She decided to start up a conversation to try to distract the others from her amateur sewing. 'Mrs. Wilden at the pub treated me to an excellent meal last night. She's quite stunningly beautiful.'
'Pity she's got the morals of a tom-cat,' snapped Polly, biting a thread with strong yellow teeth.
'Oh, really?' said Agatha, looking around curiously at the set faces. 'I found her rather sweet.'
'Good thing you're not married.' Amy, sounding almost tearful.
'When did your husband die, Agatha?' asked Carrie.
'A while back,' said Agatha. 'I don't want to talk about it.' She did not want to tell them her husband had been murdered right after he had surfaced from the past to stop her marrying James Lacey. 'I'm still wondering about those lights,' she went on. She noticed with surprise that because of the distraction of talking she had actually managed to hem a square of cloth.
'Have you seen them again?' asked Harriet.
'No.'
'Well, there you are. You were probably tired after the long drive and thought you saw them.'
Agatha gave up on the subject of the lights. She was sure these women probably gossiped easily among themselves. She was the outsider, not yet accepted, and that was putting the brakes on any conversation.
She felt she was being let out of school when Harriet said after an hour, 'Well, that's it for tonight.'
As Agatha was leaving, she stopped to admire an arrangement of autumn leaves in a vase in the hall. Harriet lifted out the bunch of leaves and thrust it at Agatha. 'Take it,' she said. 'I dip the leaves in glycerine so they should last you the winter.'
Agatha walked homewards bearing the leaves. She remembered there was a large stone jar on the floor by the fireplace in the sitting-room. She let herself into the cottage, glad that she had brought her cats for company as Hodge and Boswell undulated about her ankles.
She walked through to the kitchen and put the bunch of leaves on the kitchen counter. She looked out the window and the dancing lights were there again.
Agatha unlocked the door and walked down the garden. The lights had disappeared.
Muttering to herself, she walked back to the house. Something fimny was going on. She had not imagined those lights and there was nothing wrong with her eyesight.
She walked through to the sitting-room to get that vase. It was no longer there. Agatha began to wonder if she had imagined it. She took the inventory out of the kitchen drawer. Yes, there it was under 'Contents of Sitting- Room'--one pottery vase.
Agatha suddenly felt threatened. She checked the doors were locked and went up to bed. Her stomach rumbled, reminding her she had not had any dinner, but the thought of going downstairs again frightened her. She bathed and undressed and crawled under the duvet and pulled it over her head to shut out the terrors of the night.
TWO
ANOTHER sunny morning and Agatha, ashamed of her night-time fears, decided to drive into Norwich, buy a microwave, have breakfast, and then return to tackle the estate agent over the lack of central heating.
Being in Norwich brightened up the feelings of city-bred Agatha immensely. She bought a microwave and a further supply of microwavable meals in Marks & Spencer, had a large cholesterol-filled breakfast, bought a cheap glass vase, and returned to Fryfam in a confident frame of mind.
After she had unpacked her shopping and fed her cats, she walked to the estate agent's.
She pushed open the door of Bryman's and walked in. To her intense irritation, she saw the droopy figure of Amy Worth sitting behind a computer screen. 'Why didn't you tell me you worked here?' complained Agatha.
'There didn't seem much point,' said Amy defensively. 'I'm just the typist. I don't have anything to do with the renting of the houses.'
'So who do I speak to?'
'Mr. Bryman. I'll get him.'
Secretive about nothing at all, fumed Agatha. Amy reemerged and held open the door to an inner office. 'Mr. Bryman will see you now.'
Agatha walked past her. A youngish man with a sallow face, thick lips and wet eyes stood up and extended his hand. 'Welcome, Mrs. Raisin.'
Agatha shook his hand, which was clammy. What a damp young man, she thought. He was in shirt-sleeves and there were patches of sweat under his armpits. There was also an unpleasant goaty smell emanating from him. Amy, Agatha had noticed, was wearing the same clothes she had worn the day before. Perhaps no one in Fryfam bothered about baths.
Agatha sat down. 'You should have warned me there was no central heating,' she began.
'But the logs are free,' he protested. 'Stacks of logs.'
'I do not want to have to set and clean all those fireplaces when the weather turns cold.'
'We'll let you have a couple of Calor gas heaters like the one in the kitchen. I'll bring them round today.'
'Don't you have anywhere else?'
'Not to rent. For sale only. Quite a lot of the houses in Fryfam are second homes. People leave them empty in the winter. Only come down for the summer months. There's always a demand for second homes. You'll find there's few of us here in the winter.'
'Okay, I'll take the heaters. Now, there's something else.'
He raised his eyebrows in query.
'I checked the inventory yesterday. There was definitely a stone vase in the sitting-room. Well, it's disappeared. I saw these lights at the end of the garden and went to investigate and when I came back the vase had gone.'
'Oh, I think we can overlook that, Mrs. Raisin. It's just an old vase.'
'I am not going to overlook it,' said Agatha stubbornly. 'Is there a policeman here? There must be. I phoned the police to get your name.'
'There's PC Framp, but I wouldn't bother-'
'I will bother. Where is he? I didn't see a police station.'
'It's out a bit on the road to the manor house.'
'Which is where?'
'North of the village green. The road that goes out of the village the opposite way to the one you arrived on.'
'Right. When will you be arriving with the heaters?'
'I've got a spare key. I'll leave them in the hall if you aren't in.'
'Don't upset my cats.'
'I didn't know you had pets, Mrs. Raisin. You didn't say anything about cats.'
Agatha rose to her feet and looked at him truculently. 'And you didn't say anything about not having them. No cats, no rental.'
She turned and marched out. She ignored Amy. She was fed up with the whole bunch of them. And she had only just arrived!
She decided to drive. She returned home to get in her car and saw a square envelope lying inside the door. She opened it up. There was a note on stiff parchment. 'We would like to welcome you to the village. Please come for tea this afternoon at four o'clock. Lucy Trumpington-James.'
Summoned to the manor house, thought Agatha. Well, God knows, I've got nothing better to do.
She phoned Mrs. Bloxby in Carsely. 'Haven't heard from James,' said the vicar's wife promptly. 'I wasn't phoning about that,' lied Agatha. 'Just wondered how everyone was getting on.'
'Same as ever.' said Mrs. Bloxby cheerfully. 'What's that place in Norfolk like?'
'Weird,' said Agatha. 'It's a small village and I gather a large proportion of the population only use their houses in summer, which is enough to turn anyone Communist when you think of the housing shortage.'
'Well, your house is going to be empty for the winter. Would you like me to find a homeless family?'
