“Woodrow,” Jonas Skeeter went on, “came across my field where I was busy, building up my compost. He was holding this little book in his hands and he said he’d just finished reading it. He’d like me to read it too, he said—it was very profound.
“‘Woodrow, I’ve got no time to be profound,’ I said.
“He said, ‘You should make time, Jonas. If you’d read it, we’d have better things to talk about at Crazy Ida’s. We’d have more fun over a pint.’
“Now, that hurt my feelings, no good saying it didn’t. My childhood friend had been holding himself above me for some time—all because he read books for you people and I didn’t. I’d let it pass before—to each his own, as my Mum always said. But now he had gone too far. He had insulted me. He put himself above me in conversation.
“‘Jonas,’ he said, ‘Marcus was a Roman emperor—and a mighty warrior. This book is what he thought about, down there among the Quadi. They were barbarians who was waiting in the woods to kill all the Romans. And Marcus, hard-pressed as he was by those Quades, he took the time to write up this little book of his thoughts. He had long, long thoughts, and we could use some of those, Jonas.’
“So I pushed down my hurt and took the damned book, but I came here tonight to say before all, Shame, Woodrow! Shame on you, to put a book above your boyhood friend!
“But I did read it and here is what I think. Marcus Aurelius was an old woman—forever taking his mind’s temperature—forever wondering about what he had done, or what he had not done. Was he right—or was he wrong? Was the rest of the world in error? Could it be him instead? No, it was everybody else who was wrong, and he set matters straight for them. Broody hen that he was, he never had a tiny thought that he couldn’t turn into a sermon. Why, I bet the man couldn’t even take a piss—”
Someone gasped, “Piss! He said piss in front of ladies!”
“Make him apologize!” cried another.
“He doesn’t have to apologize. He’s supposed to say what he thinks, and that’s what he thinks. Like it or not!”
“Woodrow, how could you so hurt your friend?”
“For shame, Woodrow!”
The room fell quiet when Woodrow stood up. The two men met in the middle of the floor. Jonas held out his hand to Woodrow, and Woodrow clapped Jonas on the back, and the two of them left, arm in arm, for Crazy Ida’s. I hope that’s a pub and not a woman.
Love,
Juliet
P.S. Dawsey was the only Society member who seemed to find last night’s meeting at all funny. He’s too polite to laugh out loud, but I saw his shoulders shaking. I gathered from the others that it had been a satisfying but by no means extraordinary evening.
Love again,
Juliet
From Juliet to Sidney
31st May, 1946
Dear Sidney,
Please read the enclosed letter—I found it slipped under my door this morning.
Dear Miss Ashton,
Miss Pribby told me you wanted to know about our recent Occupation by the German Army—so here is my letter.
I am a small man, and though Mother says I never had a prime, I did. I just didn’t tell her about it. I am a champion whistler. I have won contests and prizes for my whistling. During the Occupation, I used this talent to unman the enemy.
After Mother was asleep, I would creep out of the house. I’d make my silent way down to the Germans’ brothel (if you’ll pardon the term) on Saumarez Street. I’d hide in the shadows until a soldier emerged from his tryst. I do not know if ladies are aware of this, but men are not at their peak of fitness after such an occasion. The soldier would start walking back to his quarters, often whistling. I’d start slowly walking, whistling the same tune (but much better). He’d stop whistling, but I would not stop whistling. He’d pause a second, thinking that what he had taken for an echo was actually another person in the dark—following him. But who? He would look back, I’d have slipped into a doorway. He’d see no one—he’d start on his way again, but not whistling. I’d start to walk again and to whistle again. He’d stop—I’d stop. He’d hurry on, but I’d still whistle, following him with hard footsteps. The soldier would rush toward his quarters, and I’d return to the brothel to wait for another German to stalk. I do believe I made many a soldier unfit to perform his duties well the next day. Do you see?
Now, if you’ll pardon me, I will speak more about brothels. I do not believe those young ladies were there because they wanted to be. They were sent from the Occupied territories of Europe, same as the Todt slave workers. It could not have been nice work. To the soldiers’ credit, they demanded the German authorities give the women an extra food allowance, same as given to the island’s heavy workers. Furthermore, I saw some of these same ladies share their food with the Todt workers, who were sometimes let out of their camps at night to hunt for food.
My mother’s sister lives on Jersey. Now that the war is over, she can come visit us—more’s the pity. Being the sort of woman she is, she told a nasty story.
After D-Day the Germans decided to send their brothel ladies back to France, so they put them all on a boat to St. Malo. Now those waters are very wayward, broiled-up, and ugly. Their boat was swept onto the rocks and all aboard were drowned. You could see those poor drowned women—their yellow hair (bleached hussies, my aunt called them) spread out in the water, washing against the rocks. “Served them right, the whores,” my aunt said—she and my mother laughed.
It was not to be borne! I jumped up from my chair and knocked the tea table over on them deliberately. I called them dirty old bats.
My aunt says she will never set foot in our house again, and Mother hasn’t spoken to me since that day. I find it all very peaceful.
Yours truly,
Henry A. Toussant
From Juliet to Sidney
6th June, 1946
Mr. Sidney Stark
Stephens & Stark Ltd.
21 St. James’s Place
London S.W.1
Dear Sidney,
I could hardly believe it was you, telephoning from London last night! How wise of you not to tell me you were flying home; you know how planes terrify me—even when they aren’t dropping bombs. Wonderful to know you are no longer five oceans away, but only across the Channel. Will you come to see us as soon as you can?
Isola is better than a stalking horse. She has brought seven people over to tell me their Occupation stories—and I have a growing packet of interview notes. But for now, notes are all they are. I don’t know yet if a book is possible—or, if possible, what form it should take.
Kit has taken to spending some of her mornings here. She brings rocks or shells and sits quietly—well, moderately quietly—on the floor and plays with them while I work. When I am finished, we take a picnic lunch down to the beach. If it’s too foggy, we play indoors; either Beauty Parlor—brushing each other’s hair until it crackles—or Dead Bride.
Dead Bride is not a complicated game like Snakes and Ladders; it’s quite simple. The bride veils herself in a lace curtain and stuffs herself into the laundry hamper, where she lies as though dead while the anguished bridegroom hunts for her.
When he finally discovers her entombed in the laundry hamper, he breaks into loud wails. Then and only then does the bride jump up, yell “Surprise!” and clutch him to her. Then it is all joy and smiles and kisses. Privately, I don’t give that marriage much of a chance.
I knew that all children were gruesome, but I don’t know whether I’m supposed to encourage them in it. I’m afraid to ask Sophie if Dead Bride is too morbid a game for a four-year-old. If she says yes, we’ll have to stop playing, and I don’t want to stop.
I love Dead Bride.
So many questions arise when you are spending your days with a child. For instance, if one likes to cross one’s eyes a lot, might they get stuck that way forever—or is that a rumor? My mother said they would, and I believed her, but Kit is made of sterner stuff and doubts it.
&
nbsp; I am trying hard to remember my parents’ ideas about childraising, but, as the child raised, I’m scarcely a good judge. I know I got spanked for spitting my peas across the table at Mrs. Morris, but that’s all I can recall. Perhaps she deserved it. Kit seems to show no ill-effects from having been brought up piecemeal by Society members. It certainly hasn’t made her fearful and retiring. I asked Amelia about it yesterday. She smiled and said there was no hope that a child of Elizabeth’s would be fearful and retiring. Then she told me a lovely story about her son, Ian, and Elizabeth when they were children. He was to be sent to school in England, and he was not at all happy about it, so he decided to run away from home. He consulted Jane and Elizabeth, and Elizabeth persuaded him to buy her boat for his escape. The trouble was, she had no boat—but she didn’t tell him that.
Instead, she built one herself in three days. On the appointed afternoon, they hauled it down to the beach, and Ian set off, with Elizabeth and Jane waving their hankies from the shore. About half a mile out, the boat began to sink—fast. Jane was all for running to get her father, but Elizabeth said there wasn’t time and since it was all her fault, she would have to save him. She took off her shoes, dove into the waves, and swam out to Ian. Together, they pulled the wreckage to shore, and she brought the boy to Sir Ambrose’s house to dry off. She returned his money, and as they sat steaming before the fire, she turned to him and said gloomily, “We’ll just have to steal a boat, that’s all.” Ian told his mother that he decided it would be simpler to go to school after all.
I know it will take a prodigious amount of time to catch up on your work. If you do have a moment to spare, could you find a book of paper dolls for me? One full of glamorous evening gowns, please.
I know Kit is growing fond of me—she pats my knee in passing.
Love,
Juliet
From Juliet to Sidney
10th June, 1946
Dear Sidney,
I’ve just received a wonderful package from your new secretary. Is her name really Billee Bee Jones? Never mind, she’s a genius anyway. She found Kit two books of paper dolls—and not just any old paper dolls either. She found Greta Garbo and Gone with the Wind paper dolls—pages of lovely gowns, furs, hats, boas—oh, they are wonderful. Billee Bee also sent a pair of snubnosed scissors, a piece of thoughtfulness that would never have occurred to me. Kit is using them now.
This is not a letter, but a thank-you note. I’m writing one to Billee Bee, too. However did you find such an efficient person? I hope she’s plump and motherly, because that’s how I’m imagining her. She enclosed a note saying eyes do not stay crossed permanently—it’s an old wives’ tale. Kit is thrilled and plans to cross her eyes until supper.
Love to you,
Juliet
P.S. I would like to point out that contrary to certain insinuating remarks in your last, Mr. Dawsey Adams makes no appearance in this letter. I haven’t seen Mr. Dawsey Adams since Friday afternoon, when he came to pick up Kit. He found us decked in our finest jewels and marching about the room to the stirring strains of Pomp and Circumstance on the gramophone. Kit made him a dishtowel cape, and he marched with us. I think he has an aristocrat lurking in his genealogy; he can gaze benevolently into the middle distance just like a duke.
Letter received in Guernsey on 12th June, 1946
To: “Eben” or “Isola” or Any Member of a Book Society
on Guernsey, Channel Islands, Great Britain
(Delivered to Eben 14th June, 1946)
Dear Guernsey Book Society,
I greet you as those dear to my friend Elizabeth McKenna. I write to you now so that I may tell you of her death in Ravensbrück Concentration Camp. She was executed there in March of 1945.
In those days before the Russian Army arrived to free the camp, the SS carried truck loads of papers to the crematorium and burned them in the furnaces there. Thus I feared you might never learn of Elizabeth’s imprisonment and death.
Elizabeth spoke often to me of Amelia, Isola, Dawsey, Eben, and Booker. I recall no surnames but believe the names Eben and Isola to be unusual Christian names and thus hope you may be found easily on Guernsey.
I know also that she cherished you as her family, and she felt gratitude and peace that her daughter, Kit, was in your care. Therefore, I write so you and the child will know of her and the strength she showed to us in the camp. Not strength only, but a métier she had for making us forget where we were for a small while. Elizabeth was my friend, and in that place friendship was all that aided one to remain human.
I reside now at the Hospice La Forêt in Louviers in Normandy. My English is yet poor, so Sister Touvier is improving my sentences as she writes them down.
I am now twenty-four years of age. In 1944, I was caught by the Gestapo at Plouha in Brittany, with a packet of forged ration cards. I was questioned, beaten only, and sent to Ravensbrück Concentration Camp. I was put in Block Eleven, and it was here I met Elizabeth.
I will tell you how we met. One evening she came to me and said my name, Remy. I had a joy to hear my name spoken. She said, “Come with me. I have a wonderful surprise to show you.” I did not understand her meaning, but I ran with her to the back of the barracks. A broken window there was stuffed with papers, and she pulled them out. We climbed out and ran toward the Lagerstrasse.
There I saw fully what she had meant by a wonderful surprise. The sky showing above the walls looked to be on fire—lowflying clouds of red and purple, lit from below with dark gold. They changed shapes and shades as they raced together across the sky. We stood there, hand in hand, until the darkness came. I do not think that anyone outside such a place could know how much that meant to me, to spend such a quiet moment together.
Our home, Block Eleven, held almost four hundred women. In front of each barracks was a cinder path where roll call was held twice a day, at 5:30 a.m., and in the evening after work. The women from each barracks stood in squares of one hundred women each—ten women in ten rows. The squares would stretch so far to the right and left of ours, we could often not see the end of them in the fog.
Our beds were on wooden shelves, built in platforms of three. There were pallets of straw to sleep upon, sour smelling and alive with fleas and lice. There were large yellow rats which ran over our feet at night. This was a good thing, for the overseers hated the rats and stench, so we would have freedom from them in the late nights.
Then, Elizabeth told me about your island of Guernsey and your book society. These things seemed like Heaven to me. In the bunks, the air we breathed was weighted with sickness and filth, but when Elizabeth spoke, I could imagine the good, fresh sea air and the smell of fruit in the hot sun. Though it cannot be true, I do not remember the sun shining one day on Ravensbrück.
I loved to hear, too, about how your book society came to be. I almost laughed when she told of the roasted pig, but I didn’t. Laughter made trouble in the barracks.
There were several standpipes with cold water for us to wash in. Once a week we were taken for showers and given a piece of soap. This was necessary for us, for the thing we feared most was to be dirty, to fester. We dared not become ill, for then we could not work. We would be of no further use to the Germans and they would have us put to death.
Elizabeth and I walked with our group each morning at 6:00, to reach the Siemens factory where we worked. It was outside the walls of the prison. Once there, we pushed handcarts to the railroad siding and unloaded heavy metal plates onto the carts. We were given wheat paste and peas at noon, and returned to camp for roll call at 6:00 p.m. and a supper of turnip soup.
Our duties changed according to need, and one day we were ordered to dig a trench to store potatoes in for winter. Our friend Alina stole a potato but dropped it on the ground. All digging stopped until the overseer could discover the thief.
Alina had ulcerated corneas, and it was necessary that the overseers not notice this—for they might think her to be going blind. Elizabeth said quickly she had
taken the potato, and was sent to the punishment bunker for one week.
The cells in this bunker were very small. One day, while Elizabeth was there, a guard opened the door to each cell and turned high-pressure water hoses on the prisoners. The force of the water pushed Elizabeth to the floor, but she was fortunate that the water never reached her folded blanket. She was eventually able to rise and lie under her blanket until the shivering stopped. But a young pregnant girl in the next cell was not so fortunate or so strong as to get up. She died that night, frozen to the floor.
I am perhaps saying too much, things you do not wish to hear. But I must do this to tell you how Elizabeth lived—and how she held on hard to her kindness and her courage. I would like her daughter to know this also.
Now I must tell you the cause of her death. Often, within months of being in camp, most women stopped menstruation. But some did not. The camp doctors had made no provision for the prisoners’ hygiene during this time—no rags, no sanitary towels, no soap. The women who were menstruating just had to let the blood run down their legs.
The overseers liked this, this oh so unsightly blood, it gave them the excuse to scream, to hit. A woman named Binta was the overseer for our evening roll call and she began to rage at a bleeding girl. Rage at her, and threaten her with her upraised rod. Then she began to beat the girl.
Elizabeth broke out of our line fast—so fast. She grabbed the rod from Binta’s hand and turned it upon her, hitting her over and over. Guards came running and two of them struck Elizabeth to the ground with their rifles. They threw her into a truck and took her again to the punishment bunker.
One of the guards told me that on the next morning soldiers formed a guard around Elizabeth and took her from her cell.
Outside the camp walls there was a grove of poplar trees. The branches of the trees formed an allée and Elizabeth walked down this by herself, unaided. She knelt on the ground and they shot her in the back of her head.
The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society Page 14