Break of Dawn

by Rita Bradshaw

‘And what was her heinous crime?’ Cat whispered at the side of Sophy. ‘Conducting a peaceful march through the streets of London, that’s all. Like she said in court, the disturbance that developed was the fault of the authorities who’d instructed the police to use strong measures. Mounted police riding into the march to break it up, I ask you! Women were knocked down and bruised and their clothes torn, and that lasted for five hours. There’s Finland giving women seats in the Finnish Parliament this year, and here we have the Prime Minister saying we have to be patient and wait rather than act in a pugnacious spirit! Women have been waiting for decades and where’s it got us? Nowhere, that’s where.’

  ‘You don’t actually have to convince me,’ Sophy whispered back. ‘I’m a woman, I’m on your side, remember?’

  Cat giggled. ‘Just checking.’

  They left the hall to find the weather had changed dramatically during the two hours the meeting had been in progress. The sky was overcast and grey, and a cold drizzle was misting the streets. There had been the usual number of hecklers and ne’er-do-wells inside the hall – men who favoured the MP who had openly declared two or three years ago that ‘men and women differed in mental equipment, with women having little sense of proportion, and giving women the vote would not be safe’. One or two of the more unpleasant types a meeting such as the one today always seemed to attract eyed Sophy and Cat as the two women hugged on the steps of the building.

  ‘Let me give you a lift back to your lodgings,’ Sophy urged Cat, having decided to take a cab home in view of the weather. ‘It’s beginning to rain quite hard now.’

  ‘No need. I’m going straight to the theatre – it’s only a street or two away, so it makes sense. I’ll buy something to eat before I go in, as I’ve got a matinée and I’ll be cutting it fine if I go home first.’ Cat smiled at her, pulling her felt hat further over her head and opening her umbrella. ‘What did you think of Mrs Pankhurst?’

  ‘She’s an amazing woman.’

  ‘I know. Promise me that somehow you’ll come and see the play I’m doing at the moment. It’s Elizabeth Robins’ second work and it’s sheer propaganda for the Cause, which is wonderful. It finishes with a suffragette rally in Trafalgar Square, and the political speeches are tremendous. We regularly have one or two men escorted from the premises in the evening when they’ve had a few drinks, and there’s a number who are barred from the theatre now because of their obnoxious behaviour. They only come to disrupt the performance but it doesn’t work. Everyone’s all the more determined to see it through and make the point.’

  Cat was bright-eyed and bushy-tailed and clearly pleased with herself, but Sophy felt a stab of unease. ‘Have you ever been threatened personally?’

  ‘We all have,’ Cat said airily, giving Sophy another hug before turning and saying over her shoulder, ‘I’ll see you at Dolly’s on Saturday morning. You haven’t forgotten it’s her birthday?’

  ‘Cat, please let me give you a lift to the theatre,’ Sophy called after her friend as she began to walk away.

  ‘No need,’ Cat said again, raising her hand without turning round. ‘See you at the weekend.’

  Sophy stood hesitating for a moment or two before hailing a cab. The meeting had been held in a hall off Ludgate Hill near St Paul’s Cathedral, and she knew Cat’s theatre, a tiny one in compari son to the West End giants, was only a short distance away by foot. Nevertheless, as she sat back in the cab and settled her damp skirt about her legs, she wished Cat had agreed to ride with her.

  Quite when Cat became aware of the footsteps behind her she wasn’t sure. There were a few people about although the rain had driven some folk indoors and it wasn’t as busy as when she’d walked to the hall from her lodgings earlier. She had kept glancing over her shoulder then, feeling she was being followed, but the amount of people on the pavements had made it impossible to be sure. She had told herself that the vile letters she had received from someone who called himself ‘A devotee of your art’ had made her uneasy and that she was imagining things, but now the feeling was stronger than ever and the hairs on the back of her neck were prickling.

  She had turned off Ludgate Hill into one of the side roads leading down to Queen Victoria Street, and had just reached the back of a printing works which was probably midway between the two main streets, when she was grabbed from behind by one of the two rough-looking men she thought she’d glimpsed at the hall that morning. Lifted right off her feet and with a large hard hand across her mouth, she was held against the man’s front as he carried her into the narrow alleyway at the side of the building which appeared to have a dead end, his companion following him. She kicked and struggled but it had no impact on the burly body.

  ‘Calm down, calm down.’ The man holding her spoke above her head. ‘There’s someone who wants to meet you, that’s all. Seems you didn’t reply to his letters, even though he asked you to reply in the Agony Column of The Times. Not polite, that. Ignoring him. Upset him, it has. Especially with how you flaunt yourself on stage, saying women should be able to choose where they give their favours and that you’re as good as men. Little tease, aren’t you, an’ you’ve excited him, see?’

  Fear was making Cat light-headed. Her feet still weren’t touching the ground, and he was holding her as casually as though she weighed nothing at all, the other man not looking at them but peering towards where they’d entered the alley.

  The man holding her now said, ‘You told him where we’d be? That we’d have her?’

  The second man grunted a reply, and then, as the clip-clop of horses’ hooves came to them, Cat gathered all her strength and kicked out viciously with her boots at the same time as twisting her body.

  She almost got free and she knew she’d hurt her captor from the groan he made, but as she opened her mouth to scream, the hand clamped even more firmly across her mouth. He was muttering foul curses as he carried her to the end of the alley and thrust her into the open door of the carriage that was waiting. She sprawled on the floor, but as she tried to scramble towards the opposite door, the man climbed in beside her and hoisted her up none too gently.

  ‘Gently, Charley, gently. Is that any way to treat a lady?’

  The man sitting in the seat facing her was clothed all in black; black frockcoat, black trousers and a black top hat. Cat was now frozen with terror, and although her mouth was free she couldn’t cry out or move. Not that she would have got very far with the two men who had accosted her now sitting either side of her.

  ‘But we haven’t been formally introduced, my dear.’ The man leaned forward and Cat instinctively shrank from what she saw in his face. ‘My name is Henry, and yours is Christabel. Such a very beautiful name.’

  The carriage was moving but the curtains at the windows made it impossible to see out. That alone increased Cat’s dread. It was inconceivable that she was being abducted in the middle of a normal working day, but it was happening, and no one would know.

  Somehow she found her voice. ‘Stop this carriage this instant.’

  ‘Why should I do that?’ The man leaned back again, the slender walking stick with a silver top he was holding resting between his knees. ‘I’ve been waiting for this opportunity to talk to you for some time. It’s unfortunate it had to be this way but you’ve only brought it on yourself, my dear, ignoring my letters and requests that we meet.’

  She knew but she still had to ask. ‘Letters?’

  ‘“A devotee of your art”?’

  Oh God help me, help me, help me. Those disgusting letters detailing what he wanted to do to her, the ‘fun’ they could have. ‘They were not the sort of letters a gentleman sends to a lady,’ she said, aiming to keep the trembling in her body out of her voice.

  ‘On the contrary, a lady of your profession must receive such accolades all the time, surely?’

  ‘They weren’t in the nature of an accolade, they were offensive and detestable.’

  ‘They were a compliment, my dear. To your beauty and the free spirit
you talk about on stage. You are magnificent in your unrestraint, your shamelessness.’

  She stared at him. If he had come to see her as he proclaimed, then how could he possibly have twisted the fight for liberty and the vote and the other issues in the play like this? Swallowing hard, she tried to inject cool politeness into her voice. ‘It is a play and I am an actress, that is all.’

  ‘Such modesty.’

  ‘I have to be at the theatre shortly so will you kindly stop this carriage,’ she said again, warning herself not to lose control. With this man’s henchmen sitting either side of her she had no chance of escape, so she had to talk her way out of this, but it was hard when she wanted to shout and scream. Whoever he was, he had money, that much was evident, but for all his fine clothes and this carriage, which she had to admit was beautiful, he was no gentleman to behave this way.

  ‘All in good time.’ He smiled the smile that wasn’t a smile. ‘All in good time, m’dear.’

  She would escape. He would have to stop the carriage at some time, and no matter where she was she would scream and make a run for it. Her mind made up, Cat tried to get her bearings. The carriage had been pointing in the opposite direction from the Cathedral, towards the Strand, but already she had been conscious that they had twisted and turned a couple of times so they could be going back whence she’d come for all she knew.

  Was his name really Henry? She moistened her lips which were dry with fright. He was a big man and heavy with it, and she would put his age at about fifty or so, although it was difficult to tell with the full beard he wore in the style of the King. He wasn’t ugly, but there was something distinctly repellent about him, something that made her flesh creep. Whether it was the redness of the thick, full lips beneath the moustache or the look in his eyes when he stared at her, she didn’t know, but whatever it was, everything in her recoiled from any contact with him.

  The two men either side of her were apparently relaxed, but she sensed the slightest move from her and they would pounce. Quietly, she said, ‘Where are you taking me?’

  ‘You’ll see shortly.’

  ‘Why are you doing this?’ She hated the pleading note in her voice. ‘If you admire me as you say you do, why are you treating me this way?’

  ‘This way? What way is that?’

  ‘Kidnapping me.’

  He laughed, a dry sound. ‘Christabel, Christabel, such accusations. I am merely ensuring I enjoy the pleasure of your company as you seemed determined to thwart me. And really, you intrigue me more than a little. All this passion and openness on stage and yet you shrink from my letters? Why is that? I wondered. In all my observations over the last months I see no constant male beau, and so, I began to wonder, does your fancy lie in a different direction? Or perhaps you simply enjoy pleasure from wherever it comes? Certainly I, myself, consider nothing unnatural. You could say I am the most liberal of men in that regard.’

  She stared at him, only half-understanding what he was implying. ‘You’ve been watching me? Outside the theatre, I mean?’ The creeping feeling he induced spread over her scalp as if the hairs on her head were rising.

  He sat, half-smiling, watching her.

  The rest of the journey was conducted in silence and lasted no more than ten minutes or so. When the horses’ trot slowed down and then stopped, Cat prepared herself for flight, but no one in the carriage moved. And then the wheels were rolling again but only for a moment or two before the carriage turned at an angle and then stopped once more, but this time for good.

  The man who called himself Henry got out, and she heard him say to someone, ‘Lock those gates,’ before adding, directly to her, ‘May I help you, my dear?’ as he held out his hand.

  Ignoring him, Cat climbed out of the carriage to find she was in the walled yard of what looked to be a fairly substantial house, and another man was busy locking two huge wooden gates set in the eight-foot-high wall. She opened her mouth, but the scream never had voice because the man who had grabbed her had followed her from the carriage and now lifted her as before, his hand over her mouth as he carried her straight through an open doorway into the house. She kicked and struggled for a moment before becoming still, realising the futility of wasting her strength.

  Cat saw she was in a large kitchen but she was carried through this into a passage. Halfway along the passage the man called Henry had unlocked another door, and as her captor took her down the steep stone steps she realised they were descending into the cellar. She fought again, nearly sending them both headlong, and as the man holding her uttered a string of oaths, Henry, now at the bottom of the stairs, laughed. ‘I think we’ll have to give her something. See to it, would you?’

  ‘I know what I’d like to give her.’

  ‘All good things come to those that wait, Seamus.’

  Henry stood aside at the bottom of the steps. An enclosed room had been constructed, the door of which was open, and now Cat was pushed into it with enough force to send her to her knees. She crawled forwards and then scrambled to her feet, turning to see Henry watching her from the doorway. ‘Scream all you like,’ he said mildly. ‘This room was made to certain requirements.’ And then he shut the door and she heard the bolts slid into place.

  The gas-lights burning in several holders mounted on brackets on the walls of the room told Cat she had been expected. It was the colour that hit her senses first. A deep scarlet red; walls, carpet – covering all of the floor; even the ceiling was painted in the same brazen shade. There were no windows, no natural light, but as Cat stared about her, her face white and terrified, the implements the room contained froze her blood. Whips, handcuffs and other items were hanging on the wall close to the huge bed, and it was then she began to whimper like a child.

  When the man Seamus returned he had his companion with him who was holding a cup. Cat had heard the bolts being slid, and had braced herself to fly at whoever entered the room, but Seamus had clearly anticipated such a reaction. He subdued her with little effort, and the other man held her nose, brought her head back at a painful angle and forced her to swallow the contents of the cup. It tasted bitter, and when she had ingested it all Seamus hauled her to the bed and flung her on it. ‘I’ll wager you won’t forget this day in a hurry,’ he said thickly, surveying her sprawled limbs hungrily. ‘The things he does . . .’ He grinned. ‘Still, you’ll find out soon enough.’

  When they left the room, locking the door once more, Cat had a feeling come over her she’d never experienced before. Her limbs were heavy and her mind wasn’t her own, but the panic and agitation had subsided somewhat and she wanted nothing more than to sleep. Knowing she couldn’t give in to the deadening potion, she tried to fight it, but it was worse with each minute that ticked by, and by the time the door opened again she was barely able to stand.

  Henry Chide-Mulhearne, a member of the aristocracy and a follower of Donatien Alphonse Francois de Sade, had been anticipating this moment for a while. He had come across one of the Marquis de Sade’s novels, Les 120 Journées de Sodome in his youth, and the works of sexual fantasy and perversion had gripped him like nothing else in his pampered and profligate life. Wealth and power he took as his right, and the privileges they accorded him a divine prerogative. He considered himself above the law and the narrow views of men, and although he usually took his women from the brothels where they would not be missed should his ‘games’ go too far, occasionally, as in the case of Cat, a woman who was not a prostitute caught his eye.

  His servants, such as Seamus, he chose very carefully and paid extremely well. He had a country estate, this large townhouse, a grand chalet in France and a villa in the Italian Alps, and divided his time between them, never staying too long in one place. Each of his homes had what he called his ‘special’ room, like the one Cat was in now. Actresses interested him, they always had. In an age where the paragon of womanhood was the humble, obedient wife, mother or sister of some man, a woman who flagrantly displayed herself on the stage of the theatre was a
nathema and therefore exciting to his jaded palate – whatever the puritan morality of the play. And lately, the ‘new drama’ where conventional attitudes were challenged excited him still more.

  He saw that the drug Seamus had given her had done its work. Even as she backed away from him, she stumbled and almost fell. He was wearing nothing beneath the long velvet dressing gown he had on, and as he reached her, he said softly, ‘Will you take off your clothes, my dear, or shall I?’

  Chapter 16

  The lunch with Patience and William went well, but Sophy was glad when it was over. Patience did most of the talking. By the time they parted, Sophy was well-acquainted with most aspects of her cousins’ lives. She knew John and Matthew had houses in the same street in Bishopwearmouth and were blissfully happy with their respective wives, and that John’s boys were darlings but a handful. David had done splendidly at university and was now an archaeologist working somewhere in Egypt. Patience and her husband lived close to the children’s hospital on the southern outskirts of Bishopwearmouth where William had recently taken up the post of Head Consultant, after eighteen years at the Sunderland Infirmary. Patience had told Sophy that she and her brothers saw their father on a regular basis, but their mother rarely.

  Sophy gave Patience her address before they said goodbye. It would have been churlish not to. But seeing her cousin had brought up the wounds of the past, especially the feeling of loss she’d felt when Bridget, Kitty and Patrick had been dismissed. Consequently she left the hotel sad and disturbed.

  Two days later, however, when she waited in vain for Cat at Dolly’s, and then went to the theatre where Cat was appearing only to find her friend hadn’t shown for the last few performances, she felt more than disturbed. It was the same story at Cat’s lodgings. No one had seen her since the morning Cat had attended the suffrage meeting.

  Sophy left Cat’s lodgings and went straight to the local police station. From there she tried several hospitals. Everyone she spoke to tried to be helpful but Cat had apparently disappeared into thin air. During her performance that night, all Sophy could think about was her friend. She sensed that something was terribly wrong. Single actresses were vulnerable. Everyone knew that, which was why many married for protection as much as for respectability. True, the theatre was more reputable than the music halls, and the social status regarding male actors had changed for the better in the last decade or two, but a segment of society persisted in viewing actresses as scarlet women. Henry Irving, the actor-manager of the Lyceum, had done much for male actors when he was knighted thirteen years before, but actresses were still suspect. Ambition and independence were unfeminine attributes, male logic argued, and when women expressed passion and a lack of restraint on stage, it stood to reason they were females of a certain sort.