Autobiography

by Diana Cooper

  A great believer in being sometimes alone with him and in another world, I began to take him abroad with me. I had thickets of obstruction to overcome, put up both by Nanny, who did not trust me, and by my mother, who did not trust God or the railways or foreign milk. We settled in 1936 to go to Aix-les-Bains, where I could do a bit of a useless cure for lumbago. I found a Mademoiselle who would join me and talk French. After the amusement of the child’s first journey, pretending to be monkeys on the ropes of the Wagons-Lits, we arrived at a swell hotel and went on an immediate quest for something more to my taste. We found it on the beach of the lake. I wrote to Duff:

  It’s all lovely—one of the happiest things I’ve done for years. Weather perfect, fond de l’air cold, fresh and bracing, sun showy and bronzing. The hotel itself all that I desire, though I admit that it’s no one else’s fancy. There’s no bath and the hot eau courante has gone irremediably wrong. The annexe in which we live is the shape of things to come. The nourriture is so good that with only one meal a day I’m getting fatter—lait, fromages, volaille, great massifs of the best butter, brioches, mushrooms, sweetbreads, brains and ices—all fresh and real. It costs eighty francs a day for the three of us. The garage is on the ground floor of the annexe, so I step out of my bed at 7.30, clap on the thick blue ulster over my nightgown, tie on my sandals and step into the car. I drive two kilometres to l’Etablissement des Bains, where I am given traitement gratuit. It’s like the Palace of the League of Nations and I’m passed naked to the hot hands of two fat Fates, and they hand me on to other fatter Fates through waters and pommellings and heat and cold. At last I’m sat under a shower, hatted with a rubber billycock, and am quite unaffected when I should be exhausted, so they lift me up tenderly and lay me on a bed with care and pinion my arms in boiling blankets, and I cheat and get away without cooling down. On with the ulster and the handkerchief tied round my purple face like a gay Russian’s, and off in the car again, first to fetch a bottle of purest milk for John Julius, then to get the Times and Express and buy a pear or a treat or a birthday cake. Back by 9.30 for breakfast.

  I’m delighted with the little waif’s appearance. He’s pinker and fatter and very very good. The language is the trouble but it will improve.

  As I write it’s 11 a.m. and a glorious day. The baby is doing his class with twenty other exquisite shrimps on the very green grass, and afterwards we are going to swim and I’m going to swagger my diving. He’s bad at palling up (like you) and says that he likes watching, but the class is a help. The Frogs are all wonderfully acrobatic and put our northern Metropolitans to shame, turning cartwheels and somersaulting both ways. I can see poor Mademoiselle now. She’s an acrobat and can do the splits. John Julius is making her imitate an ostrich and she has her head buried in what sand there is, while he rides on her back bawling bad-French directions at her. His French is much easier but unfortunately he has copied my accent and idiom instead of hers. I’d give almost everything to have you here, not quite all because you’d hate it so.

  Tomorrow seven years ago John Julius was born. Tonight seven years ago you were taking me to the nursing home and playing those ridiculous records that Betty gave us, with hearts shaking more with fear of death than with exultance of birth, and each heart from the other hidden. Well, he’s a great success, the little boy, up to date. I’ve ordered him a cake (white, with his name on it and seven candles) as a surprise, and we’ve invited the patronne and her son and pretty daughter and the two instructors to tea, and you see how much better it is to be at Les Platanes than at the Splendide.

  I get up all night keeping an eye on the weather. So does a darling old Frenchman in the window opposite (a great eater with a moustache, paunch and beret). We greet each other from our windows.

  Every day there’s a delightful Ausflug, rowing round or across the lake, a visit to Hautecombe, the monastery across the lake where they pray for me to be able to pray, or to any amount of gorges, and a terrifying excursion in an iron cage suspended on a wire thread, which stopped with my heart half-way, and the fair at Chambéry with a carousel and children dressed in enchanting paper costumes, and Les Charmettes to teach our child early about Rousseau. Excitements come to our door too. Today a fascinating group of nomads arrived, with a barrel-organ pulled by an old pony and turned by a young man and three young forains (two pretty girls and a boy of fourteen) all on high, high stilts, twirling faster than the eye follows, castanets and tambourines going full blast. Very Italian of Byron’s date.

  Duff’s mind was ever occupied by war. He felt it not inevitable, though every action and inaction brought us nearer to the abyss, and too few cared to look into its depths. The speech that he had made this summer of 1936 in Paris was no blunder. It was framed with care so as to convince the Germans that if they fought they would be beaten. Many censured him for it and were wrong. The King’s face was heavy with displeasure when we returned from Paris to The Fort. Duff expected a rebuke and thought that the King was preparing one, but suddenly the frown fled, giving way to his delightful smile as he said: “Well, Duff, you certainly have done it this time.” My letter to Conrad of this date reads:

  Blenheim

  Winston, while being delighted, thinks that Duff’s Paris speech will lead to good or bad. Duff is completely unconcerned about it; what a strange man it is! If he gets the boot, Anthony Eden must get it too, and Mr Baldwin won’t survive, so I don’t see what can really happen. The speech was only “between the lines.” In actual words there is little to catch hold of. Winston’s hatred for Baldwin is so violent that his wish fathers the idea that the Old Man will “fall” over this speech at a coming club dinner. I’m very fortunate in having Duff’s serenity to live with. Imagine the state I’d be in, or Edwin or Winston himself would have been, in Duff’s shoes!

  When the air-raids start only the heads of departments are to be left in Whitehall. All the others are to be hurried off to different provincial towns or encampments, so if Duff is no longer Secretary of State all the better.

  Now I must get up and face my King and the light of my common day. Back tonight probably.

  I am naturally timorous and I felt the iron entering ever more relentlessly into my soul. I thought that the cataclysm would be what the next war will be, and not what people remembered the last one was like. I never thought to survive it, nor desired to. But there were three years of peace left us, and in June the King invited us on board a yacht he had chartered in the Mediterranean. Greatly excited and flattered, we joined the Nahlin on the Dalmatian coast, pausing at Venice, where our international troubles seemed to be over. We took ship to Split, and I wrote to Conrad:

  The other passengers were madly excited about the King’s journey, all eyes scanning horizons. The Captain saw three ships long before any of us did. They were sailing obliquely ahead of us and were soon out of sight again. The destroyers Grafton and Glow-worm look a bit too militant, you know, but stirring to English hearts. A friend met us from the royal yacht, dressed very shabby—sloppy trousers, blue grubby little short-sleeved jersey, yachting cap minus badge. He told us that the only disappointments were no sandy coves for bathing (and indeed the sand is like the pumice you scrub your feet with) and the impossibility of landing because of the yelling, jostling crowd that does not leave the King space to breathe. If he walks to the sights (the churches and old streets) they follow shouting “Cheerio!” and surround him so that he can see nothing. We went aboard and there were greeted by the young King radiant in health, wearing spick-and-span little shorts, straw sandals and two crucifixes on a chain round his neck. Our fellow-guests are Helen Fitzgerald, Pootz and Humphrey Butler, Jack Aird and Wallis.

  We did not see Split. The others could not face another forced landing, so we set steam for a near island through the magic light that makes a background of ethereal mountains, the same colour and consistency as the benign little clouds floating round them. I’ve got a sore throat. God help me!

  No sooner was the yacht sighted th
an the whole village turned out—a million children and gay folk smiling and cheering. Half of them didn’t know which the King was and must have been surprised when they were told. He had no hat (the child’s hair gleaming), espadrilles, the same little shorts and a tiny blue-and-white singlet bought in one of their own villages. The other girls were rather seriously fixed, but Duff and I followed our Sovereign’s lead. I sported the old green zipped trousers, striped shirt and a straw hat bought at Le Puy last week. Duff wore navy shorts, too loose and sagging below his reduced tummy, the white sandals that we bought at Verona together, and the old blue-and-white top. The rather battered yachting cap on top (battered by my packing, not by wear) gave him a W. W. Jacobs bosun look. The crowds were handled fairly cleverly by the detectives with the help of a local policeman and the equerries, who held hands across until we were far away on a stony path up a hill. It was not very pretty, but at least we were free of the mob, and the detective was told to pick wild rosemary for the ship. Following the road over the hill took us back into the little town—a lovely church and campanile, Italian-but-not-quite, and all the bells ringing. The staff were sure that they were ringing for the King, but I was not so certain, and sure enough by great luck it was a feast day, and there passed a procession of clerics in their best, the Virgin and Child beneath a silver canopy, and a long procession of townsfolk which relieved the density of the “send-off” mob. Still there were hundreds left throwing flowers. One woman had a huge magnolia grandiflora, but by gesture she made clear that it was not for me and that I must get it to the King. I made a gallant effort and forced it into his hand when he was talking to someone else.

  At last we were on board again, and it was considered to have been a great success. I thought that I would go and gargle a bit and put some ice on my throat, not that it was much worse, but it was no better. I found that I had all but finished the gargle, so I sent for the doctor who is on one of the Nanny-boats (as the destroyers are called) to prescribe me a new one. He came, took my temperature, found it ninety-nine, said that I had tonsillitis, gauged it with a stick and said that I must stay in bed.

  It’s maddening! I feel perfectly well. Appetite, and no pain, only a lump in the throat and fearfully ashamed of arriving on the yacht as a liability. The doctor said that these things take two or three days to clear up. I can’t think that I must stay in bed three days. O dear, O dear! I haven’t got frightened yet, but that perhaps (being so unusual) is a bad sign. I shall gargle all night and pray God to let me be better in the morning.

  16 June

  I am too unhappy. My temperature went up to 101 before I went to sleep and the stone in my throat got larger and sorer. In the end I took three aspirins, sweated like a pig and woke in great pain but without fever. By lunch-time it was 101 again, but I induced the doctor to let me be “with the sick beneath the awning.” On deck things weren’t too bad. I don’t feel actually ill, but I’m in pain and ashamed. No one is sorry for me except Duff.

  Tonight I had to cry with disappointment. We are in a new place. I think it is off the island of Lissa, but one can’t tell. One never sees the Captain and there are so many thousands of these little islands. One always feels oneself to be in a kind of Garda, only without vegetation or habitation. All the others went off to see an old town and it has been a wild success. In fact they brought two Slav thugs on board and some yoghourt for me and some liquor of roses. Crowds had been well controlled, and it was what I had missed and was going to miss that made me cry. I can’t be well enough tomorrow to visit Ragusa, so they’ll do it without me, and tonight there is to be folk-dancing. Twenty monks came by in a long boat (ten pairs of oars). I’ve got a poultice on my neck and I can’t eat or speak.

  17 June

  Another awful night of poultices, gargling, sweating and praying, but the morning brought no relief. In fact things looked worse, including the other tonsil which, Dr Keating informed me, had gone too. I dragged myself on deck with a thermometer and some gargle and a glass to spit into, and lay, too bad to speak, too overcome with self-pity to concentrate on a book. I could just swallow yoghourt with greed.

  At lunch-time we reached Ragusa. The three-or four-hour journey there had been beautiful (barren, but there’s a celestial light everywhere). From my isolated position I could hear them talking after luncheon about plans for going ashore and dining ashore, and I suddenly determined that I was doing no good brooding and coddling and that I’d rise above it all, so I joined the group and said that I was well, lied about my temperature (still over 100) and threw off my wraps. The cure was immediate. Two hours later I was 99 and the pain had lessened. It seemed like a miracle and I felt tipsy with relief and exuberance. I suppose the truth was that the corner was turned before I took the decision. The turning suggested it. Anyway today, twelve hours later, I am bathing and shouting and stamping and swearing.

  To go back to yesterday, no sooner had we anchored than the King got into a row-boat and went off to discover a sandy beach, rowing through all the craft and canoes and top-heavy tourist-launches and the rubbernecks glaring at the decks of the Nahlin and not knowing that they were seeing what they were looking for. After some bathing and some sleeping and some gossiping and a cup of tea, we boarded the Royal launch respectably dressed (by that I mean trousers for the men only, no hats but sweaters, no naked torsos showing). When the Nanny-launches arrive, all the men stand to attention. I knew this but I didn’t know that they saluted with their boat-hooks with much flourish, as bandmasters do with their long rods.

  There’s no traffic in Ragusa and there are baroque and gothic churches and palaces and monasteries. The people were mostly in national dress and on this occasion they were all out in orderly rows, both sides of the streets that the Consul had mapped out for our tour of the sights. They were cheering their lungs out with looks of ecstasy on their faces.

  The King walks a little ahead talking to the Consul or Mayor, and we follow adoring it. He waves his hand half-saluting. He is utterly himself and unselfconscious. That I think is the reason why he does some things (that he likes) superlatively well. He does not act. In the middle of the procession he stopped for a good two minutes to tie up his shoe. There was a knot and it took time. We were all left staring at his behind. You or I would have risen above the lace, wouldn’t we, until the procession was over? But it did not occur to him to wait, and so the people said: “Isn’t he human! Isn’t he natural! He stopped to do up his shoe like any of us!”

  After sight-seeing, drinks in a hotel garden. The King makes the cocktails himself for Helen and Pootz. Duff and the staff have beer. I have white wine of the country. Wallis has whisky and water. The staff say that they hate the King to see the Consuls the first day, because they are always so émus and in such a trance of ecstasy and nerves that all the plans the King makes with them are forgotten as soon as they are out of the presence. When we got back I found that the doctor had been and left orders that I was to sleep on deck. Nothing pleases me more. I always have to fight for it.

  Dinner at the hotel, so we all repaired there at 9.30, along with the two Nanny-boat captains, Firth and Jessel. It went beautifully—a good time had by all. Again the orderly crowds, this time dressed up in all their national gewgaws, lining the long walk from dock to hotel. During dinner they did a peasant dance and ringed round our table (all alfresco, of course).

  18 June

  Duff and I got up early and went a proper English round of the town, entranced with every new prospect and discovery. Back at 12 and out with the others to bathe. After lunch siesta, and at 5 shopping in the town by the girls alone. I was rather tempted to buy an eighteenth-century embroidered Dalmatian coat, but didn’t do it. The town remains permanently lined up, waiting for the King to walk through it. Venice dyed my hair canary without warning me. It’s worrying—I look like a Pitcher jack-tart. No news, no letters, no papers ever reach the yacht.

  The dinner was on the roof of a little fish-shop (local food, wines and songs), too crow
ded because it got rumoured that the King would be there. Afterwards we went to their fine municipal café. One of the Nanny-boats, quartered at Malta, carries a ridiculous but pretty little scarlet gondola (square, with two standing oarsmen) which they pretend is practical. It’s really a mascot like the Welch Fusiliers’ goat so we went to and fro in it. You cannot imagine how fantastic and lovely the whole thing is. I expected a lot, but the half was not anticipated. The rough side is not there and humours are easy.

  19 June