Page 100 of The Little Teashop of Lost and Found
‘There’s what everyone expects me to find: a tall, dark, handsome man has come into her life.’
‘Can you read fortunes in tea leaves?’ I said, interested. ‘The man’s just my nearest neighbour, though – he’s tall, dark andveryhandsome.’
‘He’s nearer than you think,’ she said obscurely.
‘In what way?’
‘I don’t know, do I?’ she snapped crossly. ‘The tea leaves aren’t like reading a book.’
‘Sorry,’ I said quickly. ‘Can you see anything else?’
She scrutinized the pattern of leaves again. ‘You’ve taken a long and roundabout journey to get here, but it’s not finished quite yet.’
I could have toldherthat.
Em looked up from laying discs of scone dough on a large baking tray. ‘Those light green eyes … so unusual,’ she murmured, absently.
I did try one or two other locations for my early morning walks with the dog, but constantly found myself drawn back to the area around the Oldstone. Besides, our visits had quickly become a part of my regular routine and I find change unsettling. Hugo seemed to feel the same way, for he whined if I turned the car in another direction.
Luckily I had not seen Alice Rose there again, so I hoped her curiosity was sated by her earlier visits.
35
Tiers before Bedtime
Outside I found Nile seated on the wall at the side of the road waiting for me.
‘Sitting on cold stone gives you piles. My granny used to say so,’ I told him.
‘I’ll bear it in mind,’ he said in his usual grave way. ‘Did she have any other bits of helpful advice?’
‘Yes – eating too much sugar gives you worms.’
‘I should have asked if she had any other bits of advice that weren’t revolting.’ He got up and stretched, so he must have been waiting for a while.
‘Oh, she had lots, like eating bread crusts gives you curly hair.’
‘We must both have eaten a lot of crusts, then,’ he said, as we headed back down to where we’d parked the car. ‘And I take it you saw Emily Rhymer. Was it illuminating?’
‘It was certainly interesting,’ I said, then repeated what she’d told me about a car passing her in the narrow lane just before the turn-off to the Oldstone. ‘She thought it was a Mini, but didn’t tell the police that bit, since she couldn’t be sure.’
‘But if she had, it might have helped?’
‘I don’t know. It might have implicated someone innocent. Emily said a young local girl had one, but she knew it wasn’t her because she saw her the same day I was found, looking just the same as usual.’
‘But she didn’t tell you who it was?’
‘No, and they don’t know anyone locally with my shade of red hair,though Em said she’d seen someone with pale green eyes like mine before, she just couldn’t remember who it was. Gloria agreed with her, so I left my phone number, in case it came back to them.’
‘Gloria?’
‘The elderly lady who let me in. I don’t know if she was a relative, or the cleaner, or what. She made tea while we were talking, then read my tea leaves!’
‘Betty at Angel Delights insisted on reading my Angel Cards,’ he said. ‘Like the tarot, but less doomy.’
‘Did they say anything exciting?’ I asked, interested.
‘The usual: big changes were coming, I should embrace the future … that kind of thing. What about your tea leaves?’
