Item 89 - Letter from Lady Pethick-Lawrence to Lord Pethick-Lawrence

1 single sheet

(Place of writing not indicated.)—There has been trouble between Lydia and the staff in London, as a result of which Lydia is leaving for North Africa to take a job under the War Department.

—————

Transcript

Confidential

Feb. 18. 1947.

Dearest,

Last week in London there developed trouble between Lydia & the staff there. As usual I played her cards badly—but realizing this, in order to save me & you any disturbance, she went to the War Office on Thursday {1}, was very warmly welcomed there & obtained priority for the next Boat train for N. Africa leaving London on March 6th & also a promise of a job under the War Department immediately on her arrival there. She could not get the opportunity or courage to tell me until yesterday. On my acceptance of this solution, she is today clinching the arrangement with the War Office.

You are the only person who has come near to any understanding of the very real & deep bond that exists for ever between Lydia & myself. It defies all analysis. There is nothing of a physical nature or demand about it. The nearest analogy is that of the bond between the “Seeing Eye Dog” & his blind Master. In my almost complete deafness which prevents me from hearing the phone bell in my own room, & with my increasing difficulty in movement, Lydia is my irreplacable† support. I shall miss her desperately. There are many who love me devotedly, but there is nobody else, whose supreme delight & one object in life are to be with me to foresee & supply every smallest need. I know all her faults pathologic & psychic, and I know all her extraordinary & unique qualities. She has played her cards very badly, (as I tell her) but such things as tampering with my correspondence are far removed from possibility & so are other faults of which she has been suspected & accused. Over-devotion to our interests had led to ill-judged action. Her latest decisive move has been taken solely with a view to our interest. It is of such dual natures that the stuff of tragic drama is made. They are born, fated. The rationally-minded are quite incapable of dealing with them. But for the strain of Mysticism in you, you would have attempted in all good intention to put an end before now to the situation. As it is, she has put an end to it, herself. Her only condition is that if I were ill—mortally ill—she should be sent for. That is my wish also. I feel that I could not die in peace without her hand in mine.

Emmeline

It is one thing to meet these conflict-problems in Greek Drama. Quite another thing to confront them in flesh & blood. I thank God for all I have read & all I have experienced, which have enabled me so far to avoid fatal error.

—————

{1} 13th.

This description was created by A. C. Green in 2020.