T. E. Lawrence to Ernest Thurtle

14,Barton Street
Westminster
London, S.W.1.

28/2/29

Dear Mr Thurtle,

It is nice of you to suggest our meeting again: but my time is very short. There is only Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday left. Those are duty days, and you'll be in Westminster: so it would presumably be Soho, and not your plutocratic home! However probably you are tied up for all the time. I am free each night.

The getting back to camp feels to me the most desirable thing. I am longing to be in harness: and hope that you will not be able to abolish the three Services before 1935.

'Persecution' was a word I used in jest. Really, I could see that you were asking your questions to find out the truth: and I was glad of the chance of showing you the truth about me, so far as I could. You'll have seen that those books were not meant to throw dust in their readers' eyes: and it pleases me very much to have had you see them: Yet it would not please me to have everybody see them. My affairs don't seem worth that general interest.

Au revoir, some time: if it isn't on one of these next three evenings!

Yours sincerely,

T E Shaw