Agatha Raisin and the Wellspring of Death

folder and slid a piece of artwork in front of Agatha. ‘This is what the bottle will look like.’ Agatha was surprised to see that the label showed a photograph of the skull with the water gushing out of it. ‘Isn’t that a bit grim,’ she asked, ‘particularly in view of the murder?’
    ‘They’re not sure it is murder yet,’ said Guy. ‘Anyway, death’s heads and skulls always promote a product. There was a cigarette company that always had something like the shape of a skull in their ads and a brand of gin used to have an ad with the ice cubes in a glass in the shape of a skull.’
    ‘It could be argued,’ said Agatha, lighting a cigarette, ‘that people who drink and smoke have a death wish. But people who go around drinking gnat’s piss like mineral water are usually the healthy type.’
    ‘Not any more,’ said Peter. ‘They can be reformed alcoholics who still have the death wish. They can be business people at the new fashionable “dry” lunches, or they can be people who just can’t stand the taste of the drinking water from the tap, which often smells like swimming pools. But everyone is fascinated by death. Now there needs to be some big event to launch the water. What about taking over some stately home like Blenheim Palace . . .?’
    ‘They’d hardly agree to that, seeing as how they are producing their own water,’ Agatha pointed out.
    ‘Perhaps hire a boat and go down the Thames, lots of celebs, lots of booze for the press?’ suggested Guy.
    ‘Old hat,’ said Agatha. ‘I have it, and it’d be a way to get the goodwill of the village. A village fête.’
    ‘Oh, come on,’ protested Peter. ‘Tacky cakes and home-made jam and women in 1970s Laura Ashley dresses.’
    ‘No, no, listen to me,’ said Agatha eagerly. ‘Why do you think tourists come to the Cotswolds?’
    ‘Beauty spot?’ suggested Peter.
    ‘No, apart from that. The British are as bad as the Americans. The Americans want to believe in the good old days of June Allyson standing at the white picket fence with an apple pie. The British want the rural dream of croquet and skittles and my lord dishing out the prizes. Now usually these village affairs are tacky, I grant you that. But this one could be groomed to look like something out of a Merchant-Ivory film. And I’ll get that American film star, Jane Harris, to open it.’
    ‘The Commie?’
    ‘Doesn’t matter. Her health and beauty videos sell by the ton. And I’ll get some local doddering aristo as well.’
    ‘It could work,’ said Guy slowly. ‘But we can’t control the weather. Crowds aren’t going to come to an idyllic English fête if it’s pissing down with rain.’
    ‘July’s usually a lousy month,’ said Agatha. ‘Make it for the end of August, before the kids go back to school.’
    They discussed the pros and cons of the village fête. Agatha clinched it by pointing out the obvious. It was being marketed as Ancombe water, so where better to have the launch than in Ancombe itself?
    ‘There’s one last thing,’ said Agatha. ‘This meeting in the village hall makes me uneasy. I think we should be there to represent the company. It will be very bad publicity if we end up with the villagers against us. I’ll let you know when the meeting is to be held.’
    ‘Guy will go along with you,’ said Peter.
    Portia entered. ‘What is it?’ asked Peter.
    ‘That dead man,’ said Portia. ‘He was murdered.’
    ‘Thank you for telling us.’
    Both men waited until the secretary had left. ‘Not bad, not bad,’ said Peter.
    ‘I can’t see how a murder is going to help us.’ Agatha looked at them. Then she said slowly, ‘Of course, it means there will be a lot of the press at that meeting at the village hall.’
    ‘Exactly,’ said Peter. ‘And good PR woman that you are, you’d better find a way to swing everyone one hundred per cent behind us. God knows, you’re being paid enough.’
    Agatha did not like the flick of the whip. ‘You get what you pay for when you hire me,’ she said evenly. ‘Now, if that is all, gentlemen . . .?’
    ‘Bit tasteless that last remark of yours, bro,’ murmured Guy after Agatha had left.
    ‘Rolls off that sort of woman. Hard as nails.’
    ‘Sexy with it, though,’ said Guy reflectively, staring at the door through which Agatha had just exited.
    Agatha arrived back in Carsely to find the press waiting on her doorstep. Mindful of her new role, she invited them all in for drinks and, after