The Documents in the Case by Dorothy L. Sayers

15, Whittington Terrace, Bayswater15.11.28

Dear Olive, I have been much surprised and deeply hurt by Ronnie's letter to me, which I enclose for you to see. I cannot believe that he would have written in that spirit of his own accord. I can only suppose that you and Tom have been prejudicing him against me. Of course, he is your child and not mine, but it is quite a mistake to imagine that, merely because of the physical accident of parenthood, you are, for that reason, divinely qualified to deal with a sensitive temperament like Ronnie's. I (not having my eyes blinded) can see quite clearly through what he writes, that you have succeeded in apparently bringing him into agreement with your point of view; but, if you did but know it, you are merely encouraging him to repress his natural feelings, with consequences which may be terrible to contemplate. I can imagine nothing worse for him than what you call change of scene and companionship, when I know perfectly well that you mean that unimaginative and completely insensitive Potts person. I cannot imagine a more dangerous influence for a boy in Ronnie's state of mind than a footballing parson. The harm done by men of that class is quite incalculable, and their minds are, as a rule, perfect sinks of dangerous and sublimated libidos (I don't know whether that is the right way to spell the plural). However, it is your own affair, and I am powerless to interfere, but I do think you ought not to set the boy against me, merely because I am, unhappily, in a position to know more than you do about certain facts of life.