Part 12

I said she need not have told me that. I knew it already.

She then said: "Clare knew you would understand, even if you didn't understand."

I said that was my exact position: "I did not understand, but I knew there was something to understand, and that therefore she was right."

_Letter from Guy Cunninghame to Mrs Caryl_

LONDON, _Monday, August_ 10_th._

DEAREST ELSIE,

I have just come back from Rosedale. There is no one there except Godfrey. Lady Jarvis told us that Mrs Housman has finished the first period you told me about, and has taken the veil, though it isn't irrevocable yet, but for all intents and purposes it is, as we are all certain now that she will never leave the Convent. You know what I think about it. I haven't changed my mind, but Lady Jarvis doesn't disapprove, or is too loyal to say so.

George knows, he is going to Ireland with his sister.

I can't help thinking it is all a great, a wicked mistake, and I can't help still thinking it _selfish_.

George talked about Mrs Housman, at least he just alluded to her having become a nun, as if it were a fact and quite irrevocable. He said: "Once the priests get hold of someone they will never let them go, and in this case it was a regular conspiracy." But somehow or other this did not seem to me to ring quite true, from _him_, and I felt he was using this as a shield or a disguise or mask. I said so to Godfrey, but found it impossible to get any response. He won't talk about it.

Yours, G.

_From the Diary of Godfrey Mellor_

_Sunday, August_ 26_th. Carbis Bay Hotel_.

I have come down here to spend a week by myself. It is three years ago since I came here for the first time to stay with Mr and Mrs Housman.

I hesitated about coming down here again, but I am now glad that I did so.

I went to Father Stanway's church this morning and heard him preach. He is a good preacher, clear and unaffected. He quoted two sayings which struck me. One was about going away from earthly solace, and the other I cannot remember well enough to transcribe, but I have written him a post card asking who said them and where I could find them.

In the afternoon I went for a walk alone along the cliffs and passed the place where we began _Les Misérables_. I am re-reading it, not where we left off, but from the beginning.

_Monday, August_ 27_th_.

Father Stanway called this morning while I was out. He has left me the quotations on a card.

They are both from Thomas à Kempis. One of them is this: "By so much the more does a man draw nigh to God as he goes away from all earthly solace." The other: "Whosoever is not ready to suffer all things and to stand resigned to the will of his beloved is not worthy to be called a lover."

_Tuesday, August_ 28_th_.

I have resolved to give up keeping this diary.