"George keeps hinting at Things in marriage. He is rather like a man dreaming of good food, a series of meals magically prepared and set before him so that he does not need to rise. One meal is cleared away and another appears. I find it hard to grasp. I imagine his life otherwise must be dull, though he never seems to mind that. He is what you call Steady; has been in the same office since he was sixteen, and will go on in it until he is sixty and past work. Perhaps all his desire and hope go into this adventure. Perhaps he feels that nothing lies beyond it, and is therefore cramming everything into it. Certainly he is not allowing himself room to develop anything out of it. There's a sort of desperation in him. Now or never. After all, I suppose he's getting what he wants, but there is a heat in it which blisters me. That must be because I have known a cool, sweet love with you. How did it happen? You must try to understand, look down into the lives of people on a lower level than your own. We have no organized pleasures, at least not enough of them, and we are really thrown back on the man and maiden business, casual for the most part. We feel the grubbiness of it, but they don't. It's fire and warmth to them. Primitive, isn't it? Like savages rubbing two sticks together. It doesn't leave much room for affection or charm. It has to be raw or they can't believe in it, inarticulate as they are, and as I am too often. We can't make material existence a starting-point as you more favored ones can do if you choose. Love simply doesn't have a chance with us. I think you could bring a wonderful happiness into my mother's life. I keep wanting to tell her about you, and one of these days I shall. Will you send her some flowers from your garden? We have a backyard only with five privet bushes growing round an old bicycle shed. . . ." Writing to Cathleen was his safety-valve. He could find George amusing when he had written to her, and when he had a letter from her he could almost salute his brother as a fellow-lover.