May to David Beckenham 16.5.18
My dear David,
The weather has turned out glorious, like mid-summer, and I am feeling most fearfully hot.
I do not suppose you will get so many letters from me during the next fortnight, on account of my holiday.
The other day I saw a fine sketch in a paper. A girl land worker, looking very pleased, a farmer looking simply awful, a pigstye with curtains daintily looped with sashes, and two beautiful pigs with bug flapper bows. The words were “It gave the landworker pleasure and the farmer apoplexy”.
The General Manager has gone away for 10 days, which is a good thing as the weather has turned so hot, and no one feels like work. Strange to say there does not seem to be so much work to be done now.
Yesterday afternoon Mrs Taylor called in and took me away from my beloved business for an hour. We went to the GPO, and invested another £20 for you, and then on to Wallace’s and she bought some calico. We also did a good deal of shop gazing, which we both enjoyed. She goes today to Watford for Whitsun, while I am going out with Miss Willsher to the Chequers at Little Kimble, the Country Residence of the Prime Ministers, tomorrow, and elsewhere with her on Monday. I think she wants to do some more of the Tower of London, and so do I, so expect we will go there. It is far too crowded for you to take me to such a place. As I mentioned before my fortnight’s holiday will be commencing tomorrow, and I shall be dividing my time between No 18 and No 56. Very likely if the weather breaks up Mrs Taylor & I might go to a matinee at your expense. Guess we shall enjoy ourselves whatever we do.
There is a beautiful thunderstorm going on, and has been for the past hour. Do you remember those flying storms at Gidea Park? I see that according to the “Artists Magazine” a good deal of golf is being played on those links. I wonder if they are still using, or rather misusing, our particular bunkers. The men do not get leave now like they used to in your time, so some of the clerks who have left us and are now there tell me. You were lucky.
I am expecting a letter from you this weekend. That missing one never turned up. I wonder how you are, really. Are there many in your camp, and have you had that pain in your side again? What about your indigestion, and the noises in your head?
Cannot stop any longer, so Goodbye for the time being.
May