Kameneff came at 11.0 to give me a last sitting. He was in a much
happier frame of mind, chuckling over Tchicherin’s reply to Lloyd
George, which is an impudent bit of propaganda work, and _all_ the
papers _have_ to publish it because it is official.
I awakened this morning with an excited and tired feeling, my hands
trembling, which I have never known before. Kameneff arrived in much the
same condition. He talked politics and got excited and worked up and
produced the quizzical frown that I wanted. I worked well, and
absolutely changed the whole personality of his bust, which I think he
liked.
He promised, incidentally, not to wait here two weeks, but says that he
will start _not later_ than next Friday. I wonder if he keeps his
promises.
Peter[3] turned up with a girl, which disturbed the sitting and I felt
more and more hectic, what with the difficulties and the battle of it,
and knowing that it was the last sitting, and feeling dead beat, and
having finally to stop for lunch.
We lunched with Sydney Cooke at Claridges’. I introduced them to each
other, and we are going to stay with Sydney at his house in the Isle of
Wight, for the week-end. Like all good foreigners, Kameneff expressed a
desire, some days ago, to see the Isle of Wight. So we arranged to
go--I
[Illustration: BUST OF KAMENEFF.
_p. 24._]
could not therefore go to my beloved Dick,[4] but I sent him a crocodile
by Peter, to compensate for my absence.
Dined with Aunt Jennie,[5] she has laryngitis, and looked very ill. She
asked me what new work I was engaged on, but I took good care not to
mention either Russians or Russia.
In the course of conversation, she told me that I was being criticised
as having too much freedom. I chuckled over this, as I visualised to
myself the great band of people who grudge one that freedom, because
they have not got it, and because they know that freedom counts above
rubies.
I said to Aunt Jennie, “And how is that grave condition of things, that
dangerous “Liberty” going to be rectified? I am a widow, and earn my
living, how is it to be otherwise ordered?”
She had no suggestion, it would have been obviously out of place to
suggest re-marriage, which in fact is the only way of ending it, of
ending everything, liberty, work, and my happiness, which is dependent
on my work.