2 August
I’m sorry there’s no other ink to write with but I must write. I could never sleep after reading what I’ve read.
Lavender is dead. Dead. It happened last Saturday evening so the paper said, at Brooklands. I shall keep that cutting and the last photo I shall ever have of her.5 Lavender – I must have really cared an awful lot because I’m feeling mighty sick. But I bet Mr Cyril Bone’s feeling worse, if he can feel at all. I can’t send you anything for your grave because I don’t know where to send it, but I shall never forget you. And somehow I’m glad you didn’t live to get old and ugly, but died still lovely: ‘Whom the gods love die young’. Yet it’s awful to think you had no time to say goodbye. No one will know how much I really cared.
Sunday, 8 August
Next school year I’ve got to work like blazes for the General Schools examination in June. Everyone is so discouraging at school. That old beast Miss Pilcher informed me quite cheerfully the last day at lunch that I had no earthly for Schools next year. But Miss P. we shall see. Of course it’s absolutely idiotic of her to say that, as I feel inclined to say, ‘Well seeing as I’m not going to pass, and you seem so sure of it, why should I bother to work this year at all?’ I wish I’d thought of it at the time.
As to J.R. – she was six weeks in the sicker, poor kid, with a poisoned foot, and life was extraordinarily dull while she was there. We were socially poles apart – not even in the same cloakroom. But I think she knows I rather like her, and anyway I’ve caught her looking at me more than once. She is seen at her best in a tennis match. She’s younger than I am, but when I see her playing and forgetful of everything else there is no sweeter sight on earth.
The day after I came back from school we went up the High Street and I got the simply rippingest things.
| I. | Fawn tailor-made coat – stunning affair that matches hat, stockings and several things I already possess. |
| II. | Cotton voile frock. White with patterns of yellow roses round the navy neck and sleeves (am going to wear it this afternoon). |
| III. | Stumpy umbrella, black and white, carved handle, birthday present from Ethel in advance. Topping one. |
| IV. | Fawn gloves. |
| V. | Cream pair silk stockings – unfortunately wore them for tennis yesterday and made irrevocable ladders. |
Oh dear, I do love clothes and making myself look nice. It really makes life worth living, but Ethel laughs at me. I’m getting frightfully conceited, and I really wish I was slimmer. But sometimes I think my legs and ankles aren’t really such a bad shape in silk stockings, and I’m beginning to wonder if it’s purely imagination or are my eyes really quite a nice blue on occasions and sometimes quite big? I know I’ve got quite a nice mouth – I was told so once at school in ‘Truths’. They thought it was my best feature. I overheard Mrs White say that she thought I’d got lovely skin, but I really do not like my complexion. My nails are something appalling and my hips really are too big. In fact I am big – horribly large – and ‘well covered’ as Ethel puts it, or ‘stout’ as Mrs White said. It’s been a foregone conclusion from the days of my earliest childhood that I’ve got pretty hair, but I really am beginning to just loathe frizziness and it’s getting a really most uninteresting colour, and much thinner since I had dip. And then I wear glasses – that always puts people off a bit!
I was staying with Margaret, and she’s got hold of two awfully nice boys who half-promised they’d come to the cinema with us. When she told them I wore glasses they began to kick horribly. But she told them I smoked and liked funny stories (the kind you’re not supposed to hear), so they thought I’d be all right after all. But there was some difficulty about another girl and they couldn’t come after all. I loathe being thought a prig.
Wednesday, 1 September
Mullion again and the clear sea air!
On Monday we started at a quarter to nine from our house. Ethel and I were so tightly packed into the car, and so surrounded by ‘impedimenta’ we didn’t quite know where we began or ended. We met Uncle Charlie and Auntie Ruth on Ealing Common at 9 a.m., and after that we couldn’t get the car started, but at last with Harold’s help we were off. On the Bath Road Daddy decided the oil gauge wasn’t behaving properly so he hailed an AA man and they spent half an hour fooling with that. We went to Andover for lunch, and Ethel, Daddy and Uncle all slept afterwards in the lounge upstairs – the three beauties – until the maid floated in loudly and woke them with a start.
Sunday, 5 September
Leslie is coming on Tuesday! Not next month or next week, but Tuesday. I’m getting just a little nervous. Will he have altered too much? Does he want to see me as much as I want to see him? How will he get on with Ethel?
Monday, 6 September
Tomorrow morning at 6.30 Daddy and I go to Helston. Leslie. I mustn’t forget to brush my hair well. What shall I wear tomorrow? Oh Leslie, just one wild beautiful fortnight and then school and hard work. I mustn’t make a sound tomorrow morning …
Thursday, 9 September
It’s 10.45 p.m. and everyone but me is getting into bed. Writing by candlelight. Tonight let us deal with the biggest subject I have in my life at the moment: my brother. A tall brown man who is at once so very familiar and yet such an utter stranger. I think he feels just as shy at having to deal with a growing-up younger sister as I am at having this manly yet very brotherly brother. He is not used to England yet after three years in the wilds of Brazil. He has the most extraordinary eyes – grey-green, a little piercing, honest eyes.
All the same, it doesn’t seem so wonderful – the anticipation was far sweeter than the realisation. It usually is, but it wasn’t his or anybody else’s fault. I had anticipated too much. After all the excitement was over on Tuesday I was worn out and dead tired and disappointed. I somehow felt he found I wasn’t quite what he expected. I cried after I’d blown the candle out. Sometimes you have to. I would never cry in front of anyone if I could help it. But in the dark, just sometimes.
Saturday, 11 September
Yesterday morning a film company came down to the Cove with all their paraphernalia. Most thrilling. They were having a sort of picnic when we left for our lunch, and Geoff and I bolted our food to come down again to the Cove as early as we could. They had collected on the rocks just below the Mullion Hotel, and we clambered up the cliffs and got a topping perch. There were at least a dozen of them.
The heroine, one of those pretty fluffy little creatures with a child’s figure, a springy walk and an American accent – she was wearing an orange cap with a long silk tassel over one shoulder, a blue Eton sweater and a green skirt with white shoes and stockings. And her hair was very, very fair and fluffy – suspiciously fair.
The hero – I should think he was an Italian – anyway, something foreign – very tall and slim, black hair just going grey, quite good-looking with clean-cut features and very even teeth. He was dressed as a sailor in long dark blue trousers and a queerly worked belt in gold and black. We discovered today that he is Carlyle Blackwell and the girl Flora le Breton.6
Well they didn’t do much yesterday afternoon. It was a dull, heavy day
