Free Agatha Raisin and the Perfect Paragon by M. C. Beaton

pale face and a rabbity mouth. Good figure.”
    “We’ll look into it. Could be one of his employees. Sounds like his secretary. All right. From the teginning. They came into your office this morning …”
    “Didn’t you get it the first time?” demanded Agatha crossly. But Bill Wong flashed her a warning look so she went over the whole thing again.
    Finally they were told they were free to go. “She must have cracked and poisoned him,” said Agatha outside police headquarters.
    “They’ll have a hard time proving that if she wasn’t at the office with him,” said Phil. “Maybe it was that rabbity girl. Anyway, it’s police business now.”
    They went back to the office. Patrick Mullen phoned. “I tracked down Burt at a shop in Oxford. We went for a coffee. I swear the man’s sincere and in a miserable state of grief.”
    “Two things, Patrick. Can you catch him again and ask him about a red-haired, rabbity-looking girl who might work at Smedleys Electronics? I saw her with Smedley in Bath on Sunday. Smedley’s been poisoned. It isn’t anything to do with us any more but I’d really like to know who she is. And ask him about Fairy and Trixie. Evidently they were threatening to tell the school about him unless Jessica hung out with them. Also she was into something with them that she described as being just work.”
    “Will do.”
    Agatha rang off and asked, “What now?”
    “What about, say, talking to Trixie’s parents while we wait for the pair to get back from school?” said Phil.
    “There’s an idea. Let’s go. Mrs. Freedman, could you find out about a bereavement class and phone the information to Mrs. Bradley? And is there any news from Harry?”
    “Nothing. I’ll find out about the bereavement class right away.”
    Agatha had expected Mrs. Sommers would prove to be a hardfaced blowsy woman, but it transpired she was small and meek and harassed-looking with pale blue eyes and neat hair.
    “We are investigating the death of Jessica,” began Agatha, “and wondered if we might ask you a few questions.”
    “Come in. That poor girl.”
    The living room was almost a mirror image of the Bradleys’: three-piece suite, coffee table, but no books.
    When they were seated, Mrs. Sommers asked anxiously, “How can I help?”
    “Jessica had a boyfriend, a much older boyfriend,” said Agatha. “In a letter Jessica received from this boyfriend, it appears that Trixie and Fairy had told Jessica that if she didn’t hang out with them, they would tell her teachers that she was going out with this man.”
    Agatha expected a hot denial, something on the lines of, “My daughter would never do a thing like that,” but Mrs. Sommers looked sad. “I don’t know what to do with my daughter, and that’s the truth. My husband won’t hear a word against her. He gives her too much pocket money and just laughs when I protest at her clubbing and wearing make-up. ‘You’re in the dark ages,’ he says. ‘Let her have her fun when she’s young.’”
    “So you think Trixie might have been blackmailing Jessica?”
    “That’s too strong. She might have teased her about it.”
    The front door crashed open. “Trixie?” called her mother. Trixie and Fairy sauntered in and stopped short at the sight of Agatha and Phil.
    “What are you doing home from school so early?” asked Mrs. Sommers.
    “Sports. We don’t do sports,” said Trixie.
    “Is it true you threatened to tell Jessica’s teachers that she was seeing an older man if she didn’t hang out with you?” asked Agatha.
    “Naw. Well, maybe we might have teased her a bit. We was friends. Wasn’t we, Fairy?”
    Fairy moved a wad of gum to the other side of her mouth and volunteered, “Yeah.”
    “Were you doing any sort of work with Jessica after school?”
    They stared at her with flat eyes.
    “Do you know of anyone who might have wanted to harm her?” pursued Agatha.
    “Maybe her boyfriend.”
    “He has a cast-iron alibi. Anyone else? Boy