Tuesday 14 October Darling, the little ‘indecent exposure’ boy has been allowed to resign & he has written in thanking Mr Crotch and promising to ‘turn over a new leaf’. ‘I only hope it isn’t a fig-leaf!’ was Mr Crotch’s comment when I took the letter into him.
Wednesday 22 October Darling, did Aubrey tell you that the Intelligence Corps no longer wear the General Service Badge but that they now have the Rose of Lancaster propped up against two wreathes? This badge is always referred to by the officers of Tougher Units as ‘a pansy resting on its laurels’.
I telephoned Nita last night and I’m going to tea at the Hill on Sunday. You must meet Lord Inverforth later on, darling. He’s a very kind, unaffected and dignified old man, and he has all the tough acumen of the Scot.
Frabjous cheer, my love. Sir Edward Wilshaw8 says he’ll give us lunch and show us over Electra House when you’re next in London. (He says he didn’t ort because the Secrets of Electra House are closely guarded – but he will – Pa promised that we would refrain from Telling All afterwards!) Oh! I’m so glad, darling – I was timid of asking Sir Edward myself, but Pa has aplomb enough for 10 which is useful of him. Now you’ll be able to tell the Chief Engineer and the Cornish Bard and the Super-Technicians and the man who warned you against a Clever Solace – that you’ll probably be lunching with the Chairman of Cable & Wireless a fortnight come Saturday.
I am looking forward to seeing Leslie again tomorrow evening, darling. Last time I saw him he was stretched out between primrose-yellow sheets – and Languishing – and Loving It.
Darling, when addressing Nellie’s letter, don’t forget that she’s ‘The Hon.’, will you?
Joan had a stimulating day looking over tramp steamers, darling. She swep’ a Naval Captain off his feet – so that he outpoured a Passionate Declaration in a Bombed Warehouse. She was enchanted. I’m not surprised Ian is a little Anxious about her. She’s a susceptible Cluck.
Darling, I’m neglecting my work for my love – that is why women are No Good in a man’s job – I’ve had occasion to talk of the Struggle between the Personal & the Ethical before, I think.
Friday 24 October Leslie didn’t come to dinner after all – He was suddenly Summoned to Conclave by Marghesson9 (can’t spell him) but he arrived at 11.30 (after we’d all gone to bed) and getting no Change out of the door-knocker he went to a nearby telephone box and woke my parents up. He was talking to Pa until 12.30 – but I slept through it all and knew nothing of it until the morning. Sigmund was very amusing about the Beaverbrook–Stalin meeting.10 He says Beaverbrook ordered everyone to Memorize their documents & leave them on board ship for fear of spies – but everybody cheated and made notes in their diaries. Then he was convinced that all the rooms would be full of microphones – so he ordered a huge Radiogram, and whenever he Called a Conference he turned it on full blast and all the delegates handed round notes! A sort of ’igh-class game of Up-Jenkins, darling.
Darling, do you know much about Mental Ages? We were discussing them at the meeting yesterday in connection with reassessment of salaries. Mr Crotch wanted to apply a ‘rule of thumb’ – DMO11 said he thought people ought to be assessed on their Mental Ages. Mr Crotch says, in the last war, they tested the American Army and found that their average mental age was 8 something. A great Blow to everybody.
How do you determine a person’s mental age, darling? Surely by their power of understanding increasingly complex intellectual problems. When I first went up to Cambridge at 19, I wasn’t able to understand Eliot – but in my third year, I could understand Eliot and Joyce. Surely this means that I was older mentally at 21 than I was at 19? Mr Crotch says no, that I had simply acquired more background. Where do you draw the line between increased background and increased intellectual understanding, dear? A person can surely read 100 books relevant to the understanding of Eliot and still not understand him, whereas another can read 50, and see him All as a Pattern. I agree that I am not mentally older than I was at 15 just because then I tried to argue with my parents on matters where we have no point of contact, whereas now I say nothing because I have learnt by experience that it will do no good – but I think I am mentally older than I was at 15 because then I only understood a very limited number of books, and now I understand a much less limited number. Oh! darling, what a clumsy exposé. My mental age doesn’t seem to be showing up too well at the moment!
Sunday 26 October Joan had arranged to go to Limpsfield for the weekend, darling, and she went to bed early on Friday evening. Pa trapped me in the dining-room and gave me a Histrionic Harangue – which was a fantastic mixture of maudlin sentimentality and brutal indictment on Joan’s relationship with Don Sims. He Declared his Intention of Saving Her from Herself – he said naively that he’d noticed that she was Losing Interest in Him (Pa) lately, which was a Bad Sign and showed a marked lack of Balance – and added that he was horrified at these ‘weekend rendezvous’. He held me with his glittering eye, darling, and I wriggled like a beetle on the end of a pin.
In the morning, after I’d gone to work, Joan was given an expanded version of the tale I’d heard – and now she’s quite haggard with anxiety and distress. Pa expressed Disappointment at Joan’s arrangements for the weekend when it was probably his last in London. So Joan didn’t go to Limpsfield – and my parents went to the Davies’ after lunch yesterday and got home at 11.30 at night – and today they’ve gone to Oxford & they’ll be back in time for dinner.
Darling, I’m sizzling with anger. Why the hell can’t Pa keep his tentacles off Joan? She’s unhappy enough as it is. I am anxious about Joan’s relationship with Mr Sims, only because I think he’s going to complicate things with Ian when he comes back, and because I don’t understand it – but Pa takes much the same view of it as he did of Uncle Emile’s songster. Darling, he doesn’t know about people being happier if they’re allowed to make their own mistakes. Uncle Emile, for instance, was the kind of man who wanted an experienced woman for his bed. He also wanted to keep his illusions about her. Pa destroyed his illusions about the Singer from Rome – so he married another experienced woman – and a much more dangerous kind of bitch she was too. Darling, I’m so unhappy about Joan, I’m quite incoherent. She’s being subjected to the same kind of Hell as I was when I wanted to go to Blackpool, except that the stakes are not nearly as high – but the indignity and the distortion are there in equal measure. N’en parlons plus.
Victor and I talked of love in the evening. He said that the trouble with most men between 20 and 25 was that they were sexually restless and looked about for a satisfying bedfellow. When they found her, they became disappointed and disillusioned because only one-tenth of their personality was engaged in the relationship and satisfied by it. The right approach, he thought, would be to look for a companion, in the wider sense, and to fall in love with her naturally and gradually. He said he had always become violently excited over an attractive woman – and expected a great deal – and had found – nothing. He wants the same things from love as I do, darling – Emotional Comfort and rest – and the delight of sharing friends and pleasures. He said he’d never known me so much at peace. Oh! my darling, I have everything I want from love. Are you satisfied too? He told me about the girl at Oxford and the divorced woman in S. Africa – and he said that as soon as he became a normal human being again with a future and an anchorage, he was going to look for the things I had found.
Darling, I wish I could make Joan happy. Yesterday afternoon the Nautical Surveyor who had showed her over the ships on Tuesday, cornered her in the Ministry of War Transport and asked her to Live in Sin with him. Life is full of complications – but the trouble with Joan is that she can’t be sexually neutral with men, as I am with all men but you.
I’m going to tea with Lord Inverforth this afternoon. I hope I shall be able to talk of you and arrange for us to go to the Hill together one afternoon.
Monday 27 October I had a quiet afternoon at the Hi
ll – Lord Inverforth was very Dour about us. You see, darling, he has spent his life successfully preventing Nita from getting married because he couldn’t bear to part with her – and, although she’s 50 now, when I told him that I was going to be engaged, he gave her a Repressive, Cautionary look and said: ‘A Woman’s troubles Begin with Marriage.’ It was really very funny, my love.
Tuesday 28 October Oh! woe. The Powers can’t manage a ’plane for Pa – so he’ll have to go in a convoy to Takoradi12 and fly from there. He’s in an appalling state of nervous excitement – and my mother is in a perpetual state of suppressed cluck – so the atmosphere at home is not exactly restful – particularly as Nurse, for some unknown reason, is in a foul temper and does nothing but snap at Joan & me from evening till night – of course, Joan’s mood of Stygian Gloom doesn’t help much, darling.
I had a letter from Sheila yesterday. I told you, didn’t I, dear, that the CR don’t think her ‘suitable’ for an Assistant Principal’s job? Well, it’s their loss. She’s going in to the WAAF on Friday morning at 7 a.m. She’s going to telephone Joan & me on Thursday evening – which will be her last Gesture as a free woman, she says. Hamish was in Edinburgh on leave last week. Sheila says the atmosphere of strain and tragedy surrounding him and Charlotte is oppressive – Poor Charlotte, darling. Thank God for your eyes.
You know, my love, my father is growing really fond of you. He said, with Genuine feeling, yesterday that it would make him very proud and happy if you were to get your Commission before he left England. I wish he weren’t so erratic emotionally. There are times when I hate him and times when I’m quite honestly fond of him. But he has an extraordinary power of making other people unhappy from the best motives in the world.
Wednesday 29 October Darling, today is Joan’s birthday and she’s having a lunch party at ‘À la Brache’ for my parents and me. Last night she had a letter from Ian in reply to her telegram. He said that he wasn’t prepared to commit himself in any way – that he didn’t want to be tied until his future was assured, and that he wasn’t sure that she was the best person to help him in his career. He would, however, always be her friend etc. Darling, why do men always imagine that it will be a comfort to a woman to know that the man she loves will ‘always be her friend?’ It’s a Glaring Error, my love. Poor Joan, she looks so pale and ill – I feel so hopelessly inadequate – I can only sit and make small sorrow noises. Pa’s reaction was typical. After Joan had told me what was in her letter, I went downstairs and warned my parents not to ask her what Ian had said. Pa looked very concerned, and his eye roved about the room seeking a solution. Then he clutched his brow and said: ‘Danby!13 She must meet Danby.’ It was wonderful – in the midst of all my distress I went away and laughed & laughed and laughed.
Saturday 1 November David & Victor shall meet, darling – but they don’t really like one another you know. Victor thinks exactly the same about David as Aubrey does. You know, too solemn, too dogmatic – which shows that they don’t really know him at all.
Sunday 2 November Pa is leaving London on Wednesday. We know his sailing date, but it mustn’t go down on paper, darling. He’s going by sea to Takoradi and thence by air to Khartoum and Cairo.
Darling, Nurse is very tiresome. She keeps making two-edged remarks about Joan and my looks. Mr Sims and Mr Blair gave Joan a white Fox fur from Spitzbergen – and Nurse said: ‘But you can’t wear a fox fur. You’re not the type.’ (Preening herself Kittenishly – She obviously thinks she is the type.) ‘You never go anywhere where it would be suitable to wear foxes.’ (A palpable lie, darling.) And she keeps thrusting her wretched child under my nose. ‘You haven’t been in to see my baby for days,’ she says, which makes me Truculently determined never to go and see it. After all, darling, I think you are the First Wonder of the Western World – but I don’t tickle you under the chin in front of callers and say ‘Isn’t he sweet?’ and ‘Don’t you love the way he enjoys his food?’ Last night, when Joan and I came up to bed, the baby was yelling lustily – Nurse followed us up and said querulously, ‘You’ve woken my baby.’ – which irritated me more than somewhat – first, because we hadn’t and secondly because she was going to wake it herself to give it its evening meal. ‘I’m going to debunk that baby if it’s the last thing I do,’ I said to Joan with suppressed fury, and Nurse heard Joan laughing, and came out of her room & attacked Joan virulently for laughing at her baby! Poor Joan. Darling, I’m sorry, but I’m irritated beyond endurance by people who go all starry-eyed over babies, just because they are babies. It’s much the same sort of attitude as Nellie has towards her dogs – Fantastic – It’s not that I don’t like some babies, darling. I thought David Turner was a most entertaining child – (and he was only a year old when I first met him) but I don’t like all of them, any more than I like all dogs or all adults or all dresses or even all vinaigrettes. D’ye get the point, my love? Nurse’s baby may turn out all Right, but at the moment he is just an ecstatic bottle-sucker with a face as round and bloated as the moon.
Darling, I must leave you to finish ‘The Psychology of the Interview’, ‘Getting Things Done in Business’, ‘How to File and Index’, and ‘The Psychology of Selecting Employees’. My God! Who’d be a Civil Servant.
Thursday 4 November Mr Danby is a nice little man, darling – A little mimsy, but definitely intelligent in an unobtrusive way. He came to supper on his bicycle! At 10.45 he got up timidly, fluttered a vague hand and said: ‘Well I must be pedalling away.’ Darling, it’s odd how many different ways different people have of doing the same thing. There’s the Mistress of Girton and her Black Charger approach to the bicycle – Bernard Waley-Cohen, and his self-conscious, Hearty attitude – and Mr Danby, who treats his bicycle as though it were meditation or the wings of thought or of poesy – Definitely a whimsy, thistledown approach. I must write a book about it.
Monday 10 November My mother brought Nurse’s baby in before lunch and put it on my bed. It wriggled and gurgled and clawed at my hair, and smiled quite winningly at me. Mrs Greenberg came in, having been bidden to lunch – She was no end took aback – to find me in bed – with a baby beside me! Darling, I have a feeling I’d be quite pleased to have a nice baby – provided it was a very clever baby – and how could it help it, my dear love, if it belonged to us?
Darling, I did have a happy weekend. Each time we’re together I feel more and more safe and comforted. I never believed it was possible to be so rested and so happy. Thank you, my very dear love.
Tuesday 11 November We had a bit of an Alarum yesterday. Jean was operated on suddenly for Appendicitis and my mother and Aunt Teddy Shot Off to St Mary’s Hospital in Haste and Confusion. She’s doing nicely. I’m all in favour of appendicitis, darling – Lots of Flowers and Attention and Cosseting and very little pain. The most comfortable illness I ever had.
Darling, there’s no doubt about it that Nurse carries Mother Love a bit too far. Yesterday evening she left her baby, naked from the waist down in my arm chair. ‘Don’t worry if he suddenly Spurts a Fountain on to the chair,’ she said. ‘Don’t worry?’ I said indignantly. ‘All over my only arm chair?’ ‘Oh! well,’ she answered. ‘Why should you worry? It will be beautifully fresh and clean.’ Well, darling, there was I, Speechless. However, nothing happened so I didn’t labour the point when she came back into the room.
But, emphatically, there should be limits to Maternal Devotion. There’s one thing about Ismay’s baby, my love. With its heredity, it will never perpetrate an anti-social act of that kind. Such a thing couldn’t be contemplated.
Friday 14 November Aubrey rang up last night, darling – he’s in London for a week on Dark Affairs and he’s bidden me to lunch with him today at Simpson’s. Isn’t it odd, darling, how one doesn’t go to a place for years, and then, quite accidentally, one keeps going back to it? The last time but two that I was at Simpson’s, my host (I think it was Horace, but I’m not absolutely sure) leant across the table (It was at the time of the Du
ke of Windsor’s marriage and abdication – yes, I’m sure it was Horace) and asked me if I knew that Simpson’s was now known in the City as the Kingsway Inn.
Darling, the Government says Pulp your Love-Letters for Shell-caps. I sometimes think that wars have a shattering effect on people’s sense of proportion. Please don’t have mine pulped, darling. I hate to think of my verbal mollocks hitting a German a-midriff – It would be like kissing a Strange Man. Have you read the Whimsy Times leader on the pulping of letters? It is silly sooth – Take no account on’t.
You know, darling, I think, if it can be managed before Aubrey goes abroad, you and he and Joyce and I ought to have an evening’s outing together.
Darling, Aubrey was in Civilian Clothes and thrice his Old Self, if not more so. He’s writing a history of Syria in his spare time which is 24 hours a day. He finds Oxford Dreamy & Commercial – and he finds the Nathans terrifying in their Hearty Brutality. ‘Lord Nathan gives me whisky without water & then stands and watches me squirm.’ He’s all in favour of an outing à quatre before he leaves – I didn’t suggest any Destination as I wanted to hear your views first, my love. He says Bernard Lewis is at Station X. How inevitable, darling – Everybody ends up there. I rather wish I’d taken the job that was offered to me there – then you could have Moved to Y Sigs. Oh! My dear love, what a Solace that would have been.
Sunday 16 November I’m going to be a Sister of Mercy, not to say a Little Ray of Sunshine today, my dear love. As soon as I can Bring Myself to get up, I shall wait upon Jean at St Mary’s Hospital – (appendicitis). Thereafter I shall call on Ellis at St James’s Court (Septicaemia, poor soul, but he’s out of danger now). Then I shall have tea (without bread & butter) with Joyce at Wilton Crescent (broken foot).
Love in the Blitz Page 26
