Kissed a Sad Goodbye

smelled of tea and, beneath that, an elusive fragrance that Gemma couldn’t quite identify.
    Seating herself in the chair nearest Teresa’s desk, Gemma studied her as she poured boiling water into a simple white pot, stirred it once, then set a small timer. “I didn’t realize it was so scientific,” Gemma said, nodding at the timer.
    “What?” Teresa looked blank. “Oh, the timer.” She turned and leaned against the table while she waited for the tea to steep. “That’s one of the first things you learn, especially in tasting. If the brewing time isn’t consistent, you can’t compare the strengths of the teas. William insists on five minutes, but you can almost stand your spoon up in it. I’m afraid I’m a bit of a wimp, so I stick at four and a half.”
    “What are we having?” Gemma had not seen a label on the bag from which Teresa had spooned the tea.
    “An English breakfast blend, mostly Assam—that’s a strong, black, Indian tea,” Teresa explained. “I usually switch to the Ceylons in the afternoon. They’re a bit lighter, more flowery.” The timer beeped and she poured a little milk into the two teacups she’d warmed with water from the kettle, then poured tea into the cups through a fine mesh strainer. She brought Gemma one cup, along with a spoon and sugar bowl, and sat down at her desk with her own. “It’s a habit I learned from Annabelle, and Annabelle from William.” The glance she gave Annabelle’s vacant desk seemed almost involuntary, and she hastily gazed back at her cup.
    “Are you the one who cleared Annabelle’s desk?” asked Gemma, tasting her tea. It had a malty richness to it, and she thought it better than any she had ever drunk.
    “I’ve shoveled everything into the drawers for now,” Teresa admitted. “It’s just that I couldn’t bear looking at her things. Silly of me, I suppose. It’s not as if I don’t think about her every minute anyway.” She looked up and her pale blue eyes met Gemma’s. “I know you’ll think I’m daft, but sometimes I can almost feel her in the room. And I keep thinking I can smell her perfume.”
    Gemma remembered the barely perceptible odor she had noticed a moment ago. “A sort of woodsy, citrusy scent?”
    “You can smell it, too? She had it specially made. It had bergamot in it—that’s what’s used in Earl Grey blends. She always said it was more suited to perfumes than tea.”
    “I doubt we’re dealing with a ghost here,” Gemma assured her. “Strong scents tend to linger on things—it’s just that in other circumstances you’d probably not notice.”
    “Yes, I suppose you’re right,” Teresa agreed, but she didn’t sound convinced. She looked almost pretty today, in a soft blue summer dress, her fair hair pulled back with a matching blue hair slide. But she would always have paled in comparison with Annabelle, no matter the effort she made. Gemma wondered how much she had minded.
    Gemma drank more of her tea, making a vow to buy some of it at the first opportunity. “Is Reg Mortimer not in this morning?” she asked.
    Teresa flushed. “No, he wasn’t feeling well. This has all been dreadful for him.... Reg was devoted to Annabelle.”
    “But was Annabelle devoted to him?”
    “What... what do you mean? Of course she was—”
    “Then why was she unfaithful to her fiancé on more than one occasion?”
    Teresa’s hand froze on the delicate handle of her teacup. “What?”
    “Didn’t she confide in you? I thought she might have.”
    “Confide what? What are you talking about?”
    “Did you know that Annabelle had an affair with Martin Lowell? That’s what broke up his marriage to Jo. Reg only learned about it the night Annabelle died.”
    “Martin Lowell? That can’t be true—there must be some mistake,” Teresa breathed.
    “No mistake. Harry Lowell brought it up at Jo’s dinner party. Reg was livid. He’s admitted it now, but not until we played ring-around-the-roses a few times.”
    “It can’t be true,” Teresa said again, her eyes enormous in her pinched face. “Why would Annabelle do such a thing?”
    “I thought perhaps you could tell me.”
    “She did take her mother’s death very hard,” Teresa said slowly. “Or it seemed so to me, but I’d only worked for her a few months and didn’t know her very well.” Bitterly, she added, “Although it seems I didn’t know her much better after five years, did I? Annabelle always made it such a point to stress honesty in