Murder Keeps No Calendar by Cathy Ace

Author:Cathy Ace
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Four Tails Publishing Ltd.

JULY

Tea for Two

Edna Sweet had known from the age of ten that she wanted to own a tea shop. By the time she was fifteen and a half she’d further decided that since she didn’t really like boys, and they didn’t seem to care for her, she would probably never have to change her name, so her shop would be called The Sweet Olde Tea Shoppe. She liked the way it sounded; it spoke to her of a genteel clientele and gingham tablecloths. English through and through, like her, it would be a sign that the times had not left behind the manners and expectations of a more chivalrous age.

With a specific vision before her, and the family recipe for teacakes as her only inheritance, the sadly and suddenly orphaned Edna left school the day after she turned eighteen and promptly buried her parents, who had both, tragically, been run down at a bus stop by a drunk driver a week earlier. She got herself a job at the checkout in Tesco’s by day, and two other jobs by night – one as a barmaid in a pub during the week, the other as a nightclub server at weekends. She literally worked every hour she wasn’t asleep. While earning as much as she could, she spent as little as possible on what passed for a life at her meager bedsit in Finsbury Park.

By the time she was twenty-five Edna still hadn’t saved up enough money to realize her dreams. Then, although she had given up all hope of it happening, she finally received a payment in compensation for the loss of her parents; thanks to a thoughtless man from Edmonton who couldn’t say no to just one more pint, Edna was finally able to leave North London to hunt down an opportunity to start her new life.

After much searching she purchased a small, rundown roadside café on the edge of a village just outside Oxford. The village was pretty, though not pretty enough to draw the tourist coaches that clogged the streets of other local market towns, and, although it had four pubs and two churches, it had nowhere for ‘ladies’ to take morning coffee or tea.

Having moved into the little flat above the café, Edna spent an entire month scrubbing, cleaning, bleaching, and fitting out the grease-pit she had bought. She couldn’t believe the previous owner hadn’t killed anyone; everything was filthy. However, with maximum effort, and minimum expenditure, Edna proudly flipped the sign on the door at ten a.m. sharp on Monday the 2nd July. The Sweet Olde Tea Shoppe was open for business.

It was, without doubt, the happiest moment of Edna’s still relatively short life. As she turned to survey her world she grinned with satisfaction, because it was exactly as she had imagined it, all those years ago: white walls and paintwork; small, round, dark wooden tables; traditional Windsor-backed chairs with little blue cushions for comfort; and, set against the farthest wall, a large, darkly reassuring Welsh dresser bedecked with willow pattern china.

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