9 June

Evening party at the Arbuthnots! Tomato-basil soup, goose with wild berries, tomato aspic, beans with bacon and a green tomato tarte. The Arbuthnots' cook seems to have made tomatoes her *theme*, and I don't like that. One's cook should never think anything while cooking—it looks so *forward*. I was seated next to Nigel, a horrid boy with hair pas his ear (!) and Roger, an odd American (!) with forearms like a farmer. Really, it was too much! I was entirely prevented from speaking with Rupert and was obliged to gaze at him from afar. Nigel and Roger wanted to help me cut my meat. I told them I was 20 and they let me alone. They admitted to 21, but I am sure they were not a day past 20.