Christabel LaMotte Timeline and Summary

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• In June 1848, Christabel LaMotte meets Randolph Henry Ash at a breakfast party thrown by Crabb Robinson.
• Over the course of the next several months, Christabel and Randolph begin to correspond.
• As their letters become more and more friendly and intimate, Christabel suddenly suggests that they stop writing to each other.
• As Blanche tells Randolph, someone—cough, Blanche Glover, cough—has recently informed her that she's acting like a tramp (or something along those lines).
• Although Randolph tries to convince Christabel not to break things off, many of his letters get no replies.
• Suddenly, Christabel writes to tell Randolph that she has only just figured out that someone—cough, Blanche Glover again, cough—has been stealing the letters he's been sending her. Christabel asks Randolph to meet her in person, so that she can apologize.
• Christabel and Randolph meet up and part as good friends.
• Soon, they meet up again. This time, THEY KISS.
• Christabel and Randolph continue to correspond, but now their letters are full of passion and love and over-the-top metaphors of burning up or being drowned.
• In the spring of 1859, Christabel decides to join Randolph on an expedition that he plans to take to North Yorkshire.
• Christabel and Randolph head to North Yorkshire together in June, and sexy times ensue.
• In the autumn of 1859, Christabel flees to the home of distant relations in Brittany. Although she refuses to talk about it, they slowly realize that she's pregnant.
• At the end of April, 1860, Christabel disappears.
• Christabel returns to the de Kercoz home one week later, no longer pregnant, and without her child.
• At some point in later 1860 or in 1861, Christabel seems to have joined a group of spiritualist women who called themselves the Vestal Lights.
• At one of their séances, Christabel is startled and disturbed by the sudden appearance of Randolph Henry Ash, who has come to demand that she tell him what happened to their child.
• Christabel passes out in all of the chaos and doesn't come to for two days.
• At some point after that, Christabel moves into Seal Court, where her sister Sophie (and her daughter, Maia Thomasine Bailey), are living. There, she spends the last 20+ years of her life.
• In the autumn of 1889, Christabel writes her final letter to Randolph, who is now on his deathbed. In it, she tells him about their daughter and says her final goodbyes.