Agatha Raisin and the Terrible Tourist

yours been cut off?’
    ‘No, you do not understand. My mother is coming to stay.’
    Agatha blinked. Mrs Darry she judged to be in her late sixties.
    ‘Mother is ninety-two,’ went on Mrs Darry. ‘She is very partial to good tea. I do not have a car and I wondered whether you would get me a flask of water from the spring at Ancombe?’
    ‘I did not intend to go to Ancombe,’ said Agatha, thinking how much she disliked this newcomer to the village. She was such an ugly woman. How odd that people could be so ugly, not particularly because of appearance, but because of the atmosphere of judgemental bad temper and discontent they carried around with them.
    She was wearing one of those sleeveless quilted jackets, tightly buttoned up over a high-necked blouse. Her pointed nose, her pursed mouth and her sandy hair and her pale green hunting eyes made her look more than ever to Agatha like some vicious feral animal, always looking for the kill.
    ‘Is there no one else you could ask?’ Agatha considered offering Mrs Darry coffee, and then decided against it.
    ‘Everyone else is so busy,’ mourned Mrs Darry. ‘I mean, it’s not as if you have much to do.’
    ‘As a matter of fact I do,’ retorted Agatha, stung to the quick. ‘I am going to be handling the public relations for the new water company.’
    Mrs Darry gathered up her handbag and gloves and got to her feet. ‘I am surprised at you, Mrs Raisin. That you who live in this village should be aiding and abetting a company that is out to destroy our environment is beyond belief.’
    ‘Push off,’ said Agatha.
    Left alone, she lit another cigarette. On and off during that day, she turned over in her mind the idea of representing the water company. Of course, the offer might not still be open. If she was employed in the launch, then she would need to work very hard, and if she was working very hard, she would not be impelled to make any more silly phone calls to James and suffer the inevitable rejection.
    A poor evening on television did little to lighten her mood. She ate a whole bar of chocolate and felt the waistline of her skirt tighten alarmingly. In vain did she tell herself that the constricting feeling at her middle was probably psychosomatic. She decided on impulse to take a flask and walk over to Ancombe and get some water for tea, and to take another look at the spring.
    It was another beautiful evening. Bird cherry starred the hedgerows, orchards on either side of the road glimmered with apple blossom. She trudged along, a stocky figure, feeling diminished by the glory of the night.
    The walk to Ancombe was several miles and by the time she approached the spring, she was weary and already regretting her decision not to take the car.
    The spring was at the far end of the village, the unlit end, where the houses stopped and the countryside began again.
    As she approached she could hear the tinkling sound of the water.
    She was about to bend over the spring when she started back with a gasp of alarm and dropped her flask. For lying at her feet, staring up at the faint light from the moon and stars above, was a dead man.
    Very dead, thought Agatha, feeling for his pulse and finding none.
    She ran back to the nearest house, roused the occupants and phoned the police.
    Waving aside offers of brandy or tea, Agatha returned resolutely to the spring and waited. Word quickly spread around the village and by the time the police arrived, there was a silent circle of people around the body. The skull above the spring glared maliciously at them from over the dead man’s body.
    Agatha learned from the hushed whispers that the body was that of a Mr Robert Struthers, chairman of Ancombe Parish Council. Blood was seeping from the back of his head into the spring, blood, black in the night, swirling around the stone basin.
    Sirens tore through the silence of the night. The police had arrived at last. Bill would not be among them. It was his day off.
    But Agatha recognized Detective Inspector Wilkes.
    She sat in one of the police cars and made a statement to a policewoman. She felt quite numb. She was told to wait and a police car would take her home.
    At last she was dropped off at her own cottage. She hesitated on her doorstep, looking wistfully towards the cottage next door. Here was a splendid opportunity to talk to James. But the shock of finding the dead man had changed something in her. I’m worth better than that, thought Agatha, as she unlocked her door