My Dear Bessie (32 page)

The atomic bomb announcement
*
(which I don't understand) makes me wonder about the future. What a life!

Whatever may be the reasons, the end of the Far East war is surely to come sooner as a result of it. And (since we can only interpret such news in a personal way) for you and for me, that spells earlier happiness. The Japanese may sling it in, but more likely they will be blasted utterly and earlier than scheduled.

I love you.

Chris.

At the Vatican, August 1945 (Chris front row, third from left)

10 August 1945

My Darling,

Sitting in the YMCA just now, I heard a news flash from the USA Soldiers' Station, that the Japanese had broadcast the acceptance of Allied surrender terms. It is already in the Rome papers, and just after the original announcement there came from below the cheers of the Romans. I hope it is true.

My first thought was of thankfulness that our chaps will not have to die in greater numbers to tame the Japanese. My second, and subsequent thoughts have been of how the news affects us. It must surely mean that I shall be released from the Army much sooner, that more leave will be allowed even to chaps who are in the Army. It spells happiness for us, rather earlier than we could have expected. So rejoice that we are nearer, rejoice that our wasted years really are ending, and that soon we shall be together, not only for a little while (fine though that is) but for always. I do hope that your constitution will be able to stand all the rising emotions it needs must support. If you are anything like me (and, gloriously, you are) you are bounding forward, surging onwards, though yet there is time we must wait.

I am enclosing a photograph taken in the Vatican Gardens today. On my right hand side there are three chaps I spend the days with: Barton, Tuckey and Thurgur. The tour this morning was of the Vatican Gardens and Museum and Sistine Chapel. The Museum contains the gifts of all the European sovereigns, the kind of Blackmail to the Eternal, which the RC Church has
practised since its inception. I cannot convey the beauty of the tapestries, paintings, sculptures, mosaics, which the Museum contains.

His Holiness received me (and 400 others) in audience, spoke in Italian and English for four minutes – I caught one word, ‘Blessings'. Brazilians, Americans, S. Africans, New Zealanders were amongst the crowd of the blessed. The Swiss Guards would do credit to a D'Oyly Carte show, the priests are an anaemic looking lot of stupids.

I love you.

Chris

20 August 1945

My Dear Bessie,

Well, today I got the letter card from Mum which I have been dreading. I expect you'll know all about it by now, as you might have been at Bromley the day Bert got home. I needn't bother with the details. Bert was friendly with a chap named Wicks when he first joined the Army. He wrote him irregularly whilst abroad, and his letter sent last December was acknowledged by his friend's wife. Her husband had been accidentally shot in Italy last July. Bert sent her some nuts, and letters became quite
frequent. He had fallen in love with her, and she with him. He was very confident (as honest innocent people are) that Mum would find it easy to adjust herself of the new situation. I thought it possible but unlikely, and tried to tell him what I could of the disadvantages. (Mrs Wicks lives at Sanderstead, hence my suggestion of the name a month back.) He said that he would tell Mum the first day he arrived, then call on Mrs Wicks. I presume that he has done that. Probably Mrs Wicks was as happy as Mum was unhappy.

I am quite inadequately provided with genius to meet this situation. Personally, I find it easy to say that Bert is acting naturally and wisely and that Mum is too closely concerned as a principal to be anything but selfish and jealous.

You are in an awkward situation too. I should be very surprised to find you had different views from me, but I would be very grateful for them. Your awkward situation is that you have to try and stop neutral and be helpful to both parties, principally to Mum. Please have a shot. What a life.

I LOVE YOU.

Chris

29 August 1945

My Very Dearest One,

I hope the enclosed ‘brochure' broke the news gently to you. The operative date for us is October 10th, by which time I should have done 2 yrs 8 mths abroad, and by which time, also, I hope that the 2 yrs 8 mths men will be proceeding on leave.

In a real sense I may, I think, regard myself as on the way to you. We'll discuss how it was done, or why, and whom it affects, later on – for the present, I am very happy to think that WE shall BE together in a measurable distance of time. Perhaps as little as two months, maybe as much as three or four. It means that I can put my arms around you, and call you my wife. It means that we can marry and sleep together. It means that your name will be Barker and you'll be a ‘Mrs'. It means that I shall cast away your last doubt by a legal act, and that in a slightly different fashion we shall face the world together. It means each of us giving all to the other and holding nothing back in any way. It means new responsibilities and duties. It means settling down in faith and hope in each other. It means you'll be taking on a very hard case, and [section of letter torn off].

I must say I think you are lovely and tell you I want you and need you. That I want to rub myself against you, realise the full fleshly dearness of you, appreciate the grandeur of your beauty, the call of your body, acknowledge, honour, you.

I love you.

Chris

30 August 1945

Dearest Bessie,

This is a quick letter, rushed, crowded in.

I am glad you are getting olive oil in England.

This week in Bari I have been able to look in most of the footwear shops, and I can tell you that there is no chance at all of getting warm winter shoes. Everything is very skimpy, wood or cork, with a few little strips of stuff to keep the shoes on the feet.

I have sent you off three parcels of new season's nuts today (as a matter of interest I tell you they are 7s. each).

It occurs to me that Bert might make some suggestion to you that, should I arrive home at about the time he gets out of the Army, we might get married on the same day, or something like that. Please do not favour this course; I don't suppose the position will arise but it might do, hence the observation. I would very much like to get home about October 24th, and get married on October 26th, but I don't suppose anything so specially nice as that would happen.

I know nothing about rings. I suggest you do a very little bit of window gazing, with the idea of familiarising yourself with the kinds of rings there are, so that when we buy it, there will be only one dumb bell present, and that me.

Yes, my cold went OK, but yesterday after three very bad nights in which I slept little owing to the type of bed I slept on I found myself with stomach trouble, heartburn and one or two
other bad things. Of course, that must be the day on which I was giving my specimen lecture, and when it came to it I was very tired and not very well, so that I was nervous, and very ordinary. Although I got certain commendations from the very radical Major who is in the command, he also said my voice became monotonous after a time (which was quite true, but I hope not, normally) and that I was too much of a propagandist (a fault I really am well aware of).

Your body, your breasts, your hairs, your moisture, they speak to me, they say to me: ‘Come!' I must have you, have you, for I can only be happy through you.

I love you.

Chris

2 September 1945

My Dearest, Loveliest, Most Wonderful, Delightful One,

I received your letter of the 28th today, with more than a little relief, as another day without the joy your letters bring would have been rather bad.

What you need to look out for now is 2 parcels of roasted nuts, posted July, and four more fresh posted in the last few days. That will give you nearly a stone of almonds, but I shouldn't
squander them too rapidly, as I am not at all sure if I can send anything like them from Egypt, should I get there. So, I think if I were you I should put them in a dry spot and eat them with a view to their eventual disappearance. (I have now spent £11 on nuts since my return here in April, by the way.)

‘Moving' is in the air, and a fortnight is mentioned. So if you get few letters for a fair time (I mean only a little, I shall write daily while I can), it means I am packing up books, maps, pens, blackboards, and so on, for the sea voyage (sickening thought, I hoped I'd finished with water, water everywhere).

I am so sorry that I must go away again after my next leave. It will be hard. But the leave will make it worth it, and your new status be a mental help to you during my next, and perhaps last, absence. Bessie, my darling, my lovely, wonderful woman, it will be such sweet delight to be in a room with you again, to be able to put my hand up your skirt, to put my hands in your blouse, to grasp your breasts, to touch the tips of them. What grander sight than to contemplate your loveliness, to see your breasts, to look upon the vital spot? My darling, five months ago (see, five months have gone!) you were very good to me.

I will not say very much about the Bert business. But, I must be honest and think that Bert would have been wonderful had he ‘given up' Daisy (Mrs Wicks) and there is plenty of justification, superficially, for much that Mum says. Logically, I am with Bert. Sympathetically, I am with Mum. You do well if you can behave neutrally, but I think you should.

My Darling, I need you more, really need you more, every day.

I love you.

Chris