Chapter Eight
Daisy had quickly discovered the press could be bothersome. She’d been screening her calls since the murder, and so had her Aunt Iris. She understood the curiosity. After all, she and Iris were reopening the tea garden after a murder had been committed there. That was sensational news. But that morning, as she drove into the tea garden’s back parking lot—both her van and Iris’s car had been released by the police—she really hadn’t expected eight different news outlets to bombard her.
Parking in the back was probably mistake number one. Professionally dressed anchors with microphones and cameras surrounded her. She couldn’t even get out of the van. So this was what happened when you ignored their calls.
She was about to pick up her cell phone to call the police to see if there was anything they could do, when there was a rap on her driver’s side window and she spotted Jonas. Not only Jonas; he was accompanied by a tall burly man built like a linebacker with a full beard hiding most of his face.
Daisy managed to open her van’s door a few inches.
“Come on,” Jonas said. “We’ll get you inside.”
She wasn’t even sure she wanted to go inside, but she had a business to run.
“Iris and Tessa?” she asked.
“In the tea garden already,” Jonas said. “They’re fine. They’re cooking up a storm. Let’s get you in there too.”
She grabbed her purse, pushed her door open a little further, and stepped down onto the asphalt.
The crowd of reporters surged in closer.
Jonas directed, “Back,” in an authoritarian voice. “If you don’t want to be prosecuted for causing a public disturbance, get back.”
The reporters didn’t move far, but they did move enough that Daisy could exit her van. Jonas closed the door. He and the other man practically surrounded her—at least it seemed that way. They had very long arms.
She caught sight of Trevor Lundquist, who shouted, “Remember our deal.”
Another reporter asked, “What deal was that?”
Daisy tried to ignore the questions, tried not to be unnerved by Jonas’s strong arm around her shoulders, tried to remember that her life had once been normal.
Once inside the tea garden, Jonas shut the back door to the kitchen. “You know, once you open your doors for business, you can’t prevent the reporters from coming in.”
“I don’t know what to do,” Daisy admitted. “I can’t postpone the inevitable. How did you come to be here?”
“When I drove in to Woods this morning, I saw them crawling all over the back of your property, probably looking for signs that the murder had happened or the police had forgotten to take something away. I knew you were going to have trouble. I called Howie. He’s an old friend and a retired cop.”
Howie? This man did not look like a Howie. She extended her hand to him. “Thank you so much. I don’t know what to say. I don’t know how I would have gotten out without you.”
“No problem, ma’am,” Howie said. “Jonas suggested I stick around here after your tea garden opens.”
“And be my security guard?” she asked with a weak smile. “I can’t ask you to do that.”
“No problem, ma’am. That’s what I do now, security.”
“Then I insist on paying you.”
Howie and Jonas exchanged a look. “If you insist, ma’am. But I’ll only charge you half my rates since Jonas is a good friend.”
“Do you really think you can keep this under control when we open?”
“Between the two of us, we can,” Jonas said. “I’ll handle the front door, and Howie will handle the garden entrance. We’ll just make sure everything stays calm in here and no one causes a ruckus.”
“You have your own shop to run,” she said to Jonas.
“I do, and I have a clerk who knows full well how to sell furniture. Just say thank you, Daisy, and you can get on with your day.”
He’d used her first name as if that were the most natural thing in the world to do. She didn’t know if he’d ever called her by name before. It was one of those things—until you knew a person well, you didn’t really use their name. Names had power. Names conveyed meaning.
She was probably totally losing her mind.
Iris called from behind the counter, “The last scones are coming out of the oven. We just have to brew the tea.”
“Can I offer you gentlemen a cinnamon swirl scone before the real fun starts?” Daisy asked them.
“Tips are good,” Howie said with a grin. “Starting the day with one is even better than waiting till the end of the day to get one. And I gotta admit, Mrs. Swanson, I’m not a tea drinker.”
“I think I can rustle up a cup of coffee for you if you don’t tell anybody.”
He nodded. “Deal.”
That’s how Jonas and Howie ended up in her office, eating scones and drinking coffee while she, Tessa, and Iris prepared to open the tea garden. She wanted to ask questions of Jonas and his friend to find out exactly why they would do this for her, but there wasn’t time for that right now.
Donning her yellow apron with the huge daisy printed on the bib, she filled the cases with scones, apple bread, lemon tea cakes, chocolate chip as well as oatmeal cookies, and buttermilk biscuits. By the time she’d checked the electric water kettles and added infusers to teapots so they were ready for brewing, she’d taken several deep breaths and hoped for the best. She was about to head to the front door to open it when Jonas appeared by her side.
“Let us open the doors for you. That will send the message.”
“I don’t want to scare customers away.”
“I think your customers will be glad you have order in here rather than reporters stuffing microphones in their faces like they’re doing out there.”
When Daisy peered out the window, she saw that the reporters were doing exactly that. Anyone who approached the shop ended up being interviewed.
“They’re going to drive all my customers away,” she complained.
“Not if your customers want a scone badly enough or a good cup of tea. Howie?” Jonas called.
And Howie was there, going to the garden door, his expression somber.
“We’ll make sure your customers get in before the reporters do, and we’ll only let two reporters in at a time. We almost have to let them in because this is a public place.”
Daisy nodded. “I just hate the idea of my customers being disturbed. This is supposed to be a serene, calm, pleasant experience.”
“And it will be. Maybe not for the first hour or so, but it will be after that. These journalists just want a sound bite they can run on the news, then they’ll leave. Harvey’s murder will be old news in a few days, if not before that. It’s sad, but it’s true,” he said when he saw her expression.
Daisy was about to rush to the counter to get ready when she stopped and turned back to Jonas. “I don’t know how to thank you for this.”
“Just give me a rain check on a cup of your Daisy’s Blend tea.”
She suddenly felt choked up by his kindness. So he wouldn’t see, she just waved her hand at him and went to join Iris behind the counter.
Jonas and Howie were dressed in jeans and flannel shirts like everyday people. Yet something about their bearing was different from your normal man on the street, and everyone seemed to sense that. The two men appeared to wear a mantle of authority on their broad shoulders. It was evident in their straight posture and their no-nonsense bearing.
In spite of what Daisy had thought about the reporters chasing her customers away, that didn’t happen. It seemed the reporters being there attracted even more customers. Her staff couldn’t seat everyone who appeared for a cup of tea and a cookie or scone. When the usual eat-in area as well as the afternoon tea room were both filled, the customers seemed to understand. They took along takeout, expressing an interest in coming back again when the tea garden was less crowded.
Fortunately, Daisy had extra scones and cookies stored in the freezer. When she saw how fast her supply was being depleted, she pulled them out. By eleven o’clock, they were almost out of baked goods. Tessa and Iris mixed up more batter, with Eva assisting, while Daisy, Cora Sue, and Karina handled the front. Security became less and less a concern. Even Howie and Jonas helped carry trays to the tables. It was almost funny, really, to see these burly men serving tea.
By noon, Daisy was ready with the luncheon selections, including beef barley soup, smoked salmon and cream cheese sandwiches, and carrot-grape-walnut salad. Her luncheon selections were similar to what she served with an afternoon tea service. Fortunately, this wasn’t an afternoon tea service day. They never could have kept up. In fact, if business increased, and she was hopeful it might, now that more people had tasted what she had to offer, she’d have to hire more help. She felt guilty that she was profiting from Harvey’s death.
It was almost two o’clock when the surge in business abated. Daisy had insisted Iris stay in the kitchen or behind the counter so she wouldn’t run into a reporter asking an impertinent question. Most of all, she didn’t have to deal with serving out in the garden area. That would still be traumatic for her.
With the afternoon business quieting, she thanked Jonas and Howie profusely. She could handle whatever happened next, she hoped.
After handing both men a bag filled with cookies and scones as well as a container of beef barley soup, she added, “The two of you can have a free cup of tea anytime you’d like. Just come in and ask.” Then she focused on Howie. “You will taste tea one of these days, won’t you? I can brew you up something really strong instead of fruity.”
Howie smiled. “We’ll see. Come summer I might be able to handle iced tea.”
She laughed. “It’s a deal.”
As the men left the front porch, Howie went east, and Jonas went west toward his store. Daisy watched the way he walked and the tilt of his head. As the wind tossed his black hair, he didn’t seem to care. There was nothing pretentious about Jonas, and she liked that.
She was thinking again about how easily he’d stepped in to help, how he’d called in reinforcements, when the door dinged and a new customer stepped over the threshold. Daisy had never seen the man before. He was about five foot nine or ten with pocked cheeks as though he’d had acne as a youth and hadn’t had it treated. His gray hair was a bit wispy, and his wire-rimmed glasses were an outdated style. He was wearing a tweed sports jacket with suede patches on the elbows. Since he was overweight by twenty to thirty pounds, it hung open.
He glanced around the tea garden, then strode to the garden door and looked outside. He didn’t push the door open.
“Excuse me, sir,” Daisy said. “Can I help you?”
“It’s hard to imagine a murder happened in a place that’s so serene. In your garden, right?”
What to do? She could be firm and ask him to leave if he was just another lookie-loo. If he was a journalist, she’d definitely ask him to leave. On the other hand, if he was a curiosity seeker who wanted a cup of tea . . .
She decided to be tactful and gain a customer instead of losing one.
“The garden is one of my favorite places. I don’t know how long it will take to get over what happened there,” she confessed.
Now the man faced her instead of the garden and came toward her. “I can’t believe Harvey’s gone.”
Apparently, this wasn’t a journalist or even a lookie-loo. He seemed to be genuinely sad that he’d lost someone he’d known. Just how well had he known Harvey Fitz?
“Would you like to sit down?” Daisy asked.
The man nodded. Then as if he were emerging from a great fog, he said, “Excuse my bad manners. My name is Guy Tremont.”
Daisy extended her hand. “Daisy Swanson.”
“You own the place.”
“My aunt and I own the place. Is there anything I can get you?”
He lowered himself heavily into a chair at a table for two and picked up a menu that had been forgotten there. “Do you still have soup? I missed lunch, and a couple of those lemon tea cakes Harvey talked so much about would hit the right spot too.”
“Tea?” Daisy asked.
Guy Tremont gave her a weak smile. “I’m a black coffee or Scotch man. Harvey kept telling me I should try tea. I did that day you had confections in his store. It wasn’t bad.”
Daisy bit back a wry smile. “What kind did you have?”
“Something with pomegranate, I think.”
When Daisy looked up at her aunt, Iris raised her hand and said, “I got the order—soup, lemon tea cakes, and pomegranate green tea. It will be there in five.”
Iris could see that Daisy was maybe cultivating a customer, or maybe digging further into the investigation of Harvey’s murder. Who knew? Not knowing what else to say, she started where the conversation had begun.
“Did you come to see where Harvey died?”
“Actually, I did. His funeral is Wednesday, and I just don’t think I can go.”
“I’ll be there with my aunt. It will be a sad day for her too.”
Guy looked over at Iris and then lowered his voice. “I’ve never met your aunt, but Harvey told me about her. He even told me that when his divorce was final, he was going to change his life and do it with Iris.”
“It’s good to know Harvey’s intentions were pure.”
“Harvey respected your aunt, Daisy. May I call you Daisy?”
“Sure you can, if I can call you Guy.”
“A pretty young woman like you can call me almost anything you want.” Then he flushed a bit. “That wasn’t a come-on.”
“I didn’t take it as one, Guy. Thank you.” Since they had a bit of time before his order arrived, she asked, “So you and Harvey were good friends?”
“We were, as good as men friends get, I guess. We didn’t talk much about private matters the first years we knew each other. Harvey just came to see me when he wanted to buy coins. But then, year by year, you see somebody a few times and you start to talk about other things. Suddenly one night a few years ago, Harvey asked if I wanted to come over to Men’s Trends for a drink, and I did. He had a great selection of liquor in the back room of the store. Not many people knew about that.”
“So you think he drank alone a lot?”
“I think he drank alone a lot until he decided to file for divorce. Then he developed a penchant for tea. When you and your aunt opened this place, he became even more of a connoisseur.”
“I heard that Harvey had an extensive coin collection.”
Just then Tessa appeared from the kitchen with a tray. It held a vintage two-cup teapot, a cup and saucer, a bowl of soup, and three lemon tea cakes. She arranged it all on the table in front of Guy, adding silverware wrapped in a napkin as well as a small plate of lemon slices and a miniature creamer.
Guy waved at the place setting. “Is this how you serve everyone . . . with this fancy china?” He pointed to the plate with the lemon slices. “My mother had a dish like that—that light pink, clear glass. Depression glass I think it was called.”
“That’s what it is,” Daisy said. “I love the color pink. Since so many of our teapots have pink flowers, those dishes go with all of them.”
Tessa asked him, “The tea is ready to pour. Would you like me to do it?”
“Go right ahead,” he said with a smile, seemingly liking the idea of being served this way. Daisy wondered if he had many niceties in his life, or someone to serve him once in a while simply because they cared about him.
After Tessa departed, Daisy let Guy concentrate on his soup.
“This is good,” he determined. “No wonder Harvey came in here so often.”
“Tell me more about Harvey and his coins.”
Tremont didn’t hesitate. “The coin collection was a family tradition. That’s why it was so important to him. Harvey’s grandfather handed down a collection to his dad, and his dad left it to Harvey. Harvey added to it, and I think he would have done anything to protect it. That’s why he gave his mansion to his wife, so he didn’t have to sell the collection or split it.”
A mansion versus a coin collection. Wow. They were talking about money Daisy could only imagine.
“So how much would this coin collection be worth?” she asked. “If you can say.”
“I’m discreet. But I don’t have confidentiality agreements with my clients and . . . Harvey’s dead. The amount of the collection will come out soon anyway, I suppose. I appraised it for him just a few months ago. It’s worth nearly six hundred thousand dollars.”
When Daisy glanced over at the counter, her gaze met her aunt’s. Iris’s eyes had gone wide, and she looked a little pale. Had Aunt Iris just realized who she would be marrying if she had married Harvey Fitz? And how rich she would have become as his wife?