Found at last

Photo thanks to Sallyann at Photographic Memories.
Click on the picture to go to Sallyann’s post.

You may recall that a couple of months ago, Sallyann at Photographic Memories posted a picture of a couple of hats reclining in an (abandoned?) taxi cab. She also gave me a challenge to come up with a story as to why they were there.

Needless to say, my mind started to hum and I did come up with a story, but it was left unfinished at the end of June. Since then the characters in the story have been hammering at me to finish it. So…

We left Maisie Benton-Smythe, more properly called the Countess of Waverley and her good friend Juliet Drummond finishing off their day of frustration with a couple of large G & T and the promise of a good meal with Juliet’s husband, Major Sir Claude Drummond.

They agreed that they would start early the next day and call as many of the taxi companies as possible. Meantime, they would enjoy their evening.

The next day dawned and as promised Juliet arrived early. The two women had hardly had their first cup of coffee when Jackson, the parlour-maid came in with the telephone. The caller was the helpful young woman from central booking who had provided Juliet with a long list of taxi owners, but more importantly a number for property left in taxis. This helpful young woman had taken it on herself to call the property office to enquire whether the bonnets had turned up and to her delight, she was told they had. So she wasted no time in calling Maisie’s house to give her the good news.

As the lost property office was in the centre of town, the two women decided to make an outing, have lunch, do a little shopping (for hats maybe) and then go and claim the bonnets before returning home in the afternoon. Well as you can imagine, things did not necessarily go as planned where these women were concerned,

Oh, they finished their coffee and had a cab called to take them to their favourite department store where they spent a happy hour looking at hats and finally each buying one. Then pleased with their purchases they went off for lunch. A grand time was had as they met up with their other great friend, Imogen Carruthers who was now completely recovered from the damage to her shoulder. She was a little put out that they hadn’t included her in this adventure and declared that she would accompany them when they picked up the bonnets.

So after lunch, another cab was called and off they went. Once at the office it was relatively easy to claim the bonnets having proved that they were the owners and so they left in high spirits after deciding to all go to Maisie’s for tea. Yet another cab was called and they chatted happily all the way to Maisie’s.

It wasn’t until Imogen was leaving to meet Sir Percy for dinner and Juliet was leaving to meet Sir Claude that they realised they didn’t have the two new hats they had bought before lunch. What had happened to them? Were they left in the department store, at the lost property office or had they left their hats in the taxi cab?

To be continued … perhaps