The Horror of Love (39 page)

Nancy had been cremated at Père Lachaise. Her grave is at Swinbrook, marked with the Mitford mole that she used latterly on her letterhead, the descendant of the ‘
charmante avalanche grise’
with which she had scattered Gaston in Algeria. Gaston’s ashes are interred at Passy. Nancy loved the story of the Marquise de Sévigné complaining that the air of Paris was filled with clouds of the famous poisoner, Mme de Brinvilliers. So perhaps somewhere, in that Parisian sky, which Linda Radlett watches as it turns from bright blue to dark green to yellow to moleskin, that first summer of the war …

Nancy always warned Gaston that marriage was not for him. She wrote a scenario of his future:

‘So, did you go to the Palewskis last night?’

‘Yes, poor people, I did feel sorry for them – all ruined by the thunderstorm. Gaston had spent the whole afternoon hanging up Japanese lanterns, you can’t think how sad and sopping they looked. Then we were packed into those downstairs rooms like sardines, you know how hot it was, with the band on the staircase, you couldn’t hear yourself speak. Goodness, she has got a lot of relations, hasn’t she?’

‘I know, whenever one goes there, all those deadly inlaws. Poor Gaston, he’s really very patient but one can see what he feels. What happened to all those nice pictures he used to have in the Rue Bonaparte?’

‘
She
doesn’t like old things, except of course Antoine Bibesco.’

‘I rather like their glass furniture you know. Did you see the little girl last night?’

‘Oh yes. Gaston kept telling her to go to bed, but she only said “oh, fa la” and took no notice.’

‘Goodbye, Colonel,
à samedi.
’

Better this way?

‘“
Racontez
”, said the Regent, and fell dead at the feet of a little gossip just as she was opening her pretty little mouth to recount some piece of scandal.’

Fin

NOTES

General Notes

Citations from Nancy Mitford’s letters are collated from three volumes:

Love from Nancy: The Letters of Nancy Mitford
, ed. Mosley, Charlotte (Hodder & Stoughton, London, 1993).

The Letters of Nancy Mitford and Evelyn Waugh
, ed. Mosley, Charlotte (Hodder & Stoughton, London, 1996).

The Mitfords: Letters Between Six Sisters
, ed. Mosley, Charlotte (Fourth Estate, London, 2007).

Letters from Nancy to Gaston Palewski, where not duplicated in these volumes, are cited from Nancy’s unpublished correspondence, which was very kindly made available to the author by Charlotte Mosley.

Except where otherwise stated, citations from Gaston Palewski are from
Mémoires d’action 1924–1974
(Plon, Paris, 1988) and
Hier et aujourd’hui: Des hommes, des idées et desfaits
(Plon, Paris, 1975).

Quotations from Lord Weidenfeld, Lord Thomas, Viscount Norwich and Mr Paul Johnson, the Dowager Duchess of Devonshire and Mrs Louis Begley (Anka Muhlstein) are drawn from interviews with the author. Further interviewees are credited in the Acknowledgements.

Further Sources

PROLOGUE

1.
   This description is Laura Thompson’s in
Life in a Cold Climate: A Portrait of a Contradictory Woman
(Review, London, 2003).

2.
   Edith Cresson is quoted in
The New York Times
, 20 June 1991, from an earlier interview with the
Observer
.

PART ONE: 1901–39

1: GASTON

1.
   This section of Jean-Paul Palewski’s memoir is available online in French and Polish at
http://palevsky.myrelatives.net/trees/pa.html
A full family tree is usefully provided here.

2.
   Ibid.

3.
   Palewski, Dominique: ‘Oncle Gaston’ in
Gaston Palewski
(Publications de l’lnstitut Charles de Gaulle), p.58.

4.
   Bernot, Jacques:
Gaston Palewski: Premier Baron du Gaullisme
(François-Xavier de Guibert, Paris, 2010), p.19.

5.
   Larose, Yvon: ‘La Guerre des Mondes’ in
Le Dernier Fil
, 20 February 2003.

6.
   Palewski, Jean-Paul:
Mémoires
(five volumes, unpublished), Vol. I, p.75.

7.
   Druon, Maurice: ‘Du Côté de Chez Gaston’ (Publications de l’lnstitut Charles de Gaulle), p.62.

8.
   Palewski, Jean-Paul, op cit., Vol. II, p.14.

2: NANCY

1.
   Mitford, Nancy: ‘Blor’,
The Sunday Times
, 1962, reproduced in
A Talent to Annoy
, ed. Mosley, Charlotte (Hodder & Stoughton, London, 1996), p.137.

2.
   Ibid., p.144.

3.   Palewski, Gaston:
Mémoires d’action
, ed. Roussel, Eric (Plon, Paris, 1988), p.52.

4.
   Waugh, Evelyn:
Brideshead Revisited
.

3: COMING OUT

1.
   The Dowager Duchess of Devonshire, in an interview with the author.

2.
   Quoted in Acton, Harold:
Nancy Mitford: A Memoir
(Hamish Hamilton, London, 1975).

3.
   Viscount Norwich, in an interview with the author.

4.
   James Lees-Milne, quoted in Thompson, Laura, op. cit.

5.
   Gerald, Lord Berners:
A Distant Prospect
(Condatre, London, 1945), p.27.

6.
   Taylor, D.J.:
Bright Young People
(Vintage, London, 2008), p.203.

7.
   Quoted in an interview with Laura Thompson, op. cit.

4: FAUX PAS

1.
   Palewski, Jean-Paul, op. cit., Vol. II, p.14.

2.
   The quotation is from Shelley’s notes on Shakespeare’s tragedies, with reference to
Troilus and Cressida
, though the attribution is more correctly Samuel Johnson’s: he gives it as a replacement for ‘joy’s soul lies in the doing’.

3.
   Palewski, Dominique, op. cit., p.60.

5: THE FASCISTERS

1.
   Thompson, Laura, op. cit., p.104.

2.
   Mitford, Jessica:
Horn and Rebels (Indigo
, London, 1996), p.27.

3.
   Taylor, D.J., op. cit., p.42.

4.
   Jessica Mitford, in an interview with the
Chicago Tribune
, 23 October 1977.

5.
   De Courcy, Anne:
Diana Mosley
(Vintage, London, 2004), p.114.

6.   Mosley, Charlotte: Introduction to
Wigs on the Green
(Penguin, London, 2010).

7.
   Taylor, D.J., op. cit., p.236.

8.
   De Courcy, Anne, op. cit., p.138.

9.
   Thompson, Laura, op. cit., p.120.

6: THE PURSUIT OF HONOUR

1.
   Painter, George D.:
Marcel Proust: A Biography
(Chatto & Windus, London, 1989), p.285.

2.
   Lacouture, Jean:
De Gaulle: The Rebel 1890–1944
(Norton, New York, 1993), p.104.

3.
   Ibid., p.107.

4.
   Ibid., p.212.

5.
   Ibid.

6.
   Palewski, Gaston, op. cit., p.93.

7: LOSING

1.
   Romilly, Esmond:
Boadilla
(Hamish Hamilton, London, 1937). p.196.

2.
   Pryce-Jones, David:
Unity Mitford: A Quest
(Weidenfeld & Nicolson, London, 1976), p.235.

8: WAR

1.
   Taylor, D.J., op. cit., p.269.

2.
   Nancy’s principal biographers, Selina Hastings and Laura Thompson.

3.
   De Courcy, Anne, op. cit., p.213.

4.
   Details of Mosley’s speech and notes on the question of Fascist versus British loyalty are in Home Office 144/21429/18 and 45 2374/860502.

5.
   Lord Moyne’s letter of 26 June 1940 was sent to Sir Alexander Maxwell at the Home Office.

9: LE PREMIER DES GAULLISTES

1.
   Lacouture, Jean, op. cit., p.193.

2.
   Ibid., p.195.

3.
   Ousby, Ian:
Occupation: The Ordeal of France 1940-44
(John Murray, London, 1997), p.48.

4.
   Roussel, Eric: introduction to
Mémoires d’action
, p.io.

5.
   Quoted by Gaston Palewski in
Mémoires d’action
, p.69.

6.
   Lacouture, Jean, op. cit., p.211.

7.
   Spears, Edward:
Assignment to Catastrophe
, Vol. II:
The Fall of France
(Heinemann, London, 1954), p.32.

10: FLIGHT

1.
   1. Churchill, Winston:
The Gathering Storm
Vol. I (Cassell, London, 1948).

11: POOR FROGS

1.
   Atkin, Nicholas:
The Forgotten French: Exiles in the British Isles 1940–44
(Manchester University Press, Manchester, 2003), p.106.

2.
   Tombs, Isabelle and Robert:
That Sweet Enemy: Britain and France, the History of a Love-Hate Relationship
(Pimlico, London, 2007), p.536.

3.
   Cited in Fenby, Jonathan:
The General: Charles de Gaulle and the France He Saved
(Simon & Schuster, London, 2010), p.133.

4.
   Cremieux-Brilhac, J-L.:
Georges Boris, trente ans d’influence
(Gallimard, Paris, 2010), p.179.

5.
   Lacouture, Jean, op. cit., p.226.

12: LOVE

1.
   Lacouture, op. cit.

2.
   James Lees-Milnes quoted in Acton, Harold, op. cit.

3.
   Mahoney, Daniel J.:
De Gaulle: Statesmanship, Grandeur and Modern Democracy
(Transaction, New Jersey, 2000), p.33.

4.
   Cooper, Diana:
Trumpets from the Steep
(Hart-Davis, London, 1960), p.194.

5.
   Cooper, Duff:
The Duff Cooper Diaries
, ed. Norwich, John Julius (Weidenfeld & Nicolson, London, 2005), p.292.

PART TWO: 1944–73

13: LIBERATION

1.
   Cadogan, Alexander:
The Diaries of Sir Alexander Cadogan,
ed. Dilkes, David (Cassell, London, 1971), p.634.

2.
   Lacouture, Jean, op. cit., p.527.

3.
   Galtier-Boissiére, Jean:
Mon journal pendant I’Occupation
(La Jeune Parque, Paris, 1944), p. 25.

4.
   Beevor, Antony and Cooper, Artemis:
Paris After the Liberation: 1944–1949
(Hamish Hamilton, London, 1984), p.45.

5.
   Muggeridge, Malcolm:
Chronicles of Wasted Time
Vol. 2:
The Infernal Grove
(Collins, London, 1973) p.211.

14: THE ADVANCE ON PARIS

1.
   Cited in Thompson, Laura, op. cit., p.257.

2.
   Diana Mosley, in an interview with Mary S. Lovell quoted in
The Mitford Girls
(Little, Brown, London, 2001), p.409.

15: POLITICS 1944–6

1.
   From Nancy’s essay ‘Some Rooms for Improvement’ in
The Water Beetle
(Hamish Hamilton, London, 1962).

2.
   Beevor, Anthony and Cooper, Artemis, op. cit., p.84.

3.
   Ibid., p.134.

4.
   Domenach, Jean-Marie: ‘Y a t’il une justice en France?’ in
Esprit
, August 1947.

5.
   Cocteau, Jean:
Journal 1942–1945
(Gallimard, Paris, 1989),
cited in Home, Alistair:
The Seven Ages of Paris
(Macmillan, London, 1998), p.424.

6.
   Rioux, Jean-Pierre:
La France de la Quatriéme République
(Seuil, Paris, 1980), p.191.

7.
   Ibid., p.175.

8.
   Lachaise, C.B.: ‘L’Entourage de Charles de Gaulle président de GPRF â Paris’ in
Histoire.Politique
No.8 (May–August 2009).

9.
   Mauriac, C.:
Un autre de Gaulle
(Hachette, Paris, 1970), p.150.

l6: THE EMBASSY

1.
   Ziegler, Philip:
Diana Cooper
(Hamish Hamilton, London, 1981), p.217.

2.
   De Brissac, Pierre:
La Suite des Temps
(Grasset, Paris, 1974), p.141.

3.
   Cooper, Duff, op. cit., p.367.

4.
   Poulenc, François quoted in Ivry, Benjamin:
François Poulenc
(Phaidon, London, 1996).

5.
   Alsop, Susan Mary:
To Marietta from Paris 1945–1960
(Weidenfeld & Nicolson, London, 1974).

6.
   Ibid.

17: THE PURSUIT OF CHIC

1.
   Mullen, Richard and Munson, James:
The Smell of the Continent: The British Discover Europe 1814–1914
(Macmillan, London, 2009), p.218.

2.
   Ziegler, Philip, op. cit., p.258.

3.
   Hastings, Selina, op. cit., p.173.

l8: LES FEMMES DU MONDE

1.
   Quoted from an interview given to the author by a contemporary source.

2.
   Ziegler, Philip, op. cit., p.239.

3.   Alsop, Susan Mary, op. cit., p.330.

4.
   Ibid., p.151.

5.
   Pugh, Martin:
We Danced All Night: A Social History of Britain Between the Wars
(Random House, London, 2008), p.131.

6.
   De Courcy, Anne, op. cit., p.159).

20: DESPAIR

1.
   Victor Cunard to Billa Harrod, quoted in Thompson, Laura, op. cit., p.329.

21: THEORY OF THE LEISURE CLASS

1.
   Overy, Richard:
The Morbid Age: Britain Between the Wars
(Allen Lane, London, 2009), p.15.

22: A L’OMBRE DE L’EMBRASSADEUR EN FLEUR

1.
   Palewski, Jean-Paul, op. cit., Vol. IV, p.147.