BR TO CONSTANCE MALLESON, 23 JUNE 1919
BRACERS 19489. AL. McMaster. SLBR 2: #328
Edited by S. Turcon and N. Griffin. Reviewed by K. Blackwell

<letterhead>
70, Overstrand Mansions,
Prince of Wales Road,
Battersea, S.W.1^, 2
23 June 1919.

Dear Heart

I hate to write back a painful letter after your dear little line3 this morning. But what happened on Friday evening4 was more serious that you have realized.

One wants in love a sense of nearness in the impersonal things one cares for, so that there is more than pleasure; one longs for the sense of comradeship that relieves loneliness. It seems to me that we have drifted into having entirely separate interests, so that we only meet across a gulf, in a way that has not much depth or reality. I cannot bear the gradual fading of what has been wonderful, and I would rather end while memories are unspoilt. I think and think, trying to find out what I feel, but I cannot discover how much of my love is still alive. I only know that respect for what there has been between us makes me unwilling to go on if what is to come is to be second-rate — I tried to put down something of what I felt5 as soon as you were gone — perhaps it will help you to understand. I hate to write so coldly, but I must tell you exactly what is in my mind —

• 1

  [document] Document 200477.

• 2

  [envelope] The Lady Constance Malleson | 34 Russell Chambers | Bury Street | W.C.1. Pmk: BATTERSEA S.W.11 | 5.45 PM | 23 JUN 19

• 3

  dear little line Not extant.

• 4

  what happened on Friday evening The details of this incident on 20 June are not known.

• 5

  something of what I felt If BR finished this attempt, it is not extant.