“They should have gone there in summer,” she retorted.
I waited for Peggy to lecture me about the correct way to carry an infant, but she plunged into another topic altogether.
“William brought his sisters in here this morning,” she thundered. “I’m not one to speak ill of a man’s nearest and dearest, Lori, but those sisters of his should be shut up in a box and shipped straight back to America.”
“If you figure out how to do it,” I said, “I’ll cover the postage.”
“Like that, is it?” she roared, giving me an appraising look.
“It’s exactly like that,” I replied. “I hear you’re not buying Rose Cottage or Ivy Cottage.”
“Jasper was against it,” she shouted. “It’s a pity, because they’ll never be cheaper, but he’s right. We’re busy enough as it is.”
“How cheap are they?” I asked.
“Not cheap as chips,” she hollered. “But reasonable.”
“You’d think someone would have taken advantage of the reasonable prices by now, wouldn’t you?” I said.
“I would,” Peggy bellowed. “Don’t know why someone hasn’t.”
“Maybe the buyers Marigold Edwards has lined up are persnickety,” I said. “Have you met any of them?”
“Of course I have,” Peggy roared. “Marigold always brings them in here for a bottle of water or a tube of sun cream or some such. That’s when I give them my volunteer sign-up sheets.” A manic gleam lit Peggy’s eyes as she shook a meaty index finger at me. “I tell them not to bother moving here if they don’t intend to pull their own weight. I tell them we need all hands on deck in Finch. Flower shows and church fêtes don’t happen by accident, I tell them.” She folded her beefy arms and squared her broad shoulders. “Then I give them my sign-up sheets and send them on their way.”
I’d heard all I needed to hear. I thanked Peggy for the postcard and left the Emporium, ready to cast my nets wider.
I left Bess in her car seat while I removed the all-terrain pram from the Rover.
“Reasonable prices wouldn’t scare off house hunters,” I explained to her as I unfolded the pram and locked its safety latches, “but Marigold’s machinations would. First she lets Mr. Barlow tell them what’s wrong with the cottages, then she lets Mrs. Taxman bury them in a mountain of sign-up sheets. They’d have to be crazy to stick around after that.” I put Bess and the diaper bag in the pram, then gazed across the green at the tearoom. “Let’s find out what Mrs. Cook has to say about Marigold’s clients.”
Sally Cook had a lot to say.
“They come in here, asking for sugar-free, fat-free, cholesterol-free snacks,” she said, sounding highly affronted. “No cream, no eggs, no sugar, and above all, no butter. How am I supposed to make pastries without butter? God knows I don’t like to send folk away hungry, Lori, but they give me no choice. Pack of food-faddy fools, the lot of them.” Her round face grew pink with exasperation. “The architect and his wife ordered wine, for heaven’s sake. Does my tearoom look like a wine bar? I sent them to the pub.”
I was ninety-nine percent certain of the torture the architect and his wife had endured at Peacock’s pub, but I trundled Bess across the green again to hear a firsthand account of it from Christine Peacock.
“I remember those two,” she said disdainfully as she served me a large glass of water. “They were no better than the rest of folk Marigold’s brought in here lately. Wine snobs, every last one of them. If a bottle doesn’t have a fancy label, it’s not fit to drink. Dick tries to pry their closed minds open by giving them a taste of his homemade wine, but they never get past the first sip.” She sniffed disparagingly. “There’s no pleasing some people.”
I drank my water and left the pub, feeling as though my suspicions were being amply vindicated.
“Mr. Peacock’s wine upset Daddy’s tummy once,” I told Bess, recalling the revolting aftermath of Bill’s stint as a judge in Dick’s wine-tasting competition. “At least Marigold’s clients had the good sense to stop at one sip.”
“Lori!”
I turned to see the Handmaidens bearing down on me. Opal Taylor, Millicent Scroggins, Elspeth Binney, and Selena Buxton were eager to tell me that they, too, had had the dubious pleasure of meeting Charlotte and Honoria.
“William’s sisters dress beautifully,” Selena began.
Then the others jumped in.
Insulting comments whizzed through the air like thrown daggers, each of them prefaced with: “I don’t wish to insult William’s relatives, but . . .” By the time the collective diatribe was over, every possible criticism of Bill’s aunts had been aired, re-aired, and aired again. I could have hugged the quartet individually and as a group.