"One line to tell you C. and I have got back at last, safe and sound. The Germans wers almost in Font Litvéque, having crossed under a smoke screen before we knew it, An English officer came and told us to get out at once. Ten days previously C. and I had taken AK.'s house at Deauville for the summer as Pien-court was so full of their Italian relations, but the Havre and Deauville aerodrome bombing for three nights in succession got on our nerves. The last night they began at 9 pin. and continued every 15 minutes until exactly, 9 am. Havre was on fire from end to end, and the burning oil tanks turned day into night; we could hardly get to Piencourt in the dark and smoke, and were also hindered by refugees—a heartbreaking sight. The bombing burst windows and shutters open, and all photos, books and so on fell on to the floor, It was exactly as if the bombs had fallen in the garden. I went up on to the Boardwalk to see it and the tracer bullets but I never saw them bring one down.
"I had to give a car to B.'s gardener (who had been there 22 years) and £50 to get away—ditto to W.'s Stud Groom. T gave the Peugeot, and I heard they are both safe in England, having got a Dutch cargo boat at Bordeaux. We were not so lucky, as I had to stay till everything was put away, house shuttered up, ete.,—and Mrs. G. s old mother, 89, refused to move—took two small bottles of opium tabloids and cut veins in her wrists, luckily small ones. However, it detained us a day—I could not leave her. The Germans were now at Pont Audemef, 12 kilometres off. Luckily C. had her car and chauffeur from Paris there, so we put the old, doped lady and her cousin and nurse into C's car and I took C. and luggage in my Hotchkiss, and we managed to get to Bagnole that night though it took hours because of the refugees. All the roads were blocked for hours on end and there was no petrol anywhere. On the next day the old Duchess refused to go on—she said she was Italian and ber niece was Rumanian—and the secretary wanted to stay, but we stayed another night stupidly to try and persuade her. It was a great responsibility for me. I am furious with B. for leaving it all to me while he sat comfortably in Switzerland!
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.