The Greengage Summer

PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION

The Greengage Summer
is true, or partly true: when I was fifteen, my elder sister Jon seventeen going on eighteen, two totally self-involved adolescents, our mother,
Mam, driven by despair over us, made an announcement: “We are going,” she said, “to the Battlefields of France” – those words were in capitals – “and
perhaps when you see the rows and rows of crosses for those young men who gave their lives for you, it might make you stop and think of your selfishness.”

Mam had never been to France or anywhere on the Continent. She spoke no French but this was a crusade; her cheeks were flushed, her blue eyes determined. “We have to change trains at Rouen
and have two hours to wait so I shall take you to the market place to see where Joan of Arc was burnt” – she had read it all up thoroughly – “St Joan, too, might make you
think. And,” she added, “you are not to tell Aunt Mary. She thinks we are going to the seaside.”

We did not see where Joan of Arc was burnt; all I remember of the time in Rouen were the first French strawberry tarts we ate – Rose our youngest sister in heaven – she and the next
sister, Nancy, were with us. We spent the whole two hours in a patisserie opposite the station because Mam could go no further. She had not absolutely deceived Aunt Mary; we had been at the seaside
in Varengeville in Normandy for three weeks and there Mam had been bitten on the leg by a horsefly. On the train her leg began to swell with agonizing pain. Jon and I knew enough about fevers to
know she had high fever; by the time we arrived in Paris she was helpless.

I can see us now, the four of us on the platform of the Gare de l’Est, grouped around Mam who sits on our suitcases. “Children you . . . Jon . . . Rumer . . . you must . . .”
is all she can say, but though Jon and I were, to our minds, quite old, not children at all, we were oddly inexperienced and tongue-tied into shyness and dismay.

Mam had asked a clergyman friend for advice and he had told her that Château Thierry, a town on the Marne, had been the American Headquarters in the war. “If you want to see the
battlefields there can be no better place,” he had said and recommended a small pension, the Hôtel des Violettes. As with Joan of Arc, we failed to see the battlefields but we did reach
Château Thierry.

Not without a private battle. “Jon, you must get a porter and ask him,” I said.

“You speak better French. You ask him.”

“I don’t speak better French.”

“You do.”

“Girls,” said Mam feebly, and, “Go on,” commanded Jon.

I had to beard a horrible and extortionate porter like a bear in a blue blouse and station cap; at first, he could not understand a word I said – which was not surprising – until at
last, “Château Thierry,” he shouted; it sounded as if he were swearing and we wondered what was wrong with Château Thierry. Mercifully the train left from the same Gare de
l’Est. He shouldered and swung some of our suitcases, we carried the rest, another porter almost carried Mam and, after parting with far too many francs, we found ourselves in a second-class
compartment, bumping slowly through a flat countryside.

It is difficult, with the novel I was to write about those two months in Château Thierry and the film that followed it, to know what I remember as happening, what is transposed in the
novel, and what is overlaid by the film; each seems to shimmer through the others. I do not know if we really had to walk from the station, Jon and I one on each side of Mam holding her up, a boy
pushing our luggage in a handcart, Nancy and Rose trailing behind as, “Hôtel des Violettes,” we said over and over again.

“
Si
,” said the boy, “
si,
” and nodded ahead to where trees, iron railings, and tall scrolled iron gates showed, behind them, a big house with lights.
“Hôtel des Violettes.” We felt a tingle of anticipation.

In the book and film, the hotel was called the Hôtel des Oeillets-carnations, but, as I write, I smell the “Violettes” smell of warm dust and cool plaster, of jessamine and of
box hedges in the sun, of dew on the long grass – the smell fills the garden – and, in the house, it is of Gaston the chef’s cooking; of furniture polish, damp linen, and always a
little of drains. There are sounds that seem to belong only to des Violettes: the patter of the poplar-tree leaves along the courtyard walk, a tap running in the kitchen with a clatter of pans and
china, mixed with the sound of high French voices, especially of the chamber-maids as they call to one another out of the bedroom windows; the thump of someone washing clothes in the river sounds
close and barges puff up-stream; a faint noise comes from the town and near, the plop of a fish; a greengage falls.

The river was the Marne; and beyond the hotel’s formal garden of gravel paths, statues, small flower beds edged with box, an orchard stretched to a wall in which a blue door opened on to
the river bank. The orchard seemed to us immense; there were seven alleys of greengage trees alone; they were ripe and in the dining room, Toinette, the waitress, built them, on dessert plates,
into pyramids. “Reines Claudes,” she would say, to teach us their names; always afterward we called this time the greengage summer.

Madame – I will call her Madame Chenal – was kind; few hotel keepers would have accepted a critically ill foreign woman with four children. The doctor was there that night and she
comforted and reassured us, calling in an Englishwoman, a Mrs Martin staying in the hotel who, herself, had a small girl. Mrs Martin coaxed Nancy and Rose to eat supper and put them to bed;
meanwhile Jon and I were almost overcome by the hotel.

The Hôtel des Violettes had been a château; it had elegant rooms, a great hall from which a painted panelled staircase led up to a first and second floor of bedrooms – there
were attic bedrooms above with mansard windows. The salon was panelled too, with sofas and chairs in gilt and brocade; the dining room had – what particularly impressed me – blue satin
wallpaper. Our bedrooms were large with four-poster beds – it seemed at first that there was only a hard bolster, no pillows; we were surprised when we found them in the vast armoires. The
windows had shutters too heavy for us to close; we could see lanterns lit along the drive and, even in that night of distress, we lingered, breathing the warm fragrance and, again, felt the tingle
of anticipation.

Mam had septicaemia, acutely dangerous in the days before penicillin.

“Are there no relatives we could send for?” asked poor Madame Chenal and before I could open my mouth, “None,” said Jon firmly.

Poor Mam! How could she have known it would all turn out the opposite of her innocent plan. To begin with, Château Thierry was in the champagne country, a luxury town to which the buyers
came for the vintage. It was, too, famous for its liqueur chocolates – Jon was to be given boxes of them. We gorged ourselves, and on the delectable food, especially the ripe fruit in the
orchard. Perhaps part of the feeling of being in a dream was because we ate so much; we were, too, out of ourselves from being so suddenly immersed in France.

There was shock after shock. “Do you know,” asked Nancy who managed to discover everything, “Madame Chenal has a lover. What’s a lover?”

Jean Pierre, a French Canadian, was big, handsome with heavy-lidded eyes, astonishingly blue, and a mass of wiry dark hair. He smelled of sweat and drink – he was often drunk. Years
afterwards, I discovered he was a spy who was trading on Madame’s bounty. He fell in love with Jon, at first furtively. He used to get a ladder and climb up to our window as we undressed for
bed. The first time I froze with terror and let out a scream but Jon’s hand came like a clamp on my lips.

“Be quiet!” and, “You’re not to tell – ever.”

“Suppose he comes in?”

“He won’t.”

“Why?”

“Because he knows that I don’t like him. He keeps on bothering me,” said Jon, “so I asked Toinette what to say and I said it.
Salaud
,” said Jon with relish .
. .

“Weren’t you afraid?”

“No. Why should I be?” She gave a shrug. “Men do what you want them to,” said this new Jon. I was speechless.

It was not only Jean Pierre. There was Mr Martin, husband of the kind Englishwoman; he was English too, young, slim, with lazy good manners and perfectly dressed.

They had a four-year-old daughter, Betsy, and to our relief, took charge of Nancy and Rose. Mr Martin, Madame told us, worked in a bank in Paris; he left every morning before we were up and came
back late but during weekends he was there and, in his magnificent car, drove us out into the green and gold countryside, its white roads winding between vineyards, where the grapes were heavy. He
took us to a restaurant overlooking the river and let us order as we liked. “
Comme il est gentil
,” said Madame Chenal, but I saw him looking at Jon, not as Jean Pierre looked,
avidly, but with a half-unwilling tenderness and this time Jon looked back.

The weeks passed, the vintage began, and everything, the hotel, the whole town, was filled with bubbling life. I saw men and women drunk; I remember a gutter running with wine from a broken cask
and children scooping it up to drink. The young men were rowdy and no longer stared at us but sometimes would not let us pass. I knew enough to know they would not have given even a wolf whistle
for me – it was Jon.

That August she was eighteen and, for her birthday, Mam let her choose herself a dress which is imprinted on my memory as are many of Jon’s dresses. This was strawberry-pink French voile
piped with white, and chic – which none of our dresses had been.

The hotel guests clapped when she came in to dinner wearing it. There were murmurs of “
Ravissante
” . . . “
Charmante
” . . . “
Adorable
” and
“
Heureuse anniversaire!
” – Madame had told them it was her birthday – “
Heureuse anniversaire!
” they called and raised their glasses. It was the
first time I saw Jon blush.

One of the buyers, Monsieur Bosanquet, sent a bottle of champagne over to our table. Jon and I sipped it reverently. We took the bottle up to Mam who could sit up now and walk a little; as she
drank her wan face took on a little colour, her eyes had an echo of her sparkle. “I had forgotten how it tasted. Nectar!” she said and looked at Jon with love and pride, but that was
the last night of our dreams.

Next morning we woke to find the hotel in chaos and full of police, the gates guarded by gendarmes, even the blue door in the orchard. Mr and Mrs Martin and Betsy had gone in the night and a
Paris bank had been robbed, “Of millions and millions,” said Toinette. Mr Martin was a well-known international thief; Mrs Martin was not his wife but an accomplice and Betsy was not
their child, she was borrowed or hired to add to the illusion of their being an ordinary English family.

We were interviewed by the police, even Rose. When Mr Martin took us out, where did we go? Did he meet anyone? Did he leave us in the car and go anywhere? Had we heard Mr and Mrs Martin talking?
Jon was stiff and as non-committal as if she hated them but I felt like a heroine, shielding Mr Martin and talked willingly until, out of the corner of her mouth, Jon hissed, “Stop,
stop.”

“But I’m only trying to help him. Don’t you mind about Mr Martin?”

“Mr Martin!” Jon made a sound like “p’fui”.

It was over. Mam was soon able to travel, though painfully, and took us home.

There was an unexpected – and touching – sequel. One day of Mr Martin’s last week at the Hôtel des Violettes, as he was leaving for work, the handle of his attaché
case had come off – it would have been called a briefcase now – and Jon had lent him hers, a small case but made of crocodile leather from a crocodile Fa had shot. Jon treasured it but
it had disappeared with Mr Martin.

He was not caught but three months later the case came back, posted to Eastbourne from the South of France – he must have taken a considerable risk to send it. When Jon opened the wrapping
and saw the case she burst into tears.

CONTENTS

CHAPTER 1

CHAPTER 2