Yet no sooner had one door closed than another quite unexpectedly swung open. Among the stack of correspondence that had gathered during her detention at Holloway was a letter from Henry Cluett, the surgeon to whom Brigstock had introduced her last year, expressing a hope that she may wish to act as his assistant – unofficially, of course – in his new post at St Thomas’s Hospital. He regretted that the emolument would be small, but it would afford her useful experience in ‘theatre’. Connie was thrilled by the offer, though she fretted that her less than prompt reply might have injured her chances: Mr Cluett’s letter had arrived in January, six weeks ago, and, reckoning that a full disclosure of her whereabouts was inadvisable, she wrote explaining her tardiness as ‘an indisposition’ and hoped that his invitation still stood. The surgeon replied forthwith, admitting puzzlement at the delay but assuring her that the job was hers. She would start in April, if it suited.
Hardly able to believe her good fortune, Connie now discharged another debt of gratitude. Having obtained his address from Mr Fotheringham, she wrote a letter of thanks to Tam for his kind offices, not only in hiring the lawyer but in settling his fees, too. It was small recompense, she knew, but would he allow her to thank him personally over lunch when he was next in town? Her letter went unanswered for some weeks, a delay explained on her receiving a reply care of a hotel on the Isle of Wight, where he had gone for a month’s fishing and sailing. She briefly wondered if Will had accompanied him. In any event, Tam accepted her thanks, expressed relief that she was well again, and assented gladly to the prospect of a luncheon when he next came up to town.
The early months of the new year had seen the Union stepping up its campaign of civic disruption. It was no longer enough to set fire to pillar boxes and break windows. Now there came attacks on municipal buildings, railway trains and pavilions; golf links and bowling greens were cut up or scoured with acid. At a house being built for Lloyd George at Walton on the Hill in Surrey a bomb was detonated, an outrage for which Mrs Pankhurst herself claimed personal responsibility and was subsequently arrested. The language of war bristled in the air, and the militants began to see themselves as guerrilla fighters operating in enemy territory. Connie sensed a turning in the tide of public opinion. The outlaw glamour of the suffragettes, once treated with a wary respect, had begun to provoke impatience, and sometimes outright hostility. One afternoon late in March she and Laura were selling copies of The Suffragette news-sheet outside the Strand Tube station. Most passers-by ignored them, though Laura’s natural good cheer was beguiling the sluggish trickle of sales. She was squinting at the ‘Votes for Women’ brooch on Connie’s coat.
‘What a lovely thing!’ she exclaimed.
‘It was a gift from Marianne,’ Connie said. ‘I had a letter from her yesterday, as a matter of fact. She said that since she got out of Holloway last week the police have been watching her house.’
‘Oh, really?’
Laura sounded insouciant, so Connie continued. ‘Actually, I’ve wondered myself – perhaps I’m mistaken …’
‘About what, darling?’
‘It’s just a feeling, but – I think I’m being followed.’
‘No,’ said Laura, raking her gaze across the street. ‘By the police?’
‘I can’t be sure. There was a man I caught looking at me on the tram –’
‘Ooh, lucky you!’
Connie shook her head. ‘No, I mean it, Lau. I think I saw him again on my way here. I’ve heard that as soon as we leave prison they put spies on us.’
Laura frowned. ‘Well, that might be true – but only if they think we’re going to explode a bomb!’
As they were talking, a young man, elegantly dressed in topcoat and highly polished boots, stopped to stare at the news-sheet they were selling. His saturnine gaze and sharp cheekbones lent him a severely handsome aspect. Laura noted his hesitation and, with a little wink at Connie, took a step towards him. In her most convivial tone she said, ‘Hullo, sir. May we interest you in purchasing The Suffragette?’
The man, visibly offended to have been mistaken for a potential buyer, said in a low, unfriendly voice, ‘You must be joking.’
Laura flinched, too genteel to respond in kind. ‘I’m sorry, it’s – I just thought you were showing an interest –’
‘What?!’ He shot them a look of disgust. ‘In a pair of toms like you?’ He began to walk off. Then, changing his mind, he retraced his steps and put his face close to hers. ‘I know what you lot need,’ he hissed – and sent a glistening arc of spittle at her face. Laura’s sudden intake of breath matched Connie’s own. She turned away in shock.
‘You brute!’ Connie called after him as the man stalked off. She honestly wished at that moment that she’d had Ivy’s dagger-cane to hand. Laura, stunned by the insult, was wiping the slimy deposit from her cheek when Connie spotted a pair of policemen strolling along the Aldwych. She hailed them loudly, and they turned.
‘Excuse me – would you help us?’
The two bobbies, exhibiting no particular urgency, crossed the thoroughfare to meet them. As they approached, Connie saw them eyeing the militant news-sheets, and sensed a sceptical reflex in the look they exchanged.
‘Officers, that man has just grossly assaulted my friend,’ she said, pointing up the street at the receding figure. The taller of the policemen, hands on his hips, looked over at Laura, who was balling up her handkerchief in her fist.
‘Miss? D’you want to tell us …?’
Laura, colouring, shook her head. ‘Please, it’s nothing –’
‘He spat in her face,’ said Connie. The taller one nodded, and looked for a contribution from his partner, a stocky, pugilistic type. ‘Spat at her, you say? What had she said to him?’
The question confounded Connie. ‘What d’you mean?’
‘I mean – what did she say to provoke him?’
Connie gave an incredulous half-snort. ‘Nothing. Nothing! She only asked him if he wished to buy one of our news-sheets.’
The tall one picked up a copy of The Suffragette from the stack on the pavement, and ran a critical eye over its front page. He handed it to his companion, who made a show of examining its contents.
‘What d’you reckon, Alf?’
‘This what you’ve been selling?’ said Alf, riffling its pages.
‘Yes,’ said Connie, with a note of impatience. ‘Excuse me, but – are you going to stop that man?’
They were not listening to her. From their muttered exchanges it was becoming apparent that Laura’s assailant didn’t interest them at all. The one who wasn’t Alf now cleared his throat.
‘May I have your names, please?’
Connie and Laura looked disbelievingly at one another. ‘Our names? Why?’
Alf, taking out a notebook from his breast pocket, puffed out his cheeks and said, ‘This newspaper of yours. You know its distribution is illegal?’
‘Constable, really – it’s just a newspaper,’ said Connie, alarmed by the sudden prickle of confrontation.
‘That’s as maybe,’ said Alf, ‘but I still require your names.’
Connie shook her head. ‘No, I’m sorry. You’ve no right to ask – we’ve done nothing wrong.’
‘I’d advise you to reconsider.’
‘Or else?’
‘We’ll be obliged to arrest you.’
At this point a man who had been hovering just outside Connie’s eyeline interposed himself. Connie knew that she had seen him before, but couldn’t immediately place him. ‘That’s all right, gents,’ he said, with almost a chuckle in his voice. ‘I can supply their names. This is Miss Laura Scott, and this –’ he nodded politely to Connie ‘– is Miss Constance Callaway. Both recent detainees at His Majesty’s Prison, Holloway.’ He took out a badge and flashed it before the two policemen. ‘Relf, Special Branch. I’ll look after them from here, thank you.’
The bobbies tipped their helmets in brief salute and walked on. Connie studied the man’s face again: his
melancholy eyes and silvered moustache reminded her a little of Tam.
‘The last time I saw you was on a tram in Upper Street,’ she said.
Relf lifted his chin in acknowledgement. ‘Yes, I wondered if you’d marked me,’ he said, narrowing his eyes at her.
‘Are we under arrest?’ asked Laura.
‘Not as yet,’ he replied casually. ‘But you should take this as a warning. There’s a new bill proposed for lady militants who’ve been released before completing their sentences – they can later be arrested and taken back into custody. To serve their full term.’
Connie blinked at him. ‘Do you mean that you wait for us to recover and then put us back in prison?’
‘That’s about the size of it. “Prisoners’ Temporary Discharge for Ill Health” is what they’re calling it.’
‘Iniquitous is what I’d call it,’ said Connie flatly.
Relf shrugged. ‘Better take it up with the Home Secretary. I believe it’s his idea.’
Connie looked at Laura, and then back at Relf. ‘So – may I ask why you’ve chosen to be a gentleman? We don’t encounter many such among the police force.’
He creased his mouth into a mirthless smile. ‘Perhaps it’s just that I don’t like seeing young ladies spat upon.’
‘Well, that’s jolly decent of you, sir,’ said Laura warmly, as she gathered up her bundles of The Suffragette.
‘You’d better leave them with me, miss,’ Relf said. ‘The constable was right on that score. Its sale is illegal.’
Connie clicked her tongue. ‘Really, Mr Relf, hasn’t the Special Branch more urgent business than confiscating newspapers?’
‘We’re employed to uphold the rule of law. Don’t forget it, because I won’t.’ Relf ’s tone was suddenly grave. ‘And don’t depend on my present lenience. If you’re caught in unlawful activity, under any circumstances, I will arrest you.’
A silence fell between them after he had spoken. Connie would have liked to engage him in argument – he seemed quite reasonable, for a policeman – but she sensed that discretion would be the better course.
‘Then we’ll thank you for the warning,’ she said, linking her arm through Laura’s. ‘Are we free to go?’
Relf nodded impassively. Laura offered him a sweet smile in departing, to which he did not respond. They crossed through the Strand’s unceasing traffic and made for the crescent of the Aldwych. As they were about to turn the corner, Connie looked back. Relf was standing on the spot where they had left him. His eyes were still on them.
Connie could not recall the full name of the parliamentary bill Relf had quoted, though by the middle of April it had become law and earned itself swift notoriety. Suffragist hunger-strikers were let go until they had recovered from the effects of malnutrition, whereupon they were promptly rearrested and thrown into jail to complete their sentence. It was soon known by a popular soubriquet: the Cat and Mouse Act. Detectives and police spies were now being deployed to watch militants, and on waking each morning Connie would peek through the drawing-room curtains to check the street. Sometimes she saw a figure loitering on the pavement outside St Andrew’s Church, though she could never be sure if he were engaged in surveillance or not.
A more agreeable distraction came her way when she received a note from Tam, informing her that he would be in London on Friday week. The promised luncheon was confirmed. Connie, eager as she was to offer her thanks in person, anticipated their meeting with a tiny quiver of trepidation. She didn’t know Tam well – he was Will’s friend – and she wondered if they would have sufficient funds of conversation to carry them through a lunchtime together. An energetic spring wind was rioting about Piccadilly as she dodged the crowds and pushed through the revolving doors of the Criterion. Voices echoed off the marbled walls and lingered around the high azure-and-gold-tiled ceiling in a way that recalled the noise at the local swimming baths. Portrait-length mirrors threw back flattering profiles of the clientele. Aproned waiters strode with Napoleonic decision about the room, attending to diners whose aura of leisured entitlement caused Connie a moment’s mischievous reverie. The last time she had dined among so many was in the prison refectory. The comparison amused her. How would these people have taken to the lumpy potatoes and the greasy, gristly meat slopped on the plates at Holloway?
‘Constance.’ It was Tam. She had walked right past his table without noticing. He stood up to greet her, and gave a little bow.
‘Hullo, Tam,’ she said, smiling and blushing at once. They sat down. Tam was handsomely turned out in a navy worsted suit, its peaked lapels cut dandyishly wide. He had a flushed, well-groomed look which Connie couldn’t help remarking on.
‘Ah. I called in at the Turkish baths on Northumberland Avenue. They gave me a wash and brush-up.’
‘You look very … spruce,’ she said, and sensed him looking closely at her with a view to returning the compliment. She knew how very different she must have appeared to him. Her hair had grown back a little, but her skin was pale, almost translucent, since her incarceration, and she had failed to put back much of the weight she had lost. Her grandfather was right: she was scrawny.
‘You look –’ he began, and in the slight pause she feared some politely crushing word would follow ‘– quite lovely.’
‘Oh,’ she said, pleased, and rather flustered by the sincerity of his tone. To hide her embarrassment she made a little gesture about the room. ‘I’ve always wondered what this place would be like. You – know it well?’
He nodded. ‘Whenever we were playing at Lord’s, we’d catch the number 13 ’bus outside the ground – took us right to the door.’
Connie inwardly marvelled, again, that she should be on friendly terms with a man whom she used to watch batting for Sussex and England. She could remember the time her father had shown her a cigarette card – it must have been during an England – Australia Test series – with the little painted portrait of A. E. Tamburlain in blazer and cap. And here he was, her lunch companion.
‘That reminds me,’ said Connie, looking in her coat pocket and drawing out a small package emblazoned with the Hatchards marque. ‘This is for you.’ She watched as Tam unpicked the string and folded back the layers of brown paper. It was a new cloth-bound copy of The Poems of Francis Thompson. ‘There’s a very sad one he wrote about cricket,’ she explained. ‘It’s called “At Lord’s”.’
Tam blinked at the book in his hand, and for a moment Connie wondered if he was about to break down in tears. Into the silence she added, ‘It’s hardly adequate, I know, but it’s a gift of thanks for – well, for all that you did.’
Eventually he raised his eyes to her and said quietly, ‘Nobody’s ever given me a book of poetry before. Would you – dedicate it for me?’
‘Gladly,’ she smiled. She took out a stubby pencil, and held it up. ‘A little souvenir from Holloway. Strictly forbidden, of course. I can’t bear to get rid of it.’ As she paused over the title page of the book, she gave him an impish look. ‘Shall it be – “For the Great Tam”?’
He shook his head. ‘“For Andrew”.’
‘Who calls you that?’ she asked gaily.
‘Oh, only my sister … and one or two others. “Tam” is just the name I got stuck with.’
Connie wrote her dedication, and handed the volume back. A waiter was hovering at their table, and they both ordered the lamb cutlets. Tam also asked for a pint of champagne, which duly arrived in a gleaming bucket. When the waiter popped the cork Connie noticed Tam flinch, though he waved away her concerned look. ‘I’m apt to get a little jumpy around noise, I don’t know why.’
They talked for a while about his sojourn on the Isle of Wight, and about his plans now that he had quit M—shire. He had been offered work as an umpire – ‘but it didn’t appeal’, he added slyly, and they both laughed. ‘I’ve had an invitation to play in the Lancashire leagues. It’s club cricket, back where I started …’
‘But you don’t sound very keen,’ observed Con
nie.
Tam sighed. ‘This game … the trouble with it being a profession is that you reach the top too young. The rest of your career is a long slide down. D’you know, I think it can send a fellow mad.’
Connie smiled uncertainly. ‘Not actually mad,’ she demurred.
But Tam’s expression was in deadly earnest. ‘Don’t you think there’s something odd about spending so much time almost motionless in a field?’
‘I’ve never thought of it like –’
‘Cricket’s so much about nerves,’ he continued. ‘I once knew a fellow, name of Usher, he used to open the batting with me at Sussex. Quite a solid player, but he scored slowly – and the crowd would give him gyp. It began to prey on his mind. Meanwhile I’d be at the other end blasting away, which only made things worse for him.’
‘He must have seemed very slow next to you.’
Tam nodded. ‘It was painful to watch, but it was the only way he could play. I remember Punch ran a little satirical verse about him.’ He paused, and stared into the middle distance while he retrieved the words. ‘“Oh nice for the bowler, my boy / That each ball like a barn door you play! / Oh nice for yourself, I suppose, / That you stick at the wicket all day!” Poor old Usher.’ He laughed as he said it, but he looked sad.
‘What happened to him?’
‘Ah,’ said Tam with a shake of his head. ‘He retired, as we all must, but he didn’t settle to anything. I used to see him now and then. The game was all he knew, and he couldn’t cope. At least when you’re on your own in the field you know you’re there for a purpose. Anyway …’ He seemed to have drifted into a reverie, and at length his gaze came back into focus. He looked at Connie. ‘He moved to Eastbourne in the early nineties – and killed himself in his lodgings. A shotgun, they said.’
Half of the Human Race Page 26
