Read Online The Duchess of Bloomsbury Street by Helene Hanff - Free Book Online Page B

Brown and won all sorts of citations; she doesn’t look old enough.
    They took me to the Stafford, a very old, gracious hotel rather like the Plaza. I had a couple of martinis to clear the sinuses and discovered Leo is a gin drinker. He’s also a TV and film writer and we found we’d worked for the same TV producer—in different seasons and on different continents—and we talked shop. Ena didn’t mind, she thinks we’re both terribly witty.
    He calls her “little thing.”
    â€œLittle thing, you want the lobster again?”
    He asked me if I knew of the pianist Eileen Joyce and told me:
    â€œShe’s just been made a Dame of the British Empire and she wants the little thing to paint her in her Dame’s robes.”
    When it was too late to go see it, Ena told me one of Leo’s films was playing around the corner; I was very impressed. I’ve always believed film writing is the most difficult form a writer can work in.
    â€œTell me,” said Leo. “You’ve written a beautiful book. Why haven’t we heard from you before? What was wrong with your earlier work? Too good or not good enough.”
    â€œNot good enough,” I said. And he nodded and went on to something else, and I think that’s when we became soul mates.
    It was a marvelous evening. I’d love to see them again but I haven’t the nerve to call and suggest it. Being a visiting fireman has its own courtesy rules.
    cough-cough-cough-cough-cough.

Wednesday, June 30
    Being a celebrity means you’re paged to the phone three times during breakfast, and the first time you come back to the table your eggs are cold, the second time you come back your eggs are GONE and the third time you carry a fresh plate of eggs out to the lobby phone with you.
    Joyce Grenfell phoned to ask how my cough was and to say Do-be-here-on-the-thirteenth. I told her I mean to. The hotel switchboard operator recognized her voice and didn’t put the call through to the booth, I took it at the desk, and the switchboard operator and cashier both like to collapse when I held the receiver out so they could hear her call, “RegGEEE!” when she wanted to ask him something.
    Nora phoned and heard my croak and said Why didn’t I come out to North London and let her nurse me? That’s all she needs; she’s working at a full-time job since Frank died.
    The Colonel phoned to say the BOAC bag “will be sent round this A.M. ” and he’ll pick me up at ten tomorrow morning for the trip to Stratford-and-Oxford.
    After breakfast I went across the street for Kleenex and cough drops. There’s a string of small stores opposite the hotel on Great Russell Street: a stationery store, a Unisex Beauty Shop, a Cinema Bookshop and an Indian food store that carries health-food items. There’s also a large YWCA Women’s Residence and a curbside fruit stand. I stopped at the fruit stand for some peaches, and while I was waiting for change I noticed a bulletin board in a glass case outside the stationery store. Got my change and went over to read the bulletin board. At first glance the notices seem to be Items-for-Sale and Situations-Wanted ads, but you don’thave to read very far to discover your mistake. To the pure in heart, however, all bulletin boards are pure, viz.: (This is the entire bulletin-board list.)
    ----
    Hot Pants for sale. Phone . . . . . . . . . .

    Ex-actress will give lessons, French or anything. Phone . . . . . . . . . .

    Male model. All services. TV, photog, rubber, leather Corrective training. Phone . . . . . . . . . .

    Model seeks unusual positions. Miss Coucher. Phone . . . . . . . . . .

    New lovely blonde doll for sale. Walks, talks. Phone . . . . . . . . . .

    Tom Tamer gives lessons in the most strict deportment Phone . . . . . . . . . .

    French girl. Ex-governess, many positions. Seeks new pupils. Both sexes. Phone . . . . . . . . . .

    Three rucksacks wanted.