3122. Eugenie’s hats © Bruce Goodman 20 February 2025

Eugenie was a strange lady. Maybe she wasn’t strange; it’s simply that people regarded her as strange. Presumably she was in her late thirties. What got to people was that she always wore a hat. It wasn’t a sun hat; it was one of those flamboyant hats, complete with hat pin, seemingly straight out of the early twentieth century. You will see her if you take the underground to work. Eugenie had a collection of such hats. It was quite rare to see the same hat twice in a month. In fact some insensitive metro travellers took friendly bets as to when a hat would make a second appearance in the same month. The small monetary bet was always won by the same man. Funny that, did Eugenie perhaps know the bookie? Maybe it was her husband? When holding a conversation with her she seemed quite normal. Quite a pleasant and ordinary lady really, except for those damn hats. It was only last Thursday, when travelling home from work, that people saw Eugenie’s true spirit. An inebriated man began abusing this quite young female passenger, presumably his partner. He threatened her with his language and his fists. People stood and watched. They didn’t want to be arrested and tried in court for helping out. That was when Eugenie and her hat pin came in handy. Contact Author Back to Index Next Story Previous Story