In the morning I delivered my letter of introduction from Mr. Fletcher
to Mr. Summerlin. In the afternoon I was asked to go and see him. He at
once handed me a cable which had arrived the day before, and addressed
to me under his care. It contained news that I read and re-read before
my numbed brain could take it,--the announcement of Aunt Jennie’s[8]
death. I tried to pull myself together and talk of things Mexican
with Mr. Summerlin, who was very charming to me, but the weight of my
news was overwhelming. I drove out to San Angel Inn, in the country
with Dick and we had tea in the patio, where blue plumbago and magenta
bougainvillia mingled together from the verandah to the roof. Dick
played in a fountain. It was wondrously peaceful, and good to look at.
I have left England to “make good” and of all the people I love, and
who love me, and whose eyes have followed me across the sea, Aunt
Jennie’s were among the keenest. I would have liked to do my best work
for her appreciation. Her praise, her approval, her advice, her love
was something that counted. The loss of her, and the contemplation of
years to face without ever seeing her again is difficult to grasp. I
cannot imagine returning to an England that does not contain her. My
second mother, my loyallest friend. She had the rarest qualities, and
the largest heart, which made her loveable. She was “worldly-wise,”
yet neither wise nor worldly. She loved passionately and generously as
her heart dictated, and always she gave out more than she received.
She married three times, and twice in a wayward and unworldly fashion.
Partly what I am today is the result of her early influence. I used
to admire and love her in a rather awe-struck way when I was a child,
and when I was 17 I believed she could do no wrong. Her judgment
seemed to me infallible. In those days we lived exactly opposite,
in great Cumberland Place, London, and I used to sit with her every
morning and while she dressed I was made to read the leading articles
in the TIMES. I was very shy, having ran wild for years in
Ireland. Aunt Jennie took the raw and untamed girl, taught her how
to do her hair; made her put on her clothes with care, and scolded
her into a civilized woman. She used to say to me: “While you are
dressing, put your mind to it, and do the best you can with yourself.
After that, never give your appearance another thought.” She would
scold me unmercifully if I did not make an effort to talk to whatever
man I sat next to at luncheon or dinner: “Remember you are asked, not
for your amusement, but to contribute something to the party....” The
letters of Lord Chesterfield to his son were as nothing compared to
the worldly advice of Jennie Churchill to her niece. She frightened
me, but I loved her, because I knew she was just, and I knew she was
right. For years she took me out into the world and did with me the
best she could. It became an accepted thing with me, that she had all
the attention, and her admirers were kind to me on her account. I used
to wonder whether I would have to wait to attain her age in order to
have my own success. I never resented it, my admiration for her was
too great, I just took for granted that things were so. In later years
my awesome fear ebbed away, and we became confidential friends on a
mature basis. I seemed after marriage to catch up to her, and in my
widowhood we had a perfect understanding. There was nothing then that
we would not tell one another and I bowed to her superior experience
and judgment. Her understanding, her tolerance and her love had made
her very precious. When I returned from Russia, she was my loyallest
friend, and championed me. My last evening before sailing for New York,
was a reunion _de famille_ at her house for dinner. After dinner she
took me aside and talked to me intimately, and advisedly. She made me
promise that if I did not like being in America I was to return at
once, “You have a loving, a loyal and a powerful family,” she said, and
hoped I was not going to be lonely or unhappy in a strange new world
which she had known and left. At eight the next morning she surprised
me by being at the station to wish me godspeed, I was deeply touched,
but saddened by a rather wistful look in her face. God bless her, she
was a splendid independent woman. She disregarded public opinion, and
her own was very strong. She was beautiful and brilliant; never banal,
never conventional, always a great personality.
[Illustration: LADY RANDOLPH CHURCHILL
(Photograph by Hoppé)
]
She wrote, as Mrs. George Cornwallis West, the memories of “Lady
Randolph Churchill” ... no one had more material, or more right to
present it. Hurled into the midst of a political centre from the moment
of her first marriage, she continued to the end the friend of every
Prime Minister and every Cabinet Minister; a friend of kings, artists,
writers, musicians, a dominating influence and a leader of thought and
taste in a cosmopolitan as well as English society.
I prefer to think of her forever at rest, beautiful and brilliant and
wonderful to the end.