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'I didn't ask you to come,' he said.

'Nevertheless I am here, and I do not intend to leave until you have heard what I have to say.'

Her father's eyes were suddenly ablaze with such anger that it took all of Emmeline's resolve not to quail beneath it. 'Impudent female,' he snarled.'You will return home this instant!'

'No, Father, I will not!' she responded, trying to force as much defiance as she could into her voice.

He took a quick step towards her, half raising his hand.

Still forcing herself to stand her ground, Emmeline said, 'Are you going to strike me, Father? Has it come to that?'

Though her words stayed him, his face - with its burning eyes and clenched teeth - contained such hatred that Emmeline felt no sense of relief or gratitude, but merely loss, despair. Slowly he lowered his hand and half turned away from her. 'Say what you have to, but be quick about it,' he snapped over his shoulder.

With a heavy heart she followed him into his office, closing the door behind her, cutting off the clamour from the factory. She watched him as he stumped to his desk and sat down behind it, and tried to compose herself.

She did not wish to argue with him; that would achieve nothing. Her own anger, quick to surface though it sometimes was, would only provide further fuel for his.

She walked as calmly as she could to the chair facing him and sat down.

'Well?' he barked immediately, and she realised that this was going to be even more difficult than she had envisaged.

She sighed and said,'Please don't be angry, Father. I have come here in the hope that we can help each other.'

'I don't need your help,' he said.

'I think that you do. I know that something is troubling you greatly, something that you are keeping from Mama and me. Perhaps you feel that you are protecting us by keeping it to yourself, but you are not protecting us, Father. On the contrary, your recent behaviour is causing us great pain and distress. Mama, in particular, is at her wits' end. This morning, not for the first time, I discovered her weeping, unable to comprehend why you have abandoned your household duties of late.'

In the cab on the way to the factory, Emmeline had played this scene over and over in her mind, had imagined her father softening at her words, an expression almost of enlightenment overcoming his face. 'My dear, I never realised...' he would say, reaching out to take her hands. He would apologise for his behaviour, open his heart to her, perhaps even travel home with her to see Mama...

However, as she stumbled to the end of a speech that now seemed ill-prepared, Emmeline realised that this was not going to be the case. Her father simply sat there, as haughty and unmoved as before, his face like granite.

At last he said,'Have you finished?'

Unable to think of any other response, she nodded dumbly.

'Then I believe you can go,' he said, half rising from his seat.As an afterthought, he added,'Give your mother my regards.'

Emmeline simply sat there, momentarily dumbstruck. Finally she spluttered,'Is that all you have to say, Father?'

He looked at her completely without expression.'I have already said and heard more than I would wish to,' he replied evenly.

'But do you not care about Mama?' she exclaimed, unable to prevent her voice from rising. 'Have you no explanation for your actions?'

'There is nothing I wish to discuss,' he said acidly.

'But there is much I wish to discuss,' Emmeline retorted.

Her father had rounded the desk now and was standing above her, so that she had to tilt her head up to look at him. She was all at once aware of his tightly clenched fists, the way he held himself, rigid and straight-backed, giving the impression that the real force of his anger was still coiled inside him like a spring.

For the first time, Emmeline suddenly realised that she was actually afraid of her father, afraid of what he might do. However ludicrous she tried