature must have been in the high seventies. The room was suffocating. The windows were covered in thick white net, and curtains which looked as if they had been made out of red felt blocked out what was left of the light. The very stifling air seemed to be full of years of shared marital venom.
”The wicked shall be cut down like the green bay tree,” Mrs Boggle quoted inaccurately but viciously.
”You mean you are glad Mrs Fortune is dead?” asked Agatha.
”Course. That one got what was coming to her. Unnatural to sneer at the poor aged like us. We never did get that trip to Bristol. We ”
”Good heavens! Is that the time?” Agatha leapt to her feet. ”Come along, James. Thank you for your time, Mrs Boggle.”
Seeing her prey escape her, Mrs Boggle also got to her feet, but by the time she did that, Agatha and James had made their escape.
”Whew,” said Agatha. ”Wouldn't it be fun if it turned out they did it? At the back of my mind, there's always a fear that the murderer might turn out to be someone quite nice who was temporarily deranged by Mary. But who could feel sorry for the Boggles?”
”Mrs Raisin!” Mrs Boggle's voice sounded from Culloden. ”Come back. Boggle's fainted.”
James took a half-step towards the garden patih but Agatha seized his arm. ”Running for the doctor,” she shouted back and set off down the street, with James after her.
”Are we going for the doctor?” asked James when he caught up with her.
”Waste of time. She wanted us back there so she could bully that trip to Bristol out of us. But I'll phone the doctor when I get home, just to be on the safe side. Yes, I know they've got a phone there, but it would be just like one of them to die to spite us. Come and have a coffee with me while I phone and then we'll try Miss Simms.”
Although he accepted her invitation, Agatha, still relis.h.i.+ng her new freedom, realized that she would not have been devastated if he had turned it down.
She phoned the doctor, a new one in the village, a woman called Dr Sturret, and reported Mr Boggle's 'faint'. Then she made coffee for herself and James.
”I'm beginning to wonder if there is anyone in this village that Mary hasn't riled up,” said Agatha.
”And it's all making me feel a bit of a fool.” James looked at her uneasily.
”Surely you have nothing to reproach yourself with,” said Agatha. ”Think of Mary as an easy lay.”
”I am not in the habit of thinking of women as easy lays,” said James crossly. ”Can we drop the subject of my affair? I'm heartily sick of hearing about it.”
”Okay,” said Agatha reluctantly, because there was still enough of her old obsession for James left to make her enjoy the tras.h.i.+ng of Mary Fortune. ”When you've finished your coffee, we'll call on Miss Simms.”
”Why don't we call on Mrs Bloxby first?”
”Why her?”
”As the vicar's wife, she must hear a lot of gossip. And the women of the village will talk to someone like her more openly than they would talk to anyone else.”
”Maybe, after Miss Simms, if we have time,” Agatha pleaded.
”You know what, Agatha, I get a feeling Mrs Bloxby told you something and you don't want to tell me.”
”She told me something in confidence, James. It bears no relation to the murder. I can't tell you.”
”Fair enough. Miss Simms it is. Isn't she working?”
”Not any more. She stays at home and looks after the kids. The new man in her life is pretty generous.”
”It's amazing,” said James, ”how the ladies of Ca.r.s.ely not only accept having a blatantly unmarried mother in their midst but even make her the secretary of the Ladies' Society.”
”I think it's because villages have always accepted an unmarried mother or two in their midst before it became fas.h.i.+onable,” said Agatha. ”Let's go.”
Miss Simms answered her door. She was wearing the very high stiletto heels which she always wore, winter or summer. ”This is nice,” she said when she saw them. ”Come into the lounge and put your feet up. Gin? Lots of ice and tonic?”
”Lovely,” said Agatha, reflecting it was a treat to call on Miss Simms after such as the Boggles. Miss Simms was a pale, anaemic-looking woman in her late twenties. She had a long pale face and long mousy hair. She wore a short tight jersey skirt and a cheap frilly blouse, transparent enough to show a black bra.s.siere underneath. Mrs Bloxby had told Agatha that Miss Simms was a competent and hard-working secretary and did a great deal of voluntary work in the village. Agatha found Miss Simms a very pleasant sort of girl. She had seen glimpses of her latest gentleman a thick, beefy, florid man who drove off with her in the evenings.
”Are you investigating this murder?” asked Miss Simms after she had poured them drinks. She was sitting with her skirt hitched up, unselfconsciously exposing a border of frilly French knicker.
”Just asking a few questions,” said Agatha self-importantly.
”So what can you ask me?”
”We thought that if we could find out more about Mary, we could find out why someone killed her, and if we could find out why, we might find out who.”
”I know that line,” said Miss Simms. ”It was in Morse, or one of them detective things. Well, let me see. Mary...I didn't like her, of course. Sorry, Mr Lacey.”
”It doesn't matter,” he said gloomily. ”I'm beginning to think I didn't know her at all, although I can't get anyone to believe me.”
”I can,” said Miss Simms. ”I had a gentleman over in Persh.o.r.e once. We had a few good times and then the police came around and said he'd disappeared with the firm's takings. He worked for Padget, the paper people. I was shocked, but could I tell them a blind thing about him? I said he had a loud laugh and he wore his socks in bed, but the police said that was no good at all.”
”So what about Mary?” asked Agatha. ”I mean, I thought you liked everyone.”