Saturday
Glasgow
My Sweet,
I’m sorry if I did not make any reference to your long letter written on Sunday. How I could forget to do so when it was so full of interest I can’t make out. I was interested to see that your reactions were very similar to mine, although you obviously remember far more of the smaller incidents in the book. I wonder if the boy is just a flash in the pan, or will this film set him on the road to fame? We don’t seem to nurse youngsters in this country as they do in the U.S.
Glad to hear Milly’s taken to drink. We’ll get her sozzled one night and send her home to rape Tommy. It would do them both the world of good. Even if that doesn’t happen, I’ll be glad to sup her pint. I take them off anyone these days. Last night, for instance, we were duty watch but managed to dodge out to have a quiet gill. A Scottie insisted on buying us two pints each and we are invited to go to his house for tea next Sunday. He is a sergeant in the Signals and was at Dunkirk. He has been out of the Army for two years doing Post Office work and has to rejoin his unit at the end of this month. He says he was treated so well in England that he likes trying to repay the debt to fellows stationed here. Isn’t that decent? I should say he’s in his early forties and he was in the Navy in the last war.
Thank May for taking the trouble to drop that hint to Harold, but if there’s any danger I would rather he didn’t try it. I’d hate to be the cause of his getting in the soup.
I’m glad you managed to get over to the Rosses. How were they all? Did Madge have any good advice to offer you this time? Was there any news of Hughie’s brother Jack? He’s supposed to be in the Middle East isn’t he? I hope he is OK. Did you hear how his youngster is?
Your reference to Chris’s anniversary struck me as being typical of them. And while on this subject, you have twice mentioned our anniversary and I don’t think I have referred to either of the occasions in my replies. The reason, of course, was that both your references turned on the possibility of my being home for that occasion. As you know now, of course, that is quite out of the question, unless of course you can square Rees to send an urgent telegram! Still, I haven’t forgotten our September date. Do you realise that as it falls on a Saturday it actually falls on the day we were married! Some time we will go and spend a Saturday at the Wynnstay. What sayest thou? Or does it put ideas into your head? For the present, however, it would be heaven enough to be in Crosby for that day – and night, of course.
How is the cold? I do hope it is better, but this weather is enough to give anyone a real dose of cold. I don’t know where Mother gets her idea of hot sunshine from. While we have been here it has been reasonable on some days and other days as cold as November. We have had one really hot day and that was yesterday when it really was hot.
Sunday
I got your letter last night when I came in from seeing the sights of the city. We went to one or two pubs – three to be exact – and had a pint in each. Charlie Mitchell and John Gray had an idea that we might perhaps see some life. We were disappointed, however, for all we saw was what might be seen in any big city. A fair number of drunks staggering along the road and one classic pair in dramatic pose swearing eternal friendship to each other. There were, of course, lashings of prostitutes and “amateurs” trying, and in many cases succeeding, in picking fellows up. Central station is the notorious place for that in Glasgow and they use exactly the same technique as in every big city. We did not see any of the famous razor fights, however, so we are going round the Gorbals and Clydebank districts some time.
Many thanks for your very sweet letter, angel. It meant a lot to me. As you know, I have never been able to get over the miracle of you falling in love with me and despite all you say, I can never picture myself as the perfect husband. I’m not fishing for more compliments when I say that. Whenever I have stopped to analyse myself in any way I can only see myself as a very ordinary person full of little failings – selfish, often lazy and procrastinating. sometimes a bit bad-tempered and never, except when I’m a bit bottled, at all amusing. On the other side of married life I have done all I can to show how much I do love you in every sense of the word and perhaps my saving grace is that I do and always will love you so deeply that I know, from that point of view, that you and I are absolutely safe. Precious, I love you more and more every day and when I read your letter last night it was like being with you physically. I could feel you all round me and I went to bed with my head pillowed ever so comfortably on your breasts. It was so nice and “homey” that I’m sure I must have dropped off to sleep with a “sweet con” smile all over my smug face. And what nice dreams I had. Not very “violent” ones but just a succession of those sweet intimate things which we have shared so often before and the thought of which even now gives me that delightful and familiar stirring right deep down in my loins and which is so different from a mere vulgar erection. As I said once before, I think, it’s really a deep-seated yearning for you which can never be wholly satisfied by sexual intercourse. I have to hold you tight, and crush you, and almost hurt you with kisses, and then become all tender again in remorse, and then start all over again. You know what I mean and what lovely hours can fly swiftly past before they do culminate in oats such as you and I alone in all this world have ever known. And then to fall asleep locked together. Oh, angel, if only I could fly straight to you now! When will this damned war end? This is why I want to get done with this training business and throw my puny weight into the scales to try to bring all this nonsense to an end just a little bit sooner. We’ll never get anywhere with all this hanging back.
And now, sweet, they have started compulsory church for the Meths this week so I must leave you.
Goodbye, my sweet, for now and do take care of yourself. I hope your cold is better now. Many thanks for the children’s letters. Tell them I’ll write soon. All my love.
Ever your own,
Arthur X