That’s a bit of a shame because now we want to get to Portugal ourselves since it’s a neutral country and there are boats from there to England and America. If Morocco was a Portuguese colony instead of a French protectorate it might be easier, but then I suppose if it wasn’t a French protectorate we might not have been able to get in in the first place but have been stuck in Algeria instead, which definitely wouldn’t have been a good thing.
Morocco’s history is quite complicated with all these invasions. I asked Miss Ellis why the Moroccans don’t just keep their country for themselves and she said, ‘Their day will come.’
Once we have our American visas then Papa will have to go to the Portuguese consulate and join more queues to get our papers for passing through there too. I hope we won’t be passing through Portugal for quite such a long time as we’ve been passing through Morocco.
Actually, a holiday by the sea will be very nice （or agreeable, pleasant, lovely and wonderful, as my thesaurus suggests）。 It really is getting very hot in the city and the beaches around Casablanca are not as good for sea bathing as those further down the coast. Papa thinks it would be a good opportunity to follow the road that runs along the coastline and explore the towns there along the way. He says we will see some more of those old Portuguese fortresses, which will be good for my education. I noticed that he squeezed Maman’s hand after he said that, and that gave me a suspicion as to what this trip is really about. I shall be on high alert again in case any more Monsieur Guigners creep out of the woodwork. I won’t bring my journal with me but will leave it safely in its hiding place. However, Miss Ellis was delighted to hear we will be doing a tour of those old coastal fortifications and has given me quite a lot of work to take with me – so much for it being a holiday! I’ll have to bring my schoolbooks and she has written out questionnaires for me to fill in at each place we visit. It’s becoming quite a project. My books will be useful for taking notes, though, and then I can write everything in my journal properly later.
We leave on Saturday. Annette is already wondering whether she can persuade Maman to let her buy a new two-piece swimming costume. She’s wanted one ever since she saw a picture of Ava Gardner wearing one in Movie Life magazine. They are all the rage in America apparently, although as I pointed out to her, it may be a different kettle of fish entirely on the beaches in Morocco.
I wish there was more room in the Dodge Sedan so that Nina could come. That would make the trip a lot more fun. But by the time Annette’s suitcases （containing several changes of clothes for every possible social eventuality）， plus her vanity case, （aptly named!）， full of all her cosmetics and hair-styling things, have been accommodated, I shall count myself lucky if there’s enough space for me.
Josie’s Journal – Sunday 20th July, 1941
As Lord Peter Wimsey so wisely says in Gaudy Night, ‘The great advantage about telling the truth is that nobody ever believes it.’ This turned out to be a piece of very good advice and one that helped me to save Papa’s bacon on our trip down the coast. But I’m getting ahead of myself again and had better start at the beginning as I write up everything that happened so that I don’t miss out any important details . . .
Our first port of call was El Jadida. The Portuguese were there for 200 years and built walls to enclose the streets of the town beside the harbour. We climbed up on to the ramparts and walked around them, admiring the views and the fortifications. At the Bab el Bahr （which means the Sea Gate） there was a very good viewpoint from which I was able to sketch the harbour and fill in some of the answers to the questions Miss Ellis has set me. The fortress is very impressive and solid looking, and the Bab el Bahr forms a narrow entrance from the harbour to the town. You could see how easy it would be to defend El Jadida from an invasion: those Portuguese knew what they were doing.
As I was taking my notes and counting the boats in the little harbour, I happened to glance across at Papa. He, too, was admiring the views and then he drew a little notebook out of his inner jacket pocket and jotted something down in it, just as I was doing in my schoolbook. I said nothing and he quickly tucked the notebook away again. Then he smiled at me and suggested we go and look for a café in the town where one might be able to lay one’s hands on an ice cream.
We did so and had a pleasant mid-morning pause in our journey, with coffee for Maman, Papa and Annette and a delicious lemon water ice for me. Annette has decided quite recently that she’s too grown-up nowadays to eat ice creams and so she pretends to like coffee instead. I could tell by the way she kept looking at my lemon ice, though, that she was secretly regretting being so grown-up. I scraped the last drops out of the glass dish and licked my spoon clean, even though Maman says it’s vulgar to do so, and then I gave her a big smile and said I hoped she was enjoying her lovely cup of coffee. She did not smile back.