The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society

Dawsey

From Mark to Juliet

April 30, 1946

Darling,

Just got in—the entire trip could have been avoided if Hendry had telephoned, but I smacked a few heads together and they’ve cleared the whole shipment through customs. I feel as though I’ve been away for years. Can I see you tonight? I need to talk to you.

Love,

M.

From Juliet to Mark

Of course. Do you want to come here? I have a sausage.

Juliet

From Mark to Juliet

A sausage—how appetizing.

Suzette, at 8:00?

Love,

M.

From Juliet to Mark

Say please.

J.

From Mark to Juliet

Pleased to see you at Suzette at 8:00.

Love,

M.

From Juliet to Mark

1st May, 1946

Dear Mark,

I didn’t refuse, you know. I said I wanted to think about it. You were so busy ranting about Sidney and Guernsey that perhaps you didn’t notice—I only said I wanted time. I’ve known you two months. It’s not long enough for me to be certain that we should spend the rest of our lives together, even if you are. I once made a terrible mistake and almost married a man I hardly knew (perhaps you read about it in the papers)—and at least in that case, the war was an extenuating circumstance. I won’t be such a fool again.

Think of it: I’ve never seen your home—I don’t even know where it is, really. New York, but which street? What does it look like? What color are your walls? Your sofa? Do you arrange your books alphabetically? (I hope not.) Are your drawers tidy or messy? Do you ever hum, and if so, what? Do you prefer cats or dogs? Or fish? What on earth do you eat for breakfast—or do you have a cook?

You see? I don’t know you well enough to marry you.

I have one other piece of news that may interest you: Sidney is not your rival. I am not now nor have I ever been in love with Sidney, nor he with me. Nor will I ever marry him. Is that decisive enough for you?

Are you absolutely certain you wouldn’t rather be married to someone more tractable than I?

Juliet

From Juliet to Sophie

1st May, 1946

Dearest Sophie,

I wish you were here. I wish we still lived together in our lovely little studio and worked in dear Mr. Hawke’s shop and ate crackers and cheese for supper every night. I want so much to talk to you. I want you to tell me whether I should marry Mark Reynolds.

He asked me last night—no bended knee, but a diamond as big as a pigeon egg—at a romantic French restaurant. I’m not certain he still wants to marry me this morning—he’s absolutely furious because I didn’t give him an unequivocal yes. I tried to explain that I hadn’t known him long enough and I needed time to think, but he wouldn’t listen to me. He was certain that I was rejecting him because of a secret passion—for Sidney! They really are obsessed with one another, those two.

Thank God we were at his flat by then—he began shouting about Sidney and godforsaken islands and women who care more about a passel of strangers than men who are right in front of them (that’s Guernsey and my new friends there). I kept trying to explain and he kept shouting until I began to cry from frustration. Then he felt remorseful, which was so unlike him and endearing that I almost changed my mind and said yes. But then I imagined a lifetime of having to cry to get him to be kind, and I went back to no again. We argued and he lectured and I wept a bit more because I was so exhausted, and eventually he called his chauffeur to take me home. As he shut me into the back seat, he leaned in to kiss me and said, “You’re an idiot, Juliet.”

And maybe he’s right. Do you recall those awful, awful Cheslayne Fair novels we read the summer we were thirteen? My favorite was The Master of Blackheath. I must have read it twenty times (and so did you, don’t pretend you didn’t). Do you remember Ransom—how he manfully hid his love for the girlish Eulalie so that she could choose freely, little knowing that she had been mad for him ever since she fell off her horse when she was twelve? Here’s the thing, Sophie—Mark Reynolds is exactly like Ransom. He’s tall and handsome, with a crooked smile and a chiseled jaw. He shoulders his way through the crowd, careless of the glances that follow him. He’s impatient and magnetic, and when I go to powder my nose, I overhear other women talking about him, just like Eulalie did in the museum. People notice him. He doesn’t try to make them—they can’t help it.

I used to get shivers about Ransom. Sometimes I do about Mark, too—when I look at him—but I can’t get over the nagging feeling that I’m no Eulalie. If I were ever to fall off a horse, it would be lovely to be picked up by Mark, but I don’t think I’m likely to fall off a horse any time soon. I’m much more likely to go to Guernsey and write a book about the Occupation, and Mark can’t abide the thought. He wants me to stay in London and go to restaurants and theaters and marry him like a reasonable person.

Write and tell me what to do.

Love to Dominic—and you and Alexander as well.

Juliet

From Juliet to Sidney

3rd May, 1946

Dear Sidney,

I may not be as distraught as Stephens & Stark is without you, but I do miss you and want you to advise me. Please drop everything you are doing and write to me at once.

I want to get out of London. I want to go to Guernsey. You know I’ve grown very fond of my Guernsey friends, and I’m fascinated by their lives under the Germans—and afterward. I’ve visited the Channel Islands Refugee Committee and read their files. I have read the Red Cross reports. I’ve read all I can find on Todt slave workers—there hasn’t, so far, been much. I’ve interviewed some of the soldiers who liberated Guernsey and talked to Royal Engineers who removed the thousands of mines from their beaches. I’ve read all of the “unclassified” government reports on the state of the Islanders’ health, or lack of it; their happiness, or lack of it; their food