Open Writing

On my way to school I stayed with Daddy, in London, for my first visit. I was enchanted. Daddy had taken me to see St. Paul's Cathedral, Westminster Abbey, the Houses of Parliament, and Madam Tussaud's, but I liked best of all the London parks, with the great plane trees.

The next day Daddy devoted to business, so he left me early with instructions to be careful crossing the roads, to look at the shops, and to be in the hotel in time for one o'clock luncheon.

I felt forlorn and lonely after he had gone and busied myself for a short while in the pages of a newspaper, sitting in the lounge, before preparing to venture into the City. As I sat there I felt eyes upon me and looking up saw an elderly gentleman with a beard, exactly opposite, gazing with a peculiarly fixed stare. It was uncanny, so I dropped my head and continued to read.

But the eyes of the stranger bored into me. I lifted the paper high and had a quick look over the top. Yes, he was still there, still with that fixed stare. I was disconcerted and rose to go to my room, and when I emerged there was this man alone with me on the long, empty corridor.

I decided against going out for the present as I remembered warnings of the White Slave traffic, very prevalent at that time. I wandered to the writing room and in a few minutes the stranger entered and seated himself in an armchair close beside my desk. Feeling panicky, but trying to appear calm and withdrawn, I wrote a letter, perhaps two, relieved to see figures at the other desks.

Running through my mind was the memory of an experience which Mummy had when staying in London as a girl. For several years she was a regular visitor to her friend, Lady Belsey, in Russell Square, and on this occasion there had been some misunderstanding over the time of her arrival.

Mummy did not know this and so she waited at the station to be met as usual. She stood there a long time, wondering what had happened, but feeling she should remain or the two would miss one another. Eventually a woman appeared, out of nowhere, and began questioning Mummy as to who was meeting her and where she was going. She was interrupted by an elderly porter who took Mummy's case from her hand and steered her away, saying something she did not hear to the strange woman.

Mummy began explaining to the porter that she was waiting for her friend, but in a fatherly manner, he told her she had had a lucky escape as the woman speaking to her was a known procuress; and he beckoned a cabby and saw Mummy safely on her way.

She always felt grateful to him, for she had visions of being whisked away out of the country to a fate worse than death in some strange, foreign land. Not that she had any idea of what a 'fate worse than death' meant at that time, and to me it was only a phrase with a threat wrapped in it.

All this I remembered. Wherever I wandered in the hotel, in a few moments the stranger would be in the proximity, his fixed stare steady upon me. In this way the slow hours passed, and when Daddy appeared I nearly threw myself into his arms so great was my relief. I poured out my tale and was frightfully annoyed at Daddy's amusement and incomprehension. It is a fact that the stranger was seen no more from the very minute of Daddy's arrival.

How one suffers when young! It was beyond me to go to the manager to report my unpleasant experience; one is so afraid of appearing to be a fool.

There are two things which interested me about Lady Belsey. Mummy was certain that it was through her that grapefruit was introduced into England. Lady Belsey was an American and she called constantly at Harrods, asking the same question and explaining what the fruit was like in appearance and flavour. At last, she was able to make her purchase for she was told that a crate had been ordered and the fruit had arrived.

I was amused, too, that she called Huddersfield "Shuddersfield", so disliking the town, that after the first visit she could not be persuaded to return!