Beatriz Williams

A Hundred Summers: The ultimate romantic escapist beach read


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      Beatriz Williams

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       Copyright

      Published by HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd

      1 London Bridge Street

      London, SE1 9GF

       www.harpercollins.co.uk

      First published by Penguin Group USA 2013

      First published in the UK by Harper 2015

      Copyright © Beatriz Williams

      Cover layout design © HarperCollinPublishers Ltd 2015

      Design concept by Sara Woods

      Cover photograph © H. Armstrong Roberts/Getty Images

      Beatriz Williams asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

      A catalogue copy of this book is available from the British Library.

      This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

      All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.

      Source ISBN: 9780008134921

      Ebook Edition © April 2015 ISBN: 9780008134914

      Version: 2017-07-24

       Dedication

       To the victims and survivors of the

       great New England hurricane of 1938

       And, as always,

       to my husband and children

      Ah, love, let us be true

      To one another! for the world, which seems

      To lie before us like a land of dreams,

      So various, so beautiful, so new,

      Hath really neither joy, nor love, nor light,

      Nor certitude, nor peace, nor help for pain;

      And we are here as on a darkling plain

      Swept with confused alarms of struggle and flight,

      Where ignorant armies clash by night.

      MATTHEW ARNOLD

      “Dover Beach” (1867)

      Contents

       Cover

       Title Page

      Copyright

      Dedication

       Epigraph

      1. Route 5, Ten Miles South of Hanover, New Hampshire: October 1931

       7. Smith College, Massachusetts: Mid-December 1931

       8. Seaview, Rhode Island: July 4, 1938

       9. 725 Park Avenue, New York City: December 1931

       10. Seaview, Rhode Island: July 1938

       11. 725 Park Avenue, New York City: New Year’s Eve 1931

       12. Seaview, Rhode Island: August 1938

       13. Manhattan: New Year’s Eve 1931

       14. Seaview, Rhode Island: Labor Day 1938

       15. Route 9, New York State: New Year’s Day 1932

       16. Manhattan: Tuesday, September 20, 1938

       17. Lake George, New York: January 2, 1932

       18. Manhattan: Tuesday, September 20, 1938

       19. Lake George, New York: January 1932

       20. Manhattan: Wednesday, September 21, 1938

       21. 1932–1938

       22. Seaview, Rhode Island: Wednesday, September 21, 1938

       23. Seaview, Rhode Island: Wednesday afternoon, September 21, 1938

       Epilogue: Seaview Rhode Island - June 1944

       Historical Note

       Keep Reading The House on Cocoa Beach

       Acknowledgments

       Readers Guide: A Hundred Summers

       About the Author

       Also by Beatriz Williams

       About the Publisher

       1.

       ROUTE 5, TEN MILES SOUTH OF HANOVER, NEW HAMPSHIRE October 1931

      One hundred and twelve miles of curving pavement lie between the entrance gates of Smith College and the Dartmouth football stadium, and Budgie drives them as she does everything else: hell-for-leather.

      The leaves shimmer gold and orange and crimson against a brilliant blue sky, and the sun burns unobstructed overhead, teasing us with a false sense of warmth. Budgie has decreed we drive with the top down, though I am shivering in the draft, huddled inside my wool cardigan, clutching my hat.

      She laughs at me. “You should take your hat off, honey. You remind me of my mother holding on to her hat like that. Like it’s the end of civilization if someone sees your hair.” She has to shout the words, with the wind gusting around her.

      “It’s not that!” I shout back. It’s because my hair, released from the enveloping dark wool-felt cloche, will expand into a Western tumbleweed, while Budgie’s sleek little curls only whip about artfully before settling back