Cooper, Ethel – May 1918

5.5.18
My dear Emmie,

Yesterday we had a goodbye tea at Connie Jaeger’s for our little Swedish friend, Madame Smigielska. She has memorized Aunt Alice’s address, and is going to write to her and tell her about our life and doings here.

12.5.18
My dear Emmie,

I have been spending the afternoon in the farthest suburb of Leipzig with a Russian girl and her mother……they live like hermits, with a big tabby cat, 19 years old, and exactly like Tim. He is the most sensible animal I have ever met. He can open the door. This cat jumps, and hangs by his paws on the handle that raises the latch, and then he pushes the door open – not bad for a 19 year old cat, is it? Unfortunately he can’t shut  the door properly, and in winter when he perambulates through the flat, leaving an open door and an icy draught everywhere in his track, it is rather a nuisance.

To my relief, I have just got £30 that has been wandering about Switzerland and Germany for nearly two months. Mrs. Oldenbourg got it safely from Mr. Bullock, sent it on to me, and then it went astray – but after much reclaiming it has at last turned up.

19.5.18
My dear Emmie,

I am spending three days at Connie Jaeger’s, looking after her house and a visitor for her. Anita Naumann, the visitor, is a nice girl, nearly 18 – the daughter of an old friend of Connie’s, and very easy to entertain. It is so blazingly hot, that we just sit and read or write on the balcony, in the intervals of eating and sleeping. I go…each morning to see if there are any letters, and yesterday found a long one from Aunt Alice. She says, ‘Kevin has not written very lately, but I think he is still at school’ – that means he was still in England when she wrote.