'Tears Before Bedtime' and 'Weep No More'

by Barbara Skelton

  *

  The next letter conveyed he was anguished at telephone difficulties … he was going to try again in the evening, he hoped all his telegrams would have reached me by tonight, sincerest love and devotion unreserved …

  *

  The following day he was begging me to ring at two-thirty even if it was just for one minute or maybe try just for two seconds around seven …

  *

  He had had a long talk with Feliks most affectionately about me, he was so sorry to have been out when I called but he had been chasing after The Noble Savage, a life of Paul Gauguin, he was thinking of me constantly and counting time until Saturday and sent more floods of love …

  *

  Thought I was going to enjoy being in a private room, but the day drags. Though I do at last have a book which keeps me absorbed, Lord Byron’s Marriage by G. Wilson Knight. Even so, one can read only for so long, seven hours it has been, and then one’s head reels. With this operation there is no treatment during the day, which takes up the time. Night nurses come in at six-thirty just when one is awake, take temperature, bring toothmug and bowl of hot water to wash hands and then buzz off. Day nurses come on and make the bed, the cleaner arrives and sweeps, breakfast, the newspapers (read about Bodkin Adams case – the Eastbourne doctor then on trial for murdering a wealthy widow by administering large quantities of drugs. In her will she had bequeathed him a chest full of silver). Then what they call ‘a blanket bath’, which means I strip and wash myself. No sun today. Was given two pain-killing tablets this morning which are beginning to wear off. Cyril telephones and says he enjoyed his dinner with the Hamish Hamiltons, Stephen Spender, the Ian Gilmours and Mark Longman; thought an extra woman would have helped. Got a lot of attention from Gilmour and Longman who monopolised Cyril throughout dinner in order to make Jamie feel ‘socially inadequate’. I said, ‘How childish.’ C. agreed it was cliquey. He said that if I marry W. it will last a year. After that he will be in constant touch with his lawyers.

  *

  W. telephoned, full of groans. The new servant, Phillips, no good, not doing any work, can’t cook, how he misses the Italian Enzo (his Leporello) who is on holiday, has Lizzy Lezard coming for lunch. Originally, he promised to come to Canterbury for the weekend; now states a Mr Blow has come from America with whom he will have to spend Friday evening and he also has to see his child. I tell him not to bother and arrange for Cyril to come instead. Cyril says he will come for the whole of Saturday, stay the night. In the end, turns up on Sunday. Not much to choose between them really.

  *

  Cyril went to Brussels the weekend I came out of hospital and Sutro sent a car for me. I was booked into Westbury, where W. had taken a room. When Cyril got back he also moved into the hotel, from where he wrote to the Bill Davises:

  Barbara wants to get away from the ding-dong to rest and try to make up her mind. She was about to go to Poppet’s when vexation at W. (alas only temporary), as she wanted him to hand over evidence for a divorce to my lawyer, made her decide to go to you. Naturally, I am delighted because (a) she is with you (b) she is somewhere where he can’t telephone her … but it does mean that she is really with me … or even really trying to give him up. I suppose she will try to see whom she misses most – if it is me she will send for me and I shall fly out, if it is him, I suppose she will leave you. If I join her we would stay with you a long time and do the short book on Spain I have to do – for which she must learn to do colour photographs. Of course, I long to come for Christmas, but not if it is going to drive her away. And I want you to be very tactful and not root for me too obviously but make her feel you both like her for herself as I know you do … she has had a very bad time between the operation and the wear and tear of trying to have two husbands simultaneously. I can only say that she means to get over him and stay with me … but is also inclined to think she is bad for me. She suffers a lot of guilt when with him. Perhaps you could introduce her to the bullfighter Litri or some other distraction. A trip to Tangier or Marbella would also be welcome but try to keep that for when I come … don’t let her get depressed in the evenings, it was when she missed W. at the cottage, but run her down to Toni’s bar. I have been through hell the last weeks and it is an immense relief that she is going away and not always on the floor below here seeing us both alternately. Have had a very bad time. Very much love from Cyril …

  Chapter IV

  In Spain

  Diary

  Churriana

  The airport of Gibraltar is as beautiful as Nice’s. The plane coasted in very slowly and landed on a long strip jutting out into the sea. One was suddenly engulfed by the land and ships, and when the engines were turned off, I felt as though I’d been swallowed up into nothingness. Bill was nowhere to be seen and I began to get depressed, thinking my telegram had not arrived in time. I was about to leave and book into the Rock Hotel when I saw them unloading parcels, all bent over the boot of a large grey sportscar: Bill, Annie and her brother, Tom Bakewell, a handsome playboy who has opened a bar in Torremolinos. They had spent the day in Gibraltar and been stocking up, and were so friendly and seemed so pleased to see me that I immediately felt happy that I’d come. But the drive was terribly tiring as it was fiesta; the streets were crowded with horses, donkeys and Spaniards strolling up and down in their best and brightest clothes. We drank Scotch all the way and Bill was interested to hear about the operation; if I had a scar, what shape was it and which way did it run?

  ‘No intercourse from the day I came out of hospital for six weeks,’ I told him, knowing it was the kind of detail he relished, and with great seriousness he worked out the dates. He is a very funny man. When we arrived at La Consula, we drank a lot more Scotch on the rocks, played negro spirituals on the gramophone and lit all the big log fires.

  *

  It’s so wonderful to be here, in this well-run atmosphere of calm, luxury and quiet, apart from the baying of watchdogs at night, the wailing of nine Siamese cats and a turkey that chortles in the early morning. The house is very beautiful; white-faced with a line of columns. One enters through high iron gates with a vista of a gravel drive, a line of columns on one side and a dense, wooded, tropical garden on the other–very romantic at night. Everything is modern and white. They have some very good Giacomettis and some Goya prints; there are log fires in all the rooms, the dining room is lit by candles and the meat cooked on a charcoal grill. Bill is a great expert on food and chases after the servants so that everything is properly served. They have two horses in the paddock. If only I felt well enough to ride.

  A lot of confidences were shared while we sat over the dying embers of the charcoal grill. Bill said that I felt for Cyril pretty much as he had felt for his first wife, whom he’d lost ‘for a good lay’.

  ‘Now, if you leave Cirrule, what has this fellow got to offer you?’

  ‘Well, he hasn’t got anything, really, Bill.’

  ‘The way I see it, this fellow’ll get on. I like his books. See! I should say that in about fifteen years he’ll be rich. But what’s the good of that to you, Baubra?’

  ‘No good at all, Bill.’

  ‘I’m not sure you wouldn’t do better to stay as you are and keep writing. You never know, you might have some luck. If Cirrule says you could be good you will be. He wouldn’t say anyone was good if he didn’t believe it.’

  ‘It’s gone too far for that, Bill,’ interrupts Annie, ‘she’s got to decide between them.’

  ‘Are you in love with him?’

  ‘I suppose I am, Bill.’

  ‘Well, Baubra, if he gives you enough meat, it might work out. But you should get him to give you some shares in the business.’

  I suppose I find them endearing and funny because of their low, drawling, Yankee accents.

  *

  Woke up this morning with a fearful sore throat and the usual sensation of pending disaster. My breakfast was brought in on a basket tray that just fitted over the knees with pockets either s
ide for books and newspapers. In my bedroom everything is also white with thick cedarwood doors and shutters, a marble floor with honey-coloured matting and a view of palms. Last night the Brenans came to dinner, the usual cattiness about people – very reminiscent of England. Pritchett got it this time, but everything Gerald Brenan said about Spain was amusing and interesting. I shall go and sit in the sun on the terrace before a lovely view of the sea and mountains. One feels too hot in a pullover, the sun is so strong, but once it’s gone down around four o’clock, the temperature seems to be freezing.

  *

  The first twenty-four hours of euphoria at being out of London in an atmosphere of calm and luxury has now subsided and I suffer from mild melancholia; between six and eight it gets worse, and at the very mention of Robin and Mary Campbell my dread sinks to its lowest level. The royal suite is being prepared and they are talked of with bated breath as being very special people.

  *

  I wrote to darling Cyril:

  It’s a very triste evening, gusty, grey and chilling. My room is rather cold and I miss my red dressing gown more than anything. There are three Siamese cats that roam the house yowelling; the males have black, furry balls to match their ears. They all sprawl over each other making the same sex-mad noise as our stray cat last winter. Annie is being exceptionally forthcoming in her efforts to cheer me up, talks of possible future trips, but the only reaction from Bill is a frown as he stretches out his legs and yawns. I think he is bored with this house. He spends all his time taking short walks round the garden, carrying a cane, dressed like an English squire and playing the gramophone, or darting in and out of Malaga. He doesn’t seem in the least interested in the children and never addresses a word to them. I have only seen Annie’s brother, Tom, and his wife once. She is extremely pretty like a young Gerda, surprisingly lacking in vanity and more intelligent than him.

  The Gate House [where Cyril hoped we would live while he did a short book on Spain] is half the size of the cottage, comfortable and pokey, with no view and very dark – perfectly good for a lone author in a working mood or for two blissfully happy midgets. Gerald asked after you and said you were one of the few writers who was not envious of other writers. The Campbells have arrived, they improve things up to a point. But I don’t know why, I still find them intermittently provoking. I like Annie the best of the lot, she’s a really good, kind person, probably saved from being spoilt through Bill controlling all the money. But with the regular visits of the Brenans, it’s like having to stick to a rather indigestible diet of the same food every day. Mary starts putting on long-playing records at nine in the morning (classics, of course) which can be heard all over the house and, except on rare occasions, to me music before luncheon is equivalent to smoking on an empty stomach.

  Just received your telegram. I don’t know what to say. Don’t misinterpret whatever I wire back. I don’t want to make you more unhappy, but the decision to give up W. entirely by going back to you I find impossible to make. If you have not made any plans for Christmas, I think you ought to come here, you will be less gloomy with the Davises than with other people. But now that I’m better, there is a certain monotony about the routine. Bill goes to Malaga each morning so early that one invariably misses him and I don’t like suggesting that we go in later. One is as cut off and hermit-like as at the cottage. They never go into Torremolinos and avoid Tommy’s bar like the plague. The reason being, Bill says, that he thinks Tom will get into trouble with the police one day, through rival restauranteurs, and he doesn’t want to get mixed up in it.

  I miss you, of course, but am still bewildered about what to do, as now it has to be a decisive move. Too depressed to pursue the matter. With love, Barbara.

  *

  At this stage of our drama many people were involved. In his autobiography Feliks Topolski wrote:

  My days … weeks were stolen by the trio demanding my attention one after the other for the display of their ego-desire remedies. George, the supreme embodiment of the manipulator-errant, assumed to be destined for the highest trophies on account of his steely soullessness, had emerged now at his sexual Grail …

  Then, there was Sutro and W.’s old friend, Anne Bassett. She had been in touch with me while I was in hospital to say how unhappy George was, that she had known him ever since 1938 when he first came to England at the age of nineteen, that they had worked together in the same department of the BBC and that after the war she had been his private secretary on Contact, and that she had never heard him talk about a woman as if she were ‘a real woman’ – as she put it – and how he had struck her as being so sincerely devoted that she wanted me to know it, as she was very fond of him and she hoped I wouldn’t be angry at her for butting into my private life. Then, at some stage, Mary McCarthy had been drawn into the affair. W. was then her publisher for the English edition of A Charmed Life and I remember our meeting, Mary and I, in the bar of the Ritz, when she appeared as W.’s spokeswoman to try and make me come to some decision in his interest, and flashing the smile with which she imparted bad news.

  Cyril’s devotees were the Davises, Mary and Robin Campbell and my mother. Mail flowed back and forth between Cyril and Mummy, whose letters were tinged with old-fashioned good sense and disloyalty.

  (1)

  Dear Cyril,

  I was distressed to get your letter today. I was hoping that you were with Barbara. I got a card from her saying that she was still very sore and unable to do much but hoped that the rest and sunshine would do her good. I feel so sorry for you both as I feel that she will never be happy. I can’t help thinking that you must have hurt her in some way as she was very much in love with you and was quite happy to settle in the country and live a simple life. I remember last New Year’s Eve when she came over to me as she had been left alone in the cottage and she seemed then to be in a very distressed frame of mind. I am afraid you are not suited to each other. She always wants to come first and evidently with this other man she does. I think under it all she has a great homing instinct. I can only hope that all will be well in the end and whatever happens it will be for the happiness of both of you. Yours, Eveline Skelton …

  (2)

  Dear Cyril,

  I have not answered your last letter as I have been waiting to hear from B. I wrote to her but had no reply. I was not at all surprised that she told you I did not love her and did not care what she did. She always likes to protect herself but believe me I have gone through just as heart-breaking a time as you are having at the moment … there have been times that I have not heard from her for months and sometimes years … I did not know of her marriage to you until I read it in the paper … that is very hurtful, but I always hope and pray that she will be happy … Poor Barbara, I have never known her to be really happy. What does she want? She hates anyone vulgar and loud. I am terribly sorry for you, too; I do hope that your belongings are being looked after at the cottage. You have some beautiful things there and it makes me quite miserable to think of all your books and treasures getting damp. B. always said that you hated the cottage and used to call it Oak Coffin, so perhaps you don’t mind very much leaving it. I am afraid I have nothing good or hopeful to tell you but when I get in touch with B., I will let you know. Please call me Evie – that is the name I have always gone by. I hate the sound of mother-in-law. Yours affectionately Evie …

  (3)

  Dear Cyril,

  Thank you for your letters and letting me know the latest developments. I never hear from Barbara unless she is in a fix about something. I cannot understand how you can let her dangle you on a string, so to speak. My advice to you if you think she still loves you is to keep her wondering, do not write to her and let her make the first move. I cannot imagine what this George can be like. My younger daughter, Brenda, said on the phone that he had a very foreign voice, which I should have thought would have put anyone off. However, Barbara is Barbara … Evie

  (Mummy had, in fact, written soon after our marriage to
say, ‘I was very thrilled to hear that you were married. You didn’t say who to, except Cyril, so do not know how to address you. However, I hope you will both be happy. Tell your husband that you have a mother lurking in the background who would love to meet her son-in-law …’)

  *

  Everyone hoped that the visit to Churriana would prove a turning point in the affair, that there I would come to my senses and from then on the marriage would pick up, which is probably why Bill went into Malaga alone, in order to intercept the mail. One or two pleading cables, however, managed to break the barrier to the effect that he was missing me and I simply must go to our meeting in Madrid … he hoped I wouldn’t waver, for he simply had to see me. Did I need my overcoat for Christmas? I was to enjoy my rest but not prolong it. Would I please react to his cables? He then put a call through to the village of Churriana to say how depressed he was, as he had deduced from my lack of response that I had decided we could never make a happy marriage. He said he had been promised a small house near Genoa in the spring and summer, but first of all we simply had to meet and discuss everything. So I agree to fly to Madrid, and a final cable arrived to say that this was going to be a very crucial meeting and, he was sure, wildly exciting and wonderful, with love and au revoir.

  I then wrote to Cyril:

  The Campbells have been very kind and sensible. Robin has done his utmost to keep me here, but it is really hopeless. Although I love being here, a quiet life makes me brood. You need to be in a whirl of activity to forget an obsession. I am utterly miserable. If only you could accept my seeing W. from time to time, but you cannot. Whatever happens, I don’t want to be married to anyone but you, but if you want a divorce, I will send the evidence, use it if you want to, though I know I shall want to go back to you in the end …