CLEAR AS A NEW WINDOW

By Ben Greenman

from forthcoming collection, as yet untitled

Yesterday, before Judge Speith, at Farnham Street, James Platt and Paula Hay, who are described on the booking report as a driver and an actor, respectively, were brought up on charges of conspiring to defraud Deborah Seymour, the Duchess of St. Somerset, of more than $500,000 by the counterfeit transfer of real property. The scheme involved Hay befriending Seymour in a tennis class and then confiding in her new friend the story of how she, too, bad been high-born but was brought low by the irresponsibility of others, particularly her father, and that if Seymour would only help her purchase one small private residence, she could reassert control of the entire family estate, at which time she would return to Seymour more than double the latter’s original investment. Platt, for his part, posed as a competing bidder for the residence in question, and supported Hay’s version of events. Seymour expressed interest in the purchase but then immediately contacted police, explaining that she, too, was a charlatan and that there was no such thing as the Duchess of St. Somerset, a title she had affected for years, but that no matter her own playful fantasies regarding aristocracy, she had never tried to defraud anyone else and was, as she put it, “clear as a new window” on the dishonesty of Hay and Platt. This argument resurfaced in court. “All of them are liars,” said Rita Osborn, representing the prosecution, “though one is an entirely harmless liar and two of them wished to cause great harm.” Some drama marked the day. A woman who had tried to interfere with the police during Hay’s arrest was noticed by an officer as present in court and pointed out, at which time she tried to flee. In her haste, she dropped a sheet of paper, on which was found a detailed blueprint of the courthouse and surrounding buildings, with all rooms, doors, and other means of access circled in red, and one particular rear alley also traced with a yellow highlighter, indicating an intention to assist in the escape of the two accused. The woman, who gave a series of false names, was arrested. A second dramatic moment occurred when a witness for the defense identified Osborn as an actual royal, the direct descendant of a long-since-exiled King of Ireland. “True,” she said. “But irrelevant.”