The Mitfords

by Charlotte Mosley

  We are longing to see you, write soon & let us know your plans.

  Yr Loving Hen

  Darling Honks

  I have just arrived and must write quickly. Don’t take too much notice of it all as first impressions are sometimes so misleading and don’t tell anyone.

  I got off the aeroplane after all night and was walking to where you go out and a figure appeared who somehow was Decca and yet completely different. Oh dear it was frightening and in a way so terribly sad, I couldn’t believe that this complete American could ever have been her. I was so overcome I simply stared at her and I must say so did she so perhaps she was equally amazed at changes in me.

  So we went into the restaurant and there was Bob and the youngest child. Oh Honks. Decca has lost all colour even her eyes look different but I suppose people do change between twenty & thirty-four, and also this dreadful airless climate must be bad for people. The accent is what struck me most, I still can’t believe it, she not only does the accent but says completely American sentences like when I asked her how old Bob was she said ‘Pushing forty’. The house is a little suburban house, they seem very pleased with it. It is a sort of box painted like a child would, red doors in one room, blue in another. It had a very peculiar smell and they said they had a negro family in the basement so of course that was it. The Negress is a woman on the dole which Decca says is a good thing as she can do more work for the whatever it is she works for. Then Nicholas came in, he is very black looking & like any poor child in an American film but rather sweet, but as for Dinky she is heaven. She has got a beautiful face and fat body but she really is sweet, so enthusiastic. She booked my room in this amazing super hotel and came with me and arranged everything.

  All this is very much first impressions, I may think quite differently about it all tomorrow, but somehow it is awfully frightening seeing someone like that after so long, and I feel that her blasted cause has become so much part of her that she can never forget it for a minute. She said ‘Of course I stopped writing to Nancy the minute I heard she was living with a Gaullist’. But it’s the voice that I can’t get over. Please don’t say any of this to anyone, specially not Muv, only I had to write to tell as I got such a turn. As I say I may change my mind about a lot of things in a day or two.

  We are going on a trip tomorrow with all the children in the car & stay somewhere by the sea till Tues when we come back here to go to a dinner party some of her friends are having for us, what will it be like, anyhow terribly kind of them. I expect most of them will be black. I am so thankful to be in this luxurious hotel. I suppose one is tired a bit by the journey anyway.

  I’ll write again.

  I do wonder how Clonfert is going.1

  Much love, Debo

  Derel

  I never remember birthdays until I see the date & then I say to myself Gog1 or whatever it is.

  How are u? I don’t seem to have heard for ages.

  I hear all your dogs had children while you were away – what scenes there must have been on your return with twenty dogs all rushing out hunting, all more idiotic than ever, & you in hot pursuit, hairnet on head & whip in hand.2

  I bought The Best of Boulestin3 but the agony of translating for Marie really makes it rather useless.

  I hear you can’t come to France any more for fear of being Drummonded by Diana & me for The Will.4

  Victor Cunard5 would like to marry you but we have had to forbid it – people sometimes ALTER their wills when they marry.

  Dereling, many happy returns. No more now as I have much work to do.

  I am told you can kill dogs painlessly & quite cheaply by gas, do think it over.

  Love from N

  Darling,

  The posts are still very odd to tell the truth – one day from Ireland & seldom less than six from London. Sunday T wrote a very urgent letter asking for 800 words on Willy Maugham,1 which took a week. I had to refuse, & I fear it will leave a short time to somebody else. He lunched here today – most agreeable. I was rather nervous as he can be so crusty, but he had a great click with Marie-Louise [Bousquet] while Lolotte2 faisait la cour à me3 (gel gel [jealous]?). Luncheon absolutely delicious I must say, Marie at her best.

  A letter from Aunt Weenie ordering me to go to London for Muv’s golden wedding in Feb. It’s too farcical & I won’t – anyhow I can’t face the journey. But are we expected to send telegrams or something? I should have thought a tactful silence was indicated. (Fancy having the date of one’s wedding – I haven’t the vaguest idea, have you? I mean I know the year but literally not the month.) Do say what you intend to do. Flowers? R.S.V.P. (!!) and if so, to one or both or all three. It must be his silver with Margaret by now.

  Colonel has sent you, c/o me, a teasing Xmas print – you know the sort. Guilty giggles of course! Brute.

  Much love – so glad you are having a good rest, N

  Darling Susan,

  Please note my address, your letter took almost a month.

  Why don’t you come, at least for a week and one $5,000? Or shall I go to H.wood & pretend to be you?1 I wonder if we are still exactly alike? I’m sending along a picture so you can see.

  The graphs are rather different, but I still note them a bit. I thought you going to Russia was frightfully unfair, you are so lucky.2 I note you thought they were governessy, I expect you thought they would be Mme de Pompadourish3 but you know that isn’t their form, in fact their main pnt is not being. I expect you would find me a bit governessy too but so would you if you had 3 children & no governess. By the way, are you still leaving the Donk some jewels? I came across some old letters, round the time she was born, where you said you would.

  Well Sooze I can’t think of anything to write, it’s been too long since I’ve seen you – (16 years? or more?) so you’d better come, I can see I won’t ever get to Europe now because they won’t let us have a passport.

  Best love from Susan

  P.S. I can’t imagine you & Aranka [Kliot] specially liking each other, I was simply amazed when she & Muv liked each other. Do write & tell what she says about me & Bob, or better still, come & tell.

  Give my love to Muv, & Idden if you ever see her, I haven’t written to her for years but keep meaning to.

  Darling Sooze

  I was excited to note yr handwriting. Oh dear, if I could have come for a short time it would have been different, but it had to be from three to six months & I couldn’t face it.

  I loved the photographs & riposte with one of me in Russia which seems rather suitable.

  About the Donk. I haven’t any jewellery, only trinkets, & I haven’t much money to leave, but what I have got is the furniture of this flat, all of which is valuable. I love fine furniture more & more & when I have a little money that is what I buy. I have left it to Diana for her boys but now she has sent them to school in Germany where their greatest friend is young Krupps, & it’s too much even for me to swallow. If I left it to the Donk, with enough money to take it to America would she like it do you think? Oh dear how difficult – it is all rather fragile, & might be spoilt by the central heating which I hear is terrific there. We must think about it.1

  What about the Donk learning French? When she is older will you send her here to go to a cours? If so I’ll alter my existence, arrange a room for her & have her to stay. Only I suppose she ought to know a bit of French first, before being plunged among French girls all day.

  Aranka. Well I absolutely love her, she is a dear. Also she’s the only person who gives me news of you, so I eat her up whenever she comes. She simply thinks the world of you. She says you’re so wonderful that I thought you must have altered considerably.

  I’m writing about Blor in a book which is coming out about them, & as I wrack my poor old brains (bad memory as I’ve always had) it does take me back to the stiffened paw days.2 If you think of any lovely typical Blorism do write it to me.

  I’ve asked my bank to send you 100 dollars – will you give 50 to Donk & 25 to each boy
for Xmas & say it’s from their old mad aunt who loves them.

  Yes the Russians are very governessy, specially the women. The chaps I feel one could twist round one’s little finger, but the women give you a cold blue look out of their little pig eyes which is quite terrifying. One of them asked me if I’d like to see a workman’s flat & I said no not a bit, it’s the kind of thing I loathe, I want to see old silver & fine morocco bindings. I could see that she gave me up for a bad job after that.

  I asked about meeting some Russian writers & she said they’re all away at the Black Sea writing. She said popular novels in Russia sell about 50 million copies, goodness the lucky writers. I asked for an example, ‘Cement by the author of Glue’ was the reply.3

  Well Sooze, keep in close touch especially about the lovely Donk and her future. Now you have written you might as well make a resolution to do so once every 10 years.

  All love, N

  Darling

  I expect you’ve heard about Clonfert,1 it is dreadfully sad, such a pretty old house & it had been there 300 years, and masses of things burnt which one can never get again. Oh dear. If Mrs Blake Kelly’s horse hadn’t neighed & woken her up they might have all been burnt except Kit, so thank heavens for that anyway. Madeleine,2 by rushing up to the attic & having to jump into a blanket held by Kit & Alexander, prevented them saving the dining room pictures & many pretty things in there. She had been wonderful at the beginning helping to unsew the big Aubusson & then when they weren’t looking she dashed up for her clothes & was cut off by the fire at once. Jean-Pierre3 announces that he has lost £300 worth of things in his attic, what can they have been & how embarrassing because I know we shan’t get anything like the replacement value, & my clothes & dressing table things which are all gone I have put at £100, and shoes alone cost almost that don’t they. I had lots. The bitter thing is that these last weeks I had a lot of work done in the house; & had brought from attic that wasn’t burnt lots of drawings by Tchelichew,4 John5 etc ready to take to France, & the whole lot went west. I haven’t seen it yet because then a storm came, the worst for 100 years, & the roads were flooded. We are going to try again today. The poor village people, I feel so sad for them because they live near what is now a black ruin and we were their livelihood; we can rush away from it but they can’t. It is too miserable the whole business.

  Al is dressed in Kit’s clothes, all his are burnt, I was amazed to note he is still clutching a book by Maryse Choisy, that Freudian lady, but all his other books are burnt. Not mine, except a few in my bedroom. Of my (once Muv’s) four-post bed, which had just been trimmed in blue silk, all that remains is a few red hot springs.

  Debo has angelically said we can have Lismore,6 which saves our Christmas. Poor Max will mind terribly about Clonfert I fear. We shall come back to France about the 9th Jan I suppose. Kit now has such a mania about Orsay that he is going to fill the poor Temple with elaborate extinguishers (I never think one has time to use them, it’s always at 2 in the morning).

  Not only the sadness & the loss of all one’s things (for instance all letters & diaries I fear) but also the boredom of dealing with the insurance, storing what’s left etc is almost more than I can bear. It was just now really finished. Bother.

  Do write, to Lismore I suppose we shall go on Monday or so.

  All love darling, excuse wail, D

  Darling,

  Yes, & I wrote to the Russell which I expect you’ve got. Only it is all much worse than I thought – Muv rather said all the nice things saved, & Jefferson1 kept saying you can trust Kit for being over – insured. £100 for clothes – mine are insured for £1,000 to the amazement of the little agent. I’m only hoping you’ve left quite a lot here – big ball dress etc surely. Your tenant rang up to enquire – many people have including of course Jean2 who, I note, now says ‘aingel’ etc & talks almost perfect English. I shall have a Frenchman in my next book who people only like because of the way he talks & when, by dint of being with English people, he learns, they all drop him. I can hear your shrieks of protest from here.

  I’m off in ½ an hour to London for one night to see Farve. Noble? Actually I think less tiring than going for a week as one won’t have time to get tired.

  Stephen3 is here. He says he’s very poor because he has spent all his capital on statues & balustrades but they all blew down in the gales. ‘But they look very pretty lying in the grass.’ Yesterday he rang up – I said, ‘Isn’t it an awful day?’ ‘Dolorous – I’m going to the Ritz to cheer myself up.’ He says he is trying to get taken on to strip off ermine & mink in front of a jet curtain. ‘I am followed everywhere for my beauty, Nancy.’

  Darling, the descriptions of the ball.4 It seems they all came in, in £1,000 dresses, leaning forward, bottoms out, arms wildly waving. That daughter of Lady Kenmare called Pat Cameron thought her hour had come, but she fell down four times & broke several bones. Lady Kenmare furious with her. The piste was covered with diamonds where everybody had flumped.

  A rat on my bed two days ago at 4 A.M. You’d hardly believe it could happen twice in a lifetime – so horrid & it wouldn’t get off, quite tame. I fetched Minet but he only shivered in a corner & Marie had to drive it out with an umbrella.

  Must get up & catch my plane – fond love & sympathy darling – oh I do think it’s too hard.

  N

  Get on

  Oh the SAGA of all here,1 it’s a great strain on my aged 9 writing and mentality to write any of it let alone all. I do so wish you were here to study it, and Honks and my Wife.2 Oh dear, Decca’s appearance, she has got an Eton crop & specs and wears men’s trousers and smokes without stopping, it really is too sad. She doesn’t seem to care in the least. Bob has grown a ½ hearted sort of moustache as a disguise to fuddle the American police.3 He looks pretty odd anyhow, but with that he really is an old yellow peril. Dinky is wonderful looking and makes the very worst of herself by having her hair dragged to the back of her head in a horse’s tail, but she is so funny & so nice, I really love her.

  Dinky thinks Andrew gets money from selling slaves, I do wish we could buy some, I wouldn’t dream of selling.

  The children are all getting on fairly well, & Decca is being terribly nice & much less violent as far as one can make out without actually getting involved on some subject which means arguing which I can’t do. When they go to London, two of them are going to Chesterfield St4 & two to the Mews, I shudder to think of the result but ne’er mind. I’m afraid they’ll find Chatsworth not very progressive & be bored stiff by sight seeing, all those silly pictures etc but I’ll have a try with them. Progressive is a terrific word with them, it always makes me scream. Oh dear it does all seem so sad in a way but they seem happy with each other I must say.

  Oh what will you make of these Americans, I must come & see you immediately after they’ve been, to hear while all is fresh. There is too much to tell, all so odd.

  I shrieked over your article about the aristocracy.5 The mother’s hall was lovely.

  Poor Andrew lost such a terrible lot of money at the Casino that he has gone back to Biarritz this weekend, I can’t quite think why as he obviously won’t win any back.

  Much love, Debo

  Dear 9

  I must say your letter has filled me with gloom & apprehension. TROUSERS! Well if she goes to Russia in them she’ll be lynched, because no women wear them, not even those poor devils who mend the roads. When do they come here? Ay di me, as Carlyle used to say.1

  And then Farve – sounds so pathetic. Wicked as one knows him to be I don’t like to think of him really low. Do go & see. I can’t move from here as they need me the whole time & will, I guess, for at least another month.2 But I never think he really likes seeing one much.

  Oh my Lanvin dress is a dream. Mme Sézille asked lovingly after you – she’s a very good vendeuse I think, sees at once what’s wrong.

  How much did Muv enjoy the visit, that’s what I do long to know. Oh I do hope so, she was dying for it for such an a
ge. Then won’t she see them again before they go back? Do write more details – I begin to see the possibility of another book. The Return of Jassy.3

  Much love – never let the pencil out of your little fist from now on –

  Nancy

  Darling,

  I suppose you’ve heard all the Decca news from Debo. Oh dear how I dread their arrival – & I have to keep hypocritically writing to say I die for them. Ay de mi. I bet they’re off to Russia, hence Bob’s disguising moustache. The awful thing is it won’t teach them (that’ll teach them) because nothing ever does teach people. But the great new smiling love between Russia & America must bore them rather?

  Match is full of Pigmy-Peep-a-toes1 again – SURELY we’ve had enough.

  Much love do write, Nancy

  Darling

  Just a bulletin from the Daisy [Fellowes] front. You know Grace R1 & Ali Forbes2 arrived late on Wed. to stay, & by Thurs. she was dying to be rid of him, well on Sat. Grace (noticing something) said, ‘By the way Daisy, do tell me how long you want us to stay. Which day would it be convenient for us to leave?’ There was a pause while Daisy seemed to calculate then she said, ‘The 10th.’ ‘But today’s the 10th!’ says Grace. ‘Oh well then, the 11th’, says Daisy.

  All love, D

  Get on

  Oh dear I hope I haven’t gone too far in my letters about the Treuhafts. Please don’t tell anyone, it does sound so awful, but I don’t know what it is about them, perhaps the voices, the screaming American sounds made by the children, or the fact that one feels the other two are waiting to attack one on a million things.

  I really don’t know what it is, perhaps it is just that there isn’t one single point of contact with any of them. They come here tonight, the bitter thing is that Andrew has had to go to London & he would have been so good with them. They are only staying two nights so I shall spend hours with them at Chatsworth & see what they think & I can make them go to Haddon.1 The children anyway. Oh dear me how difficult it all is.