#c: clytaemnestra cavendish

[simadelics]

Bibury, 1895

Emmeline

I'd fretted terribly about when I'd have to announce to Almira that I'd gone into labour, considering I'd not informed her I was with child to begin with. When the moment inevitably came that I had to, she only laughed: “Emmeline, dear,” she said, “I’m blind, not deaf.” She'd later recount the many times I’d loudly become ill over the period I've been staying with her, and — in her words — pregnancy seemed to be the least concerning explanation she had settled on some time after she’d heard a wooden chair creak underneath me.

She held my hand in hers through what had proved to be a startlingly easy birth, even without the care of a physician. I consider myself to be a logical, reasonable woman, but I cannot help but feel as if my prayers had been answered. For once, I need not struggle and sacrifice; while Isabelle seemed to desire to usher in my death for her life as some sort of awful, biblical exchange, I had this wonderful calm wash over me as I held little Clytaemnestra — I've named her for another wronged, maligned woman — in my arms for the very first time.

I must admit, I expected to feel my Kenneth’s arms around me in turn.

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