Towards the end of their stay at Knockmaroon, Lamb painted a life-sized portrait of Bryan, Diana, Jonathan and Pilgrim. It was a prophetic piece, with Diana looking one way and Bryan looking the other. In a poem The Composition by Henry Lamb,27 inspired by the painting, Bryan described Diana as sitting up ‘in wonderment, and listens, watching like a startled doe, to see what next will come …’ With the exception of small disagreements, Bryan had no indication that his lovely young wife was less than enchanted by her gilded life.
As the seasons changed, a dark shadow of grief was cast upon the lives of the carefree Bright Young Things. Days after the gaiety of Guy Fawkes Night, Diana Skeffington – the daughter of Viscount Massereene and his wife, Jean Ainsworth – perished from typhoid at the age of 21. This Diana was a dazzling star on the Mayfair social scene and her striking dark looks were rumoured to have caught the eye of Edward, the Prince of Wales. A few days later, a further blow was delivered when Meriel Lyttleton, daughter of Lord Cobham, had succumbed to meningitis at the age of 19. And, then, Evelyn Colyer, one of ‘The Babes’ who had played at Wimbledon in 1923, died in childbirth.
With little happening on the social scene, Diana and Bryan left for an opulent trip on board the Orient Express for an excursion to Venice, Greece and Constantinople. The trip was unremarkable and, having proclaimed Constantinople as a ‘dying city full of filth and beggars’, Diana was relieved when they boarded the luxurious train for the journey home.
NOTES
26 A letter dated 12 August 1930, The Letters of Lytton Strachey, Paul Levy (ed.).
27 Complete poem printed in Potpourri from the Thirties, Bryan Guinness.
15
THE BLOOMSBURY SET
The unpleasant experience of Knockmaroon did little to diminish Lytton Strachey’s admiration for Diana. The burgeoning friendship was soon revived when she and Bryan accepted an invitation to Ham Spray, Strachey’s country home near Berkshire, which he shared with Dora Carrington. It was the apotheosis of a typical Bloomsbury arrangement, with Carrington’s husband, Ralph Partridge, also residing with his mistress, Frances Marshall. Despite Strachey’s praise for Diana’s charming personality, Ralph and Frances found her blank gaze and affected speech irksome and they privately nicknamed her ‘Dotty Di’.
Diana had never experienced a living arrangement so blatantly unconventional. Carrington seemed content to devote her to life to Strachey and, undeterred by his homosexuality, she viewed their relationship as an unofficial marriage. As she had told James Lees-Milne, Diana held enough contempt towards monogamy to embrace an open mind as far as extra-marital affairs were concerned. But this was quite different to her grasp on what she knew and what she understood. Standing next to Strachey in the window of his library, Diana spied Roger Senhouse crossing the lawn. ‘Almost too charming, don’t you think?’ Strachey inquired in a tone that made Diana realise that Roger was his beloved. Where did Carrington fit in? Diana wondered.
At Knockmaroon, Diana had voiced her keenness to meet Carrington, a request that troubled Strachey. He envisioned Carrington, small and shy, peering through her pale, thick fringe at the statuesque Diana. He need not have worried, for Diana declared: ‘I loved her at first sight!’ To Diana, Carrington resembled a real life Beatrix Potter character in her unfashionable cotton dresses. Her pale skin was sunburnt from her avid interest in gardening and her hands were worn from toiling in the soil ‘working for her beloved Lytton’. Carrington’s entire persona seemed so simplistic, and Diana could not have imagined the complexities that plagued her.
The Bloomsbury set were everything the teenage Diana once held in esteem. Hidden away in the linen closet at Swinbrook, she had pored over their writings, admired their art and read their essays on aesthetic criticism. Regardless of their mutual admiration for one another and the passionate affairs within their exclusive circle, Diana found the Bloomsbury set far more ‘reserved and chilly than most people’. This disenchantment towards her heroes filtered through to their quirks, which she found ridiculous – they refrained from offering a farewell parting, for it offended a Bloomsbury to say goodbye or goodnight. They looked up to Strachey as their perennial master, adopting his speech pattern of emphasising one or two words in a conversation and punctuating their responses with his characteristic, ‘Oh indeed’. They were nothing more than his disciples. Diana also critiqued their style, declaring their clothes dowdy – a stark contrast to their brilliant ideals. She privately decided they were middle class and, therefore, they were dull.
Before Diana and Bryan left Ham Spray, Carrington cooked a rabbit pie for supper. The meal went against Sydney’s Mosaic dietary rules – an extensive list ranging from shellfish to ‘the dirty pig’ – and, as Diana discovered, her mother and Moses were correct. Later in the evening, she fell violently ill and Bryan summoned the doctor, who diagnosed her as suffering from food poisoning. An odd diagnoses, for nobody else fell ill. He injected Diana with a strong sedative and when she awoke the party had left, all except Carrington, who remained her faithful nursemaid. When she recovered, she worried about the impression she had left on Strachey; she feared the disastrous beginning at Knockmaroon and her illness had conspired to portray her in an unfavourable light.
As a consolation for interrupting the weekend party at Ham Spray, Diana invited Strachey to dinner at Buckingham Street. It was a calculated approach, for Diana was certain she could restore Strachey’s confidence in her by introducing him to Harold Acton, whom she ‘revered as well as loved’. But Strachey was not impressed: ‘A rather dreary dinner,’ he confided to Carrington.
The dreariness soon turned into dread when Diana suggested they all attend a party given by ‘Ma and Pa Redesdale’ at Rutland Gate. Strachey felt intimidated by David and Sydney. Perhaps the inconvenience of having their home overrun by their offspring’s pleasure-loving friends presented them as standoffish. Nancy and her fictitious fiancé, Hamish St Claire Erskine, were in attendance. Strachey had previously met her at Knockmaroon and found her amusing, but his opinion of her suitor was less than flattering – ‘A tart,’ he wrote to Carrington.28 Surprisingly, he found the mood of the party quite informal, ‘like a choice flower bed – each tulip standing separately, elegant and gay … Tom Mit[ford] was undoubtedly the beau, the fine fleur of the ball.’ The high point of the party, for Strachey, was his introduction to Tom, and his romantic nature was quite ‘shattered by his charm and beauty’.
When Diana and Bryan were not travelling or visiting friends in the countryside, she found herself alone throughout the day. It was a freedom she had become used to, and Bryan’s presence around the home and in her company began to feel intrusive and irritating. She had established a carefree routine of trips to art galleries, afternoon shopping sprees and taking tea at the Ritz. Following Bryan’s announcement of his intention to quit the Bar, her exhilarating spell of independence dangled precariously before her. When Diana questioned his motives, she learned of the discouraging and fateful exchange that had taken place:
‘I’m afraid you’ll never get any briefs,’ a fellow barrister told Bryan.
‘Why not?’ asked Bryan.
‘Well, because when there’s a brief going for one of us the clerk always gives it to me. He says Mr Guinness doesn’t need the three guineas.’
It was a jolt of reality for Bryan, who had little interest in commercial law, and he came up with a variety of feeble excuses to address his disinterest in his chosen profession. One excuse was that his wig gave him headaches. So, without a backward glance, he quit the Bar. Bryan longed to spend his every waking moment with Diana, and he viewed the Bar as something that stood in the way of him fulfilling this ambition.
Far from being thrilled at his announcement, she viewed it as another upheaval in her life. And, after Christmas, Diana had another unwelcome discovery. She was pregnant again. Bryan was ecstatic, and, to compensate for her negative response, she put his mind at ease and agreed that a second child was, indeed, a much wanted additio
n to their family. ‘But,’ as she hastened to add, ‘just not then.’29
NOTES
28 The scene was related in a letter to Carrington, dated 28 May 1930, The Letters of Lytton Strachey, Paul Levy (ed.).
29 Diana told her second son, Desmond Guinness: ‘Of course we’d have had you one day, darling, but just not then.’ Diana Mosley, Anne de Courcy.
16
THE HAPPY FOURSOME
As Diana’s pregnancy advanced, she busied herself with the renovation of their new country house, Biddesden. Although since her marriage she had become accustomed to living in beautiful and comfortable surroundings, she could not muster the same levels of enthusiasm as Bryan. Owing to the arrival of the baby and feeling exasperated by its disruption in her life, Diana put on a placid front and tried in vain to enjoy the summer. But the heat, combined with the impending confinement, weighed heavily on her mood. Bryan wanted to postpone his trip to Europe, but Diana urged him to go. In truth, she longed for the respite, as since giving up the Bar his constant attention had become unbearable.
With Bryan gone, Diana luxuriated in the joy of the new house; the furniture, paintings and décor were all selected by her. Though, in the evenings, Diana felt an uneasy presence filling the room. A superstitious undertone loomed over Biddesden, a familiar relic from her childhood at Asthall Manor, where it was believed a poltergeist had forced David to sell the property. This ghostly apparition was in the form of a vast painting of General Webb on his battle charger. The portrait came with the house and if it was moved General Webb’s ghost was said to ride up and down the staircase, making the house uninhabitable until it was put back where it belonged.
Diana, who had not forgotten her vision at the age of 6 in the garden of Batsford Park, wondered if there was an ounce of truth in the tale. The haunting played on her mind as she lay in her four-poster bed adorned with oyster satin curtains and lined with Prince of Wales feathers. Her eyes fixed on the five long windows looking out at the darkened view, she was too afraid to sleep because she was convinced she heard footsteps on the stones outside. Lytton Strachey eventually cured Diana of her night terrors. ‘I had hoped,’ he said, as he raised both hands to display astonishment, ‘that the age of reason had dawned.’ She pondered Strachey’s remark and on the surface she agreed with him, but inside she remained unconvinced.
Pamela Mitford visited from Swinbrook and her presence at Biddesden allayed Bryan’s concerns at leaving Diana behind on his European trip. Self-taught in the art of running a house, and with a knowledge of animals and the land, Pamela seemed the perfect person to manage the 200-acre farm at Biddesden. If her evenings were free she dined with Diana, and she became friendly with the set who visited the house. Out of the diverse group of artists and aristocrats, it was the poet John Betjeman who gravitated towards Pamela. Theirs was a placid friendship away from the chaotic chatter of Diana and Bryan’s friends, but Betjeman mistook Pamela’s kindness for love and he proposed. ‘I rather turned him down,’ she said.
Betjeman charmed Diana and, having made no attempt to conceal that his father was in trade, his writer’s imagination relayed to her the descriptions of his family to such an extent that she wanted to know what they were really like. An opportunity presented itself, when among Diana’s wedding presents was an onyx cigarette box made by Betjeman & Sons. Taking a screwdriver, she removed one of its hinges and went along to 36 Pentonville Road, asking if it was possible to have it repaired. The clerk to whom she spoke said he would fetch ‘Mr Ernest’. Betjeman’s father, Ernest, appeared and treated Diana with the utmost courtesy, thinking her just another upper-class customer. After going along with the charade, she slithered away, feeling ashamed for having spied on Betjeman’s family.
Having spent a considerable amount of time at Biddesden, the haunting of General Webb was also felt by Pamela, who claimed she had encountered his ghost one evening when Diana and Bryan had gone up to London. Given her status as farm manager – miraculously during an agricultural slump she managed to turn over a small profit – Pamela had been allotted the small cottage on the grounds of Biddesden as her home. While the cottage was being renovated, she stayed in the main house, sleeping in a bedroom above a two storey-high hall overlooking the driveway.
At two o’clock in the morning, after the household staff had retired to their quarters, Pamela let the dogs out for a run. On the lawn, they became startled and bolted into the house, emitting piercing howls. Although shaken from the shrill, unexpected noise, she left Diana’s dog downstairs and took Bryan’s dachshund upstairs with her. It was in her bedroom that Pamela became aware of an unseen presence. She felt it watching her and hovering over her from behind the bed. She stayed awake until morning, relating her experience when she said: ‘The ghost never left me. I lay rigid, with the dog shivering in its basket. It was the other side of the room, but it shook so much you could feel the vibrations through the floorboards.’30
John Betjeman also experienced a terrifying incident at Biddesden, when one night he dreamt that he was handed a card with wide black edges and on it his name and a date were engraved. He knew it was the date of his death. Throughout the years, several guests verified the haunting of General Webb, and those disturbed by its manifestation never stayed at Biddesden again.
Ham Spray, a mere 12 miles away from Biddesden, allowed Carrington to motor over at a moment’s notice. Diana imagined she knew Carrington intimately, but she soon discovered this to be an illusion. Shy, sweet Carrington had concealed from Diana the fact that she maintained a number of lovers, but regardless of her promiscuity, Strachey remained the star of her life. Flattery, Diana learned, was a powerful weapon which Carrington used with an unusual skill. With the constant storm of jealously that prevailed at Ham Spray, she was able to remain calm despite the currents of bitterness.
‘The Happy Foursome’, was, in truth, anything but happy. With her comings and goings from London, Diana was largely sheltered from the more sordid elements which lurked beneath the surface at Ham Spray. She learned that Carrington had only agreed to marry her husband a decade earlier to keep the ménage à trois together. Strachey even accompanied them on their honeymoon to Venice.
Shortly after the marriage, Carrington met Bernard ‘Beakus’ Penrose and began an affair with him but, as always, her love for Strachey prevented her from committing to Penrose. When she became pregnant with Penrose’s child, Carrington aborted the pregnancy and ended the affair.
Further pulled into the murkiness of Carrington’s secret life, one of her great friends Phyllis de Janzé, with whom she attended the Slade School, had begun to confide in Diana. Collecting men as though they were charms, she had abandoned her French husband for a succession of lovers. Referring to her bedroom as ‘the office’, Phyllis entertained the men at her small house on Chapel Street. But more than anything, Phyllis sought a rich protector to relieve her of her genteel poverty.
In comparison to her contemporaries, Diana lived a life they could only dream of, but when drawing on her experiences against Carrington and Phyllis, she began to feel as though she hadn’t lived at all. She was further impressed by Phyllis’s perseverance; her beauty and charm eventually won her the admiration of a very rich man.
It seemed to Diana that if Phyllis, a mere shadow in her life, could confide in her, then so could Carrington. As Carrington failed to divulge her secrets, Diana merely assumed she had none to tell. Still, a small voice warned her that all was not as it seemed. Brushing doubt aside, she focused on the attributes which had attracted her to Carrington in the first place. Above all else, Diana valued nonconformity, and there was no denying that Carrington embraced this attitude in her private life, as well as in her artistry. As a token of their friendship, Carrington gave Diana and Bryan many pieces of her artwork; flower pictures modelled out of crumpled silver paper and a rococo fantasy of shells, mounted on a wooden board taken from a sewing machine.
It was nothing short of a tragedy, Diana thought, that Carri
ngton placed Strachey and his needs before her own and, as such, a painting would go unfinished or a fleeting creative idea might be abandoned altogether. She was like a bird singing, all too easily interrupted.31
NOTES
30 As told to Anne de Courcy, author of Diana Mosley.
31 A Life of Contrasts, Diana Mosley.
17
LIFE AND DEATH
Without the intimacy of her friendship with Evelyn Waugh, Diana was more active during her second pregnancy. As September approached, Diana and Bryan departed Biddesden for Buckingham Street, where she awaited the birth of her baby. She went to the theatre almost every night and one of the plays which captured her attention was The Front Page. So engrossed with the play, Diana decided to ignore the twinges of labour so that she could stay for the final act. In the early hours of the next morning, on 8 September 1931, she gave birth to a second son.
‘Clever’ was the chosen adjective bestowed on Diana after the birth – ‘Aren’t you clever?’ her friends remarked when they learned she had produced another healthy son. She made no secret of her frustration – not that she minded the baby, Diana loved her babies – it was the confinement that bored her. Furthermore, she was increasingly irritated by Bryan’s incessant fawning over her. He imagined Diana would have more children, as soon as possible. Wouldn’t she like a daughter? He, and others, questioned.
For Diana, the answer was no. Given her statuesque height of 5ft 10in and Bryan’s towering frame, she realised any daughters that might be born to her would have to rely on their physical attractiveness to advance in life. Height, Diana realised, could also be a hindrance should they lack in the looks department. Her mind drew on Unity’s imposing physique and, as such, Diana knew they would be at a pathetic disadvantage.
Lytton Strachey was the first of Diana’s friends to arrive, making it clear that he came to see her and not the baby. ‘Take the baby to your room,’ she ordered the monthly nurse, ‘Mr Strachey can’t bear newborn babies.’ Diana remembered his grimace upon seeing a photograph in The Tatler of her holding baby Jonathan in her arms.
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