of Bhopal, and scenery in the Lake Country.
At twenty minutes to seven, our Vicar's wife is again shocked, and rushes out of the house. She meets Robert on the doorstep and stops to tell him that I am as thin as a rake, and a very bad colour, and the eyes, after measles, often give rise to serious trouble. Robert, so far as I can hear, makes no answer to any of it, and our Vicar's wife finally departs.
(Query here suggests itself: Is not silence frequently more efficacious than the utmost eloquence? Answer probably yes. Must try to remember this more often than I do.)
Second post brings a long letter from Mademoiselle, recuperating with friends at Clacton-on-Sea, written, apparently, with a pin point dipped in violet ink on thinnest imaginable paper, and crossed in every direction. Decipher portions of it with great difficulty, but am relieved to find that I am still "Bien-chère Madame" and that recent mysterious affront has been condoned.
(Mem.: If Cook sends up jelly even once again, as being suitable diet for convalescence, shall send it straight back to the kitchen.)
May 16th.—But for disappointing children, should be much tempted to abandon scheme for my complete restoration to health at Bude. Weather icy cold, self feeble and more than inclined to feverishness, and Mademoiselle, who was to have come with me, and helped with children, now writes that she is désolée, but has developed une angine. Do not know what this is, and have alarming thoughts about Angina Pectoris, but dictionary reassures me. I say to Robert: "After all, shouldn't I get well just as quickly at home?" He replies briefly: "Better go," and I perceive that his mind is made up. After a moment he suggests—but without real conviction—that I might like to invite our Vicar's wife to come with me. I reply with a look only, and suggestion falls to the ground.
A letter from Lady B. saying that she has only just heard about measles—(Why only just, when news has been all over parish for weeks?) and is so sorry, especially as measles are no joke at my age—(Can she be in league with Doctor, who also used identical objectionable expression?).—She cannot come herself to enquire, as with so many visitors always coming and going it wouldn't be wise, but if I want anything from the House, I am to telephone without hesitation. She has given "her people" orders that anything I ask for is to be sent up. Have a very good mind to telephone and ask for a pound of tea and Lady B.'s pearl necklace—(Could Cleopatra be quoted as precedent here?)—and see what happens.
Further demand for the Rates arrives, and Cook sends up jelly once more for lunch. I offer it to Helen Wills, who gives one heave, and turns away. Feel that this would more than justify me in sending down entire dish untouched, but Cook will certainly give notice if I do, and cannot face possibility. Interesting to note that although by this time all Cook's jellies take away at sight what appetite measles have left me, am more wholly revolted by emerald green variety than by yellow or red. Should like to work out possible Freudian significance of this, but find myself unable to concentrate.
Go to sleep in the afternoon, and awake sufficiently restored to do what I have long contemplated and Go Through my clothes. Result so depressing that I wish I had never done it. Have nothing fit to wear, and if I had, should look like a scarecrow in it at present. Send off parcel with knitted red cardigan, two evening dresses (much too short for present mode), three out-of-date hats, and tweed skirt that bags at the knees, to Mary Kellway's Jumble Sale, where she declares that anything will be welcome. Make out a list of all the new clothes I require, get pleasantly excited about them, am again confronted with the Rates, and put the list in the fire.
May 17th.—Robert drives me to North Road station to catch train for Bude. Temperature has fallen again, and I ask Robert if it is below zero. He replies briefly and untruthfully that the day will get warmer as it goes on, and no doubt Bude will be one blaze of sunshine. We arrive early and sit on a bench on the platform next to a young woman with a cough, who takes one look at me and then says: "Dreadful, isn't it?" Cannot help feeling that she has summarised the whole situation quite admirably. Robert hands me my ticket—he has handsomely offered to make it first-class and I have refused—and gazes at me with rather strange expression. At last he says: "You don't think you're going there to die, do you?" Now that he suggests it, realise that I do feel very like that, but summon up smile that I feel to be unconvincing and make sprightly reference to Bishop, whose name I forget, coming to lay his bones at place the name of which I cannot remember. All of it appears to be Greek to Robert, and I leave him still trying to unravel it. Journey ensues and proves chilly and exhausting. Rain lashes at the windows, and every time carriage door opens—which is often—gust of icy wind, mysteriously blowing in two opposite directions at once, goes up my legs and down back of my neck. Have not told children by what train I am arriving, so no one meets me, not even bus on which I had counted. Am, however, secretly thankful, as this gives me an excuse for taking a taxi. Reach lodgings at rather uninspiring hour of 2.45, too early for tea or bed, which constitute present summit of my ambitions. Uproarious welcome from children, both in blooming health and riotous spirits, makes up for everything.
May 19th.—Recovery definitely in sight, although almost certainly retarded by landlady's inspiration of sending up a nice jelly for supper on evening of arrival. Rooms reasonably comfortable—(except for extreme cold, which is, says landlady, quite unheard-of at this or any other time of year)—all is linoleum, pink and gold china, and enlarged photographs of females in lace collars and males with long moustaches and bow ties. Robin, Vicky, and the hospital nurse—retained at vast expense as a temporary substitute for Mademoiselle—have apparently braved the weather and spent much time on the Breakwater. Vicky has also made friends with a little dog, whose name she alleges to be "Baby", a gentleman who sells papers, another gentleman who drives about in a Sunbeam, and the head waiter from the Hotel. I tell her about Mademoiselle's illness, and after a silence she says "Oh!" in tones of brassy indifference, and resumes topic of little dog "Baby". Robin, from whom I cannot help hoping better things, makes no comment except "Is she?" and immediately adds a request for a banana.
(Mem.: Would it not be possible to write more domesticated and less foreign version of High Wind in Jamaica, featuring extraordinary callousness of infancy?) Can distinctly recollect heated correspondence in Time and Tide regarding vraisemblance or otherwise of Jamaica children, and now range myself, decidedly and for ever, on the side of the author. Can quite believe that dear Vicky would murder any number of sailors, if necessary.
May 23rd.—Sudden warm afternoon, children take off their shoes and dash into pools, landlady says that it's often like this On the. last day of a visit to the sea, she's noticed, and I take brisk walk over the cliffs, wearing thick tweed coat, and really begin to feel quite warm at the end of an hour. Pack suit-case after children are in bed, register resolution never to let stewed prunes and custard form part of any meal ever again as long as I live, and thankfully write postcard to Robert, announcing time of our arrival at home to-morrow.
May 28th.—Mademoiselle returns, and is greeted with enthusiasm—to my great relief. (Robin and Vicky perhaps less like Jamaica children than I had feared.) She has on new black and white check skirt, white blouse with frills, black kid gloves, embroidered in white on the backs, and black straw hat almost entirely covered in purple violets, and informs me that the whole outfit was made by herself at a total cost of one pound, nine shillings, and fourpence-halfpenny. The French undoubtedly thrifty, and gifted in using a needle, but cannot altogether stifle conviction that a shade less economy might have produced better results.
She presents me, in the kindest way, with a present in the shape of two blue glass flower-vases, of spiral construction, and adorned with gilt knobs at many unexpected points. Vicky receives a large artificial-silk red rose, which she fortunately appears to admire, and Robin a small affair in wire that is intended, says Mademoiselle, to extract the stones out of cherries.
(Mem.: Interesting to ascertain number of these ingenious contrivances sold in a year.)
