Come to Tea and A Nice Cup of Tea

"Come to Tea" by Janet Laurence is a short story that appears in the book Murder, They Wrote. Jessica Fletcher compiled this collection of short stories by her favorite mystery writers. Some of the writers presented in this collection are: Nancy Pickard, Jane Dentiger, Kate Kingsbury, Janet Laurence, Margaret Lawrence, and others. This collection contains 18 short stories and is the first of three books. The other two books are titled Murder, They Wrote II and More Murder, They Wrote.

"Come to Tea" by Janet Laurence is an excellent short story about a woman named Eileen, who is the narrator, and Julia Norman, whom she invites to her house for tea. She wasn't sure Julia would come because she lived 120 miles away. Also, they both were involved with the John and both had children by him. Julia did arrive at Eileen's house for tea. Eileen worked for John. It was the day of John's funeral that Eileen began to see the truth about their relationship and another woman, Julia Norman, who was involved with John. One day Eileen decided to invite Julia over to her house. Julia was glad they finally met. Each woman shared their pictures of their children and got to know each other. Julia served tea and some small sandwiches. Julia ate several small sandwiches. She mentioned to Eileen that she didn't realize how hungry she was. Eileen was glad she ate those sandwiches and drank the tea. Can you guess why Eileen was pleased that Julia at the sandwiches? You'll have to read the story to find out what happened. Were these two women who were rivals going to become friends after all?

"A Nice Cup of Tea" by Kate Kingsbury is also in the collection. It is about two women Annie and Maisie, who are sisters. They invited Sam Wilson, their mailman, over for tea. They were worried about him when he didn't arrive. They finally decided to call the post office to see what has happened. Annie was told that Sam passed away the night before. Originally they thought he died of a heart attack, but later they found out that he died of food poisoning. Annie and Maisie were both shocked.

One day Annie was talking to Betsy Mae, who was basically known as the town gossip. She told Annie that she had seen Maisie in the post office mailing a package of tea to Louise Daniels for her birthday. However, it wasn't Louise's birthday yet. Annie knew something was weird about Maisie's actions because she never left the house without her and Maisie told Annie that she never liked Louise. Why did Maisie send Louise a package? Was she wanting to make amends with her? Did the package contain something poisonous? What was Annie's thoughts about the things Betsy Mae told her? What was Maisie going to do next? You'll have to read the short story to find out what happened.

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