Agatha Raisin and The Wellspring of Death

'Now, where?' asked Agatha as they stood in the car park outside the police headquarters.

'Fred Shaw?'

'I feel small,' said Agatha wearily. 'I feel I've just been ticked off by the ieacher. I feel I'm a bad person. I'll tell you, James, I have never been so insulted by so many people as I have been since the first murder took place.'

'Oh, you're all right,' said James absent-mindedly. 'Let's see Fred.'

They drove out of Mircester. It was the end of August. A few leaves were already turning yellow and there was a faint chill in the air. Agatha began to feel that every winter in the country with its fogs and icy roads was another little death. She could take a holiday somewhere sunny and miss the bad weather and the frantic ho-ho-ho jollity of Christmas, but the fact was she was increasingly reluctant to leave her cats. When they die, she vowed, I'll never keep another animal. It was no fun going away any more when part of her heart was always worrying if they were all right.

Her thoughts turned to Guy. He had at least given her a buzz when she was out with him, although the look-what-J'ue-got feeling was mitigated by the feeling that people might think her too old for him.

And what of James? Driving so competently, seemingly unfazed by the fact that they might both soon be in deep trouble. He would probably take himself off, she thought bitterly, and leave her alone to face the music.

She no longer knew what she felt for him. Relationships had to move forward, even an inch, or, like one of those videos she rented, the film came to an end and the tape began to run backwards--only, in her mind, showing not the happy scenes, but a long list of rejections.

She would see this case to the end, if it ever ended, and then detach herself from him.

They drove into Ancombe and stopped outside Fred Shaw's shop. He was serving a customer. He looked down the shop and saw them. 'Be with you shortly,' he called.

He served his customer with four batteries, said goodbye, and then approached them.

'What do you want?' he asked truculently.

'Just a few questions,' said James.

'I'm shutting the place up for lunchtime,' he said. 'Come into the back shop.'

He locked the door and pulled down the blind. He jerked his head and they followed him into the back shop.

'So what do you want?' There was no offer of whisky this time.

'We feel that life in Ancombe will never really go back to normal until these murders have been solved,' began James.

'So what's that got to do with me? The police are working on it.'

'Yes, but you are a man of business, a shrewd man,' said Agatha quickly.

The truculence left Fred's face. 'I do see a lot of things other people don't,' he said in a mollified voice.

'I heard something about Andy Stiggs being in love with Mrs Struthers. Mrs Struthers must have been younger than her husband.'

'Yes, she was. Andy also thought he should have been chairman of the council as well. He will be now.'

'Do you think he could have murdered Robina as well?' asked Agatha.

'Here now. I never said he murdered Robert. But he was always around Robina's. Maybe he saw something.'

'As Andy Stiggs was against the water company, that must have soured his relations with Robina,' said Agatha.

'I think he thought he could persuade her to change her mind.'

Agatha looked at him thoughtfully, wondering when she could slip in a question about his speech. Instead she said, 'Was there ever a Mrs Stiggs?'

'Yes, he married Ethel Fairweather on the rebound right after Robert got married and lived unhappily right up until her death. She was a shrew. In some way, he blamed Robert for his rotten marriage, know what I mean?'

'Where does he live?' asked James. 'I have his address but I'm not sure exactly where his cottage is.'

'Second on the left past the church.'

'You never called to see me with your speech,' said Agatha.

'What speech?'

'The one you were going to make at the fete.'

'When I heard that pop group was coming, I knew you wouldn't want me.'

And yet the pop group was a relatively late booking, thought Agatha. And when Fred had thought that Jane Harris was to open the fete, it had not stopped him.

'You don't think Mary Owen could have had anything to do with it?' asked Agatha. 'I mean, it turns out as far as I can gather that she's not broke after all. She paid those protesters.'

'She's big enough, strong enough and nasty enough,' said Fred. 'But Andy Stiggs is my choice.'

'You thought it was Mary Owen at one time.'

'Did I? I can't remember that.'

'So let's try Andy Stiggs,' said James when they left the shop.

'What's our approach?'

'Same as with Fred. Just want to get it cleared up.'

Andy Stiggs's cottage was a mellow building of Cotswold stone with a newly thatched roof. There was a pleasing jumble of old-fashioned flowers: stocks, impatiens, delphiniums, lupins, and roses, roses all the way.

Andy Stiggs was weeding a flowerbed. He straightened up as they came through the garden gate.

'What?' he demanded.

Oh, to be from the police and be able to say, 'Just a few questions,' with an air of authority, thought Agatha.

'We were in the village,' said James, 'and we thought we would drop in and see you.'

'Why?' He brushed earth from his large hands.

'As vice-chairman of the council, soon to be chairman, you must know a lot about what goes on in the village.'

'And what's that got to do with you? You don't live here.'

'You surely want these murders cleared up.'

'Of course I do, and the answer is staring you in the face. It's that water company. It's my belief that poor Robina changed her mind and so they bumped her off.'

'I think it's only on TV that companies go around bumping people off,' said Agatha.

'You can't see what's under your nose because that Guy Freemont has been romancing you,' said Andy.

'That's got nothing to do with it!' Agatha's face flamed.

'To my mind it has. What else would a young man like that be doing with a woman of your age?'

'That's enough of that,' said James coldly. 'You are just as suspect. I gather that Robert Struthers pinched the love of your life from under your nose.'

'That was years and years ago.'

'Sometimes resentments grow with the passing of time.'

Andy picked up a hoe and brandished it at them. 'Get out of here. Just get out and don't come round again or I'll...'

'Or I'll what?' asked James. 'Murder us? Come along, Agatha.'

'I think I've got a headache coming on,' said Agatha as they walked back to the car. 'If you don't mind, I would like to go home and lie down for a little.'

'I think we've done enough for one day anyway,' said James.

Half an hour later, Agatha crawled under the duvet on her bed and drew her knees up to her chin. She felt she could not go on investigating the murders. The council members with their insults had finally been able to intimidate her.

Despite the warmth of the duvet and the warmth of the day, she shivered. All the Carsely security, all the