A woman's intuition

Vespa was already packed for her trip to London to review the latest fashion samples for her next Paris Vogue article when she made a final stop in her office. Vespa was just finishing gathering the few papers from her desk she planned to read on the train when her editor burst breathlessly through her door. "Oh Vespa! Thank goodness I caught you, I thought you would have left for the train already" The woman was an impeccable pillar of womanhood, her hair as black as Vespa's, a face so flawlessly drawn on none of the reporters could guess her age, although many attempts had been made. Today she wore a sharp, fitted black suit with a wide scoop of white collar that tucked neatly into her polite decolletage. A fluffy white swath of scarf punctuated with black polka dots floated below her chin. Mdm Guillory thrust a newspaper on Vespa's desk, Vespa was relieved to see it was an english newspaper, she had mostly mastered Cecile Guillory's soupy thick Parisian accent, but reading french...Vespa hadn't really made an effort. The paper was a recent London Times, the whole front page was taken up with an expose on a "Lady in lace". The story and accompanying photograph seemed standard tabloid fare and of little interest to Vespa. Vespa glanced at the clock, she had precious little time to get to her train..."This lady in lace has captured everyone's attention, no one knows anything about her, some say she could be a foreign princess." Vespa hurriedly stuffed her papers in her satchel and moved towards the door "She could also be the sister of a stagehand and it was a slow news day! I need to get on a train Cecile." Vespa moved to push past her boss out the door, but the Vogue Editor stopped her with a firm hand. "Vespa, you still work for me. Yes, you do have a train to catch, to London it so happens, where this lady in lace is! So you now have two assignments, get me those fashion reviews, and find this woman. People want to know everything about her, therefore if we get that exclusive, everyone will read our magazine." Cecile shoved the folded London Times into Vespa's satchel "Bonne chance, Mademoiselle, and..." she lightly pushed Vespa out the door "au revoir!"

Vespa sulked on the way to the train, and most of the way to Lille, she wasn't a puppy, trained to fetch slippers! She didn't move to Paris to do fluffy tabloid pieces. By the time the train was approaching Calais, however, Vespa had read the newspaper article several times. Vespa discarded the article as a source of information, it was poorly written and all conjecture, so she turned to the picture. The photograph of the mysterious lace wearing woman was fairly clear, and closeup. Vespa took out her brass handled spy glass and looked closer at the black and white print. There was no mistaking the high quality of the clothing the woman was wearing, even in grainy ink, Vespa recognized Italian lace and real fur, the pearls were real too. But as the train passed through Ashford, Vespa began to pick apart what was wrong with the lady in lace. The mysterious woman wore a gorgeous imported hat, but her hair had obviously never been professionally set, although someone had given it a good try, and though it was nearly impossible to tell from the photograph, Vespa was sure something wasn't right about the hands, they didn't look quite like they belonged to someone who had grown up with a silver spoon in her mouth. When Vespa's train chugged into London Victoria train station, Vespa had completely forgotten she'd been sent to England on a fashion assignment...

 

***PLEASE SEE BLYTHE QUAKE FOR CONTINUING STORIES***

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