BR TO CONSTANCE MALLESON, [25 SEPT. 1916]
BRACERS 19044. ALS. McMaster.
Edited by S. Turcon. Reviewed by K. Blackwell

<letterhead>
57 Gordon Square
W.C.1
Monday night late.2

What a joy to get your letter3 just now when I came in — and to know tomorrow is free — Yes, tomorrow 6.30 I can come. I will telephone about 10 tomorrow. My dear one your image is with me whatever I am doing — I keep on forgetting everything. It grows and grows in my mind and heart. I grudge the thoughts that have to go to other things — I long for leisure, just to be happy. I dream of you in the country — these autumn days make one long for it. But really outward things matter very little. In less than a fortnight I have to start off for my lectures4 — after that, I shall only be here Sundays at most, even if all goes well. It is sad. How about this next Sunday? I shan’t be busy then.

Poor Miss Rinder!5 I feel her terribly pathetic — I long to be able to be interested in her, but I cannot be.

They are terrible, the times when one feels nothing is real or true. I think every one who feels deeply has them. But love is really real — I used to love fiercely and possessively and almost cruelly — in a way that parts one from the world of love — now I don’t — it is terrible when love breeds hate. I could not bear that any love of mine should bring any pain to any one — it seems a poison in the roots of it when it does. O my dear, I am so tired, and so weary of fighting when I want to live at peace with all men. Strange that such a wish should make them so angry.

My coming to John Street6 was only an excuse to see you — I slipped round from Duke Street7 — I wanted to make sure that you exist and were not just a dream I had had. There was no doubt of you in the office!

Now goodnight my dear one — I long for tomorrow. There is so much unsaid — and I want to know I have not been dreaming.

B.

As to plans — don’t bother to give me dinner — we can get a meal out somewhere after the music if that is what you would like. I will come at 6.30 — but don’t waste thought on food!

Notes

• 1

  [document] Document 200007.

• 2

  [date] Colette wrote “25 Sept. 1916” on the letter.

• 3

  your letter  Colette’s letter of 25 September 1916, BRACERS 112930.

• 4

  my lectures “The World as It Can Be Made”, a series of lectures in Manchester and Birmingham (Glasgow had to be by proxy) which began on 16 October 1916. The syllabus is 71 in Papers 13; the lectures were published as Political Ideals (1917; 56–60 in Papers 14).

• 5

  Miss Rinder Winifred Gladys Rinder (1882–1965) worked for the No-Conscription Fellowship and was “chiefly concerned with details in the treatment of pacifist prisoners” (BR’s note, Auto. 2: 88). More specifically, she helped administer the Conscientious Objectors’ Information Bureau, a joint advisory committee set up in May 1916 and representing two other anti-conscription organizations—the Friends’ Service Committee and Fellowship of Reconciliation—as well as the NCF. One C.O. later testified to her “able and zealous” management of this repository of records on individual C.O.s (see John W. Graham, Conscription and Conscience: a History, 1916–1919 [London: Allen & Unwin, 1922], p. 186). Rinder exhibited similar qualities in assisting with the distribution of BR’s correspondence from prison and in writing him official and smuggled letters. Her role in the NCF changed in June 1918, and after the Armistice she assumed control of a new department dedicated to campaigning for the immediate release of all imprisoned C.O.s. She appears to have lost touch with BR after the war but continued her peace advocacy, which included publishing occasionally on international affairs. In 1924 she travelled to Washington, DC, as part of the British delegation to a congress of the Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom. Decades later Colette remembered Rinder to Blackwell as somebody who “seemed about 40 in 1916–18. She was a completely nondescript person, but efficient, and kind” (BRACERS 121687).

• 6

  John Street The Conscientious Objector Information Bureau was located in John Street, Adelphi, London. It was set up by the JAC (Joint Advisory Council) comprised of the NCF, the Fellowship of Reconciliation and the Friends’ Service Committee. In her autobiography After Ten Years (London: Cape, 1931), Colette wrote: “We kept, at the Information Bureau, a complete history of each man from his appearance before the Tribunal to his last known prison or camp.... I spent my time keeping the index up to date” (p. 101).

• 7

  Duke Street The office of the NCF was located at 4 Duke Street, Aldelphi, London.