“By all means,” I said. “It will be an opportunity to see Carlotta, which is always delightful.”
Julia occupies as her residence the top story of a dilapidated Victorian house near the British Museum, owned by the celebrated historical novelist Carlotta Benares — my readers will doubtless be familiar with her work, though a tendency to emphasize the more sentimental aspects of history has prevented her enjoying the critical esteem which would be the just reward for her painstaking research. I am always pleased to see her, for we have several enemies in common.
She greeted us in her customary splendor of black lace and topaz, and offered us madeira and macaroons. Ragwort is a favorite in her affections, for she regards him as being “the right man for Julia”: she does not know, I think, that he has rejected Julia’s matrimonial proposals with as much firmness as those of a less honorable nature. Myself also she greeted with great goodwill, being eager to know my opinion of a colleague in the world of Scholarship who had written unfavorably, in a review of her most recent novel, of her understanding of military tactics in the reign of Richard III. The same man, as it happened, had once published an impertinent comment in one of the learned journals on a little article of my own concerning the statute De Donis: I was happy to assure Carlotta that he was a person of no intellectual consequence, and reported by a reliable source to change his underwear only once a year.
Of Julia, however, there was no sign. At about half past eight on the previous evening she had triumphantly announced that she had at last finished her Opinion on Part XV of the Taxes Act and intended to reward herself with dinner at Guido’s: Carlotta had not seen her since and was beginning to be anxious.
Returning once more to 62 New Square, we found Selena in not wholly amicable discussion with the temporary typist, who seemed to feel that she was being unduly critical of a newly typed Statement of Claim.
“You did say,” said the temporary typist, in a tone of accusation, “that you wanted it in a hurry.”
“Yes,” said Selena. “Yes, Muriel, it’s quite true I said that. But I didn’t actually mean that I wanted you to leave bits out.”
“It’s only one paragraph, Miss Jardine. I don’t suppose anyone’ll notice.”
“I know it’s only one paragraph, Muriel, but it does contain allegations which are essential to my client’s case. I really can’t just leave it out.”
“Well,” said the temporary typist, “you could write it in in handwriting, couldn’t you?”
“I suppose I shall have to,” said Selena with a small sigh, “but it’s going to look very messy. It hardly seems worth typing it at all if half of it is going to be in manuscript. It’s quite a long paragraph — I don’t understand how you came to miss it out.”
This was unreasonable, for the error was a natural one. I saw, looking over Selena’s shoulder at her draft, that the missing paragraph had begun with the same half-dozen words as that which succeeded it: the typist, having copied them for the first time, would have looked back at the draft to see what followed; the same phrase, occurring again a few lines later, would have caught her eye; and she would have continued from that point, omitting what lay between.
“It is an instance,” I said, “of the mistake known as haplography — a fruitful source of error in ancient and medieval manuscripts. I cannot doubt, Selena, that you are familiar with it: just such a blunder in the P Codex of the
“Hilary,” said Selena, “do you wish me to lie down on the floor and scream?” I recalled that she thought the day unseasonable for the discussion of textual criticism, and said no more on the subject.
The temporary typist having departed in dudgeon, we told Selena of our visit to Bloomsbury and of Julia’s failure to return there. Selena looked puzzled and frowned a little.
“Perhaps she spent the night somewhere and has gone straight back to Chambers. I’ll ring William and see if she’s there.”
But Julia’s Clerk was equally without news of his missing principal, and had begun to regard with some disquiet the approach of the hour appointed for her conference. Selena now looked perceptibly anxious.
“Did you say she was meaning to have dinner at Guido’s? Let’s see if they’ve any idea what’s happened to her.”
An eavesdropper on Selena’s conversation with Guido’s would have gathered that on the previous evening she had lent her umbrella — a rather pretty and distinctive umbrella, with an ivory handle carved in the shape of a horse’s head — to her friend Miss Larwood; that Miss Larwood, before departing for her morning’s engagements in the High Court, had confessed to having left it somewhere — she thought in Guido’s; and that Selena would like it back. She would be most grateful if they could look and see — there was silence while search was made.
“She didn’t?… didn’t leave anything at all? How strange — unprecedented. Was there anyone with her to remind her not to forget things?… Ah… Ah, I see… I wonder if it’s anyone I know — did you happen to catch the name?… No, I don’t think so… Well, she must have gone on somewhere else and left my umbrella there. You wouldn’t know of course — oh really?… yes… thank you, that’s most kind… yes, I’ll try there.” Replacing the telephone receiver, she began to arrange her papers in separate bundles, each neatly tied up in pink tape.
“Selena,” said Ragwort severely, “very little of that was true.”
“Losing one’s umbrella,” said Selena, “seems less eccentric, somehow, than losing Julia.”
“I gather,” I said, “that she dined at Guido’s last night. Are we to understand that there was someone with her?”
“She arrived alone, but when she was about half way through her meal a red-haired signorina came in, who seemed to be a friend of hers — that is to say, Julia seemed pleased to see her and invited her to share her table. They drank much wine and were very happy. When they had finished their meal, the red-haired signorina asked the waiter to call a taxi for them — to go, it seems, to a place called Vashti’s House. It’s a sort of nightclub in Chelsea.”
“Vashti’s?” said Ragwort with austere disapproval. “Vashti’s has a most unsavory reputation. I have heard it spoken of as a place frequented by females of unnatural propensity, seeking companions in disgraceful conduct.”
“I have heard it spoken of,” said Selena, “as an agreeable little establishment where single women may enjoy one another’s company in relaxed and convivial surroundings. Still, we’re clearly thinking of the same place.” She now rolled down her sleeves and put on the black linen jacket which would have completed the suitability of her costume for an appearance in Court. “The discotheque in the basement will be closed, of course, in the daytime. I believe, however, that there is a wine bar on the ground floor under the same management. With reasonable expedition, we should be able to get there in time to present ourselves as customers for a late lunch.”
Remembering her aeroplane and her paperwork, I did not suppose that any trifling danger to Julia’s merely moral welfare would persuade her to set forth so precipitately for Chelsea. I inquired what more there was to it.
“It seems,” said Selena, “that the name of her red-haired friend was Rowena. That was the name, you remember, of the girl at Rupert’s party — the one dressed as a parlormaid. It sounds as if Julia’s trying to investigate Rupert; and in view of the Rustington business and so forth, I’d really rather she didn’t.”
To a place of such ambiguous repute as Vashti’s my readers will wish no precise directions. Nor, indeed, am I in a position to give them: it is my custom, when being driven by Selena on any errand which she considers urgent, to keep my eyes firmly closed. When at last it seemed safe to open them, we were somewhere in that area of south-west London where the artistic overlaps the opulent, no doubt to their mutual advantage.
Having reflected during the journey on the best means of obtaining news of her missing friend, Selena had concluded that it was in the character of one who loved not wisely but too well that she was most likely to attract sympathetic assistance. She proposed, therefore, to enter the wine bar in that state of solitary dejection appropriate to one misused in an affair of the heart: Ragwort and I would appear to be strangers to her, but would endeavor to find a table in close proximity.
The interior decoration of Vashti’s House has a certain Moorish quality: arched recesses in whitewashed walls, a floor of terracotta tiles, many curls and arabesques of black wrought-ironwork. Our orders for lunch were taken by a tall, dark girl, short-haired and aquiline-nosed, dressed in a costume reminiscent of the bull-ring — very tight black trousers, white shirt and scarlet cummerbund.
It being now almost two hours since our lunch in the Corkscrew, neither Ragwort nor I found any difficulty in disposing of our slices of quiche lorraine and their accompanying salads. Selena, on the other hand, sitting alone at
