Bloomsbury's Outsider (36 page)

The snow has come down and there is more to follow in those leaden clouds to the north, but I shall seize the moments of sunshine, put on my coat and muffler, take my stick and step out bravely, for I must see a little life and breathe a little air; I cannot live with books all the time. There is air certainly, arctic air, but there is not much life on the whitened roads. The doctor has visited the village and the treads of his tyres are freshly marked, but everyone else seems to have spent the morning hurrying indoors, and even if I caught sight of a child hurrying along in Wellington boots with a milk-can in his hand I should not have added much to my stock of knowledge.
³

This eventually arrives at a review of Pirandello, but not before a lengthy perambulation around the subjects of family stories and those of village life. As his son Richard commented, Bunny's ‘Books' pages ‘give a richer impression of the interests of his civilised and well-filled mind than can be found elsewhere, even in his three volumes of autobiography'.
⁴
Bunny's
New Statesman
articles are highly personal, reflecting not only his interests and scholarship, but also where he was or what he had been doing
around the time of writing. The curlews in the
Flush
review signify he had been in Yorkshire, the snow in the Pirandello essay that he had been out in Hilton. Writing to Bunny from China in 1936, Julian Bell had commented, ‘I keep in touch with you more than most of my friends, thanks to the Statesman and your habit of writing autobiography in it'.
⁵

Bunny could not know, in September 1939, that he would spend most of the next six years involved in writing propaganda and that he would have no time to write novels. What he did recognise, with some panic, was that he was ceasing to be a free agent. The boy who detested school and the young man who did not enlist in the Great War was now a middle-aged Air Force man, a tiny cog in the great machinery of war. From the outset, Bunny's working hours were long and his free-time short. With only Sundays off, it was difficult to get to Hilton or to visit Angelica at Charleston.

London had undergone rapid transformation. With the introduction of petrol rationing, it was almost devoid of cars; parks were dug up to make allotments; the Oval cricket ground was turned into a POW camp; shelters were springing up everywhere and statues taken down. Eros had flown Piccadilly Circus, the National Gallery was empty of art and soon the city's sign posts and street names would be removed too. At night London was cloaked in black, lit only by an intermittently benevolent moon.

Bunny kept up a social life of sorts, dining with H.G. Wells, A.W. Lawrence, Geoffrey Keynes, Francis Meynell and his old flame, Barbara Ker-Seymer. But there was one friend whom Bunny missed: Duncan had been a mainstay in his life for
twenty-five years. He was the male friend Bunny loved best. But Duncan could not accept Bunny's relationship with Angelica. Usually extremely polite, Duncan was so angry with Bunny that in November 1939 he cut him dead when they met by chance at Victoria station.

Bunny had not been to Hilton since before the fateful holiday in Ireland and wondered whether he would ever live there again. The Herlitschkas finally departed in early October, Herbert sending Bunny a touchingly grateful letter for all he had done. When Bunny returned on 7 October he did so with some trepidation, feeling desperate in the knowledge that Ray's condition would worsen, and that circumstances dictated that neither he nor the boys could be there to make life more tolerable. He was relieved when Ray's old friend, Cecily Hey, agreed to act as her paid companion.

Bunny turned to Geoffrey Keynes, who advised that although he was certain Ray had secondary growths in her brain, she should not be told she had anything more than fainting fits, but must be stopped from driving. Keynes and the distinguished radiologist, Dr N.S. Finzi colluded in telling her all was well. Ray was in a dreadful position, aware that her doctors were not telling the truth, but as she could not discuss her predicament with them, it was as though her illness was a shameful secret.

With Bunny in London, Ray became progressively fearful, lying awake at night worrying about her fate. She told Bunny, ‘The Horror seems to be beginning'.
⁶
‘One can't go on for ever crawling just out of reach like an injured mouse only to be dragged back by the cat's claw.'
⁷
Now she began to talk of
‘cancer', although Bunny tried to deflect her from such fears. He sent her an anthology on the subject of ‘Courage', but Ray commented to Nellie with some bitterness, ‘now I am inclined to lie thinking of cancer on the brain at night I can open my booke [sic] & read how Nurse Cavell died'.
⁸
There was no question, now, of Ray taking a cottage at Melksham. As the weeks passed Hey was joined by Ray's sisters Judy and Eleanor, the three women taking turns to care for her.

Bunny's weekly news sheet had given way to a daily bulletin. Believing he would write more competent bulletins if he had direct experience of the RAF's work, he decided to witness the work of Coastal Command. In November he was taken by boat from Pembroke Dock to a big Sunderland, a flying boat, in which he and several officers took off at dawn, flying between the Welsh hills into the Western Approaches, where they were under orders to observe a convoy of ships and look out for U-boats. Conditions were particularly rough; the plane kept hitting air pockets and being swept by squalls of rain. Bunny was not alone in being air-sick, but it came as something of a surprise. Later that month he flew again with Coastal Command, this time from Leuchars, near St Andrews in Scotland.

Meanwhile, Angelica was largely confined to Charleston. When she managed to snatch a whole week with Bunny at Charlotte Street, he wrote to her afterwards: ‘I don't doubt your love darling', ‘Your tears are so vivid: the feel & taste of them & I am ashamed you should shed them for me'.
⁹
Angelica's tears masked a growing confusion regarding her feelings for Bunny. She was not seeing enough of him and could not make up her
mind whether or not she remained in love. The cause of Angelica's confusion was a young German man called Eribert, whom she had met at a book stall on the Charing Cross Road and for whom she felt an attraction. They had barely spoken, but nevertheless, encouraged by Duncan, Angelica invited Eribert to her twenty-first birthday party at Charleston. Bunny felt vulnerable, fearing Angelica would prefer the younger man.

After the party, Angelica told Bunny that she was ‘immensely relieved when disillusionment came and he turned out to be exactly the wrong sort of person for me, & I could write to you & tell you so'.
¹⁰
An odd statement: was Angelica in love with the idea of falling in love? With so many young men disappearing into the Forces, did she feel the need to snatch at the opportunity Eribert appeared to offer? Or was she testing the strength of Bunny's love by causing him jealousy? She succeeded on that count: ‘I quite nauseated myself with my own jealousy', he told her, ‘an emotion which I
loathe
.'
¹¹

At the Air Ministry Bunny took turns as weekend Duty Officer, which involved being on duty round the clock, sleeping in a camp bed in the Director of Intelligence's office. Given Ray's now rapidly failing health, it was particularly hard on them both that Bunny had to work over Christmas, although the house resounded with happiness when Noel Olivier arrived with her husband Arthur Richards and their children. Bunny bought Ray a shooting stick to rest on while walking in the garden and gave her a magnificent patchwork quilt, which she had made into a dressing gown with a sort of farthingale skirt. It kept her warm and gave the impression that she glided about on wheels.

Returning to Hilton for four days' leave on Boxing Day and emerging from a climate of secrecy, Bunny wondered whether Ray's fears would subside if she were told the truth about her condition. ‘But', he reasoned, ‘one cannot tell a living creature, clinging to life, that there
is no hope
.' On one occasion, trying to reassure Ray, Bunny had to find a pretext to leave the room, unable to control his voice or disguise his emotion. He found himself automatically ordering seed for the garden, a pointless and unbearable exercise. He worried about Richard and William, about what they saw, how they perceived their mother, whether they knew how ill she was. As Bunny told Constance, ‘During the week I have to try to invent lies about our hopeful prospects of the war – that is child's play to lying when I get home.'
¹²
Ray told him, ‘You must lie to me if necessary but lie well'.
¹³
Preoccupied with Ray, Bunny found it difficult to concentrate on anything. He apologised to Angelica for seeming rather remote, explaining that confronted with Ray's worsening condition, he felt paralysed. ‘I often cry', he told her.
¹⁴

In January 1940, when the boiler burst at Hilton, Ray became cold and took to bed. She rapidly weakened. A nurse was brought in and Richard built a bird table outside Ray's window, so she could watch the birds. Bunny could now spend two days a week with Ray, and he exhausted himself staying up with her at night, reading aloud from her favourite detective fiction. Ray did not want to go into hospital and Bunny had no intention of letting this happen. Instead he explained the situation to Groves, who in February granted Bunny compassionate leave.

‘Life has settled into the curious routine when extreme illness governs the house', Bunny told Constance.
¹⁵
Now he, Hey and Judy took turns to sit with Ray throughout the day and to go to her at night. Bunny found it a comfort to be with her, that they could talk together, although he often broke down in tears, and wished there was more he could do to alleviate her suffering. ‘If only I could have a heart attack', she told him, ‘and not recover.'
¹⁶
But with Bunny at Hilton, Ray's fears began to subside. Now there was a tacit understanding between them that she would not get better, but this unspoken acknowledgement brought her more peace. Bunny asked the local doctor to administer morphine and heroin, one for the pain, the other to raise her spirits. Thus made comfortable, Ray was able to bring the family photograph albums up to date, Bunny having hastily taken the most recent films to the chemist to be developed. As Ray declined he observed it was ‘like watching a sandcastle being destroyed by the tide'.
¹⁷
She was perceptibly thinner and Bunny began to worry about the Easter holidays, believing it would be distressing for the boys to see her in this state, or worse still, if she were to die while they were at home. Ray too had been pondering these questions, and they agreed the boys should stay away.

Bunny had also taken another important decision: he resigned his commission in the RAF. This was partly for political reasons as Groves had left and Bunny thought his new superior might not be as sympathetic and might recall him prematurely. Mainly Bunny wanted to leave because he could no longer stand manufacturing lies, a realisation underlined by the fact that he and
Ray could now speak openly about her health. But there was another reason for his resignation. ‘That I want to be with a Jelly Cat & that the Jelly Cat wants me to resign.'
¹⁸
‘Jelly Cat' was Bunny's nickname for Angelica.

Bunny felt very close to Ray, relieved that they could talk about the boys' futures. She wished Bunny luck and happiness, saying she hoped Hilton would one day be full of children again. When Bunny mentioned William, Ray ‘cried out joyously: “William! There he is! I can see him lifting his head to look at me!” Bunny found the happiness in Ray's voice heart-rending. He felt utterly miserable, knowing she longed to die, knowing death would bring relief to them both, but wishing she had not had ‘such damned cruel bad luck'.
¹⁹

On the evening of Easter Sunday, 24 March, Ray died. Bunny had put her beloved cat on the bed beside her. With one hand stroking the cat, and the other clasped in Bunny's, Ray died, ‘almost imperceptibly', ‘a fortunate & peaceful death'.
²⁰
As Bunny told Richard and William, she ‘died so gently that the nurse could not be sure when it was'.
²¹
Afterwards, Bunny cried out “Thank God. Oh Thank God”, reflecting it was an odd response, as he did not believe in God.
²²
He and Ray had been married for nineteen years, the shadow of illness gradually darkening the last eleven. Bunny wrote to Duncan, pouring out his grief to his dearest friend. He said he would no longer live at
Hilton, ‘I can't bear it. I can't bear the waste: the silly unnecessary cruelty of Ray's death […]. Ray made this house: was often unhappy in it, but loved all the things which made it what it is. And now all the flowers are coming out: and I am turning out the jars of mincemeat she made last autumn.'
²³

Among the letters of condolence was one from Morgan Forster in which he clumsily chirruped about his mother and a friend of hers, both in their eighties. Ray's body was cremated and on 29 March Bunny went to Ham Spray, collecting the boys from Hungerford station. Frances Partridge found seventeen-year-old Richard ‘self-possessed and talkative', but William, only fifteen, ‘sunk and hunched in tangible gloom'. Bunny, she noticed, looked exhausted.
²⁴
Afterwards, Bunny took Richard and William to The Cearne, where they spent several days with Constance. Then Bunny wrote to Vanessa to ask whether he could come to Charleston, bringing his sons. She obviously acquiesced, as he later wrote to thank her for all her kindness and hospitality. Was Bunny easing Angelica into his sons' lives? Did he want them to taste the pleasures of Charleston, the house which for many reasons had played an important role in Bunny's life? Given Duncan's and Vanessa's antipathy towards Bunny, it seems astonishing he should have imposed himself upon them. No doubt the visit was intended to demonstrate the possibility of the evolution of another family unit, one which included both Angelica and his sons.