Chapter Five
The Dark Letter
1
On a bitter afternoon in the last week of January of the year 1923 the writer found himself in the Place Vendôme in Paris.
Now here, in the Place Vendôme, is material ready to the hand of the as yet undiscovered chronicler of lofty frivolities: such, unfortunately, as am not I. But I can, at least, count up to fifty. There were forty-eight motor-cars in the Place Vendome, and one coach-and-six.
The Place Vendôme is a paradox in grey stone. Spacious, noble, monumental, it is cast, even at the stranger’s first glance, in an everlasting mould. The Place Vendôme is, without a doubt, one among the few things about which we may say with certainty: ‘That will last.’ And yet, monumental and everlasting though it is, what do we find in the Place Vendôme? Do we fi
