'Tears Before Bedtime' and 'Weep No More'

by Barbara Skelton

  Mummy taught one nil. Tina had stressed you must keep your hands busy all day doing something utile. Louise’s way of filling a void was to be continually on the go swigging and making rendezvous with no matter whom … My resort was laughter.

  *Son of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.

  Chapter V

  The War

  That last winter before the war Gerda and I went skiing in Davos, where glamorous Gerda became the toast of all the sportive Teutons. The last summer was spent in St Tropez with Luba and her son, Jean-François Bergery, a very clever little boy of whom I was much in awe. Among our Schiaparelli clothes, I remember a satin swimsuit printed in cockles and seashells, and a large black Panama hat with velvet ribbons.

  When war finally broke out, Schiaparelli had already closed her salon and gone back to Paris; Luba and I were sharing a tiny top floor flat above a grocery store on the corner of Kinnerton Street. My quarters were the attic, a triangular room with candy-striped wallpaper, white furniture and matting. As she was a perfectionist, Luba’s room was never furnished and contained nothing but a bed. She had, and still has, superb taste and a charming Russian accent, her sentences invariably interjected with ‘Darling’. My chosen companions were always a good deal older than myself; and Luba became such a maternal figure that, whenever we separated, I lapsed into a depression. She had two sisters, Lukey, and the brightest and maddest, Katyia, a costume designer, very extravagant and always in debt. All three girls had been beauties. Their father, Krassin, had been a friend of Lenin. When Stalin came to power Krassin despatched his family to Sweden, and they never returned to live in Russia. Krassin became the first Soviet Ambassador to London and later Ambassador to Paris where Luba married the radical socialist, Gaston Bergery. After Stalin’s death, the Soviets recognised Krassin as having been an important economist and a statue of him now stands in his native town Kurgan in Siberia.

  One of Luba’s first visitors to Kinnerton Street was a Frenchman who came over with de Gaulle. A banker, Monsieur Boris had been the Chef de Cabinet du Ministère des Finances under Léon Blum. During the war he worked with the Resistance leader Emmanuel d’Astier de la Vigerie, who became Luba’s second husband. A talented writer, and Minister of the Interior in the provisional French Government under de Gaulle in Algiers, Emmanuel d’Astier was a distinguished figure. In politics he veered towards the Left. Throughout the war he had a nom de guerre and moved between England and occupied France, carrying messages from the French Resistance. Separated from his wife in Paris, his advances rejected by Luba, Monsieur Boris was desperate for a woman and I seemed to fit the bill. When Luba evacuated herself to Devon with her son, Jean-François Bergery, Kinnerton Street was disbanded and Georges Boris took me to live with him in Shepherd’s Market. A balding stocky man with a pale reptilian face, Georges Boris was kind and intelligent and had boundless energy. Every morning, he prepared the coffee, then dressed in army uniform and a képi and, carrying a briefcase, walked briskly out heading for the French headquarters, where he relayed broadcasts to the French people.

  Standing at the window, I would watch him stride away, then utterly exhausted return to bed and go on dozing. Monsieur Boris’s knowledge of English was about equivalent to my French. But, like many Frenchman I have known, he was an extremely jealous man. Once, at a party, I was sitting beside another Free Frenchman, when Georges came across the room and slapped my face. But then, I was in love with him, so the gesture was pleasing.

  We saw quite a lot of the beautiful Lee Miller of L’Age d’Or* fame and Roland Penrose. Though Roland was divorced from his French wife, Valentine, she lived with them in Hampstead. It was an agreeably relaxed household. There was no demur should two luncheon guests decide to take an afternoon nap in their double bed. Lee was working for Vogue. She tried to turn me into a photographic model, but in all her pictures, I looked like a deadend kid.

  It was during the Blitz with its sticks of bombs; six in succession were dropped. We would listen for their approach and, just as the sixth was about to fall, Monsieur Boris had a habit of flinging himself flat on the carpet. We did, in fact, have a very narrow escape in the middle of the night when a bomb fell on the pub next door and everyone in it was killed. We merely suffered shock, as the walls of the flat caved in, and everything was embedded in dust and plaster. The rest of the night was spent with Luba’s sister, Katyia. Then Georges took a flat above the Mirabelle, a very popular underground restaurant, on the corner of Curzon Street, and life went on. As though to seek oblivion, we led a hectic social life. Pre-luncheon drinks in the Curzon Street Sherry Bar, luncheons at the Ritz, the Coquille, the Ecu de France or the Coq d’Or in Mayfair. When we were not at the 400, we frequented a vast vulgar nightclub off Berkeley Square; the Conga had a revolving dance floor. Or one went to the Suivi or the Jamboree and, of course, there was always the Players’ Theatre Club, where the walls were covered in Feliks Topolski’s prancing horses and Peter Ustinov was the principal performer. Or we might have drinks with Augustus John in the French Club, run by a lady called Olwen, where Louise did her war work behind the bar.

  Madame Boris had been informed of our affair. She had written to say that she only hoped Georges was living with someone ‘digne de lui’. His closest friend, another Free Frenchman, shared a flat with a streetwalker on Bond Street. Everything went well until Georges started negotiating for his wife to come over and I began dining out on my own. Then there were scenes; Georges was always in a rage or distant, while I became increasingly depressed, until one day I packed my belongings and left.

  The family had returned to London and were living in Cranmer Court. In spite of his bad health, Daddy had rejoined the War Office, for he felt it to be his duty to participate in the war effort. Sister Brenda was packing parcels, war work she shared with Melinda Maclean. My furniture came out of storage and Mattli, the dress designer, offered me the top floor of his house in Hertford Street. Michael Sevier, then divorced from Louise, hummed about the floor below, until one night he came back drunk and died climbing the stairs.

  The main cause of Georges’s jealousy had been a mystic gentleman-farmer separated from his wife, the famous beauty Euphemia.† Ned Grove had built his own house, a white bungalow surrounded by meadows. He wore an eyeglass, was tall and distinguished, and might have been quite handsome but for a clownish snout.

  On a weekend, I would take the train to Salisbury, change for the village of Binley and, once, when I stepped out of the train, Euphemia attacked me with her handbag, until Ned appeared to intercede. Ned’s mysticism took the form of sentimentalising over Joan of Arc who he claimed had been in direct contact with God. In spite of this, however, visits to the farm were always extremely agreeable. Ned made his own bread, churned butter and brewed elderberry wine which, when drunk before a log fire on winter evenings, seemed strangely potent. One time, his friend, Hugo Pitman, arrived with a freshly caught salmon. It was so delicious that, when he found me raiding the larder in the middle of the night, Ned labelled me ‘Mouse’. He was a charming man, if rather intense. When the spring came, we were always out of doors gathering hay, feeding the animals, taking long walks to the post office for Ned to pick up his mail. The relationship remained chaste; and this aggravated Ned. The last visit, returning to London on a sunny May morning, carrying a basket of fresh eggs and vegetables, I mounted the stairs of Hertford Street and looking up saw a patch of blue sky. The roof had received a direct hit in one of the fiercest raids on London and the whole of the top floor was wiped out. Rummaging about amongst the ashes, where my desk had been, I found under the rubble all my jewellery intact and with it my diamond ring.

  Deprived of all possessions, I became a night flitter, using Cranmer Court as a base for letters and telephone messages. Sometimes I stayed with Gerda in her charming Culross Street house, with Feliks Topolski in his studio off Warwick Avenue, overlooking the canal where barges drifted past the window, or with Louise in Ebury Street until we had a serious falling out over a Frenc
h opium smoker who frequented the French Club. We named him Chopin, and he was so addicted to his pipe that, when taken to Cot, he never considered it odd to be put in the spare room, while someone else shared my bed. Far from it, not only did Cot become his clos de bonheur but, in an enamoured state, he took his darling trésor to Cartier and spent all his money on a diamond bracelet. As it was too ornate for wartime wear, I never knew what to do with this lavish gift; and it was carried around, gloated over from time to time, in a straw basket containing paraphernalia like spoons and knives and the rations, until one day Louise claimed the Frenchman was being exploited. She grabbed the basket and retrieved his valuable present, whereupon Chopin came to his senses, gave up smoking opium, and grew fat and pompous. Whether it was due to disillusionment or drink, Louise became increasingly bitter. If someone she didn’t like was mentioned while she was polishing glasses, she literally spat across the bar. PBO had joined up in the Pioneer Corps and been transferred to Wargraves, so her permanent escort became Sir Simon Schuster, a rich elderly financier with a toothbrush moustache, whom she named ‘Schoolboy’. Louise towered over this pinstriped figure and his rolled umbrella. They were an odd couple, seen all over London leaping in and out of taxis on a permanent pub-crawl.

  It was not until 1941 that I was summoned to appear before a call-up board. In perpetual dread of being put into the WAAFs or the WRENs, I set about finding a serious job. Peter Quennell and Gerda worked at the Ministry of Information. Hoping that I also might qualify for a censorship job, I went to apply. I was carrying The Spoils of Poynton, so when asked by the interviewer who was my favourite author it seemed apt to reply ‘Henry James’. ‘That elephantine trunk continually chasing after a garden pea!’ sneered the interviewer, and showed me the door. Eventually I got a job driving trucks for the MTC. Then, when my old seducer Sidney acquired a factory of nuts and bolts, he gave me the job of doling out the men’s wages. It meant taking a train from Waterloo to Sudbury every day. The factory had once been a large garage. The office was situated above the machines, where the manager, his wife and a secretary sat drinking endless cups of tea. Luncheons consisted of powdered eggs and chips brought over from a canteen. The wages had to conform to the Union Rate System which meant working out two thirds or one fifth of one and sixpence.

  Once a week, Sidney appeared smartly dressed in a dark blue suit and a blue woolly overcoat, with a trilby tilted over one eye. As soon as he entered the factory, all the workers stopped singing and the machines came to a halt After poking about and questioning them, he was eventually coaxed back into the office and handed a cup of tea and a cheque book. Then, the manager’s wife helped him back into his blue woolly overcoat and, giving his trilby a final tilt, Sidney groped his way down the perpendicular stairway and sped off in the direction of the station.

  *A surrealist film made by Luis Buñuel in cooperation with the painter Salvador Dali.

  †Euphemia Grove was first married to the painter Henry Lamb. She is described by Frances Partridge in Everything to Lose as being at the age of sixty ‘really beautiful still; she has a splendid pair of blue eyes, a classical nose and a skin that keeps its bloom and softness’.

  Chapter VI

  Yugoslavs

  The first time I saw Peter Quennell was at Gerda’s in Culross Street. He came round one evening bringing Cyril Connolly, who was then editor of Horizon magazine, and the two men of letters were sharing a flat in Drayton Gardens. With his Byronic attitudes, wit and blond quiff Peter struck me as being a romantic figure, an impression that was soon dispelled when I knew him intimately. Peter loved the country and soon became a steady visitor to the cottage.

  It was about this time that a Yugoslav friend, Dimy, offered me the job of secretary to the Yugoslav government in exile. Their office was in Kingston House and by then I was sharing a second floor flat above an antique shop in the Brompton Road with an odd girl who, for some reason, never got called up. I then had a passion for brewing stews, the dominant ingredient being potatoes, which were sometimes eaten seated on the edge of the bed or the carpet, and shared with Peter Quennell, a journalist Anthony Cotterill, or a guerrilla Yugoslav doctor, whom we termed the ‘Horse Thief.’ Another member of the entourage was a practising lawyer until he got called up. I had met Captain Brien How in a curious way, as we both alighted from a bus outside the Café Royal. Brien had a caustic sense of humour, but he was rather stodgy and, because of his ashen complexion, Peter always referred to him as ‘Cold Veal’.

  Diary

  I awoke early. Sour grunts from Miss Morris when I looked into her room. Brewed some tea, using the stale leaves, as the rations have run out. A dreary weekend. Saturday was spent gloomily eating huge platefuls of tagliatelli at the Speranza, with Peter dismally reciting Dryden’s translation of Horace, ‘Happy the man, happy he alone, he who can call today his own,’ and where Peter was attacked by Nika Hulton who accused him of spreading nasty gossip. Sunday, Peter spends his morning in the telephone booth opposite fixing himself up with free meals. Washed my hair and then rushed off to meet Feliks Topolski at the cinema; he arrived late so we trailed about the streets in the rain without speaking and eventually saw a very bad film, the life of Schubert.

  *

  Lunchtime I met Cold Veal at the Bunch of Grapes. Found him seated at the bar gazing into space; as torpid as ever; so I left him and went back to the flat where Miss Morris made me a fish pie. Cold Veal again in the evening for a drink. He was still sitting in the Bunch of Grapes staring into space. He came out of a coma to attack me, saying I was unworthy and led a pointless existence. When he saw I was not interested he lapsed back into a coma. Peter appeared, very screechy and tiresome; baited Cold Veal. Very much the gloating victor with a vanquished foe. What a pair!

  *

  Last night Miss Morris threw a party. It had been threatening for some time. She greeted her guests wearing a plum-coloured brocade dinner dress made specially for the occasion out of curtain material. Later, I took the Yugoslav ministers off to the Café Royal for dinner. One of them had just arrived from Yugoslavia; he had been with the guerrillas and had escaped through Turkey and Bulgaria. We sat up on the balcony drinking wine and toasting the Chetniks. The conversation consisted of solitary chords. ‘Encore du vin,’ gurgle gurgle, ‘Aux Chetniks,’ ‘A Mihailovic’.

  Went to bed early and slept until eleven o’clock. Woke to hear Miss Morris running up and down stairs singing. I lit the gas fire, turned on the bath, made toast and tea. We walked across the park to Feliks’s studio. A friend of his arrived at six. They talked about the tank situation in Libya where the Germans have guns that can fire a greater distance than ours. They said the Russian successes were due to the slow retreat which meant they suffered gigantic losses in material and manpower. The young man was a great admirer of Feliks’s work and we all picked out drawings for a Polish paper in the order we liked best. Feliks gave me a ‘roasted pyramid’ to eat when I got home, but I was too stuffed with caraway bread, meat balls and herring paste. He lent me Scum of the Earth which I took away with English Wits, a book I left at the studio months ago when I was in the process of installing myself there. Quite a nice day really although I intended reading Peter’s Byron.*

  *

  Japan has declared war on America and Great Britain. I suppose now all the Japs will be moving out of Kingston House. Miss Morris was maddening this morning as I was dressing and insisted on prattling away from her bed that she had been listening to the radio stations until five in the morning. She was boasting in some way, trying to impress me that she was sufficiently bright to take in the news.

  Kingston House was swarming with Japs rushing about in dapper black suits. When I came back at lunchtime several of them were standing looking grim and defiant beside their suitcases in the hall. Tarzo (our doorman) noticed I had changed my hair. ‘Hair change. No like,’ he said, ‘Me, no change,’ pointing to his own frizzy head. Wrote to Peter Q. Stayed in this evening and had a stew with Cotterill. He
has been the only person concerned about the Jap news. His serial in the Express will not be included tomorrow. Miss Morris is worried about the parties for the New Year. Thinks that the news will affect them.

  *

  Cotterill came to see me at the office looking shamefaced and embarrassed. After standing in the hall for several minutes at a loss for anything to say, he then produced two packets of cigarettes as a peace offering. Evidently his behaviour of last night had been worrying him. He told me he was off to Brighton and would I have dinner on Thursday; as I had had a telegram from Peter saying he would be back that day I had to refuse, so Cotterill said he would return from Brighton Wednesday.

  Went home, had a bath and put on a new face and black dress, as I was dining with Feliks. Miss Morris tried to persuade me to wear my tarty red fox cape; but I explained it made Feliks feel like a sugar-daddy out with a moll. I had to wait for him at the Café Royal and was late myself, anyway. I ordered a large double whisky and read Scum. When Feliks arrived, the usual food discussion. We had a filthy dinner, and diluted red wine. Clive Entwistle came in with his stooping walk looking like a hunted animal on the prowl. He seemed to have toughened up since being in the army. Feliks did a drawing making me look benevolent and homely. He made Clive look like someone supervising the coconut shies. I gave Feliks my compact to do a drawing of himself. He did a pair of black button eyes gazing out in pain and bewilderment. Then we all bundled into a bus as the taxi situation was hopeless.