The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society

thought of all those bottles of wine, champagne, brandy, cognac that didn’t make it back to the yacht—and me all alone amongst them. I thought of no more bells, of no more livery, of no more Lord Tobias. In fact, of no more being in service at all.

I turned my back on him and quickly walked back down the gangway. I ran up the road to La Fort and watched the yacht sail away, Lord Tobias still screaming. Then I went inside, laid a fire, and stepped down to the wine cellar. I took down a bottle of claret and drew my first cork. I let the wine breathe. Then I returned to the library, sipped, and began to read The Wine-Lover’s Companion.

I read about grapes, tended the garden, slept in silk pajamas—and drank wine. And so it went until September when Amelia Maugery and Elizabeth McKenna came to call on me. Elizabeth I knew slightly—she and I had chatted several times among the market stalls—but Mrs. Maugery was a stranger to me. Were they going to turn me in to the constable? I wondered.

No. They were there to warn me. The Commandant of Guernsey had ordered all Jews to report to the Grange Lodge Hotel and register. According to the Commandant, our ID cards would merely be marked “Juden” and then we were free to go home. Elizabeth knew my mother was Jewish; I had mentioned it once. They had come to tell me that I must not, under any circumstances, go to the Grange Lodge Hotel.

But that wasn’t all. Elizabeth had considered my predicament thoroughly (more thoroughly than I) and made a plan. Since all Islanders were to have identity cards anyway, why couldn’t I declare myself to be Lord Tobias Penn- Piers himself ? I could claim that, as a visitor, all my documents had been left behind in my London bank. Amelia was sure Mr. Dilwyn would be happy to back up my impersonation, and he was. He and Amelia went with me to the Commandant’s Office, and we all swore that I was Lord Tobias Penn-Piers.

It was Elizabeth who came up with the finishing touch. The Germans were taking over all of Guernsey’s grand houses for their officers to live in, and they would never ignore such a residence as La Fort—it was too good to miss. And when they came I must be ready for them as Lord Tobias Penn-Piers. I must look like a Lord at Leisure and act at my ease. I was terrified.

“Nonsense,” said Elizabeth. “You have presence, Booker. You’re tall, dark, handsome, and all valets know how to look down their noses.”

She decided that she would quickly paint my portrait as a sixteenth-century Penn-Piers. So I posed as such in a velvet cloak and ruff, seated against a background of dark tapestries and dim shadows, fingering my dagger. I looked Noble, Aggrieved, and Treasonous.

It was a brilliant stroke, for, not two weeks later, a body of German officers (six in all) appeared in my library —without knocking. I received them there, sipping a Chateau Margaux ’93 and bearing an uncanny resemblance to the portrait of my “ancestor” hanging above me over the mantel.

They bowed to me and were all politeness, which did not prevent them from taking over the house and moving me into the gatekeeper’s cottage the very next day. Eben and Dawsey slipped over after curfew that night and helped me carry most of the wine down to the cottage, where we cleverly hid it behind the woodpile, down the well, up the chimney, under a haystack, and above the rafters. But even with all this toting of bottles, I still ran out of wine by early 1941. A sad day, but I had friends to help distract me—and then, then I found Seneca.

I came to love our book meetings—they helped to make the Occupation bearable. Some of their books sounded fine, but I stayed true to Seneca. I came to feel that he was talking to me—in his funny, biting way—but talking to me alone. His letters helped to keep me alive in what was to come later.

I still go to all our Society meetings. Everyone is sick of Seneca, and they are begging me to read someone else. But I’ll not do it. I also act in plays that one of our repertory companies puts on—impersonating Lord Tobias gave me a taste for acting, and besides that, I am tall, loud, and can be heard in the last row.

I am happy the war is over, and I am John Booker again.

Yours truly,

John Booker

From Juliet to Sidney and Piers

31st March, 1946

Mr. Sidney Stark

Monreagle Hotel

Broadmeadows Avenue, 79

Melbourne

Victoria

Australia

Dear Sidney and Piers,

No life’s blood—just sprained thumbs from copying out the enclosed letters from my new friends on Guernsey. I love their letters and could not bear the thought of sending the originals to the bottom of the earth where they would undoubtedly be eaten by wild dogs.

I knew the Germans occupied the Channel Islands, but I barely gave them a thought during the war. I have since scoured the Times for articles and anything I can cull from the London Library on the Occupation. I also need to find a good travel book on Guernsey—one with descriptions, not timetables and hotel recommendations—to give me the feel of the island.

Quite apart from my interest in their interest in reading, I have fallen in love with two men: Eben Ramsey and Dawsey Adams. Clovis Fossey and John Booker, I like. I want Amelia Maugery to adopt me; and me, I want to adopt Isola Pribby. I will leave you to discern my feelings for Adelaide Addison (Miss) by reading her letters. The truth is, I am living more in Guernsey than I am in London at the moment—I pretend work with one ear cocked for the sound of the post dropping in the box, and when I hear it, I scramble down the stairs, breathless for the next piece of the story. This must be how people felt when they gathered around the publisher’s door to seize the latest installment of David Copperfield as it came off the printing press.

I know you’re going to love the letters, too—but would you be interested in more? To me, these people and their war-time experiences are fascinating and moving. Do you agree? Do you think there could be a book here? Don’t be polite—I want your opinion (both of your opinions) unvarnished. And you needn’t worry—I’ll continue to send you copies of the letters even if you don’t want me to write a book about Guernsey. I am (mostly) above petty vengeance.

Since I have sacrificed my thumbs for your amusement, you should send me one of Piers’s latest in return. So glad you are writing again, my dear.

My love to you both,

Juliet