84, Charing Cross Road Read Online Free PDF Page A

but my wife managed to persuade her to sell this cloth, and I think she also made her a present of some of the dried egg you sent us which helped a lot.
    If you must clean your Grolier Bible, we should advise ordinary soap and water. Put a teaspoonful of soda in a pint of warm water and use a soapy sponge. I think you will find this will remove the dirt and you can then polish it with a little lanolin.
    J. Pemberton is a lady and the J. is for Janet.
    With best wishes from all of us for the coming year.
    Faithfully yours,

Frank Doel

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37 Oakfield Court
Haslemere Road
Crouch End
London, N.8

20–1–52

    Dear Miss Hanff:
    For a long time I have wanted to write to you to thank you for my family’s share in the wonderful food parcels you’ve been sending to Marks & Co. Now I have an excuse as Frank tells me you want to know the name and address of the old lady who embroidered your cloth. It was beautiful, wasn’t it?
    Her name is Mrs. Boulton and she lives next door at No. 36 Oakfield Court. She was thrilled to know that her cloth had crossed the Atlantic and I know she would be delighted to hear how much you admired it.
    Thank you for wanting to send us more dried egg, but we still have a bit left to see us through until spring. Some time between April and September we usually manage all right for eggs, as they go off ration for a time and then we do a bit of trading with the tins, as once for a special occasion I traded a tin of dried egg for a pair of nylons. Not quite legal but it does help us to get by!
    I will send you snaps of my happy family one of these days. Our oldest girl was twelve last August, by name Sheila, who by the way is my ready-made daughter, as Frank lost his first wife during the war. Our youngest, Mary, was four last week. Last May, Sheila announced at school that she was sending Mummy and Daddy an anniversary card and told the nuns (it’s a convent) that we had been married four years. It took a bit of explaining as you can imagine.
    I will close this with all good wishes for the New Year and especially a wish that we may see you in England one of these days.
    Sincerely,

Nora Doel

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36 Oakfield Court
Haslemere Road
Crouch End
London, N.8

Jan. 29th, 1952

    Dear Miss Hanff:
    Thank you very much for the letter, I appreciate your kindness in telling me the cloth I worked has given you so much pleasure. I only wish I could do more. I expect Mrs. Doel has told you I am getting on in years so I am unable to do as much as I used to. It is always a joy to me when my work gets into the hands of someone who appreciates it.
    I see Mrs. Doel most days, she often speaks of you. Perhaps I may see you if you come to England.
    Again thanking you,
    Yours very sincerely,

Mary Boulton

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14 East 95th St.

February 9, 1952

    Now listen, Maxine—
    I just talked to your mother, she says you don’t think the show will run another month and she says you took two dozen pairs of nylons over there, so do me a favor. As soon as the closing notice goes up take four pairs of nylons around to the bookshop for me, give them to Frank Doel, tell him they’re for the three girls and Nora (his wife).
    Your mother says I am NOT to enclose any money for them, she got them last summer at a close-out sale at Saks, they were very cheap and she’ll donate them to the shop, she’s feeling pro-British.
    Wait’ll you see what the shop sent me for Christmas. It’s an Irish linen tablecloth, the color of thick cream, hand-embroidered in an old-fashioned pattern of leaves and flowers, every flower worked in a different color and shaded from very pale to very deep, you never saw anything like it. My junk-shop drop-leaf table CERTainly never saw anything like it, i get this urge to shake out my flowing Victorian sleeve and lift a graceful arm to pour tea from an imaginary Georgian teapot, we’re gonna play Stanislavski with it the minute you get home.
    Ellery raised me to $250 a script, if it keeps up till June I may get to