DAISY
October 28, 2019. Monday.
Three days before the murder.
After being foiled in her attempt to corner the maid named Kit, Daisy repairs to a café downtown. She orders a chai latte and sits at a table near the window. She watches pedestrians huddling in their jackets as they lean into a blustery fall wind, dead leaves being trampled under boots.
She decides to bite the bullet. She reaches for her phone, looks up the Holly’s Help website, and calls the office.
“Holly’s Help, Sabrina speaking. How may I direct your call?” The voice is high pitched and annoyingly sunny.
“Can I speak to Holly McGuire, please?” Daisy says.
She is put on hold for a few moments.
“Holly here.”
Daisy sits upright. “Hi, Holly, I’m Daisy Rittenberg, one of your clients. One of your employees, Kit, has been cleaning our home—Rose Cottage—and I understand she’s been replaced. I was wondering what happened?”
“With Kit? Oh, she had a scheduling conflict. We juggled the roster. Is everything okay with your new cleaner?”
“Great so far. I just met her this morning. I was wondering if you could tell me what Kit’s last name is?”
There is a moment of silence. Holly says, “Why? Is there a problem?”
“Not at all. Kit has been doing an excellent job. We are sorry to lose her. We want to send her a bouquet of flowers with a personalized note as a thank-you, and I realized I never got her surname.”
“Thank you. Kit always has such great feedback. We get so many referrals through her. It’s Kit Darling.”
Daisy’s pulse quickens. She writes “Darling” on her napkin. “Do you have an address for her? So I can have the flowers delivered to her home?”
“You can just send them here to our head office. I’ll make sure they get into her hands. Thank you so much.”
“Wait, please, it would be so much more special for her to be surprised at home, don’t you think?”
“I’m sorry, Mrs.Rittenberg. While it’s a lovely idea, it’s not policy to give out the personal information of our employees.”
Daisy tries again, but Holly refuses to give additional details on her employee. Daisy curses to herself, thanks Holly again, and hangs up.
Immediately she opens a browser on her phone and starts searching for “Kit Darling” online.
She finds a New York–based model named Kit Darling. She finds lots of other Kit Darlings—a veterinarian, a research scientist in the UK, someone named Kit who has completed several ultradistance marathons, a romance novelist from Arizona named Kit Darling, but no one who appears to be a maid in Vancouver.
Daisy returns to the Holly’s Help website and opens the “About Us” link, hoping to find photos of the maids. But there is only a photo of Holly McGuire and her happy admin staff.
Daisy absently chews her lip, thinking. Then she remembers Vanessa also uses the Holly’s Help service. She phones Vanessa.
“Hey, Daisy,” Vanessa says. “I was just thinking about you—I was wondering if you and Jo—”
“You do use the Holly’s Help cleaning service, right?”
There is a pause. “Yes. Why?”
Daisy clears her throat. “Do you know who your maid is? Have you personally met her?”
“Of course, yes. What’s this about?”
“What’s her name?”
