The two friends, physically far apart but in each other’s thoughts, also wrote
to each other again on 29 December. Emmeline was still in high spirits as she
recounted the latest news:
The D. Mail credits us with half a million damage during the year,
exclusive of golf links, letter boxes etc.! ... C. has gone out with Mrs.
Tuke shopping, and the little dog Fay [a Pomeranian ] and I are trying
to amuse one another with a paper ball. She is painfully trying to learn
the exact locality of her legitimate retiring place and when she chooses
a wrong one her contrition is most touching. C. is devoted to her and
has her to sleep on her bed every night. This morning I looked in at
her, fast asleep with the window wide open, the snow almost coming
into the room and little Fay curled up almost in her neck, a pretty
sight. I am glad she has her. It keeps one human to have the care of a
little helpless creature.
C’s book [The great scourge] is out at last. Is it not strange that none
of the doctors who testify in it to the truth of her statements felt
moved themselves to agitate in the matter?While Emmeline was writing thus to Ethel, Ethel was penning a letter to
Emmeline, recalling a tale about a barrister in Cairo who had ‘raved about you
& whatever speech of yours at [the] Old Bailey he heard & said you were, as
speaker, in a class by yourself – & as for yr. charm etc. etc.!’ The bond of love,
friendship and trust between the two women was especially important to
Emmeline at this time in her life while Ethel, a professional woman in her own
right, enjoyed the fact that she was an emotional support for such an interna-
tionally known notorious rebel. Ethel ended this letter in a characteristically
loving tone. ‘Goodnight my darling. The thought of you is like a great light-
house, visible through all the thousand miles of fog between us.’^55 On 1 January
1914, she wrote another affectionate note to ‘My darling Em ... I long to see
you fiercely sometimes – but crush the feeling back.’^56
Emmeline was relatively contented. She had a warm, loving friendship with
Ethel, in whom she could confide, and she was in Paris with her favourite
daughter. But the problem of what was best to do for her unsettled daughter,
Adela, had still not been decided, nor had the problem of how to bring Sylvia
into line. Emmeline had been in correspondence with Helen Archdale again,
apologising for the behaviour of Adela. Adela had had difficulty in finding
another job and had decided to become a writer, a career move with which her
mother had little sympathy, fearing that she would not be able to earn her
living. ‘Can she not begin to look out for advts of employment in American
papers agricultural and educational [?]’, Emmeline asked. Impatient with her
restless daughter, Emmeline advised Helen that they both must be firm with
Adela, for her own sake. ‘It is too dreadful that she should waste all the time &
money that has been spent on her training at Studley. It was her own choice to
OUSTING OF SYLVIA AND A FRESH START FOR ADELA