STREAMLINED ALIBIS

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 83, Issue 36, 13 February 1939, Page 3

STREAMLINED ALIBIS

JN Paris there is a unique and characteristically French institution —the alibi post. Harassed husbands eager to flee from nagging wives and find a few weeks' consolation in the arms of their mistresses, need no longer fear their little game being discovered, writes Jean Marit in Le Journal de la Femme, Paris. They can remain peacefully and blissfully in Paris and convince their spouse beyond doubt or suspicion that they are hundreds of miles away basking in the sun of Italy or Spain. A poet conceived the idea of the aibi post in 1883 and set up the first enterprise of this kind. To-day there are four such agencies in Paris. Quite naturally they are all wrapped in professional secrecy and view snooping reporters with a jaundiced eye. I therefore decided to hide my identity as I knocked at the door of one of these establishments. A rather formal but polite gentleman received me. “I wish to make a trip to Brittany,” 1 said stimulating embarrassment, “but would like to give certain people the impression that I am in Sicily.” “That is easily done, sir,” came the confident reply. “We would suggest

[ that instead of choosing a fixed address | you work out an itinerary with stops of only one or two days in each place. I in that way you will avoid the risk of | having people attempt to find you in | ycur supposed retreat. Twenty ad- ; dresses have frequently meant the salI vation of many a bedroom traveller; a | single address often spells disaster.” I 1 agreed to his proposal. I could not conceal by admiration for his foresight. “But how are you going to arrange all this?” “That is very simple. We will work out an itinerary with you. You can stop over in as many cities as you wish. We will provide you with letterheads of hotels in these various cities. You can sit down and pen the correspondence for your entire trip in a single day. We then mail the letters to our subsidiaries in various parts of the country. They will see to it that the postcards and letters are mailed from the proper places at the proper time.” “If you wish still more fool-proof alibis to bear out your story, we can produce photographs of you against scenic backgrounds from any part of ' the world.”

After collecting a small “advance deposit” from me, he led me into the photography studio. The w’alls are covered with filing cabinets. “Here we have the whole world in a hundred drawers. We have all localities that are likely to attract tourist trade, arranged in alphabetical order. Do you want to be photographed in Nice? We have pictures of the Promenade des Anglais, of the Gimiez Gardens, of the Jetee-Promen-ade. In the same drawer there is Nantes, Namur, Niort, etc. You select the scenes that please you most. Then we take a few shots of you in the adjoining room. We cut out your photo, paste it against one of these scenic backgrounds, photograph the combined product, and voila you have been in Nice or Honolulu, for that matter. You have a cast-iron alibi.” “Have you a very numerous clientele?” I asked casually. “Are they mostly men or women?” “We cannot complain about the state of our business. Our customers are mostly men, but there is no lack of women—especially from the wealthier sections of the foreign colony, in Paris.” I left this alibi postmaster with the promise that I would return the next day to discuss the details of a phantom voyage for myself through the sunny islands of Greece and Sicily . . .