To Bryan’s embarrassment, Diana ignored his declaration of love, and when they met in person, he did not mention the contents of his letter, instead he tried to forget he ever sent it. He knew Diana might lose interest in him, and given her beauty and confidence, she would not be without an admirer for long. He decided to put on a show of false bravado and take control of the situation.
Several days after their last meeting, an opportunity presented itself to Bryan when, on 16 July, he and Diana attended a ball at Grosvenor House. He instrumented a way to get Diana outside when he suggested they escape the stuffy ballroom for a breath of fresh air. After what seemed like an eternal stroll down Park Lane until they were safely out of view, Bryan nervously told Diana of his feelings and before she could respond he kissed her. ‘Do you – could you – love me enough to marry me?’ he stammered.
Diana, truthful in her response, answered, ‘I’m very fond of you.’
‘But do you love me? You kissed me?’ he pathetically implored.
She could not imagine the agonies Bryan had suffered and replied, ‘A kiss means nothing, I do it without thinking as I’m used to kissing in my family.’
A kiss meant everything to Bryan, and in the past he had purposely avoided kissing girls because, in his view, a kiss was sacred. He wrote in his diary of a beautiful Italian girl whom he had met during a three-week tour of Germany. One evening, quite similar to this evening with Diana, they stood on a balcony and it dawned on him that she expected him to kiss her. His heart sank for he could not go through with it until ‘true love should some day strike me like a thunderbolt’.
Without acknowledging Diana’s rejection, Bryan escorted her back to Grosvenor House and he asked his mother if they could go home. Lady Evelyn did not wish to leave and Bryan was forced to stay for what seemed hours, his tortured soul circling the ballroom in a heartbroken daze.
The next morning, Bryan’s misery was interrupted by a note on his breakfast tray. The words, in their neat cursive scrawl, surprised him. Diana had written to confess that she loved him and had agreed to marry him. He replied immediately, ‘I still don’t know how much you love me, nor really understand what you felt last night.’ A flicker of Diana’s dual personality revealed itself to Bryan but, nevertheless, he repeated how glad he was at her change of heart. ‘I am glad that you are glad. I am glad that I love you. I am altogether glad again.’
Bryan’s letter to Diana gave her the upper hand and she was quick to recognise his tunnel vision when he felt closer to obtaining what he desired; in this case, consummating his love through marriage. Absorbed in his passion for Diana, Bryan was blind to her faults and he did not question whether she truly loved him or not. Perhaps he did not wish to hear the truth.
After three months of polite conversation carried out in the grandest ballrooms in London, Diana announced her intention to marry Bryan. ‘Oh no,’ cried Sydney. ‘You are much too young. How old is he?’
‘Twenty-two,’ Diana told her, confident his age might sway her mother’s decision.
‘Oh no, darling,’ Sydney repeated. ‘That’s ridiculous. Of course you can ask him to stay if you like, but you must wait two years.’
‘Two years?’
‘Well, one year. You are too young to make up your mind.’
All of her expectations of leaving Swinbrook were dashed in Sydney’s final sentence of concealed disapproval. A year seemed like a lifetime to the impatient Diana, and with the certainty of a marriage proposal – it was evident that Bryan would wait for her – she began to calculate the exact strategy it would take to win Sydney over. In her mind, she was already engaged and it was only a matter of time before she could begin living the life she dreamed of.
NOTES
15 ‘… about which I can remember nothing since my thoughts were not following the words.’ Bryan Guinness, Potpourri from the Thirties.
16 The entire poem is printed in Potpourri from the Thirties, Bryan Guinness.
8
THE ENGAGEMENT
Sydney was neither enthusiastic nor optimistic about Diana and Bryan’s longing to become engaged. Diana’s young age was not the only element that made her doubt the decision. Sydney felt there would be plenty of time for Diana to find a suitable husband once Nancy and Pamela were settled. She agreed with the age-old custom that daughters ought to marry in order of age. ‘You must have one more season in London,’ she told Diana. ‘So that you can at least meet more people.’
Pleading her case to Sydney, Diana argued that she had met quite enough young and old men to know that Bryan was the one she wished to marry. Sydney could not argue with that, as Diana was the most popular out of her three eldest daughters. In a rare change of heart, for Sydney rarely consented to anything, she permitted Diana to visit Bailiffscourt, the Guinness family’s seaside retreat.
Accompanied by her nanny, Diana made the journey to Climping in Sussex to the small farmhouse by the sea, purchased a few years before by Lady Evelyn and Colonel Guinness. Their purchase of the property had saved it from speculators who planned to ruin the entire coast. The house itself was surrounded by mystique and scandal; it had been the home of the notorious Colonel Barker, a woman who had pretended she was a man and under which guise she married a Brighton girl. Diana and her sisters loved the story, having pored over it in the newspapers, and it thrilled her to visit the scene of the crime. However, she was disheartened when she learned the very mention of Colonel Barker’s name was taboo – Lady Evelyn did not care to discuss the subject.
The strange tale was not the only thing that intrigued Diana. Lady Evelyn, her two youngest children, Grania and Murtogh, their Willoughby cousins and two nurses lived in an area known as the Huts, in the middle of a cornfield facing out to the sea. As the name suggests, they were authentic huts, made of pitch and pine and set on brick foundations, and smelling of raw wood and sea air. Lady Evelyn, like David, was a builder and she had envisioned a strange house, but in the meantime the family were living in a semi-bohemian state.
Outside the Huts, the flat, treeless landscape gave off an exceptional glare in summer when the bright sunlight hit the cornfields, its rays almost blinding the onlooker. Lady Evelyn took charge of the cornfield and, inspired by the wild flowers growing, she scattered poppy and cornflower seeds amongst them. She had such a passion for wild flowers that she would lean out of the carriage all the way down from Victoria and Arundel, throwing seeds out of the window. ‘I’m afraid Walter doesn’t quite approve,’ she told Diana. Given his post as Minister of Agriculture, this was one eccentricity Colonel Guinness could not endorse.
Diana and Bryan often stole away from her nanny and his family and went for walks through the fields or sat on the beach. On one occasion, everyone loaded into chauffeur-driven cars to go on a picnic and when they had reached their chosen spot on the Downs, the drivers stopped to unpack a huge tea, a frying pan, a pat of butter and eggs. Bryan seized the moment and, bursting with pride, he turned to Lady Evelyn and announced, ‘Diana’s so clever, mummy, she can cook!’
‘I can’t really. Only fried eggs. Anybody can do fried eggs,’ Diana modestly replied. This modesty was soon dispelled when Lady Evelyn and the children’s nurses agreed ‘To cook! It was too wonderful.’
Although the Guinness children shared a similar camaraderie to Diana’s younger sisters, their upbringing was strikingly different. Unlike the Mitford children, who were forced to do lessons in the schoolroom at home, Grania, at the age of 8, was not made to adhere to a traditional curriculum of learning due to her ballet lessons. One of her masters had been the great Massine. Diaghilev and all his dancers had been Diana’s childhood heroes and she looked at Grania with a certain level of awe. Murtogh, too, was exceptional in his interests.17 He never attended the picnics nor did he venture outside much, instead he sought refuge in his room, with the blinds drawn against the sunlight, making toy cinemas. Diana marvelled that Murtogh was not ordered outdoors, as her own father would never have tolerated suc
h a thing, but Lady Evelyn did not dream of depriving her children of their whims.
The visit to Bailiffscourt was a resounding success. ‘She’s enough to turn anyone’s head,’ Grania told Bryan. Bryan proudly agreed, and he formed an ally in Lady Evelyn who, won over by Diana’s charm, began to take a favourable view of their wish to marry. Sydney and David did not share Lady Evelyn’s optimism. Soon after her return to Swinbrook, Diana was promptly sent up to Scotland to be received by the Malcolms of Poltalloch, whose third son, Angus, had fallen in love with her.
Diana’s hostess, Lady Malcolm, was reputedly the illegitimate daughter of Prince Louis of Battenberg and Lillie Langtry. Her flamboyance was enough to put Lady Evelyn in the shade; banners hung round the azalea-scented hall in the grand sandstone house on the Mull of Kintyre and bagpipes wailed as the guests dined. Lady Malcolm took an instant shine to Diana; she thought her beautiful, well-mannered and the perfect wife for Angus. Hoping to secure Diana as a daughter-in-law, she encouraged the young people to take evening walks alone in the Scottish hills. Failing to acknowledge the romantic setting or the machinations of her hostess, Diana faithfully corresponded with Bryan, who had ventured to Vienna with Robert Byron to take his mind off her while she was in Scotland.
Bryan responded to Diana’s frequent and detailed letters:
I am green with envy, but not jealousy, I promise you, of Angus. I get really furious when I think of the Clan Malcolm pursuing you, winding smiles around you, stunning you with bagpipe music and then trying to mother and marry you. I suppose one can’t blame them for liking you but how dare Lady M be so forward as to propose to you all helpless and alone under her roof.
Bryan had little to worry about, for Diana rebuffed the proposal.
After visiting Poltalloch, Diana stayed with her fellow debutante and friend, Margaret Mercer-Nairne, at Meikleour. Riding through the fertile countryside while the men were working on the moors, Diana spoke of her wish to marry Bryan. Margaret, who thought of nothing except horses and hunting, agreed, ‘Yes, marry Bryan, and then you can live in Leicestershire and hunt.’ It was the last thing Diana wanted, for she had had enough of country life to last a lifetime. She longed for ‘people, an eternity of talk, books, pictures, music and travel’ – they were her ‘eighteen year old desires’.
When she returned to Swinbrook, Diana told her mother that her mind was made up and that she still wished to marry Bryan. She confided that Lady Evelyn was on their side but, despite her enthusiasm, she could not write to Sydney. ‘I couldn’t dare,’ she had whispered to Diana, when Bryan pressed her to do so. There was only one thing for it. Bryan would have to visit Swinbrook and charm David and Sydney himself.
Diana was eager for Bryan to make a positive impression on her philistine parents, especially her father. She consoled herself with the knowledge that, unlike James Lees-Milne, Bryan lacked a rebellious streak. He would never be outspoken or challenge David’s opinions, and she was certain her parents would judge him likeable.
The girls flitted around Swinbrook, waiting for Bryan’s arrival. He showed up in plain clothing, a gesture that impressed Sydney, for she disapproved of overt displays of wealth. Furthermore, Bryan was self-conscious about his privileged life and often downplayed his status, opting to dress and to live simply. Naive to such grandeur, Diana never assumed his clothing was plain or bohemian. But his clothing did not represent his romantic and cultured frame of mind, and every time he did or said something ‘un-countrified’, Diana glowed with pride and pleasure. She viewed him as the ‘antithesis of a squire’.
The visit was not without its tense moments, provoked by Bryan’s clumsy performance at the breakfast table. He stood, poised at the sideboard, with a plate in one hand, a spoonful of sticky porridge in the other, which he shook violently in an attempt to dislodge it on to his plate, all the time fixing his gaze on Diana as he chatted. David could not tolerate spills of any sort: crumbs on the tablecloth or a spill down the side of the jam jar were enough to cause a furious scene. He thought Bryan a ‘clever cove’ – quite the compliment from David – and owing to such, he suppressed his annoyance by quietly grinding his false teeth and remaining silent for Diana’s sake.
Bryan revelled in the company of the younger children and he enjoyed being part of their lively chatter, the lilting voices of the ‘Mockingbird Mitfords’ merging into one. Diana loved them, too, but she longed to escape. Swinbrook held no charm for her, and it was that very atmosphere which Bryan most enjoyed, though he pressed her with the plea, ‘Do you think we will ever be able to see each other alone? Or will the seminary follow in a crocodile wherever we go?’
When Bryan returned home he was met by an anxious Lady Evelyn, who was eager to hear about his trip to Swinbrook. They went for a walk and Bryan told her it went ‘swimmingly’ and that he saw no cause for Diana’s parents to doubt his intentions. Barely containing her excitement, Lady Evelyn said, ‘I can see no point in your waiting, as you are both absolutely sure of your feelings.’ His mother warned him that ‘people who are in doubt tend to wait for ages’, and since he had no doubt, it seemed useless to waste valuable time. She promised to do all she could to convince Colonel Guinness that the marriage should go ahead.
Having returned from his lengthy voyage to ‘savage lands’, Colonel Guinness’s first priority was to have a long discussion with Bryan. He was not as impulsive as Lady Evelyn, and to judge whether his wife’s eagerness for the marriage was not merely one of her fancies, he decided that Diana should visit their family home, Heath House. In doing so, he could make a sound decision based on fact rather than emotion.
They wasted no time in planning their reunion, and as Diana’s train pulled into Paddington, she spied Bryan waiting on the platform. He was bursting with excitement, although when she disembarked the train his greeting was rigidly polite; he would not have been so bold as to kiss her in broad daylight or in public. In a gallant effort, Bryan shunned the family chauffeur in favour of driving Diana down to Hampstead himself. They arrived to the bizarre sight of Lady Evelyn wandering along the long and winding path, watering can in hand, sprinkling it with milk. Diana’s confusion must have been apparent because Bryan quickly added, ‘Mummy’s encouraging the moss.’
Everything hinged on this visit and Diana was especially nervous to meet Colonel Guinness, who had been absent during her stay at Bailiffscourt. He used the parliamentary recess as an opportunity to escape on his yacht, away from Lady Evelyn and her idiosyncrasies. Colonel Guinness failed to understand his wife’s unique gardening skills, nor did he take any interest in the house – he preferred to talk of politics, people and health. ‘What! No vitamins?’ he barked when Diana politely refused a slice of raw carrot.
Despite his reserved nature, Diana thought Colonel Guinness was kind, but distant. However, and perhaps most importantly, he threw the young couple a lifeline when he offered to write to David. This small gesture was a momentous relief to Diana and Bryan, but as time went on, Colonel Guinness’s attention was spent elsewhere. And, Lady Evelyn, once vocal about the marriage, focused on Christmas shopping, which she started in May. Even though it was still only July, there was, as she warned Diana, only seventy days until the big day.
In the meantime, Bryan spoke of eloping to Gretna Green. This plan soon vanished when he wrote to a parson reputed to be sympathetic to young couples in their position and all they received in a reply was a lecture on self-control. It was as much use as ‘shouting halt at the Falls of Niagara’, Bryan retaliated. Pondering their uncertain future, he suggested they try another method. ‘When you feel most unhappy you must make a point of showing yourself to your father and then you may convince him of how serious we are,’ he urged Diana.
Taking this advice, Diana adopted the practice known in the family as ‘slowly wearing away’. Day after day, she sat in silence, aloof and withdrawn, her face etched with desperation and misery. Nancy remarked on Diana’s sullenness and was met by a defensive – if not witty – rem
ark from one of the younger girls, ‘She’s thinking of how rich she’ll be!’
Remnants of Diana’s past were catching up with her. Randolph, although he had been away at Eton and had not entered her thoughts since Bryan’s arrival on the scene, was about to intrude on her happiness. The unwelcome news of Bryan and Diana’s romance came from Randolph’s sister. Diana Churchill had spotted them together at a Harrow and Eton cricket match and she informed her brother that Bryan had been ‘much catched’ by the object of his boyhood affection. Consumed by rage and jealousy, Randolph was not prepared to allow Bryan to steal Diana before he had a chance to grow up and court her properly. He was always a sore loser and he hatched a plan to separate them before a wedding date was firmly set.
Randolph’s first plan of attack was to bombard both Diana and Bryan with letters, explaining how unsuited they were for one another and that marriage would be an ‘appalling’ mistake. ‘You’ll hate each other in no time,’ he predicted. He also attempted to put Bryan off Diana, warning him that he had known her for many years and that she had been guilty of flirting with other men. She was, Randolph said, possessed by an immoral character. To Diana, Randolph accused Bryan of not being strong enough and that she would do better to wait for him to grow up so they could be together.
Rather than reprimanding Randolph for his meddling ways, Diana laughed it off. This reaction provoked Randolph to write a letter of self-justification. ‘You know I never told Bryan anything about you which anyone could possibly resent … You do not actually see anything WRONG in sin,’ he chastised her.18
Mrs Guinness Page 7
