Page 60 - Life of Gertrude Bell

48 GERTRUDE BELL
round and about, the common is too heavenly, a mass of broom
and hawthorn.’ Then she said, ‘We have spent an extremely lazy
morning basking in the sun and talking and idling about. I
expect it’s rather cockney outside ... ’
By summer, social activity had reached a climax: Ascot with
the Lascelles and other relatives and friends—Uncle Frank was
now ambassador at Berlin and was able to slip over to London
at intervals—and Lord’s for the annual confrontation of Eton and
Harrow, and an endless procession of parties and dinners. In
June she writes: ‘We have had a most delightful day. We started
about 10.30, Gerald, Florence, Uncle Frank and I, got to Ascot
half an hour before the first race, which we saw from the top of
the Royal Enclosure stand ... My gown was a dream and was
much admired. I am going this evening with Aunty Mary and
Florence and the Johnsons to sit out of doors in the Imperial
Institute and listen to the band—rather nice as it is very hot...
What a dear Lord Granville is ... ’ She reassured her stepmother,
parenthetically, ‘I didn’t bet, I need not say.’ In July: ‘Hugo
came up in great form and we started off for Lord’s together, but
on the way discovered that we had lost the blue tassel on his
umbrella, which saddened us dreadfully! So we tried in many
shops to get one, and failed alas! However, we were comforted
at Lord’s when we saw that many Eton boys had no tassel.’ They
ate greengages for lunch and made wishes as the fruit was the
first of the year, and Gertrude asked Hugo what he had wished:
< <<
Why I wished Eton might win—what in the world is there to
wish for besides?” He was such a darling!’
At the beginning of 1896 Mary Talbot left her work among the
poor of London’s Bethnal Green, which she combined with her
duties at Lady Margaret Hall, in order to marry the Reverend
Winfrid Burrows. Mary was thirty-four at this time, six years
older than Gertrude, and by the end of the year she was expecting
twins. Gertrude made frequent journeys to the vicarage in Leeds
where her friend now lived. Towards the end of the year she met
Janet Hogarth at tea in London and seizing her arm she said, ‘It’s
all right, Janet; I’ve seen Mary and she’s radiant.’ Gertrude
remarked to her stepmother that Mary had said to her that
whatever might happen she had no regrets, for her happiness had
been so great that it was worth any sacrifice. She died soon after
the birth of twin girls.