I never dreamt such luck could be mine. She seemed so far above me, so obviously a match for the best of men and not for a poor drudge of a schoolmaster. She says that for a whole year she has been thinking about me and meant to marry me all along, only she was afraid I was already engaged or about to be. We sat out all the rest of the dances. I am living on air. I am much too cheerful and can't sleep at all. I want to go out and shout my good fortune to the skies. What are we going to live on I wonder? What will my people or hers say about it? I only know that nothing will induce me to give her up. I seem to be a quite different person from what I was this time yesterday. I know that then I never thought that I should have the ghost of a chance of even knowing Elspeth well, and now she is willing and anxious to live with me for the rest of my life.
January 23, 1913
The day after I was engaged I took Elspeth up to London with the idea of going to see the South Africans play footer at Richmond. When we got to Paddington we decided to "do" two theatres instead, so we lunched in the Haymarket and went to see The Dancing Mistress, which was rotten, and Doormats at night. We didn't get back till half-past three the next morning.
It was on that day that I was formally introduced to her people, who were most kind and asked me to stay, which invitation I naturally accepted. So I moved my belongings up to the Crescent where they live, and in two or three days I began to receive telegrams and letters by the hundred congratulating me.
Every day we took the dogs for walks, played billiards or went out with the beagles. Old General Tetley, Elspeth's father, is a dear, very kind to me and quite willing to allow us to be engaged and even talked of our being married in a year if I could get a better job than my present one at Radchester. Mrs. Tetley gave us the run of the house and we were left pretty well to our own devices. Elspeth's brothers and sisters (she has two of each) all appeared to congratulate us at one time or another: they are an extremely cheery family and I love them all. After a week of bliss at the Tetley's I took Elspeth up to see my father and mother, in order to let her see our part of the country. She took to them at once as they did to her. The rest of the holidays passed like lightning: so long as Elspeth was with me I was perfectly happy, doing nothing at all but listening to her play and sing or talk—the thought of having to separate, however, went near to driving me mad.
When the time came for me to return here, I simply could not face it. That last morning we walked over the moor and talked about anything to keep our minds off the afternoon and then at 1.48 I took her south as far as Derby, where she caught the Bath express and left me standing, absolutely lifeless, waiting for the train to take me back to Scarborough and Radchester. The pain of parting is the most excruciating agony that I have ever undergone in my life. I had often imagined that it must be awful for lovers to have to part, but I had no idea it meant all this. I wanted to throw myself under the train rather than put any more miles between us. I tried to read: I had bought every kind of interesting magazine: it was all no use. I tried to talk to people in the train: they bored me to distraction. By the time I got to Leeds I was joined by a crowd of boys whom normally I am only too glad to see. I couldn't find a word to say to them. "Elspeth—Elspeth—Elspeth"—the one word throbbed through my head the whole way back. I kept on wondering what she was doing at each moment of the journey. I started to pour out my soul on paper. I want to go on writing to her all day. Nothing else interests me. I can't work. I take no interest in anything. I can't possibly face a year of this cruel agony. I'd far rather die.
February 2, 1913
I have tried in every sort of direction to find another job. I can't possibly torture Elspeth by bringing her here even if I could afford to keep her, which I can't. I answer advertisements of every kind. I think I must have approached every Head Master in the kingdom.
One business firm wrote from the City and asked me to go down to see their directors, and I did, but all they could offer me was a sort of glorified commercial traveller's job, my income to be solely on commission, which isn't good enough.