You’re still making the d———d things?
JANET
Yes. Only at another shop. The Regent Street place had no room for me when I was well enough to go back to work. But the woman who kept it gave me a recommendation to a friend who was starting in Hanover Street. A most superior quarter for a hatshop, Monty. In fact the superior quarter. Claude et Cie was the name.
(Monty (rather shocked)
A French shop?
JANET
No more French than you are, Monty. It was kept by a Miss Hicks, one of the most thoroughly British people you can possibly imagine. But we called ourselves Claude et Cie in order to be able to charge people more for their hats. You can always charge fashionable women more for their clothes if you pretend to be French. It’s one of the imbecilities of commerce. So poor dear Miss Hicks became Madame Claude and none of our hats cost less than seven guineas.
MONTY
Do people buy hats at such a price?