But, dearest, if it was ‘intolerable’ to see you yawn yesterday, still less supportable was it to-day when I had all the yawning to myself, and proved nothing by it. Tired I am beyond your conceiving of ... tired! You saw how I broke off in my letter to you this morning. Well—that was Miss Heaton, who came yesterday and left the packet you saw, and came again to-day and sate here exactly three hours. Now imagine that! Three hours of incessant restless talking. At the end I was blanched, as everybody could see, and Mrs. Jameson who came afterwards for five minutes and was too unwell herself to stay, seriously exhorted me not to exert myself too much lest I should pay the penalty. And I had not been down-stairs even—only been ground down in the talking-mill. Arabel told her too, before she came up-stairs, that I was expecting a friend—‘Oh’ ... said she to me, ‘I shall go away directly anyone comes.’ And again presently ... ‘Pray tell me when I ought to go away’! (As if I could say Go. She deserved it, but I couldn’t!) And then ... ‘How good of you to let me sit here and talk!’ So good of me, when I was wishing her ... only at Leeds in the High Street, between a dissenter and a churchman—anywhere but opposite to my eyes! Yet she has very bright ones, and cheeks redder than your roses; and she is kind and cordial ... as I thought in the anguish of my soul, when I tried to be grateful to her. Certainly I should have been more so, if she had stayed a little less, talked a little less—it is awful to think how some women can talk! Happily she leaves London to-morrow morning, and will not be here again till next year, if then. She talked biography too ... ah, I did not mean to tell you—but it is better to tell you at once and have done ... only she desired me not to mention it ... only she little knew what she was doing! You will not mention it. She told me that ‘her informant about Mr. Browning, ... was a lady to whom he had been engaged ... that there had been a very strong attachment on both sides, but that everything was broken off by her on the ground of religious differences—that it happened years ago and that the lady was married.’ At first I exclaimed imprudently enough (but how could it be otherwise?) that it was not true—but I caught at the bridle in a minute or two and let her have it her own way. Do not answer this—it is nonsense, I know—but it helped to tire me with the rest. Wasn’t it a delightful day for me? At the end of the three hours, she threw her arms round me and kissed me some half dozen times and wished me ‘goodbye’ till next year. Wilson found me standing in the middle of the room, looking as she said, ‘like a ghost.’ And no wonder! The ‘vile wind’ out of doors was nothing to it.
Dearest, you are well? Your letter says nothing. Only one more letter, and then Monday. Ah—it is the sweetest of flattery to say that you ‘need’ me—but isn’t it difficult to understand? Yet while you even fancy that you have such a need, you may be sure (let Charles Fox break his promises ever so!) of your own
Ba.
R.B. to E.B.B.
Saturday.
[Post-mark, May 16, 1846.]
Then, dearest-dearest, do take Mrs. Jameson’s advice—do take care of the results of this fatigue—why should you see any woman that pleases to ask to come? I am certain that some of the men you have refused to admit, would be more considerate—and Miss Heaton must be a kind of fool into the bargain with her inconsiderateness ... though that is the folly’s very self. As for her ‘Yorkshire Tragedy,’ I hold myself rather aggrieved by it—they used to get up better stories of Lord Byron,—and even I told you, anticipatingly, that I caused that first wife of mine to drown and hang herself ... whereas, now, it turns out she did neither, but bade me do both ... nay, was not my wife after all! I hope she told Miss Heaton the story in the presence of the husband who had no irreligious scruples. But enough of this pure nonsense—I had, by this post that brings me your last letter, one from Horne—he leaves to-day for Ireland, and says kind things about my plays—and unkind things of Mr. Powell ‘a dog he repudiates for ever.’ So our ‘clique’ is deprived of yet another member!
For me, love,—I am pretty well—but rather out of spirits,—for no earthly cause. I shall take a walk and get better presently—your dear letters have their due effect, all that effect!
So, dear,—all my world, my life, all I look to or live for, my own Ba—I will bless you and bid you goodbye for to-day—to-morrow I will write more—and on Monday—return, my Ba, this kiss ... my dearest above all dearness!