mind strictly on it until he found out something useful. The only person in the village who seemed prepared to gossip to him was May Dinwoody. The likeliest subject was Tilly Glossop. She had had an affair, as far as anyone knew, with Sunday. He had a photograph of her in a compromising position with the mayor. Nothing of her affair with the mayor had leaked into the press.
He could only assume that the whole business had been hushed up. In the report which Simon had accessed, Patrick had said that Tilly had claimed it was a brief fling and there was nothing in the mayor's bank statements that revealed he was being blackmailed. How had Sunday got hold of the photo? Tilly swore she did not know.
I must manage to get friendly with Tilly, thought Simon as he passed a slow afternoon and eventually made his way back to the car park in time to pick up his passengers.
His charges arrived promptly at five o' clock, carrying various plastic shopping bags. He gathered from their conversation--for not one of them addressed him directly--that apart from shopping they had been 'taking the waters.'
On the road back to the village there had to be even more 'comfort stops' than there had been on the road in, so it was dark by the time he thankfully reached the village and helped them out of the people carrier before taking it back to the vicarage and leaving it outside.
Either his imagination was working overtime or Odley Cruesis was an eerie place. As he made his way across the village green and along the lane to the old mill house, it was completely silent. No dog barked, no voices sounded in the still summer air, not even the blare of a television set.
He sighed. Another evening of polite conversation with May. If only he could find out something, anything, to enable him to get out of this place. There was a large yellow moon in the sky, turning the waters of the old millpond to gold.
He stood at the edge of the pond, looking at the water. A vicious shove right between the shoulder blades sent him hurtling down into the pool.
Something prompted him to stay down as long as possible. His terrified mind conjured up visions of medieval-type villagers with pickaxes and billhooks waiting for him to surface. At last, he thrust himself upwards, shaking the water from his eyes and casting terrified looks around but there was no one there. He hauled himself up the steep bank and lay panting on the grass.
Instead of going to the mill house, he ran to his car and drove as fast as he could to Agatha's cottage in Carsely.
Agatha answered the door and stared in amazement at the soaking figure of Simon. 'Come in,' she said. 'What on earth happened?'
Simon told her about the attack on him. 'I'm a good swimmer,' he said, 'otherwise I would have drowned.'
'I'll run you a hot bath,' said Agatha. 'My friend, Charles, has left a dressing gown and some clothes in the spare room. Brandy? Maybe not. Hot sweet tea is the answer.'
'I know,' said Simon, 'but I'd rather have the brandy.'
'Leave your clothes outside the bathroom and I'll put them in the tumble dryer. Good thing you were only wearing a shirt and trousers and not your best suit.'
After Simon had bathed and was dressed in Charles's dressing gown and waiting for his clothes to dry, Agatha said, 'Well, that's you finished with that village. What did you do today?'
So Simon told her but could not admit he had seen Toni. Yet someone must have seen him. Perhaps the old people. Even so, surely they hadn't had any time to gossip to anyone in the village. Of course they always could have phoned someone. But he said none of this aloud.
'I want you to type out every little thing you can think of,' said Agatha. 'Describe your stay at the village from beginning to end, what people said, what impression you had of them. I suppose they all hope that Tom Courtney for some odd reason killed Sunday himself. You may know more than you think you know. Take the whole day tomorrow to do it. I'll break it to the others that you were employed by me after all. Now, do we report this to the police? No, they'll start raging about us interfering. You'd better phone May Dinwoody and tell her that you're visiting a friend and then you're moving out. I know. I'll phone her and say I am your aunt. I'm very good at accents.'
Agatha phoned May and adopted what she cheerfully thought was a Gloucestershire accent. After she had finished calling, she told Simon cheerfully, 'She's a bit upset about losing you. Do you want me to get Patrick or Phil to go and collect your stuff? It does seem as if someone in that cursed village guessed you were working for me.'
'No, I'll go myself,' said Simon. 'May and I got very friendly. I don't want her to know.'
'If you like. But I would go as soon as your clothes are dry, because I bet the gossip will be all round the village by the morning.'
On his return to the mill house, Simon discovered that Agatha's fond interpretation of a Gloucestershire accent had not fooled May one bit. 'It was that Raisin female,' she said. 'I recognised that bullying voice of hers the minute she spoke.'
May listened while Simon told her how someone had pushed him into the millpond.
'You've only yourself to blame,' said May. 'This is a nice village. You'll find the murderer was that Tom Courtney. One of the village boys must just have been playing a wee joke on you.'
'I haven't seen any boys around,' protested Simon. 'Everyone seems pretty old to me.'
May bristled with outrage. 'You're not much of a detective, are you? We have a few boys and girls who are bussed over to the school at Chipping Campden.'
Simon suddenly remembered the vicar asking him if he could swim. Not wanting to be drawn into any village activities, he had said he could not. Penelope had been there.
'Anyway, just you pack your things up, laddie, and leave now. I don't like cheats.'
Simon mumbled an apology and went off to pack.
The next day found Agatha Raisin in a militant mood. Firstly, she was annoyed that her famous accent hadn't worked, and secondly, she decided it was time she went back to that village with Toni and Patrick to start the questioning all over again.
Patrick had told her through his police contacts that the office end of John Sunday's life had been thoroughly investigated and nothing sinister had been found. Tilly Glossop had been questioned over and over again but they could get nothing further out of her. Sunday, apart from the photograph of the mayor, had several e-mails from staff members he had printed off. Each contained something they would not like the boss or the wife or husband to know but they all had cast-iron alibis for the time of Sunday's death. Sunday, it appeared, had not been a blackmailer, merely using his knowledge as power to do what he liked in his job.
Agatha thought guiltily of that compromising photo of Penelope Timson. She should never have suppressed it.
When they arrived in the village, she decided to visit Penelope herself. Patrick was sent to see if he could get anything at all out of Tilly Glossop and Toni was dispatched to Carrie Brother.
Toni had been glad to see Simon back in the office. Agatha had briefly outlined Simon's adventures. She wondered what her old school friends would make of Simon. With his beaky nose and long mouth, he looked a bit like a Bavarian puppet. But it was his warm smile and the way his grey eyes sparkled under his thick thatch of curly black hair that made her find him endearing. And he had been kind to her.
Toni rang the bell of Carrie's cottage and listened to the cacophony of barking from Carrie's tape recorder before the lady herself opened the door. Her large face was blotched with tears.
'What's the matter?' exclaimed Toni. 'Is there anything I can do to help?'
'Yes, there is. Come in.'
Toni followed her into her cluttered parlour which still smelled of dog. Carrie rounded on her. 'You're a detective. I want you to solve a murder.'
