“My lease isn’t for sale!” Sally bellowed.
“So you say, but I know better,” Peggy said, with a self-satisfied smirk. “You may be able to find your way around a kitchen, Sally Pyne, but you’ve no head for business.”
“No head for business?” Sally echoed, her voice rising along with her blood pressure.
“An experienced businesswoman doesn’t shut up shop for two days running,” said Peggy. “She doesn’t leave paying customers out in the cold while she swans about, acting like the queen of the May.”
“The queen of the May?” Sally screeched, her ruffles trembling.
“There goes the boa,” Mr. Barlow observed.
Jemma Renshawe was wriggling through the grass on her belly with her trim backside in the air, pausing every few feet to roll onto her side and photograph the villagers from below. The women who were wearing skirts looked scandalized and those who were wearing trousers scowled at her, but the men followed her progress avidly, elbowing one another in the ribs and waggling their eyebrows expressively.
“Jemma, please,” Elspeth whispered piercingly as she wound her way through the assembled throng.
Her niece ignored her plaintive hiss and continued crawling.
“Cats and clowns,” said Mr. Barlow.
“Hmmm?” I said, too absorbed in the drama to spare him a glance.
“Cats and clowns,” Mr. Barlow repeated, gesturing toward the onlookers. “The women want to scratch her eyes out and the men look like village idiots. And she’s getting it all on film.” He chuckled happily. “I reckon Charles and Grant won’t be the only ones having fits when her book comes out.”
I shushed him and bent my ear toward the green.
“I am not swanning about,” Sally protested. “Haven’t you heard of publicity? It’s the way an experienced businesswoman attracts new customers. My media exposure will reach a much larger demographic than your poxy shop windows.”
“Media exposure? Demographic?” Peggy scoffed. “Don’t wave your fancy words in my face until you know what they mean. And there’s nothing wrong with my shop windows.”
“There’s an inch of dust on those rusty old tins of beans,” Sally retorted, “and the C fell off of your crumpets sign two months ago. Having a sale on rumpets, are we?”
The villagers tittered cautiously, acknowledging Sally’s wit while at the same time respecting Peggy’s power.
“Ow!” cried Jemma Renshawe.
“Did I tread on you, dear?” Millicent Scroggins inquired. “So sorry.”
“I think it might have been my fault,” said Opal Taylor. “I didn’t mean to kick you, dear.”
“Jemma,” said Elspeth, looking mortified. “Please . . .”
Jemma sat up with a pained grimace and rubbed her reddened shoulder vigorously, then scrambled to her feet and began creeping through the crowd, aiming her camera at random villagers.
“We aren’t having a sale on anything,” Peggy bellowed, ignoring the sideshow, “because I’m about to buy your building. Once I have your lease in my hand, the tearoom will be mine!”
“B-but I live above the tearoom,” Sally stammered, looking thunderstruck. “If you buy the building, you’ll be my landlady.”
“I’ll be your boss as well,” Peggy said smugly.
“Over my dead body,” Sally shot back.
“Suit yourself,” said Peggy. “I wouldn’t have kept you on anyway. The amount of money you throw away on flour and sugar and cream and eggs is disgraceful. I know a supplier who’ll give them to me for half the price.”
“They’ll have half the quality, too, I’ll wager,” Sally said doggedly. “Cheap ingredients taste cheap. Not that you’d know the difference.”
A chorus of gasps rose from the onlookers.
“She insulted Peggy,” I said, awestruck. “No one insults Peggy Taxman.”
“Not to her face, they don’t,” said Mr. Barlow.
“When I’m running the tearoom,” said Peggy, “I’ll turn a pretty profit.”
“You? Run the tearoom?” Sally laughed derisively. “Your cakes fall, your lemon curd tastes like soap, and you’ve never baked a loaf of bread you haven’t burnt.”
“I don’t intend to waste my valuable time slaving over a hot oven,” said Peggy. “I plan to hire a real baker.”
“Is your husband a real baker, then?” Sally taunted. “He’d better be, because you won’t find anyone else willing to work for you.”
“You’re sacked!” bellowed Peggy.
“You can’t sack me because I don’t work for you and I never will,” Sally hollered. “For your information, Mistress High-and-Mighty, I don’t need to work at all.” She reached behind her, pulled Henry Cook forward, and linked arms with him. “My Henry will support me.”
“How will Henry support you?” Peggy demanded. “He works for you!”
“Not anymore,” said Sally. She drew herself up and surveyed her audience with an air of great satisfaction, then dropped her bombshell. “Henry is going back into show business!”