From the Diary of Godfrey Mellor
Friday, December 18th, 1908. Gray's Inn.
I went to the station this morning to see the Housmans off. They areleaving for Egypt and intend to stay there a month or perhaps twomonths. They are stopping a few days at Paris on the way.
Saturday, December 19th.
My Christmas holidays begin. I am spending Christmas with Uncle Arthurand Aunt Ruth. I have to be back at the office on the first of January.
Thursday, January 1st, 1909. Gray's Inn.
Received a post-card from Mrs Housman, from Cairo.
Monday, February 2nd.
Received a letter from Mrs Housman. They are returning to London.
Sunday, February 8th.
The Housmans return to-morrow. They have been away one month andtwenty-one days.
Monday, February 9th.
Went to meet the Housmans at the station. They are going straight intotheir new house at Campden Hill and are giving a house-warming dinnernext Monday, to which I have been invited.
Tuesday, February 10th.
Lord Ayton has been made Parliamentary Under-Secretary. I do not knowhim but I remain in the office. He is taking me on.
Monday, February 16th. Gray's Inn.
The Housmans had their house-warming in their new house at Campden Hill.I was the first to arrive.
On one of the walls in the drawing-room there is the large portrait ofMrs Housman by Walter Bell, which I had never seen since it wasexhibited in the New Gallery ten years ago. It was always being lent forexhibitions when I went to the old house in Inverness Terrace. While Iwas looking at this picture Housman joined me and apologised for beinglate. He said the portrait of Mrs Housman was Bell's chef-d'oeuvre.He liked it now. Then he said: "We are having some music to-night.Solway is dining with us and will play afterwards. He plays for nothinghere, an old friend; you know him? Miss Singer is coming too. You knowher? She writes. I don't read her."
At that moment Mrs Housman came in and almost immediately Mr and MrsCarrington-Smith were announced. Mr Carrington-Smith is Housman'spartner, an expert in deep-breathing besides being rich. MrsCarrington-Smith had lately arrived from Munich. The other guestswere—Miss Housman (Housman's sister), Lady Jarvis, Miss Singer, whom Iwas to take in to dinner, a city friend of Mr Housman's, Mr JamesRandall, a little man with a silk waistcoat, and, the last to arrive,Solway. I sat on Mrs Housman's left, next to Miss Singer.Carrington-Smith sat on Mrs Housmans right; Housman sat at the head ofthe table, between Mrs Carrington-Smith and Lady Jarvis. Miss Singertalked to me earnestly at first. She is writing on the ItalianRenaissance. I told her I was ignorant of the subject, upon which herearnestness subsided, and she smiled. Then we talked of music, where Ifelt more at home. She had been to all Solway's concerts. She is not aWagnerite. Just as we were beginning to get on smoothly there was ashuffle in the conversation and Mrs Housman turned to me.
I told her we had a new chief at the office—Lord Ayton.
"We met him in Egypt," she said. "He had been big-game shooting. I hadno idea he was an official."
I told her he was only a Parliamentary Under-Secretary. At that momentthere was a lull in the general conversation and Housman overheard us.
"Ayton," he broke in. "A pleasant fellow, not too much money, some finethings, furniture, at his place, but he won't go far, no grit."
I asked Mrs Housman what he was like. She said they had made greatfriends at Cairo but she did not thin