Agatha Raisin and The Wellspring of Death

'But you don't know for sure!'

'I know. Do me a favour and get it out of your police friends. Now if you don't mind, I have work to do.'

'So what do you think of that?' asked Roy as they drove off.

'I think we should drive to Mircester and see what we can get out of Bill Wong.'

'Why do you think she sneered at me like that?' demanded Roy moodily. 'Creature, indeed.'

'She was furious with me and you just happened to be there.'

Roy's thin face lightened. 'That's it. It can't be my clothes. I mean, this sweater's Italian and cost a mint, and my jeans are stone-washed.'

Agatha privately thought that no matter how much money he spent on clothes, Roy would always look somehow as if he belonged in one of those London street gangs of white-faced undernourished youths.

'Oh, bugger,' said Agatha as they drove into Mircester. 'Market-day. No central parking, and I'm sick of walking.'

'Park right there!' said Roy.

'It's a yellow line. No parking.'

'Just park,' said Roy, fumbling in his back pocket and taking out his wallet. He fished out a 'disabled' sticker and affixed it on Agatha's windscreen.

'Where did you get that?'

'From a friend,' said Roy.

'But what if some copper comes along?'

'We can always drool at the mouth and say we're mentally disabled. Come along.'

They went into the police headquarters and asked for Bill Wong. 'We should have phoned,' said Agatha, as they waited. 'He's probably out.'

But after a few minutes, Bill appeared.

'I hope you've got something for me,' he said. 'I'm busy.' He led the way to an interviewing-room.

Agatha outlined everything she had learned since the last time she had seen him, ending up with Mary Owen's claim that Jane Cutler had murdered Robert Struthers to inherit after his death.

'Not the case,' said Bill. 'His son gets everything, not even a mention of either Jane Cutler or Mary Owen in the will.'

'Oh,' said Agatha, disappointed.

'This old boy, I mean Struthers,' said Roy, 'could have been playing both of them along. Old people sometimes do that to get attention. I mean, he liked playing cagey. He wouldn't tell any of the other councillors which way he meant to vote. Strikes me as being manipulative and liking his little bit of power. Just suppose Jane Cuder thought she was in the will.'

'That's a good point,' said Bill, 'but why not get him to marry her and be absolutely sure? Common sense would tell her that he would leave it all to his son. Then Jane Cutler is rich, and if Mary Owen has fallen on hard times, and she believed he had changed his will in her favour, then she might have bumped him off and then accused Jane to deflect any suspicions from her, although it's all very far-fetched.'

'James has disappeared,' said Agatha. 'Have you heard anything?'

Yes, Bill had through the grapevine learned that James was masquerading as a member of Save Our Foxes, but he didn't want to tell Agatha that. He felt the less Agatha saw of James, the better. Out of sight was out of mind.

'No,' he lied. 'Probably off on his travels.'

Agatha pulled herself together. 'You said they had decided that Struthers had been killed elsewhere and dumped at the spring. Any forensic evidence?'

'Nothing much. Forensic believes that someone vacuumed the body before dumping it. There was just one thing. A white cat hair in one of his turn-ups. He wore those old-fashioned trousers.'

Agatha's eyes gleamed. 'So we are looking for someone with a white cat!'

'Do you know, there isn't one white cat in the village of Ancombe?' said Bill. 'We went from house to house. Someone could be lying, of course.'

'It needn't be an all-white cat,' said Roy. 'Could be one of those black-and-white things.'

'Sorry. I should have explained that the hair was from a Persian cat.'

'Definitely a Persian, and a cat?' asked Agatha. 'It couldn't have been a dog?'

Agatha would have loved it to turn out to have been Mrs Darry.

'Definitely a Persian cat.'

'Still, it's something to go on,' said Agatha eagerly.

'I don't want to dampen your enthusiasm for amateur detection, but a great number of policemen have been searching for that cat and are still searching.'

'Does Mary Owen have an alibi?'

'Yes, on the night of the murder she was staying with her sister in Mircester. She stayed all night.'

'But he could have been killed earlier in the day!'

'It's always hard to estimate time of death, but he was killed earlier that evening. Mary Owen's sister said she arrived at four in the afternoon and did not leave until the following morning.'

'A sister would say anything.'

'True, but she seems a very direct, truthful sort of lady. Now, I've really got to get back to work.'

As Agatha and Roy approached Agatha's car, a large policeman was standing staring at it.

'Limp!' hissed Roy.

The policeman swung round and watched their approach. 'Thank you, dear boy,' quavered Agatha. 'I am getting so forgetful. I cannot remember where I left my stick.'

Hoping desperately it was not some policeman who had seen her before, Agatha smiled at him weakly and allowed Roy to help her into the driving seat. As soon as Roy was in behind her, she drove off with a great grinding and clashing of gears.

'Okay, I'm nervous,' said Agatha. 'The minute we stop I'm going to get that sticker off the windscreen.'

'Where now?'

'Let's go back to Ancombe and have a wander around. We might see that cat.'

'We haven't eaten and I'm starving.'

'We'll eat in the pub in Ancombe.'

'What about all that food I was going to cook? I've got to get the London train this evening.'

'Next time,' said Agatha.

James and Zak had agreed not to be seen spending too much time together. There was a member of Save Our Foxes called Billy Guide who drank heavily. James targeted him, buying the grateful Billy as much as he could drink.

A week after Agatha's interview with Mary Owen, James attended another meeting and his heart beat faster when he learned that the group's next expedition was to the spring in Ancombe.

Sybil, her fine eyes flashing, said they would take bags of cement and put them into the basin of the spring.

James, who longed to point out that their plan would cause more destruction to the village environment than the water company, kept silent. Why should such a group switch their attention from animals to the matter of spring water? Someone must be paying them for this action. Sybil was saying that the bus would pick them up at the usual place.

He half-listened to her rant, wondering if she believed a word of it.

Various other members made rousing speeches. James stifled a yawn. He roused himself when he heard Trevor ask if the press had been informed.

'No,' said Sybil. 'When the spring is cemented up, we'll phone them.'

'Wait a bit,' slurred Billy Guide, 'if the basin is filled with cement, that means the water from the spring will flood that woman's garden--what's her name?--Toynbee.'

'And serve her right!' cried Sybil. 'It's all her fault that capitalist commercialism has been allowed to pollute