She was the first person that I sought and that I would still seek
if I were unhappy, because her genius lay in a penetrating
understanding of the human heart and a determination to redress
the balance of life's unhappiness. Etty and I attracted the same
people. She married Willy Grenfell,[Footnote: Lord Desborough of
Taplow Court.] a man to whom I was much attached and a British
gladiator capable of challenging the world in boating and boxing.
Of their soldier sons, Julian and Billy, I cannot write. They and
their friends, Edward Horner, Charles Lister and Raymond Asquith
all fell in the war. They haunt my heart; I can see them in front
of me now, eternal sentinels of youth and manliness.
In spite of a voracious appetite for enjoyment and an expert
capacity in entertaining, Etty Desborough was perfectly happy
either alone with her family or alone with her books and could
endure, with enviable patience, cold ugly country-seats and
fashionable people. I said of her when I first knew her that she
ought to have lived in the days of the great King's mistresses. I
would have gone to her if I were sad, but never if I were guilty.
Most of us have asked ourselves at one time or another whom we
would go to if we had done a wicked thing; and the interesting
part of this question is that in the answer you will get the best
possible indication of human nature. Many have said to me, "I
would go to So-and-so, because they would understand my temptation
and make allowances for me"; but the majority would choose the
confidante most competent to point to the way of escape.
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