Since the family moved to Cannon Hall in that spring of 1916, Gerald has grown nostalgic. He wanted his children to live in the place where he spent his idyllic, pampered childhood with his parents, and in particular with his father. Daddy talks about him all the time: George du Maurier. Daphne gets the impression that the history of Muriel’s family, the Beaumonts, is of no—or certainly less—interest to Daddy. Why? In the Beaumont family, Daphne knows, her uncle Willie runs a famous magazine, The Bystander, read by the most elegant ladies. Perhaps Daddy is less interested in his in-laws because there are no actors in their family? The girls’ other grandfather, who came from East Anglia, was a notary in his youth, but his company went bankrupt and he lost almost his entire fortune. The Beaumonts are not as rich as the du Mauriers, as Daphne is quick to realize. The Beaumont grandparents’ modest house on Woodstock Avenue has none of the grandeur of Cannon Hall, and when she stays there Daphne has to share a room with her aunt Billy, Mummy’s sister. Not that this bothers Daphne; on the contrary, she enjoys the cozy atmosphere of this house. Her “Little Granny” does the cooking herself. There are no servants, as there are at Cannon Hall, and on Saturday mornings Daphne accompanies her grandmother when she goes grocery shopping in Golders Green, near Hampstead, then helps her knead the dough before the house is filled with the wonderful smell of freshly baked bread.
Every month, come rain or shine, Gerald takes his daughters on a pilgrimage to New Grove House, where he grew up. The house is occupied by other people now, so they can’t go inside, but Daddy insists on telling them all about the façade. That downstairs window is where your grandfather had his studio. He would draw there every day, and he didn’t mind if we played while he worked. Through Gerald’s words, Daphne builds a strong impression of her grandfather: a good, gentle man, a man who loved his family, and whose family loved him. Once, Gerald tells them, when a dog was drowning in a pond on the Heath, their grandfather jumped right in to rescue it. The next stage of the pilgrimage takes place on the Heath, at the base of a tall tree. Gerald always sits in the same spot, in the hollow of a branch. This is where I used to come with my father when I was your age, and the two of us would sit up here. Afterward, he goes to the cemetery at the bottom of the hill, next to the church, where his parents and his sister Sylvia are buried, and where there is a memorial for Uncle Guy. Daphne likes the peacefulness of this place, but she thinks her father spends too much time here, and his face takes on a melancholic expression that pains her. She prefers sitting in Daddy’s study to look at the photographs of her grandfather, at all his drawings and books. She is now able to recognize the face of that relative she never knew, his fine features, his straight nose, his little goatee. Daddy shows her a very old glass tumbler, the family’s lucky charm, which he guards jealously in his desk, inside a worn leather case, and removes only at Christmas. He touches the glass ritually before every premiere in order to ward off bad luck. It was given to him by Kicky, his father. Gerald tells his daughters the story of his paternal family, the Bussons du Maurier, and when he speaks about this his eyes seem to shine with satisfaction at belonging to this clan; and he makes them, too, feel proud to bear the family name. Their grandfather’s father was named Louis-Mathurin. He was part-French, the son of émigrés from the French Revolution, from a great aristocratic family of glassblowers, originally from Sarthe, who had a château, lands, a factory. But it all burned down during the revolution, and the family lost everything.
Listening to her father, Daphne finds this tale almost too novel-like. Is it possible Daddy is embroidering the facts, exaggerating? Quite possibly: he’s an actor after all, and actors exaggerate everything, as she is beginning to understand. What is true, however, what cannot be denied, is that French blood flows through her veins. Her grandfather was born in Paris, in a second-floor apartment on the Avenue des Champs-Élysées, at number 80. His mother was Ellen Clarke, an Englishwoman. Louis-Mathurin and Ellen were married at the British embassy, a handsome building on Rue du Faubourg–Saint-Honoré with a private garden. Her ancestor’s full name stirs something in Daphne: George Louis Palmella Busson du Maurier, although he was known simply as Kicky. Why Kicky? she asks. Because he was given that nickname by a Flemish nurse, inspired by the Manneken-Pis, the statue in Brussels of a little boy peeing, and the name stuck. His younger brother, Alexandre Eugène, born two years after him, was nicknamed Gygy. The du Maurier family lived in Paris, on Rue de Passy, at the corner of Rue de la Pompe, in the 16th arrondissement. Kicky and Gygy would play near the Auteuil pond, catching tadpoles, and in winter they would skate on the lake in the Bois de Boulogne and eat roasted chestnuts. It was a radiant Parisian childhood, despite the family’s financial difficulties. The father of Kicky, Gygy, and their little sister, Isobel, was an inventor of genius, according to Daddy. Louis-Mathurin had a superb voice—and Kicky inherited that extraordinary musical range—but he was also a man of ideas. He invented portable lamps, and he attempted all sorts of scientific experiments in his laboratory in the Poissonnière neighborhood, but alas, no one believed in him, no one wanted to invest in his inventions, and he never had enough money to bring them to fruition.
Daphne always looks forward to these privileged moments on the second floor of Cannon Hall, when Gerald—sitting by the fire with a cup of tea and a cigarette—would tell stories about his father’s childhood. At the age of seventeen, Kicky failed his exams, the famous baccalaureat. All he enjoyed was reading and drawing. His specialty was sketching caustic, funny family portraits, executed in three pencil strokes. Under pressure from his parents, Kicky moved to London to study science in a laboratory. Daphne feels the pain Kicky must have felt at being torn away from his beloved Paris; she feels his homesickness, exiled in London with its gray skies and thick fogs. Listening, captivated, Daphne falls under the charm of a city she has not yet seen; just like her grandfather, she yearns to devour a piece of cheese with a still-warm baguette, to taste a cup of chicory, to stroll along the embankment near Notre-Dame. Like Kicky, she dreams of Paris at night, understands why he feels more French than English: after all, wasn’t he born in the City of Light? Weren’t his ancestors French aristocrats of a noble lineage? His parents became alarmed: What is Kicky doing, daydreaming all day long instead of concentrating on his scientific studies? The girl guesses the reason: Kicky wants to return to Paris! After the death of his father, a few years later, the young man goes back to the city he loves so much. He is twenty-two. In the meantime, Gerald explains, Paris has changed: the prefect Haussmann has left his mark, the man nicknamed the Attila of the Straight Line or the Ripper Baron, the man who modernized Paris with the construction of long, rectilinear boulevards. Kicky no longer recognizes his medieval Paris with its damp, twisting alleys. But who cares? He makes friends; he feels happy; he takes art classes in Montparnasse, on Rue Notre-Dame-des-Champs. Life is beautiful.
One day, Daphne will go to Paris. She makes this promise to herself. She will see all those places with her own eyes; she will be the first du Maurier to follow in the footsteps of her grandfather.
* * *
One new element in Angela’s and Daphne’s lives is the school where they go each day, in Oak Hill Park. Gerald has very specific ideas about his daughters’ education. For him, the most important subjects are art, music, French, and literature. To this must be added algebra, alas, a subject loved by no one in the du Maurier family. To reach the school, the girls must walk, alone, down a deserted path. They are big girls now—thirteen and ten—and their parents have decided they no longer need to be chaperoned. One morning, a soldier in his blue uniform is lurking on the path. He is wounded: his leg is in plaster. Daphne pays no attention to him, but her sister, more fearful, thinks him suspicious. As the two girls pass, the soldier unbuttons his pants and exposes himself. Angela runs off at top speed, and Daphne follows her, though she doesn’t understand why, and her elder sister is too shocked to explain.
Angela works harder than her sister, receives better grades.
In the end, Daphne starts imitating Muriel’s signature on the weekly report in her notebook, which she is supposed to show to her parents. Miss Druce, her teacher, eventually notices that Mrs. du Maurier’s signature never looks the same. She hands the notebook to her student and asks, Daphne, did your mother sign this? Daphne replies, without batting an eyelid, that it wasn’t her mother, but her. But don’t you realize, my child, how dishonest that is? It’s forgery! Did you know that people go to prison for that? No, Daphne didn’t know. She won’t do it again. It’s not really so important, after all. The most important thing is to make friends at Oak Hill Park, to have fun, to forget the war.
One morning, Miss Druce makes a solemn announcement to her students: Daphne du Maurier has written an excellent essay, by far the best. Unfortunately, her handwriting and spelling are atrocious. Consequently, Daphne is not top of the class; she is beaten by another girl. Daphne smiles to herself: Who cares about being top of the class? She was the one who wrote the best essay. She is so proud! Later, Daddy congratulates her warmly, while Mummy seems slightly disappointed. Why is there always this invisible barrier between Daphne’s mother and her, like a sort of strange shyness, a mutual reserve? The barrier seems as high as the redbrick wall that encircles Cannon Hall. Is it possible that Mummy is a bit jealous of the obvious complicity between Daddy and his middle daughter?
One night, before Gerald has returned from the theater, the household is woken by the screaming of a siren. The deafening sound of cannon fire, close by, makes everyone jump. The maid, young Dorothy, cowers under her bed in terror. Muriel, wearing a bathrobe, makes hot chocolate and attempts to reassure her daughters. Daphne can see clearly that her mother is worried: she keeps looking out of the window. Where is her husband? She appears to pray silently that nothing has happened to him. Daphne prays, too, in her head. She feels suddenly afraid, sensing the vulnerability of her family, of this whole city. At last, the headlights of Daddy’s car sweep the façade of Cannon Hall. So he has come home. The little girl breathes easily again. During another air-raid warning—this one in mid-morning—the sirens strike up their familiar howl, and the cannon booms so loudly that they decide to take shelter in the dusty cupboard under the stairs. Gerald, in pajamas, announces from the top of the stairs, with a hint of provocation, that he is going up to the attic. Perhaps he will see a zeppelin from up there: wouldn’t that be splendid? He’s never seen one: it must be an impressive sight. Although Muriel continues smiling, Daphne can tell that her mother does not find this at all amusing. Daphne feels faint at the thought of her father going up to the roof—he might die; she would never see him again—and an unbearable pain bores into her stomach. She has never felt so frightened, so sick, in her life. She reaches out her arms to him, crying at the top of her voice, Daddy, don’t go, don’t go, don’t ever leave me! Her father stares at her in silence, then looks at his wife’s pale face. Slowly, he walks downstairs and joins them in the cupboard. Finally, the sirens stop screaming. The air-raid warning is over.
Despite their country being at war, Londoners continue going to the theater. Gerald has never been in such demand. He triumphs in Dear Brutus, a hit play penned by Uncle Jim. Gerald plays Will Dearth, a failed artist and alcoholic. During one magical night, Will, who has no children, finds himself the father of a ten-year-old girl and his existence is transformed. At dawn, this chimerical child vanishes. At the premiere, Daphne is overwhelmed by emotion: the relationship between father and daughter onstage is so like the real-life complicity between Gerald and Daphne. She has to leave the box, in tears. Once again, she feels her mother’s disapproving stare trained on her.
* * *
Milton Hall … Daphne looks up at the sand-colored cut-stone façade. The huge house rears up amid green fields. It is impossible to imagine anything altering its age-old beauty. Daphne, with her mother and sisters, traveled to Peterborough by train, and there was a chauffeur waiting for them at the station. It is September 1917 and they have been invited for a short stay by friends of the family. As the car entered the driveway, Muriel whispered proudly that the Fitzwilliam family had lived at Milton for four hundred years. Muriel and the girls are inside the mansion now, but Daphne lingers outside, admiring the porch with its pillars, the clock at the top of a turret, the rows of lattice windows. In the entrance hall, the mistress of the house, Lady Fitzwilliam, welcomes them, her white hair in a bun. Next to her are a lady’s companion with a chow chow, and a shy adolescent boy who hops up and down. Behind them are two lines of servants, from the little chambermaid, whose task it is to light fires, to the self-important butler. Daphne sees only the splendor of the setting, the high ceilings, the wood-paneled walls, the portraits of gentlemen in frock coats and jabots. Why does she feel so at ease in Milton Hall? What a strange sensation.… Usually she hates visiting her parents’ friends, all those strangers whom she has no desire to know, those hands to be shaken, those forced smiles, when all she wants to do is disappear into a book.
For ten days, Daphne lives at Milton Hall as in a dream. She will remember the large bedroom in the north wing that she shares with Angela, and the even more spacious room in the south wing where Jeanne and her mother sleep. She will recall the breakfast served in the dining room by a dedicated servant, the silent ballet of silver platters, poached eggs and bacon, smoked herring, the white napkins, and their host’s welcoming smile at the other end of the table. She will think about those hushed moments in the morning room with the mistress of the house, at teatime, leaning over a jigsaw puzzle.
On rainy days, Daphne plays with her sisters in the unused rooms of the north wing, where there are dustcovers on the beds and chairs, where the closed shutters keep out the light of day. During these games, as her sisters are used to by now, she always plays a boy. He has a name, this boy. Eric Avon. He is ten years old, like her. Her little sister plays one of his friends, whom they name David Dampier. What could be easier than becoming a boy in these dark rooms where no one can see her? Her skirt, pulled up and slipped inside her tights, becomes a pageboy’s puffed pants, the sweater draped over her shoulders is transformed into a cape, and the stick in her hand is brandished as a sword. Eric Avon is afraid of nothing, of no one. He is radiant, glorious, pure hearted. He roams the hallways of Milton, a scout, protecting his family.
At a bend in the hallway, Eric Avon hears a whisper of clothes rustling along the parquet floor, the clinking of a bunch of keys. He flattens himself against the wall and signals to those following him. Watch out, danger, enemy. Hide behind the curtains. It’s the housekeeper of Milton Hall, a tall, thin woman in a black dress. She wears her keys on a belt and never smiles. Her face is scarily white. Her name is Mrs. Parker. Everyone is afraid of her, but apparently Mrs. Parker is a remarkable housekeeper and Milton would not be Milton without her. From his hiding place, holding his breath, Eric Avon watches her pass. His eyes follow the train of her dress as it skims over the floorboards.
At the end of their stay, when the time comes to leave Milton, Daphne feels distraught. She turns around to admire the immensity of the house one last time. Why does she feel she is leaving behind a friend? She will never forget Milton Hall, nor Mrs. Parker’s long black dress.
* * *
Every Saturday, for a month, the sisters pose in an icy cold studio for an artist friend of their parents, Frederic Whiting, who paints a portrait of the three du Maurier girls. The only amusing aspect of the picture is that it features Brutus, their new dog, a little fox terrier. Other than that, posing is deadly dull. Not only do they have to take the tube from Hampstead all the way to Kensington, but they then have to remain utterly still for hours on end. The huge portrait, when it is finally completed, is a source of pride and pleasure for the family and their friends, but Angela, on the right of the image, continues to think she looks ugly, with a red nose and a behind that she considers too plump. Jeanne, cuddling Brutus, is adorable. But Daphne, on the left of the picture, with her blue dress and slender figure, is the one who
catches the eye. Daphne hears the whispered compliments; she doesn’t know what to do with them, but she understands—how could she not?—that she is prettier than her sisters. Not that she thinks so. The idea is meaningless to her anyway. In her mind, she is a boy, she is Eric Avon, who couldn’t care less what anyone says about him, because there’s a damsel in distress to be rescued, a villain to arrest, a cricket match to play.
The war is over, and the heavy atmosphere is transformed into floating bubbles: the champagne flows once again in Cannon Hall. Daphne hears the guests all uttering the same phrases: The war changed everything, Nothing is like it was before, We’ve lost our points of reference. She wonders what has changed exactly: The dead who will never return? The sadness that has left its stain forever? Whatever! Gerald and Muriel have decided to travel, and there is nothing too wonderful for the du Maurier family: Monte Carlo, Beaulieu, Cannes, the Hotel Saint-Georges in Algiers, Lake Como in Italy.