Julia’s Day Off/All About Lauren came about after watching an episode of Sherlock Holmes mysteries staring Jeremy Brett as the famous sleuth. I watched it mainly because I had just seen the first episode of the modern Sherlock, written by Steve Moffatt, and was interested in a comparison of the pace and style of the traditional version. The story was The Adventure of The Copper Beeches. In the story the master of Copper Beeches persuades a young governess to wear an electric blue dress and pose as his daughter.

That basic storyline developed into a story in which Julia is kidnapped because she vaguely resembles the dead (sort of) daughter of Mr Trelawney, a wealthy man from New Brisbane on Beta Delta V.

It didn’t start out as a two part story. But the day out stretched out quite nicely, with the issue of whether Julia ought to eat puddings and her reluctance to tell anyone at school that she has a fiancé forming the central theme. The mysterious metallic blue car that follows them is significant, too.

I originally planned a scene in the dormitory where Julia has a row with one of her fellow students who saw her with Chrístõ. In the end I decided to leave that out. It was irrelevant to either part of the plot.

Why didn’t she just make a note of the registration number of the car? Good question. It’s a bit of a plot hole. The only answer is that she was trying NOT to be paranoid and memorising the number would have made it obvious she was worried.

Part two of the story, of course, is Chrístõ trying to find out what happened to Julia the hard way, by risking a paradox and going back in time. As Hext points out, later, he could have just looked at the CCTV from everywhere he visited with Julia. The involvement of Hext in the plot was a late addition. Chrístõ WAS meant to do it all himself. I brought him in mainly because it was obvious Lauren had to die, and Chrístõ is too nice to pull that plug. Hext is a bit more ruthless than he is.

This is another story in which Hext saves the day. I probably need to give that plot device a rest for a while. There have been several of them recently. But Hext will get to be a hero again. He’s too much fun to leave out for long.

http://sherlockholmes_cases.tripod.com/holmes1_12.htm