by Paul Gallico
He climbed into the driver’s seat, started up, and sat there for a moment or two glorying in the perfection of non-sound and non-vibration from the engine. Then he turned it off and before shutting the garage, let a last lingering look dwell upon her loveliness, his heart strangely and upsettingly full, as though he might be saying a farewell.
Thereafter he returned upstairs, hauled forth a suitcase from beneath the bed and packed it carefully for a long absence. From the desk he took a number of foreign road maps, his passport and a considerable amount of cash he had stashed away.
All this completed, he stood by the window once more looking out upon a lone cat nosing at a dustbin cover, puzzling over the powerful surge of emotion he had been entertaining ever since he had heard the news on the wireless and reflected upon its consequences. His old habits and ways of thought twisted him this way and that, but in the end he was unable to find any alternative to what he proposed to do, and so went to bed, but hardly to close an eye.
When early morning illuminated his windows once again, he arose, washed, shaved and dressed, wrote a note to the milkman and another which he put into his pocket. After a last look about the flat and the kitchen to make sure that everything was turned off that ought to be, he picked up his suitcase and gear, locked the door behind him, stowed the stuff in the Rolls and thereafter, without so much as a single backward look, drove away.
Mrs Harris awoke from troubled sleep to the sound of bells and a heavy feeling of sadness and dismay in her heart that is ever there to greet the unhappy person who, for a short spell, has achieved surcease through sleep and upon awakening is aware only that misery is still there to attend the new day. Her telephone and doorbell were ringing simultaneously. She glanced at her alarm clock and saw that it was only seven in the morning.
The telephone seemed to call for first attention. She answered it.
A voice said, ‘Mrs Harris? This is the News of the World speaking. I wonder whether you would …’ and it got no further, because Mrs Harris replaced the receiver. All of the pain and memories, which had been signalized only by the heavy sadness on waking, came swimming back and possessed her once more. She remembered.
The doorbell was still insisting.
Mrs Harris donned slippers, wrapped her dressing-gown about her, gave her curls a quick pat and hurried to answer it, wondering what it might be. Except for occasional telegrams, doorbells did not ring that early in her vicinity.
To her utter amazement, when she opened up, there stood the last person in the world she had expected to see after her recent and somewhat unjust outburst against him – John Bayswater. He looked startlingly elegant in a grey travelling suit with cap to match. Behind him, parked at the kerb was an old-fashioned, goggle-eyed monster of a Rolls-Royce, looking as huge as a railway locomotive, the pale near-wintry sun splintering from its polished sides and chrome-work.
He was regarding her somewhat warily and seemed to be having difficulty in opening the conversation. Finally he said, ‘Ah – good morning, Ada. I hope you will forgive me for getting you up so early, but you see there was no other way …’
Mrs Harris’s mind was still not entirely cleared of cobwebs and Bayswater’s presence there at that time of the morning could only mean trouble of some kind.
‘John,’ she cried – ‘What is it? Is anything the matter?’
‘No, no, no. Nothing at all. Only I was afraid if I telephoned first, you’d hang up the receiver again. I do hope you are not cross with me any longer …’
Mrs Harris experienced a sudden rush of remorse. However Bayswater had handled the affair, he had behaved with the best of intentions. ‘I shouldn’t ’ave talked the way I did. I’m sorry, John. Won’t yer come in?’
Mr Bayswater looked slightly shocked. ‘I’ll wait for you out here in the car. There might be talk …’
Mrs Harris inwardly acknowledged his tactful concern for her reputation in the neighbourhood, and then equally inwardly did a double take at what she thought she had heard besides.
‘Did you say you’d wait outside? What for?’
Her friend swallowed once more, hard, and then replied manfully and forcefully, ‘You! I’ve come to take you away.’
It was almost one shock tactic too many. ‘Take me away! Whatever are you talking about, John Bayswater? ’Ave you gone out of your mind?’
‘No. But you will if you don’t do as I say and go in and pack a bag. I heard all about your leaving Parliament last night and I guessed why. Haven’t you had enough of the press? You can’t stay here now, Ada.’
‘That would be running away. I’ve always made up me own bed after lying in it.’
‘They’ve done enough to you, Ada,’ Bayswater said with a fierceness that surprised himself and her even more. ‘They’ll tear your heart out this time. I’ll not have it.’
At that moment, the telephone inside the house again burst into song. ‘There you are,’ Bayswater said – ‘I expect that’ll be one of them. If you hurry we’ll be able to get away before they start coming around here. I’ve got my bag in the back.’
Something of the magnitude of what he was proposing, the change in his own life and the sacrifice he was making, began to be clear to Mrs Harris. ‘John, you’ve taken me breath away. I don’t know what to say.’
‘Don’t say anything, and just get cracking. A little trip to foreign climes will do you a world of good. The air abroad is said to be most salubrious. You still have your passport, haven’t you?’
She looked at him searchingly. ‘But what about your position, John? You haven’t lost your job on account of me, have you?’
‘You don’t think I’d go on working for Sir Wilmot after the dastardly manner in which he treated you? My letter of resignation crossed with – ah – one sent to me from his office. But I do believe mine was postmarked an hour earlier.’
Mrs Harris said, ‘You’ve come in your own car …’ for she was embarrassed suddenly.
‘Yes,’ replied Bayswater proudly. ‘Isn’t she beautiful?’ Then he added with a note almost of hope and wistfulness combined, ‘You’ll come to love her too, when you get to know her better.’
‘Oh, John,’ Mrs Harris said, for the wistfulness and the offer he was making to share his love for his old friend had penetrated, and they stood there for a moment regarding one another silently.
The milkman clattered by and called cheerily, ‘Wanting any today, Mrs Harris?’
‘No, not today, or until further notice,’ John Bayswater replied for her, then said, ‘You’d better hurry. You don’t want to catch cold standing there in the doorway in just your …’
Mrs Harris pulled her dressing-gown about her more tightly, for one more helpless moment. ‘I don’t know what to do …’
‘Do as I say,’ said Mr Bayswater. ‘Hurry and dress. Pack up a bag or two. You’ll want enough for a month or so. I’ll be waiting here in the car.’
‘But I’ve only me monthly mortgage money in the house.’
‘I’ve enough for both of us. Be quick now.’
Mrs Harris had known Bayswater as a strong and purposeful man she had looked up to, but had never before seen him quite so masterful and for a moment it worried her, for she was an independent soul and not used to being ordered about.
‘Please, Ada,’ Mr Bayswater added gently. ‘You’ll never regret it.’
‘Oh dear,’ said Mrs Harris, ‘oh dear – I’ll see,’ and closed the door.
It was the ‘please’ that seemed to have done it, coupled with a rush of understanding of not only what John Bayswater had done, but was about to do for her. It must have gone against the very grain of his long and determined bachelorhood, something, no doubt, for the first time in his lonely life that was selfless. It would be churlish to refuse.
And, besides, she discovered suddenly that she did not wish to do so. She had been battered, bruised and badly hurt and here was a real friend offering her a measure of solace and, above all, care and temporary escape. Whe
n she appeared at the door a half-hour later, she clutched two suitcases and a large handbag and was wearing her best clothes; travelling dress by Lady Dant, shoes by Countess Wyszcinska, hat by Mrs Joel Schreiber.
‘Oh dear,’ she said. ‘What am I to do about Mrs Butterfield? What will she say or think?’
Mr Bayswater produced an envelope from his breast pocket. ‘I’ve already prepared a note,’ he said. ‘I’ll just slip it under her door.’
And then she was sitting beside him on the shiny, well-sprung, comfortable, leather seat of the great Rolls and for a moment they did nothing but look at one another searchingly, as though to be sure they were doing the right thing.
‘John,’ cried Mrs Harris finally. ‘Oh, you’re a dreadful man! Where are we going?’
The chauffeur reached into the side pocket of the car and made a fan of the road maps of Norway, Sweden, Greece, Spain, Holland, Portugal, France, Italy and Yugoslavia. ‘Anywhere,’ he replied. ‘What difference does it make?’
He eased the silent gears via the silent clutch, stepped upon the silent accelerator, the silent engine took hold. They moved off down the street, bound for the Channel ports, just as the first of the press cars came baying around the corner to pull up in front of the empty house at No. 5, Willis Gardens, Battersea.
A Note on the Author
PAUL GALLICO was born in New York City, of Italian and Austrian parentage, in 1897, and attended Columbia University. From 1922 to 1936 he worked on the New York Daily News as sports editor, columnist, and assistant managing editor. In 1936 he bought a house on top of a hill at Salcombe in South Devon and settled down with a Great Dane and twenty-three assorted cats. It was in 1941 that he made his name with The Snow Goose, a classic story of Dunkirk which became a worldwide bestseller. Having served as a gunner’s mate in the U.S. Navy in 1918, he was again active as a war correspondent with the American Expeditionary Force in 1944. Gallico, who later lived in Monaco, was a first-class fencer and a keen sea-fisherman.
He wrote over forty books, four of which were the adventures of Mrs Harris: Mrs Harris Goes to Paris (1958), Mrs Harris Goes to New York (1959), Mrs Harris MP (1965) and Mrs Harris Goes to Moscow (1974), all of which have been reissued by Bloomsbury Publishing, alongside Coronation (1962). One of the most prolific and professional of American authors, Paul Gallico died in July 1976.
Also available by Paul Gallico
MRS HARRIS GOES TO PARIS
& MRS HARRIS GOES TO NEW YORK
Mrs Harris is a salt-of-the-earth London charlady who cheerfully cleans the houses of the rich. One day, when tidying Lady Dant’s wardrobe, she comes across the most beautiful thing she has ever seen – a Dior dress. She’s never seen anything as magical and she’s never wanted anything as much. Determined to make her dream come true, Mrs Harris scrimps, saves and slaves away until one day, she finally has enough money to go to Paris. Little does she know how her life is about to be transformed forever …
Part charlady, part fairy godmother, Mrs Harris’s adventures take her from her humble Battersea roots to the heights of glamour in Paris and New York as she learns some of life’s greatest lessons along the way.
‘Mrs Harris is one of the great creations of fiction – so real that you feel you know her, yet truly magical as well. I can never have enough of her’
JUSTINE PICARDIE
MRS HARRIS GOES TO MOSCOW
Ada Harris is a cheery London charlady who earns an honest living cleaning the homes of the well-to-do. Hers is a simple, humble life, so she can’t quite believe her luck when she wins a once-in-a-lifetime trip to Moscow.
Ever the loyal servant, however, Mrs Harris believes it only right that others benefit from her good fortune. With her dear friend Mrs Butterworth in tow, Mrs Harris is determined to use her holiday to reignite a lost romance between her lovelorn employer Geoffrey Lockwood and a Russian lady he loved years ago. Unfortunately, the discreet passing of documents is an activity which can land even the most well-intentioned old ladies in hot water with the KGB …
CORONATION
Imagine seeing the Queen that close as she goes by in her golden carriage! The kiddies will have something to tell their kiddies, won’t they? And a drink of real champagne to go with it!
Coronation Day, 2 June 1953! A humble, working-class family from Sheffield is desperate to buy train tickets to London to see the coronation, but doing so means forsaking their annual seaside holiday. After some scrimping and saving, and a family meeting in which the enthusiasm of the children overrules the reluctance of their long-suffering mother and grandmother, the Clagg family take the plunge and buy premium, champagne tickets for the big day.
But alas, not everything goes smoothly. Will their tickets be everything they hoped for and dreamed? Will Granny stop grumbling that it’s all a waste of money? And, most importantly, will they all get to see their beloved Queen? In this tender and heartwarming story, Paul Gallico brings to life the joy and fervor that swept the nation.
WWW.BLOOMSBURY.COM/PAULGALLICO
First published in Great Britain by
William Heinemann Ltd 1965
This electronic edition published in 2012 by Bloomsbury Publishing Plc
Copyright © Paul Gallico, 1965
The moral right of the author has been asserted
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A CIP catalogue record for this book is
available from the British Library
ISBN 978 1 4088 3322 3
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