After Christmas II

8 June. London. In large shops full of women I always feel safe from Gordon. But in the street, especially round Oxford Circus, I must be careful!

I had a happy wandering in the shops. It was a hot sunny day. I went into Zwemmers and bought a volume of Rilke – the young man there is growing older. His hair is receding. I remember the first time I saw him – it was at the Exhibition of Picasso’s Guernica in the winter of 1938 – nearly five years then. And since Guernica, Rotterdam, Belgrade, Coventry, Athens – just like a poem by one of our young modern poets. But even they aren’t so young now.

I took a taxi to 271 High Holborn for my interview at 3. It is a large grey non-committal looking building called Princeton House. I went in a lift to the 8th floor, and was deposited in front of a pair of swing doors. Inside behold, a dear, familiar scene – tables of censors – so much like our office except that some of them were Wrens and there were one or two naval officers padding about. I was put to wait by an open window looking out on to city roofs. I was given a cup of tea which was most welcome as I was very thirsty. Then I had my interview with First Officer Salmond – a charming person with curly hair and a faint Scots accent. Apparently I must serve three months in the ranks and after that I am pretty sure of my commission, provided I behave myself. I was very pleased and happy with this interview – very different from last week – and am now longing to be called. I had a discreet tea in Marshall’s, wandered on to Selfridge’s and bought a few things then took a taxi to Paddington to get the 6.30.

Wednesday 9 June. Bristol. In the evening we went to the Theatre Royal to see Bridie’s play Susannah and the Elders. Very amusing. It’s curious how unreal a play seems at first but how you soon get into it. It really does take you out of yourself as they say. We had some beer in the interval and ate a whole bar of Fry’s sandwich each! I wore the turquoise dress I made for Gordon at Christmas with a grey jacket. The theatre is charming inside – green and gold with nice slender pillars and designs – masks etc. It was a lovely evening.

Whitsuntide. 12–14 June. Hilary and I got a train to Compton and from there cycled to the cottage [belonging to Hilary and Sandy], which is literally in the middle of the downs and has a pretty overgrown garden full of delphiniums. Tom Marriner was there and had started to get lunch. We had sausages and potatoes and salad. Later George [Murr] came bringing a ham and a chicken – we had the chicken on Sunday. Baptista disembowelled it and I watched her. It was most delicious. I slept a good deal and felt quite happy but rather remote and lonely. One feels so without a chap especially when one has had one. A nice lump of misery which goes everywhere like a dog. Isolation. Still, I wasn’t unhappy. But I couldn’t help thinking how nice such a place would be with Gordon.

Tuesday 15 June. In the evening Honor told me about a communication in which Gordon has apparently demanded the big Armchair in the sitting room, so of course that at once suggested Eliza Cook and

But oh darling – can my love stand this. May it not be the beginning of the end. Could it be because of an armchair that I first began to fall out of love with you! But of course one doesn’t fall – it’s a slow wrenching away painful at once, afterwards just sad and dreary. Or so I imagine. It hasn’t happened yet.

Wednesday 16 June. Once – a few days ago – I dreamed that when a certain period was up – six months I believe – Gordon wrote to me and suggested that we should go on again, but what as I never knew – I woke up before that was made clear. Well I’m afraid it won’t be six months – because that’s less than a fortnight from now. He seems to be rather sticky about the allowance for the children – that’s the thing that maddens me most about him.

Thursday 17 June. At supper had to fight a little pang of jealousy when Honor talked about ringing him up. Must go now and see if the boiler is in because it is our bath night. So there is romance and wild longing and death in life the days that are no more all in the chaos of the Palmers’ kitchen. My clerihew – made this evening.

Julian found some rubber objects in the Gorge and told Honor what they were used for.

Sunday 20 June. Surely it is the height of decadence to listen to Richard Strauss before lunch on a Sunday morning. As I am doing now – Scott Goddard doing a programme about Strauss’s Don Quixote. Such lovely music, rich, exciting – cold shivers of delight – breezes of spring (in the Banbury Road)! – like the Rosenkavalier waltz. Earlier in the day I chopped off some of my hair and gave myself a new style, curled up all round. The idea is for it to look shorter and neater.

Oh Coppice back kitchen full of kisses and jokes and tears – and the blackcurrants are ripening.

Tuesday 22 June. Ann lent me Cocktails at Six [one of Gordon’s novels] which I tried to read at Arkesden. But I can’t get up any interest in it – so brittle and unreal.

Thursday 24 June. Well, it came this morning. And when it does come, it’s like Love – make no mistake about it, you know. A long envelope with a railway warrant Bristol to Rochester (Single, this time there is No Return). Also a list of clothes to be taken. No food or drink (not the smallest of double gins) to be taken there. I am to go on July 7th. My feelings are a little mixed but mostly I am excited and glad. Everyone at the office very nice. It was a hot day, hard to work. In the afternoon we had a lecture, very interesting, then our birthday tea party on the balcony. The table was decorated with flowers, wild strawberries and cakes to eat. It was gloriously sunny.

Tea in the garden when I got home – did some rather spectacular weeding among the roses – enormous things two or three feet high and even a potato plant. Pleasant evening with Honor – very few of these left now – how I shall miss her. I wonder what Gordon will say.

Saturday 26 June. Oh dear, oh dear. I’m afraid I had a bad outburst this morning – in the kitchen. Honor advised me to forget Gordon (I had been lamenting that we had no news of him) and then it suddenly all came over me and I had a good weep all over Honor and didn’t start for work till after nine!

I picked a lot of raspberries and went over the whole Gordon situation. I feel at the moment that I still love him as much as ever and nothing will alter that except meeting somebody else. It is no use worrying about his feelings because even if they were still the same I shouldn’t want him to do anything about it (though I long for just some word of comfort before I go into the Wrens).

Sunday 27 June. My last Sunday at the Coppice and there was a sweetness and sadness about everything and everybody. Breakfast in the kitchen, tea on the grass after lunch and in the evening a supper for me and my health drunk in cider. Looking through a book of Honor’s press cuttings I came across the wedding picture of her and Gordon – the two people I love best in the world. One can’t help feeling sad and sentimental. Gordon looks so young and so absurdly like Julian.

This evening heard the Epilogue [BBC radio] – the parable of the Prodigal Son, which I love, and we are now listening to a programme about Gluck.

Monday 28 June. My last afternoon and so hot and airless, there was an extremely good looking Air Force officer in attendance most of the day. Got home and tea under the beech trees with Honor and the children – read our novels for a bit. Listened to some of the Brahms Piano Concerto (early one) on the gramophone. Hearing that lovely rounded melody in the first movement, I thought, yes it could be all right. There might be somebody else – it’s just possible. He must like music and, if possible, Matthew Arnold, and have a ridiculous sense of humour.

Tuesday 29 June. Work as usual in the morning and I was even able to concentrate on all the usual things as I had all time before me. At about 12 I started to say goodbyes which was very sad and everyone was so nice. Well at least I have got on with people and made friends – that’s something. I was given a lovely extravagant box of talcum powder, a nice expensive gift I would never buy for myself and therefore all the nicer to have.

Trying not to feel sad, though I’m excited too – worrying now about what clothes to take!

Wednesday 30 June. Had a very pleasant day at the Coppice. Listened to Dick’s broadcast and Honor doing bits in Hilary’s Unicorn programme [for schools]. Very nice though of course it didn’t sound a bit like my Honor. I did a lot of clearing up and packed a suitcase of clothes to take home. Gave Prue my wreath of flowers I got in Salzburg and Honor the scarf with Edelweiss from Dresden.

Friday 2 July. Oswestry. Did more tidying and packed a large suitcase to come home.

I had a hot journey but managed to catch all the connections – I slept a little and read The Lover by Naomi Royde Smith which G. says (in this week’s Introducing) he thinks would make a good Radio Play. It’s rather sad, the cold places in the heart, the ashes and Devouring Time or Time the Great Healer – anyway Nor in thy marble vault shall sound my echoing song.…

Sunday 4 July. Independence Day, and we were not allowed to forget it! Quite right of course, but I wonder why I can’t listen to modem American music. Strawberries for lunch – afternoon in the garden reading an excellent novel Two Days in Aragon by M. J. Farrell. Very penetrating – about sorrow going to the stomach too!

‘I leaned my back unto an oak – I thought it was a trusty tree’ – the other day Honor and I were discussing the versions of ‘Waly, Waly’, especially the verse about gathering flowers and pricking my finger right to the bone. She quoted the oak verse and I wondered if the same thought was in both our minds – Gordon. But we neither of us said anything.

Monday 5 July. Bristol. Crowded journey. I stood as far as Hereford – trying to read Browning but the train was going too fast. So I meditated and planned a grand future for myself including a new love to smooth out everything! At Hereford I got a corner, ate my sandwiches and slept. Managed to get back to the Coppice in a taxi by way of Blackboy Hill. Climbed in through the kitchen window. The house was locked. Lovely to see Honor again, and Prue. We had tea then I cycled to the BBC and had a drink with Hilary – then to Uncle Vanya – a wonderful play and well acted. So very like the Coppice – except that we don’t sit down under our sorrows – no we are drearily splendid and even join the Wrens. And we have a more positive hope than ‘we shall rest’. But comic too. And we know we are comic – don’t we, my relique?

Tuesday 6 July. A very busy typically Coppice last day. How can I bear to write about it. It’s raining, trees – the beach tree swaying in the wind – Julian shouting and Scarlatti on the wireless. Well, I will write – and I just can’t take it in. It just doesn’t seem real.… I went out in the pouring rain and shopped – then came back to a hasty lunch with Honor and preparations for Prue’s birthday party – she looking intolerably sweet in a white smock with my wreath of Austrian flowers in her hair. I wore my Christmas frock – we had a lovely tea. I did a lot of packing and tidying and we had supper – then I began writing this. After supper we listened to a John Betjeman programme in the How series – How to Look at a Town – simply delightful of course – ending up with a Non-conformist chapel! Then talking to Honor and telling her all the last minute things – news of HIM etc. In the morning I gave the first volume of this diary and his letters to her to keep.

Wednesday 7 July. The worst time is definitely when you wake up on the morning you’re going. I woke at six, having set the alarm for seven. I took Honor the last cup of tea for some time. The taxi came very early, soon after eight. Then goodbyes and I felt very wretched and couldn’t keep back my tears. They stood in the doorway, the dear Coppice porch with the antlers. Honor held my hand tight in the taxi and she was crying too. She and Prue and Julian came with me some of the way. As she said she and I were the worst possible people to be left together at the end. I was early at the station and got the best sort of corner – i.e. in control of the window – carriage empty except for two W.O.4’s – we talked all the way, so I hadn’t much time to brood. At Paddington I queued for a taxi and eventually got one – calling down the queue to find if anyone wanted Charing Cross I was joined by a stout jolly businessman from Birmingham and might have been seen driving through the park with him. He insisted on paying for the taxi. I left my luggage, looked out my train then went to Oxford Circus and into D.H. Evans, where I soon found myself in a queue explaining the intricacies of the Quick Lunch Bar to two Miss Moberlies [BP’s generic name for elderly gentlewomen]. I looked at a few shop windows but had little heart for it and less coupons so I took a taxi to Charing Cross where I had a cup of tea in the Buffet – now feeling calm and drained of all feeling. I got the 2.27 to Rochester – a bright green train that stopped at every station – including Greenwich. (How lovely if I were there one day.) Got to Rochester just before four and staggered along with my suitcase (helped by two kind Wrens) to the Training Depot.

Pro-Wren at Rochester

Well, the Nore Training Depot is a big North Oxford Victorian Gothic house, that looks like a Theological College – actually it was a school. I was in time for Tea Boat – afterwards changed my ration books etc. and got sheets. There was a lot of queueing and I felt a little low and strange – but not very. I have a cabin – Beehive XI – which I share with a girl of 19, my own class and quite nice. She has a long rather melancholy face and I can see her when she is older as an English gentlewoman – one of her names is Mildred. There are about fifty new pro-Wrens – most of them in teens and early twenties. I don’t think there are really any of our kind of people, though there are one or two pleasant ones.

Making up a bunk is difficult, especially when you have the lower one and it is fixed against the wall. You must do hospital corners and the anchor on the blue and white quilt must be the right way up.

For supper we had toad-in-the-hole and bread and jam. After that a talk from First Officer Dixon who was very kind and Third Officer Bolland – Quarters Officer, who was also very nice. A rather restless night, as there was thunder and the mattress and especially pillow are very hard.

Thursday 8 July. Woke very early, still not feeling too bad. Rose at about 6.10 but couldn’t get into 7 o’clock breakfast as I have a No. 3 meal ticket – so had some rather melancholy hanging about – I was glad not to be a steward when I saw them sweeping and scrubbing the coloured tiled passage by the mess. (Yes, we have varnished pitch pine too.) Made my bed and had breakfast 7.30 – scrambled egg and bacon, tea, bread, also cornflakes. Good! At 7.50 we had to muster on the parade ground and were taken in two lorries to R.N. Barracks, Chatham. Chatham is a cold windy place, as far as I could see, absolutely full of the Navy, of course. We stood in queues in various places for what seemed a long time. We are, on the whole, a silly giggly lot and look rather dreary in our motley civilian clothes – most of us wearing turbans. We are not allowed to go out without a hat or turban, but must not wear one in the mess. One soon gets used to it.

First of all we had X-Ray of our chests – a rather impatient Surgeon-Commander who seemed rather irascible and one could hardly blame him. Then a visit to the dentist who said my teeth were all right. After that into the lorries again and back to Rochester in time for Tea Boat. After that we waited in the fo’c’sle for our separate interviews with First Officer. She said a few words to each of us – I heard her saying something about me – I must be made a note of or something – I suppose my white paper entry or something. I can see now that one must be in the ranks first!

After lunch we went into the Captain’s office and had our qualifications taken down – that is all the writers, who have a ‘school’. We were given a list of ships in the Nore command and various naval abbreviations to learn.

After Tea Boat we had a lecture on pay and allowances, during which I found it terribly difficult to keep awake – my head kept jerking and sometimes I was even dreaming! After that supper and letter writing and cigarettes in the fo’c’sle. Then I went out and met two others and went to the majestic Cinema – we had tea there. It is architecturally what one would expect – very pretentious and modern with steel chairs and palms – but all right for a cinema really.

Friday 9 July. Woke quite early and got up just before seven to wash up for 7.30 breakfast. One washing up a day is all the fatigues we have to do. At 8.45 we attended our first Divisions – which is really prayers. We muster on the parade ground with the five Petty Officers and three officers. After various salutings First Officer reads prayers – we first have a roll call.

After that we had our first squad drill with C.P.O. Penny. We learnt how to stand at attention and ease etc and also saluting which is more difficult than it looks. Then Tea Boat – then again in the writers’ school – there isn’t very much to do apart from learning the commands, ranks and abbreviations. So sometimes, as now, I can write this diary. The shorthand typists practise but there’s nothing for the rest of us to do but chew over the abbreviations etc. Oh M. A./ S.B., D.E.M.S. and R.H.M. – Praise Ye the Lord etc.

We had a lecture on Naval Customs and Traditions from a very amusing Lieutenant-Commander, quite good looking and not more than about forty five!

After that I went to the YWCA with a girl called Vera Potts and we had supper there – baked beans, gooseberries and custard and tea. I never thought in the days when I used to serve in the old YM that I should be one of the Troops myself one day. Anyway one certainly appreciates it. There is a reading room with a wireless where one might be able to hear a little decent music. The wireless is always on in the fo’c’sle but always at the Forces Programme.

Now as I write (Saturday 7.10 p.m.) there is ‘Ah Sweet Mystery of Life’ but very often it is ‘As Time goes By’ – ‘A kiss is still a kiss’ – well I wouldn’t know about that. After supper I went for a walk by myself. I walked up the Vines (a park opposite our house) and towards the Cathedral. There are some very decent Georgian houses around it – from one in a row I heard the sound of a Bach Prelude and Fugue on the piano – so I stopped to listen for a moment. I discovered a nice little old teashop (perhaps run by a widow of one of the Canons – or sister of the late Dean) with a lovely old rounded glass window – Also a nice set of tombstones and a well kept churchyard belonging to the Cathedral. And to crown all – as I looked through an archway into the main street I caught a glimpse of a rather pretentious GORDON HOTEL restaurant and grill room.

And for about half an hour I was my old gothick self – the self that I’ve had to put off while I’ve been here – and it’s been quite easy – in fact I seem to have adapted myself quite happily to this life – and haven’t felt at all miserable yet. And it’s very hard to brood about Gordon or even the darling Coppice. Is this like an anaesthetic and will the effects wear off sometime? I can only wait and see.

Saturday 10 July. A very long morning in the class room, not doing very much, but learning Plymouth and Portsmouth commands and writing this diary. It’s rather a bore sometimes not having very much to do. After lunch (a good one) we went to the pictures. I think the pictures are slightly nostalgic, also radio – they take you out of yourself, your new self, into your old one – but not too badly. I went with Peggy Wall, a quiet dark girl who seems to be about the best of our lot – she used to be secretary to a literary agent. She said as soon as she saw me she thought – I bet she’s going to write a novel about it. Well – who knows.

Sunday 11 July. At 9 o’clock we had a short service in the Mess taken by a naval chaplain – it reminded me irresistibly of school – the chairs and the pitchpine-panelled hall and us singing ‘For all the Saints’ rather badly. After that we had an inspection and then were free for the rest of the day. I went to the Cathedral to hear the Archbishop of Canterbury preach. I noticed some nice wall-urns etc. – one to Henry King – young officer – Victorian. I had an excellent view of the Archbishop and also of an Admiral and a Vice-Admiral. My attention wandered rather during the sermon but I enjoyed the service and the singing.

After Tea Boat I went out to post some letters and called at the Museum – it is quite well arranged, but has a great variety of things – mammoth’s tusks, Victorian shell and wool flowers under glass, arrowheads and of course Dickens. Various nice engravings – Sir Philip Sidney and Laurence Hyde, Earl of Rochester, but not John Wilmot, ‘the dear Earl’.

When I came back I washed my hair and went into supper with it rather wild and flowing but it is now setting in curls, very decorous – I am sitting in the comparatively deserted fo’c’sle – but the wireless still goes on – Happidrome, Sandy Macpherson and now Memories of Musical Comedy. This evening I should like to be at the Coppice with Honor, talking, having a cup of tea and then listening to Edward II – Marlowe’s – which is at 9.30. But I’m quite happy really – I keep expecting to be miserable but it hasn’t come yet. Just occasionally a phrase somewhere will strike me.

Monday 12 July. We had Divisions and squad drill out on the grass in a fine drizzle of rain. AFS men and other Wrens drilled near us. It is quite fun except for the hanging about. I had a slight feeling of desolation, coming to myself a little and thinking but what am I doing here and why on earth am I standing out on the grass drilling with this curious crowd of women. Then Tea Boat and work – I laboriously copied out the Rosyth command and the functions of the Admiralty. A lovely letter from Honor, which cheered me up a lot, though I shed a few tears in the lavatory. All the dear Coppice scene was so beautifully painted – Honor in her curlers, Flora finding a nest of insects in her desk and Dick joyously examining them under the microscope – and my letter being passed round the Palmer teatable. After Tea Boat we had a lecture on Hygiene by a Surgeon-Captain – everything, but everything.

At about 2.45 a.m. the siren went and we all had to troop down to the shelter – sad amid lines of washing. This is a bad time to be woken – we were there only about twenty minutes, then back to bed where I tossed and turned a little, with sad thoughts of Gordon.

Tuesday 13 July. Went on a route march which was rather pleasant – we went by the river and had a nice view. After Tea Boat I had to go to Chatham again with eight others to have X-Rays done again. We went by bus with a rather plump wanton-looking Wren with gold rings in her ears and dark hair – and pink nails. It was all rather alarming and I felt as if I were going to cry! Of course I began imagining all sorts of things – I was in a Naval Hospital – I was invalided out. The Surgeon-Commander didn’t come near us, and we were X-Rayed by a young man, who was very reassuring. Still, he wouldn’t be able to tell us, even if he knew. My companions were so dreary, and there is something very alarming about medical apparatus – but I’ve never had anything wrong with me, so surely it’s all right. But we still didn’t know for certain. After supper we did some washing and romped like jolly schoolgirls in our cabins. But I’m not one really and it doesn’t come very naturally. The others are all so much younger. But if I’m at all desolate (and I’m not really) it isn’t in the same way as it was before. And I suppose there’s always the whimsical and perilous charm somewhere.… Another siren but we didn’t have to go down.

Wednesday 14 July. I suppose I have become too introspective during the last six months – the luxury of having somebody to talk to, which of course I haven’t here.

After that we had a practice Air-Raid Warning and went down to the shelter. When First Officer was taking the roll call she asked ‘Which is Pym?’ so out I came from behind the washing. But why did she ask – because of my white paper – or what?

Thursday 15 July. A hot day. We went on a route march of nearly 4 miles. We passed a remarkably fine cemetery on a hill, white angels, and fine grass, which was being cut by a motor mower. I think it must be a public cemetery. Every day at the start of our march we pass a very nice eighteenth century church with a beautiful churchyard full of waving grass – and a lovely urn tomb. Nearby is always the sound of children’s voices singing – there must be a school here.

It was a day of endless queueing and altogether TOO MANY WRENS, so that I could almost have packed my bag and gone. After a half hour’s queueing and waiting, we got PAY – £1 and 2 soap coupons – but I can’t work it out at all! After tea a lecture on Ranks and Badges – the Mess was very hot and crowded and I looked forward to a weekend in solitude.

Friday 16 July. In the morning we had our writers’ test – it wasn’t so bad. I got the rates of pay right purely by luck as I hadn’t learned them properly. At 2.30 we had a lecture about firefighting given by a P. O. from Chatham. It was intolerably hot and crowded in the Mess and a great relief to go outside for the practical demonstration of the hose. After that a few volunteered to be lowered from an upper window in a rope sling – I couldn’t have done it – it made me quite sick to look at it. After Tea Boat we were FREE – it was a glorious afternoon and a lovely sensation to be able to walk out to the shops – I went into Smiths, got a book to read at the weekend and bought a copy of Tristram Shandy, which I feel will be nice to have about. I also bought apples and cherries and a Radio Times. I spent a happy hour lying in my bunk eating and reading a Graham Greene novel.

Saturday 17 July. Lovely hot day. We wrote our essay after Tea Boat. I wrote, as did most other people, on my impressions of Life in the Nore Command. As I write this I am in a nearly deserted fo’c’sle. I have heard the whole of Liszt’s Piano Concerto in E flat and am halfway through Hary Janos, though a group of stewards have suggested we should have Jack Leon.

I feel apologetic for Kodaly when he makes a specially peculiar noise! And one eyes anyone who comes near the wireless with suspicion.

Sunday 18 July. This was a Day of religions, or religious observance of different kinds. I began the day feeling very sad and aching for Honor and my friends and the Coppice. Tears pricking behind my eyes, terrible lump in the throat. Also I’d had no letters for a week, which is a long time in a strange place. The weight (or burden) of unshed tears – there was a phrase to that effect in the novel I’m reading now (Long Division by Hester Chapman). But as the day went on I gradually got better. It’s nearly always in the morning that one feels most homesick – by evening one is generally very happy and exuberant.

We started off with a service in the Mess. We had a very good-looking Padre but with such an affected voice that it was difficult to concentrate on what he was saying. I got nothing from it. Then Margaret Earp and I went to the Cathedral – it was dark and cool and the service was very sparsely attended – the usual sprinkling of old ladies – a soldier or two, a few Wrens. We sang and prayed and there was a dry theological sermon about original sin from an old withered man. I felt yes, this is the end. What can one get from this but peace and the pleasure of music and the loftiness of the Cathedral? You couldn’t expect anyone to come in and be inspired or even very much comforted – at the best soothed a little. Or even rather damped down and saddened as I was. Age and dry bones.

Later on we had quite the opposite. Margaret and I had gone to the YWCA after supper and were sitting in the room opposite the canteen when two young clergymen came in with hymn books and said that they usually had a short service – so we stayed. Somebody at once chose ‘Rock of Ages’ – so we sang then had a very nice little address, then some prayers and finally more hymns which people began to choose. I could only think of ‘Lead, kindly Light’ and the one about keep our loved ones now far distant ’neath thy care. Anyway it was all very nice.

Monday 19 July. Too Many Women. Has this ever been used as a title? It would do for my life in the Censorship or this Wren life – squashed among them in the queue for breakfast.

In the afternoon we were enrolled – 3/O Rendel did it – she is rather nice, with a kind of babyish air which is a contrast to her parade ground manner. I had been feeling depressed but at teatime I got 3 letters, including a lovely one from Honor – Gordon knows now – he said he was glad I had got into the WRNS and hopes it will turn out to be a nice thing to have done – My only reaction is – well, (dear), it had better be! I was a little disappointed, having expected some message a little less dreary.

Tuesday 20 July. Today we were kitted. We were taken in lorries to Chatham at 8 a. m. – a great herd of us – I was standing in a mass of suitcases, lurching all over the place as we drove very fast. My hat is lovely, every bit as fetching as I’d hoped, but my suit rather large though it’s easier to alter that way. I have also a macintosh and greatcoat – 3 pairs of ‘hose’ (black), gloves, tie, 4 shirts and 9 stiff collars, and two pairs of shoes which are surprisingly comfortable. After that we had to get respirators. One girl and I got left behind at the clothing store so had to hurry through the barracks – on our way we came across a little company of Greek sailors being drilled – in Greek. Service respirators are a good deal more comfortable than civilian – we went in the gas chamber. Then had lunch in the WRNS mess.

It all sounds quite simple written down like this, but it’s a long dreary business and we all looked very tired and fed up as we sat (or lay) in dejected groups in the WRNS fo’c’sle – I wished I was out of it all – but suddenly, drinking the dregs of a cup of indifferent coffee my spirits began to lift and when we got back I was quite excited – I packed two large parcels of civilian clothes and sent them off. At 4.30 we had a lecture by a Padre, but all the time I wanted to shorten my skirt and there seemed to be so much to do. I got down to it eventually and little Peggy Wall very kindly marked all my things for me. After supper we mustered in the mess and 3/O Rendel read out the draft list – most of us are to go to Westcliff which is a holding depot where we wait indefinitely for a draft. Days or weeks. I envied Palmer, a dark evil-looking little steward, who had got a draft to Drake at Plymouth! The evening was spent frantically packing and worrying about how we were going to get our heavy suitcases to the station in the morning. I couldn’t sleep for thinking of what I had to do.

Wednesday 21 July. After a rush to the station with heavy suitcases we heard that we’d missed the 9.29 which was almost a relief. It felt funny being in uniform – more like fancy dress than anything, but I don’t look too bad. Hair is a difficulty. I think I must have mine cut.

This journey was noteworthy as being one of the longest and most tedious I have ever made – as the crow flies it isn’t far from Rochester to Westcliff but it took us about four and half hours to get there – rain and carrying luggage and laughing and hating Vera Potts (who always managed to get her suitcase carried) and over the ferry from Gravesend to Tilbury where we had hours to wait and had tea and cake in the refreshment room (3rd class) and Beatrice Pizzey and I stood and watched the rain pouring down. Tilbury obviously has been a large exciting station, but now it’s bare and deserted, though not decayed, just empty and waiting. We arrived at Westcliff and it was still raining. We were given a meal in the mess then went to our quarters – Pizzey and I are sharing a cabin in 7 Clifton Drive – a typical seaside villa in a row on the front – there is a good view of Southend Pier and plenty of ships to be seen – but no beach to speak of. Was asleep literally as soon as my head touched the pillow. I was on fire watch duty – but no siren luckily.

Thursday 22 July. There are no clocks here at all except one by the Regulating office, but there are various bugles, bells, bosun’s pipes etc. which sound in the camp and are some guide. First bugle is 6.30. Pipe down 10 o’clock. We had to rush into breakfast – I was unwashed and wore my hat – a contrast to our decorous behaviour and dress at the Nore – also smoked, though this has now been stopped. We had an examination by the M.O. after breakfast – at least when I say ‘examination’ it was hardly that – ‘Are you feeling quite well?’ – ‘Yes thank you sir’ – no more than that. After that Beatrice and I scrubbed a larder – saw masses of butter etc., large tins of golden syrup like petrol tins. The food is good here, though everything is rather slapdash – there’s plenty of it, but we often have to wait for knives etc. After dinner we had P. T., very strenuous with a very fine upstanding young man who puts on an Oxford accent. After Tea Boat a lecture from 1st Officer Bowen-Jones in a sad room littered with benches and piled-up chairs at the back – and round the walls large square mirrors, rather misted over and spotted – not with gold baroque frames, but the place had an atmosphere – the room where the children played on wet days or there was a dance in the evenings or pingpong – before it was table tennis I think.

After supper we walked a short way along the front – sadness and decay – closed cafés, Tomassi’s ices, and Rossi’s – the idea for a radio programme came into my head – about a seaside town before and during the war. Now rolls of barbed wire everywhere, but gardens decently kept.

Friday 23 July. The most strenuous day I’ve ever had in the WRNS so far. Gardened till lunch, then squad drill, then scrubbed a room in Palmerston Court. Quite worn out. One’s spirits go up and down. After supper we walked into Southend and had a look at it – it is definitely a common place with no charm as far as I can see – one great street of shops – Woolworth’s, Marks and Spencer and cheap stores – pin-tables and amusement halls – cinemas – the whole place smelling of fish and chips – raffish – and an enormous hotel, the Palace. Much of it decayed, but in a very depressing way, no beauty or dignity or even nostalgia about it. We finished up at the Women’s Services Club, which is a house with various rooms, library etc. and refreshments – very convenient.

Sunday 25 July. Why am I always depressed at Sunday Divisions and church parade? We marched (rather badly) in shirt sleeves and were inspected by the Captain, who hurried along our ranks with his head bent. The service was awful – I was choking with tears and longing for the Coppice and Honor and everyone, so that I could hardly sing. The place was very hot and the sailors restless and irreverent. I was surprised at their bad behaviour. After dinner I had a good howl in my cabin! Then washed my face, powdered and lipsticked and went and sat in the public gardens and read G. D.H. & M. Cole, which I’d got out of the Services Club Library. It was terribly hot and I began to fall asleep and dreamed of a field of waving corn but when I opened my eyes it was just the sea and the ships and Southend pier if I could see it. I had tea at a little café and then decided to explore the amenities of Westcliff – to see if there was anything to see – any churches or fine buildings. Well, there’s nothing – I walked down a road of dreary suburban houses called Valkyrie Road which led me into what seemed an interminable street of shops, many of them shut up, ruined and otherwise decayed. One felt that the whole lot might just as well be wiped out and started again. I don’t think Westcliff or Southend has much for me now. I noticed an undertaker’s shop – ‘H. W. Whur – Cremations arranged’. I wonder if it’s any relation to the author of ‘The Female Friend’ in The Stuffed Owl. Walking along carrying my coat and feeling like a braised owl it all began to seem quite funny as it usually does and I gradually came out of my depression. For supper I changed into a cotton frock and sat on a seat on the front – really very pleasant like being on holiday. But I’m not.

Wanting Gordon still comes into it. Now that the novelty of being a Wren is wearing off. WRNS – you aren’t giving me enough. I’m doing my best, trying to see the funny side, looking out for churches and buildings, writing it up, talking to various people and trying to take it all as a great chunk of experience – an extraordinary bit of life – but I want music and intellectual companionship and affection – to be able to lavish it as I could at the Coppice. Well – perhaps I’ll get all that, one day. Don’t forget the whimsical and perilous charm – there’ll come a day when you really will have to pack that Gladstone bag and go to wherever the Admiralty thinks fit. And in the meantime there are little things to look forward to, letters and the unexpected.

Monday 26 July. It was terribly hot – and now I know how hot one can feel in uniform even without a coat. I scrubbed out a room in Palmerston Court. We visited four ships – ordinary looking middle-aged men in navy blue suits and trilby hats climbed perilous rope ladders. Somehow one didn’t connect them with the sea.

I stood looking over the side – humming ‘Dearly Beloved’ and that took me back to the early spring and trips on the top of a 28 bus to Avonmouth, and I knew that the thought of Gordon is still an ache, a longing, a regret, a sadness.…

Two sirens in the night – I had to get up – oh wretched, looking at the stars and hearing muffled guns towards Sheerness and Canvey Island.

Tuesday 27 July. Another grilling day. Was working at Mount Liell which appears to be rather junior officers’ quarters. Cleaned windows and a bathroom and swept. It amuses me to pay exaggerated respect to very young sublieutenants and even midshipmen, flattening myself and my broom against the wall as they pass, less than the dust indeed. The F.O.I.C. was coming down to inspect us so we were urged to make ourselves very scarce indeed – consequently we did nothing from 12 to 2.30 except have dinner and sit under the apple tree in the backyard of our house, reading – The Constant Nymph. At 2.30 P.T. inside the gym – he was more merciful than last week. At 6.45 I had my hair cut and set – pageboy again which is more my style really, then tea at the Services Club and finally a walk in search of churches or other interesting buildings – so far I’ve only seen chapels, but tonight I found St Alban’s, modern and rather ugly outside but somebody was playing the organ rather well so I went in – it was a girl, her bicycle was in the porch. The church was dark and smelled comfortingly of incense – there were little lights burning and a statue of the Virgin Mary. It has no tablets or monuments worth mentioning – I should think it is quite new. I think I must try and go there on Sunday to take away the depressed feeling that the service here gives me.

Wednesday 28 July. I was sent to sweep and clean in the V.A.D.’s quarters, but I had just started on a room when I was summoned to First Officer – so into uniform again, and after waiting for a time I went in – apparently she has just discovered I am a white paper (Rochester hadn’t told her) and I am to be given a job to do in Whitehall Regulating office. I saw 3/ O Patch and spent the rest of the morning and afternoon trying to learn a little about my job which is to take over Green Watch – rather formidable but P/O Williams is very kind and helpful and I hope I’ll be able to pick it up.

Thursday 29 July. My first day in Regulating Office – quite enjoyed it, especially being able to smoke and drink tea – there’s so much to think about one has no time to brood! We were paid – about 32/- – the Paymaster is a thin harassed looking man, as he might well be. I officiated at 3/O Patch’s lecture and held up charts for her – had to march a squad of Pro-Wrens back – managed quite successfully. What will I turn into at this rate.

Saturday 31 July. Had a rather hectic time looking for people to do the washing up and trying to hunt out those who weren’t there. Not like me at all, but it will be good for me to learn.

Sunday 1 August. We had Divisions and I couldn’t swing my arms properly so Third Officer Honey had to move me. Gradually people will begin to discover what a fake I am – how phoney is my Wrennish façade. My Wren façade – no that makes it quite different. We had the service outside this week – it was much nicer, though singing was a little difficult as the harmonium accompaniment dragged rather. After that I went to the Regulating Office and made out my list for Monday. I am going to try hard to be really efficient – it doesn’t come naturally to me, no use pretending it does, but it will be good for me to learn to be.

I went to a concert in Southend with Beatrice and Eileen Starinovich. Pouishnoff was giving a Chopin recital, the first concert I’ve been to since goodness knows how long. I became drowsy and thought all sorts of strange dreamy surrealist things – none of which I can now remember – of Gordon, of course, and it’s still a raw wound. And will I ever meet anybody here to divert my thoughts from him? Ought I to go dancing feverishly at the Queen’s? Is there anything for me in the future.

Monday 2 August. In the afternoon we went on a tug trip – had some jolly conversation with some Irish Merchant Navy. One had a little sacking bag full of cockles which he offered to us, also cigarettes. The sea was rough and sometimes the spray drenched us. We visited several ships, two quite large ones. One felt very nautical, especially climbing back out of the boat on to the pier up a rather scarifying ladder. I was the first to set foot on it.

Wednesday 4 August. A very busy day – went into Southend on a bicycle and enjoyed the ride – carrying a Petty Officer’s coat for which I was trying to buy buttons and an Admin. Crown.

Friday 6 August. I was standby so did some ironing and talked to a strange girl with flowing blonde hair who asked me if I drank a lot. Gone are the days of round about Christmas when through a glorious haze of Guinness I was happy in my own little piece of world enough and time.

Sunday 8 August. Did not go to Divisions, but watched from an upper window – no I mean from above and thought sentimentally how nice the sailors looked in their blue collars. After dinner I went to the Services Club and managed to get some chocolate – then lay reading and sleeping, listening to Johnny Canuck’s Revue, writing to Honor and talking to some ATS.

Monday 9 August. I am officially drafted to HMS Westcliff as from the 11th. I’m pleased – Busy today as 56 are going out and 44 coming in on Wednesday.

Thursday 12 August. Writing in my new single cabin, having just had a hot bath, great luxury. Spent the evening at the Services Club drinking tea and writing letters. Was called Leading Wren by one of the new ones!

Friday 13 August. The Superintendent came. P.O. came in with a rumour that Holding Depot might be increased to 500 – Palmeira and the block of flats by us might be taken – awful speculations.

(Oh dear, what value will this journal be to posterity with its nautical jargon and incomprehensible daily routine – the puzzled reader of After Christmas plodding hopefully on to A Happy Ending will stick in the bogs of Wren Pym asking plaintively but what is Holding Depot and what do you mean when you say you were standby?)

Saturday 15 August. Went to Divisions and service. The dear boys behaved a little better than usual. But the Padre has no idea of what to say to them. In the evening went into the Queen’s with Margaret Earp to have a drink and listen to the band – orchestra I should say. It was nice in a way but I couldn’t help feeling sad. It would have been better if we’d had some male company of course. There was a full moon when we got out. I went doggedly to bed and read a novel by Stephen McKenna. On how many evenings, when one is older, does one just go ‘Doggedly to Bed’. (Obviously the title of something.)

Tuesday 17 August. Busy coping with tomorrow’s drafts – everyone grizzling so that one feels harsh and inhuman and would like to knock their heads together and send them to some filthy place.

Wednesday 18 August. Had a letter from Honor – it was over a week since I’d heard and this was a short letter – one page – I unfolded it, wondering.… And I read that she had had mumps and George had arrived suddenly in England on Saturday. Naturally I was quite overcome – the thing one had never dared imagine – and oh what does it feel like to have one’s love come back like that.… I wonder if it will ever happen to me. But I’m so happy for her.

We had quite a busy day – 23 out and 14 in. I staggered with luggage from the station. Like a seaside landlady showing them round anxiously pointing out the delights of a front cabin.

Thursday 19 August. In the evening, I went to the Palace in Southend with Joyce Gresham. It is a large jolly smoky place, rather pleasant, crowded with people, mostly soldiers and cadets, a few odd Navy, Poles and Americans. We got some drinks, harmless little half pints, a Cadet asked Joyce to dance and bought us some drinks – I had a dance with one of his friends – not quite my height; but I found I still remembered how to dance. Afterwards Joyce’s cadet saw us most of the way home – we got talking about classical music. It was quite an enjoyable, queer kind of evening – and I know I should love it if I had someone nice (and tall) to dance with. Funny moment when, sitting in that vast smoky place I realised that I didn’t care twopence for a single person there!

Thursday 26 August. Busy and weary in the evenings. Not busy with doing things entirely, but with wondering if I’ve forgotten things and coping with people. And yet it doesn’t really worry me – and I’m not frightened of anyone. It has given me confidence – and I feel I can do something I thought I couldn’t before.

3–6 September. Had my first weekend – went to the Coppice. Off on the 10.16 train – then from Fenchurch St to Paddington, and it wasn’t till I was in the train there that I began to realise it – the real places – Reading, Swindon, Chippenham, Bath, Bristol. Hilary had expected me at 7.30, so there was nobody to meet me – but by a miraculous chance I was seen going up the steps by Honor and Julian – We had a taxi to the Coppice. No need to say what the reunion was like. And they think I look nice in uniform. A boiled egg for my tea. And what strikes me is the luxuriant greenness of everything – the lovely trees and the weeds in the garden!

On Saturday morning Hilary brought me breakfast in bed – toast seems a luxury – and the softness of the bed. I got up in uniform and went into Clifton with Honor. We talked about Gordon as we walked down North Road. I said I was trying to forget him and she thought it much the best thing to do. He will, obviously, never be any good to me. All this I acknowledge and it hurts me – but – wasn’t he like that always? And didn’t I know? I can’t say more – we had coffee at Lloyd’s Café and then I went into the Censorship where I stayed nearly an hour. I felt homesick when I saw the letters, but knew I couldn’t go back there.

A real Coppice Saturday lunch with Sally grizzling and Gill looking beautiful in a red dress with a black peasant jacket. Heard a lot of music during the weekend, all the things I’ve longed for – Berlioz Fantastic Symphony, Brahms Piano Concerto No. 1 (in D minor), Mozart Sinfonia Concertante, Brahms-Haydn Variations, Dohnanyi, and the rest. Lovely and all too short – so that I began feeling sad on Sunday morning at the idea of going back. Honor and I went to church and heard a sermon about up with your listless hands and strengthen your feeble knees – for me, surely. Julian looked angelic. He is going to learn the piano – lovely picture of his aged father at his first concert, weeping in a box while he plays the old T chaikowsky. Honor dreamed I had told her the whole Wrens thing was a failure – of course it hadn’t been – even though it hasn’t done anything positive and concrete for me yet – it has at last given me a change, less opportunity to think of G. – no associations – and the feeling that I am trying to do something about it.

Monday 6 September. I got up at 6 and managed to say goodbye bravely – it was a lovely morning and I rode down to the BBC on Hilary’s bike – then got the 7.50. I tried to read Pater’s Marius the Epicurean which I’ve always found soothing, but somehow it didn’t work and I found myself thinking instead. Wandering round Oxford Circus trying to get silk stockings I had an insane desire to see Gordon, who may be still in Scotland, and in the taxi to Fenchurch St and at the station I was very near to tears. That funny raised-up station in the middle of the city and Poor Jenny sits a-weeping, trying to eat a very stodgy sausage roll. In the train I noticed a nice churchyard, very green and overgrown with little leaning tombstones, in the middle of buildings and ruins and a curious Russian-looking edifice.

Italy gave in and we are all so busy dissecting shrimps that we hardly noticed. I’ve been working in the Mail Office and though at first I didn’t like it I’m getting to now as we are really busy and were working till 6 today – Saturday.

Gordon has written another Radio play to be broadcast on 14th September – but I shan’t hear it – I haven’t even bought the new Radio Times.

How exciting it is when the men come in from abroad in their white hats and shorts, looking sunburned and ragged.

Sunday 12 September. After supper went to St Alban’s church. I like to see some other side of the life of Westcliff. In my enthusiasm I brought away an English hymnal and prayer book. I shall read some of Marius the Epicurean before Tea Boat.

Wednesday 15 September. Tuesday was Gordon’s play and this is the first week I haven’t bought a Radio Times. I went to the Services Club and saw from the paper that it was at 10.30 – too late for me to listen anyway. I felt dramatic standing there in the dusk alone in that funny little room, too lazy to do the blackout.

It’s better to be dramatic than just a lonely spinster, though it comes to the same thing in the end.

Friday 17 September. I am thinking of finishing that radio play I started, also an amusing spy novel. And of learning German at the Southend Municipal College. I’ll think ahead. After the war.

Last night had a very nice dinner at Gavon’s with P.O. and Priestley. How long is it since I had dinner out with a nice chap! We had loud blaring music all the afternoon, which was pleasant at first, but later one wanted to escape from it, as there was a loud speaker in every house.

In the evening I enrolled as a student at the Southend Municipal College, to take the Intermediate Course. A crowd of spinsters, spectacled young men, nondescripts, Forces men and women – crowded into the great hall and up to the little tables where the various departments were stationed. At the languages table was a little elderly woman in a grey cardigan with some feather or bird in her hat. When I said I already knew some she nodded eagerly and said ‘Splendid, splendid’. Then we all queued to pay our fees. It was all like an early H. G. Wells novel – Kipps or Love and Mr Lewisham. Surely there ought to have been a beautiful young woman teaching wood-carving?

Saturday 18 September. London. Went up to London on the 12.37 train, together with a crowd of liberty men – but got a seat. Had tea with Muriel Maby and Betty Rankin in the flat belonging to Muriel’s friend – I loved it all. We walked round Chelsea afterwards and I began to feel really human and myself again – as if something were thawing inside me – Mulberry House and Mulberry Walk – and I don’t approve of a garage being called after Carlyle. And do you remember Jane writing: ‘I died yesterday and was buried at Kensal Green – at least you have no knowledge to the contrary.…’ Some nice houses, with dignity, which is what Southend and Westcliff hasn’t got. We rode to Piccadilly in a bus and then had dinner at the Berkeley Buttery – cocktails and baby chickens – and oh I enjoyed it all so – seeing different people, and we also walked in Berkeley Square then back to Fenchurch St with no miserable feelings – only anxiety lest I should fail to catch the train and be adrift!

Sunday 19 September. Another good day – worked in the morning – mechanically at checking and victualling sheets and talked to 3/O Hawksworth about all sorts of things, German poetry, churches, censorship, and will my face fit at 271 High Holborn?

In the bath Marvell and Matthew Arnold and Heine. And what literature can compare with English poetry for variety and richness – and people who like the same thing find it the hardest thing in the world not to like one another – so if there could be a marine who liked Matthew Arnold and Brahms.… Anyway a good weekend. On the way back from blackberrying, chapels and meeting houses – Christadelphians, a small square house in an overgrown leafy garden. And a chapel with a curious obelisk-like monument – which might have been a chapel or a rather ornate garage and petrol pump. It adds to the pleasure of life to notice things.

Monday 20 September. Had a letter from Rosemary – she is worried about Emile who may even be prisoner of the Germans now. Oh, it’s terrible what people are having to suffer.

Went to Intermediate German class at the Southend Municipal College – enjoyed it very much. Found it quite easy, though it will do me good to revise the grammar.

Monday 27 September. Things seem to have begun to move for me – I mean about a commission – Do you play any games? Not if I can help it. Or the greatest indoor sport and you know what that is, dear Reader. And what is my degree. And Pym must take squad drill – and we are all laughing about Pym in the Wardroom. And will you sign a paper saying that you are willing to go overseas. And no I’m damned if I will – but I do it and think, well I’ll deal with that when I come to it. If I ever do get it it will be the biggest laugh ever – I shall be quite the phoniest thing in the navy. A grown up person playing a fantastic game. You see, Reader, I am now completely myself again — the most unlikely person to be in the Wrens – but there’s no reason why I shouldn’t do it as well as other people.

On Sunday I went out to Kew to see Rosemary and Sybil. We went into the Star and Garter and had a pint, and while I was there, hat adrift, face flushed, glass in my hand and voice talking loud Naval jargon, a woman came up to me and asked how she could join the WRNS! Then Rosemary and I walked to Kew Gardens. We talked about our lives as we walked. Of course we’re both pretty splendid. We both want the same kind of things. And fancy people not getting married and having children when they are able to. She encouraged me by so obviously thinking I had done the best thing in joining the WRNS. I gave her a pretty comprehensive picture of what it’s like and how people of our sort feel about it.

We went back to the flat and had high tea about six – beautifully arranged salad – if all else fails we can always start a teashop.

Just to think, I’ve been saying to myself that it will soon be a year since G. declared himself and we had that brief, stormy but heavenly two months. It’s Sunday October 3rd, a gloriously sunny morning with an undercurrent of cold air, rather like a spring day. I’m sitting looking at the sea and listening to rather too many seagulls. I am reading Room of One’s Own. Most delightful and profound – if I had the time I would write an essay about life in the WRNS.

Officers – pay them the respect due to their uniform but otherwise assess them as people.

On Being Yourself, and how you cannot be too much yourself or the life wouldn’t be endurable. On Friday evening I was having supper when Marion Booth, a very attractive looking MT driver came and sat by me and we talked about German and Rilke and the necessity of hanging on to the things that matter – painting for her, writing and literature for me and music, of course. This is important, otherwise you will lose yourself completely, as you do in the first week or two. ‘… it is much more important to be oneself than anything else.’ So Virginia Woolf. I wonder what she would have made of service life.

Sunday afternoon. At 3.15 I went to a CEMA concert at the Queen’s. The singer sang a group of Schubert songs and apologised for having the words with him but he was using a new translation and might otherwise burst into German. How stupid that one should have to use a bad English translation – this kind of thing makes me bristle and wonder if we are worth saving! The pianist was good. He played Brahms, Chopin and Ravel.

Wednesday 6 October. The Wondrous Dance. I feel I should write something about this, but I don’t quite know what. I had been inoculated in the morning, Dr Levy. ‘Now nurse, be sure that the needle is sharp. It is better to have a sharp needle. I do not believe in economy in these matters – it is foolish to economise in needles when the war is costing us 11 millions a day’ etc. Anyway after inoculation I wasn’t feeling quite at my best. But I managed to get partners at the beginning, though I didn’t dance very well. I felt very tired, probably because of the inoculation. Left at 10.40, alone in pitch dark and drizzling rain. When I got back into my cabin leaned my head against the wall, not unhappy, but thinking the obvious thing – where in the whole world, etc. But mixed with this feeling was a kind of satisfaction – well, I’ve been to the Wardroom dance. I’m trying. Saturday 9 October. Leave started.…

Had breakfast and caught the 7.45 train to Fenchurch St. Very cold and misty. Went to Paddington by Inner Circle. How I love Paddington Station. Already a mass of people was beginning to queue for the 10.25 Cornish Riviera Express. I went to the Restaurant on Platform 1 and had some toast and coffee – the room has pretty pale green walls and on the table a notice reminding customers that the GWR have NOT adopted the principle of adding a service charge. Got home about four – changed into a red dress with unwrenlike red bows in my hair. Then wallowed in the luxury of bed.

Sunday 10 October. Oswestry. Breakfast in bed – enjoying my room – sunshine, books, light clean walls and pictures – the bright Raoul Dufy over the mantelpiece. After lunch lying outside in the sun.

Tuesday 12 October. Being on leave one is humanised again, listens to the news more, gets more into touch with the war. Coming home in the train I was reading the Spectator and an article by Harold Nicolson, in which he mentions looking up his diary for 1940 – the Battle of Britain period. It occurred to me that were I to look in this volume in three years time what dreariness I should find. One would hardly know that there was a war on at all, and certainly not have any idea that I was an intelligent and presumably thinking person. Or perhaps I do think a little, but not about anything that really matters to anyone except myself.

Thursday 14 October. Yesterday Italy declared war on Germany. What a strange mad war. A pity they didn’t choose our side three years ago.

I am a wretched melancholy creature when I would like to be noble and strong and very intelligent. I lie in a hot bath brooding about G. (yes I still do in spite of putting him right out of my life) when I ought to be thinking about the Metaphysicals in a scholarly way or planning a great comic novel.

Friday 15 October. Bristol. Hilary met me at the station yesterday and we came straight up to the Coppice in a taxi. A lovely welcome of course – but poor little Sally lying on the sofa looking rather plain and peaky, just like a child in a novel by Charlotte M. Yonge. And Dick in his dressing gown – Lulu and Dan and darling Mary. Prue is ill too, and now as I write is sleeping through the Fantastic Symphony of Berlioz.

I asked Honor if there was any more news about the divorce – and she says it is going to be heard NEXT FRIDAY! They had not intended to tell me until it was over.

My first feeling was one of elation – I went upstairs to change and stood for a long time looking out of the window, over the trees and gardens of Brackenhill. But now of course I’m sobered down. There is really no cause for rejoicing as far as I’m concerned.

Saturday 16 October. A very melancholy day, but in some ways a satisfying one. Because I’ve really faced up to the fact that Gordon doesn’t really love me as I love him and will never ask me to marry him when he is free. He told Honor a week or two back that he didn’t intend to make any more ‘experiments’. And she also told me, when I asked her, that according to Pen Lloyd James he regarded it as a pleasant sentimental episode which was now closed. He must have said that as long ago as the winter. So now what becomes of my illusion that this was a great renunciation and that he had ever for a moment wanted the same things as I do? Well, the illusion is dead or dying. But I’m not bitter about it. I still love him of course and in the months (or years!) that follow I shall no doubt ache for him sometimes – sweet, hopeless person, the most delightful companion. I was of course wretchedly miserable in the evening and tore up all his letters. But I have been realising that it would come to this soon and am really glad that I have had the courage to ask Honor and face up to it.

Sunday 17 October. Had breakfast rather late. And a surprisingly happy and calm day. Had lunch with Honor and the children – Julian amazed us all by saying that the king was in church, but we haven’t really got to the bottom of it yet – I mean how could he be?

Monday 18 October. London. When I got out of the train at Paddington in the twilight full of dim hurrying figures I felt about the most lonely person there. Oh, to be cherished and comforted at a journey’s end. It was nearly seven o’clock and I hurried on to Platform 1, hoping that the restaurant might be open. I sat at a table with a young Canadian officer who offered me a cigarette. We got talking and he finished by paying for my meal. I couldn’t say to him – you’ve brought comfort and friendliness to a rather lonely and miserable person, but that’s what he did.

Wednesday 20 October. Westcliff. Hawksworth thinks I ought not to be a Censor Officer, but suggests Intelligence or Staff Officer. But how could this be managed? I mean, nobody ever tells one anything about anything – but it would be lovely.

Friday 22 October. Was very busy today on the Marine index and thinking all the time about Honor and how she was getting on with the divorce.

About 5 o’clock they rang through from Regulating to say there was a telegram for me and should they read it. It said ‘Successful and Painless. Love. Honor.’

Sunday 24 October. London. Caught the 7.40 to London and now am sitting in the Tottenham Court Road Lyons Corner House having had a second breakfast. It’s nice to be in London on one’s own. Had some coffee and an almost continental fruit flan in Old Vienna. It’s nice, red plush and a chandelier and the waiters surely were once eminent Viennese businessmen and lawyers. I felt I had to have a glass of water with my coffee even if I hadn’t felt thirsty. I had decided to go to a concert but wasn’t sure which one as there were three to choose from – the L.P.O. were playing, and it wasn’t till afterwards that I discovered their programme contained both the old Tchaikowsky Piano Concerto and Prokofiev’s Classical Symphony – so I could have been nicely torn to pieces. But I chose the Albert Hall and heard a lovely programme with Boyd Neel conducting.

After the concert went into the big Lyons where I soon got a seat at a table with two young men – (one very dark and good looking, who reminded me of poor Friedbert) and a sergeant. We soon all got talking about music and so I had quite a jolly tea. Talking about Lyons the dark young man said that one needn’t ever feel lonely there, which was a new aspect of it to me, as I’ve always thought of it as the sort of place where one was essentially lonely, especially with all the crowds and music and glittering decor. It was the first time I ever haven’t been and I enjoyed it.

Sunday 31 October. Winter will soon begin. I often used to think it would be romantic to be by the sea in winter. Now that I am by it I scarcely look at it. Though perhaps I meant wild dramatic sea, not Westcliff’s tame suburban waters.

I had a lovely weekend in Bristol – unmarred by any real Gordon misery – but plenty of tender rather sad memories – it’s come round again to that time of year. Our feet rustling through the leaves and the dark mornings. But how completely he is Honor’s, really.

Friday 12 November. I was sad yesterday evening and alone in the redirection room began writing a poem. As soon as I’d had supper I hurried out to the Municipal College to a gramophone recital – whirled away from my misery along the London Road in a blue-ly lighted trolley bus. The lecture was at the School of Art – a modern building, rooms full of Greek plaster casts – (Oh God, oh Montreal – surely Westcliff might be such a place?). Our room was full of books and had a blackboard and a screen, and rows of chairs. Mr May, the lecturer, is a tall, distinguished looking grey haired man, wearing a striped flannel suit. A white haired woman in a turban (his wife!) put on the records. The audience was rather scanty – an old man, one or two civilians and three soldiers.

Thursday 18 November. On Tuesday I had my second inoculation. Felt very ill in the evening and I was duty wren. Sat desolately by the fire shivering uncontrollably with an aching head and longing to be cherished. A year ago to the day Gordon said to me, sitting by the fire in Honor’s room, ‘whatever happens you mustn’t be made unhappy over this affair’.

Saturday 20 November. In the afternoon went into Southend with Prue Leith Ross. A cold bright day – we walked in. Bought two vests and then went into the Odeon to see Flemish Farm – very good of its kind. We also had a selection on the organ – bathed in a luxurious glow of rose, green, blue and purple light, one could imagine anything – listening to ‘Believe me if all those endearing young charms’ – dear ruin and dear Tom Moore – and ‘Because’.… I like cinema organs, in cinemas – one must have the plush seat and coloured lights, all the right trappings.

Sunday 21 November. Went to St Alban’s church, taking with me the prayer book and English Hymnal I brought away from there more than 2 months ago. When I got to the church heard the sound of a piano and inside a thin bald man was playing Chopin – a Nocturne – with great fervour. It seemed rather unsuitable. We had quite nice hymns and the Vicar was very jolly afterwards. When I got out of the church it was absolutely black and I had no idea where I was going, but somehow walking boldly in the middle of the road I found my way to the Hobby Horse! One step enough for me. So I sit listening to Albert Sandler, Indian Love Lyrics, and before that Vera Lynn, surrounded by Marines.

3/O B. M.C. Pym, WRNS

Box 500,

Southampton.

26 May 1944

I was so pleased to get your letter when I was in London doing my Censorship course. As you will see I have now got my Commission, and am a Third Officer in the depths of the country – although our address is Southampton we are in fact about 18 miles away and work in a large country house, with beautiful grounds full of camellias, azaleas and rhododendrons. It belongs to the Rothschilds and before that the Mitfords – Unity’s family, you know, lived there. It has quite an imposing façade, mock Palladian, with a good sweep of grass and a view over to the Isle of Wight.

I have been here since 13 March and there is plenty of social life whether you like it or not, because, as you can imagine most of the invasion forces, both English and American are concentrated in the South and South-West and there are always far more men than women at dances. The Wrens get so many invitations they hardly know which to accept. Last night we went to a big Anglo-American dance given at the Village Hall – we were allowed to wear civilian clothes which was a pleasant change as a stiff collar and tie isn’t very comfortable for dancing. I met there a young Surgeon-Lieutenant, who was up at Magdalen 1936–1939. It was nice to talk to somebody about Oxford again – my dear, I couldn’t remember anyone I knew who’d been up at Magdalen except Oscar Wilde and your tutor Lewis. Though before I knew you I used to think you were there as I often saw you coming out on my way back from the Bodleian, some starry evening in the very early spring 1933!

Anyway the dance wasn’t too bad – naturally I hadn’t wanted to go, I never do, would much rather have a quiet evening at home reading. And as for writing I never get a moment now, and have a fine idea for a novel about this place and all the queer people in it. Don’t think that because I mention all this social life that I have changed in the least. I don’t really like meeting and making conversation with all these people but it has to be done and naturally I manage to see the funny side of it. Last Sunday night I went for drinks with our Captain (an RN type) and some Canadian Commandos, very tough and free with Himself’s booze, to which they helped me liberally! The Captain is a great personality with a silver headed stick and a Great Dane – can be very charming when he likes. The other Navy people here are rather varied – we have some Army Captains too who are very nice on the whole – two Oxford ones among them but rather young. Still it is a bond and always makes something to talk about.

I’ve got your letter in front of me, so will answer it whatever there is to be answered in it. I can’t remember at all what my last two letters were like – not very good, I imagine as I know in the first one I was probably feeling very depressed about Gordon – well, that is all over now and I have quite recovered from the misery I felt at the time. It took me nine months or so to recover (just like having a baby). It was really much better when I went into the Wrens last July. Change of scene and new people and now I have met Gordon again and feel quite indifferent towards him – well hardly indifferent but you know what I mean! We had a rather dramatic meeting last December, drinks at the Bolivar, behind the BBC and lunch at Pagani’s which lasted till 4. Have seen him only once since then but we write occasionally. I am sure you would like him – he has great charm, though he is hopelessly unstable to lean on, and one does want a little of that, dull though it may sound. Since then I have had one other ‘entanglement’ with a Petty Officer at Westcliff-on-Sea, where I was stationed during the winter, but I finished that off and am now more or less heart free. So it looks as if you and Jock may get your way and have me as Miss Pym all my life. I cannot believe that I am still an essential bearing in your lives – it is so long since we have met and we must all have made many other friends in these last four or five years. Still, I do think that we could quite easily slip back into our old ways if we were ever all together again, say in Oxford, preferably. We still all like the same things as we did then.

My officer’s uniform is really smarter than my Wrens, I think. Of course it is made to measure and fits much better, has gold buttons and a tricorne hat with a rather beautiful naval badge, blue and gold and crimson. The Wrens wear little sailor hats, as I expect you know. I quite like mine and still have it at home. I imagine you would still recognise me, even in uniform. I suppose I’ve got to look older but that’s about all. How do you look these days – have you still got all your hair? Elsie seemed to look very much the same, judging by the photograph that you sent of her with the baby. Do tell her to write to me – she used to write such lovely amusing letters.

I am vaguely depressed, waiting for things to happen as we all are now, I wish it could be over and done with – we shall know so many people in it and I suppose a good many of them won’t come back. Still, I wouldn’t be anywhere else now at this time.

I’ve just been reading a letter from home, my parents are both very well and Hilary too – she is still in Bristol. Her husband is a Sergeant now – Air Force. He’s very intelligent. They have started writing to each other in Modern Greek, as they hope to go out there after the war. He is also very musical, as she is, so they are quite a well suited couple.

I must stop now and go over to tea. We still get quite good food, though it isn’t always as well cooked as it might be. Anyway there’s plenty of it. Cigarettes are plentiful too – at 2/4 for 20! Drink is very short but we do manage to get it.