Diffusing gossip
Sir: Concerning gossip (Shared opinion, 17 October), surely the way out of Frank Johnson's predicament is to drop sufficient hints about the identity of the two persons concerned for those interested to identify them with high probability, but not suffi- cient for people to say that he has betrayed a confidence. Thus, if and when Alan Clark names names in a future diary, the facts will not be sensationally new and won't attract enough publicity to disgrace Mr Johnson.
Presumably the woman is Diana, Princess of Wales, because I can't think of another beautiful woman sufficiently singular to jus- tify the gossip. A number of ugly men come to mind, but not men with the intelligence to work out how to make Diana laugh and then do it. My best speculation is Auberon Waugh. He met Diana and was infatuated With her, on his own admission. I would have thought he could make her laugh if he tried. There was the story, later denied, that he took a French letter when he called on Diana 'on the off-chance'. Somebody some- where wrote that Messrs Clark and Waugh don't like each other and that might explain why Mr Johnson (presumably) enjoyed telling Mr Clark about Mr Waugh's success.
However, it's also a reason why Mr Clark won't put it into his next published diary. All this is speculation, but presumably Mr John- son wrote the story to generate speculation. At the very least it's a plausible red herring. Michael Payne
2 Elm Grove, Epsom, Surrey
Frank Johnson writes: I cannot agree that Mr Waugh is ugly.
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