Agatha Raisin and the Love from Hell

until I get the book and see when the hall is free. It had better be an evening or the weekend, so that everyone can come.’
    She returned with a ledger and ran her finger down the pages. ‘Let me see, next Saturday morning is free. I’m afraid Alf might expect you to pay for the rental of the hall.’
    ‘What! After all the money Aggie raised at the fête!’ exclaimed Charles.
    ‘That money went straight to charity,’ said Mrs Bloxby.
    ‘I don’t mind,’ said Agatha. ‘I’ll pay half and Charles will pay the other half.’
    Charles opened his mouth to protest but saw the gleeful look in Agatha’s eyes and closed it again.
    Mrs Bloxby carefully entered the hall booking and said, ‘You are both going to have a busy day.’
    ‘Why?’ asked Agatha.
    ‘Because everyone will have to know there is a meeting. You’ll need to run off flyers from your computer and post them through all the doors.’
    Agatha groaned. ‘Can’t I just put up a notice in the village shop?’
    ‘A lot of people shop at the supermarkets and might not see it.’
    ‘I know,’ said Charles. ‘The schoolchildren are still on holiday. We could get some of them to distribute flyers.’
    ‘I wouldn’t do that,’ said Mrs Bloxby. ‘It’s been tried. They even get paid for it, but children are so lazy nowadays. One cottage usually ends up with several hundred flyers pushed through the one letterbox and then the little angels come round to the vicarage demanding their money.’
    ‘Oh, well,’ sighed Agatha. ‘I need the exercise.’
    She and Charles returned to her cottage. Agatha typed off a flyer on her computer and ran off several hundred copies and then she and Charles split up, agreeing to meet at the Red Lion later.
    As Agatha trudged from door to door, she felt a sudden sympathy with the lazy schoolchildren. It would be so easy just to hide a bunch of flyers or shove a hundred through the one letterbox and then be finished with the wretched things. She just hoped the same idea wasn’t occurring to Charles.
    She took a break for lunch and noticed from an egg-smeared plate lying in the sink that Charles had taken a break as well. Back out she went, ending up by posting the last flyer in the village store’s window. People she spoke to grumbled that they had told the police all they knew, and yet all seemed intrigued by the idea of the meeting.
    Agatha wearily made her way along to the pub, where Charles was already sitting. She eyed him suspiciously. ‘You didn’t cheat?’
    ‘No, sweetie, as my aching feet will bear testimony. I ran like the wind from door to door. You would leave me to do the council estate. Loads of houses there. Oh, and I had to call the police.’
    ‘Why?’
    ‘I was bending down – all the letterboxes in those council houses are practically at ground level – when I heard a woman screaming. “Leave me alone,” she was shouting, and then there was the sound of a thump and then another scream. So I called Fred Griggs.’
    ‘Was it a Mrs Allan?’
    ‘That’s the one. Fred tried to get her to lay charges. The man is called Derry Patterson, a big rough fellow.’
    ‘But she wouldn’t lay charges?’
    ‘Nope.’
    ‘Why does she do it? She’s just got rid of one brutal man.’
    ‘Seems they go for the same kind. Anyway, what next?’
    ‘I think we should try to get Bill to tell us the name of Melissa’s solicitor and also tell us how much she left in her will.’
    ‘Aren’t wills published in the newspaper? We could ask that editor in Mircester. He might open up a bit. I know, we’ll tell him about the village hall meeting, get a bit of publicity for it.’
    ‘Good idea.’
    The following day, the editor of the Mircester Journal , Mr Jason Blacklock, surveyed them wearily. ‘You two again,’ he said. ‘You’re not very good at supplying us with stories. It’s just as well we don’t cover Worcester, although I did get reports you’ve had the police out twice.’
    ‘The next thing that happens in your area, we’ll let you know. I mean, I did send you an invitation to the fête,’ said Agatha. ‘I looked at your paper and you didn’t cover it.’
    He sighed. ‘I decided to give Josie a break and sent her.’
    ‘What? Mircester’s finest example of anorexia?’
    ‘Yes, her.’
    ‘So what happened?’
    ‘She told us nothing happened. She said it was just a tatty little village fête. When I read in the Gloucester Echo that an antique doll had gone for two thousand, I