When it appears that every other avenue is closed to us. And when the consequences of doing nothing, of letting Fate push us along the seemingly downhill path she has mapped out, look worse than any possible retribution for the transgression itself.Back then, with Ernie heading toward her twin’s clutches, with the prospect of not seeing him for such a long time that he might forget that he loved her, and again faced with the possibility of becoming an abandoned wife stranded in gray England, the consequences of doing nothing were that intolerable for Lilla.She did try to persuade everyone to let her follow Ernie out to Calcutta as the weather was cooling in September and have the baby there. Ernie’s family thought she was mad. She had been very ill with her last child, and they didn’t yet believe that she was fully recovered. “I do not think she should travel until she is quite fit again,” wrote Laura. Even Alice, who usually batted so hard on her daughter’s side, who was firmly of the belief that a wife should always be with her husband, thought Lilla was not well enough to go.And then the tide turned just a little in Lilla’s favor.
