‘The maid lives out,’ Elizabeth said mildly. She had rented the small, very pretty little house, with its bay tree in a tub outside the door, shining brass knocker, pale wallpapers and elegant furniture, and lived there alone. On the other hand, Harry Hislop was there overnight as often as not. It was partly to avoid servants’ gossip, and partly to be able to be completely alone in the house with him, that her cook and maid lived out, arriving only at ten o’clock and leaving at eight in the evening. On this particular day Harry had left in a rage at dawn. Elizabeth had lain awake for hours, finally falling asleep, then, feeling dreadful, had woken up to let Constance in.
She marvelled at the vigour of this woman, now well over fifty – she kept her age a secret – who had left the theatre after everyone else the night before and must have risen at seven to get here so early. She dreaded hearing what Constance had to say. She said, still shivering in her nightdress, ‘I can try to light the fire, or get dressed, Constance, or you could simply deliver your ultimatum and save us both time. For my part, I think if you believe in something you should do everything in your power to support it.’
‘Easily said,’ Constance interrupted. ‘If I go to prison I lose the theatre, and throw some fifty people, from you to the charwomen, out of work. Perhaps you’d like to see that.’
‘You marched before…’
‘I did my best. But in my view the WSPU is going too far now. Breaking windows, arson, attacking the police – what good does that do? Who does that convince? Not those who need to be convinced.’
‘We have asked and asked,’ said Elizabeth. ‘Instead, the Government proposes to widen the number of men who can vote – but still leave out the women.’
‘Yes, yes,’ Constance said hastily. ‘That is very offensive. But steady and earnest pressure will, one day, succeed. In the meantime, are you really prepared to sacrifice your own career to all this? You asked for my ultimatum, as you call it. What I say is that you put me in an impossible position. I cannot have a leading lady who is deliberately running the risk of going to prison. Unless you can guarantee me you will not break the law I shall have to ask, very reluctantly, I might say, for your resignation. There’s no other way, Elizabeth.’
‘Do your worst, Constance – Harry already has,’ mumbled the shivering Elizabeth.
Constance gave her a sharp look. ‘Well then,’ she declared. ‘You’ll lose Harry; you’re losing your career.’
‘My mother,’ declared Elizabeth bitterly, ‘found herself a widow, with a child – me – and no rights. In addition, she had none of the confidence which comes from the knowledge that you have some power – the power to vote, make laws and all the rest. My mother was crushed – how can I permit myself, my daughters, to be crushed also?’
Constance said drily, ‘I imagine if you continued with your successful career, you could very easily ensure the welfare of your unborn daughter.’
‘Until she meets the law, made by men, for men, and finds no protection,’ said Elizabeth doggedly. ‘Finds she cannot divorce a cruel or drunken husband, be the guardian of her own children – is nothing, in the eyes of the law. Constance, the knowledge that neither you nor I nor any woman can play any part in the government of our own country weakens us. I pay taxes, so do you, but we have no say in how that money is spent. If nothing else moves you, surely that must.’
Constance declared angrily, ‘You are rapidly putting yourself in the position of a woman who will pay no taxes – having no income to be taxed. My concern is that you don’t reduce me to that position, too.’ Then she said, in a pleading tone, ‘Elizabeth, I beg you, be reasonable. You have a gift. Exercise it. Surely you can do as much for your sex on stage as off it, in prison. Don’t you understand what such places are like?’
But Elizabeth thought of Bella, her mother, and how she had been unable to protect herself or her daughter from her own brother.
‘Do you think I look forward to it?’ she asked bleakly.
Constance stood. ‘Very well. I shall have to play Marguerite myself and endure Edith’s criticisms and complaints. I’m forced to dismiss you, Elizabeth.’ As she left, she added, ‘You’d better write me a play.’
And Elizabeth said, mechanically, ‘Very well, Constance.’ The words meant little to her. She had admittedly written two one-act comedies for the Sunday-afternoon performances Constance allowed at the theatre to benefit the suffrage movement. Women actresses performed, women artists painted the sets, women composers wrote the music. But in spite of her playlets, written for fun and to help the movement, she had not considered herself a playwright, just an actress who knew what would work on stage.
After Constance had gone, she sat down in the cold room, wondering what on earth to do. It was not too late to tell Harry she would attend no more suffragette demonstrations. He had banged out of the house in the early morning, declaring that in spite of his support for the movement for women’s suffrage he could not face the thought of Elizabeth in prison. He had also predicted this morning’s scene with Constance, and added, ‘You will have a criminal record, and be unemployed. And, worse than that, you seem content to be parted from me, all to make a point that could easily be made by others. Let them go to gaol, Elizabeth. Perhaps they have less to lose.’
She knew that in his eyes the fact that she was prepared to go to prison for an abstract thing, the vote, was linked with her refusal to marry him. Both things, he thought, meant she did not, could not, love him. She had tried to explain again and again that she did, but was afraid she might not continue to do so if she were legally tied to him. Kind as he was, open-minded as he was, he could not understand. He suggested she was not prepared to make any sacrifices for him. ‘Why do you want sacrifice?’ she had asked. He had no answer. The truth was, women were supposed to sacrifice themselves for men. Harry was kind; Harry was reasonable, but how many men could understand what marriage could mean for a woman, that what was described as a shelter could so often end as a trap? Harry had grown up believing, as all men did, that to offer a woman marriage was to honour her, with his name, his reputation and that of his family. Elizabeth suspected that if she married him, he would not be able to prevent himself from becoming a conventional husband, a man demanding service and obeisance from his wife.
Over the four years of their relationship she had visited the Hislops several times. Harry’s father, a retired naval commander, and his mother, daughter of a baronet, lived with Harry’s sister Mercy in a large house in Kent. Another sister, Susan, was married to a wealthy landowner who lived nearby.
Elizabeth knew that Harry’s mother did not like her. His family did not like his acting career – Elizabeth was an actress and therefore presumed to be encouraging him in it. In addition, Elizabeth thought that Emily Hislop must know or guess that she had refused a proposal of marriage from Harry. In his mother’s eyes this would be tantamount to rejecting the Hislop family itself. On her side, although Emily did not much like Elizabeth, she wanted a daughter-in-law. She wanted a married son, grandchildren and, Elizabeth suspected, someone to boss about in her customary manner.
Emily Hislop had even once taken the step, consulting no one, not even her husband, of calling at Linden Grove to see Elizabeth’s family. She came one Saturday afternoon when she must have known Elizabeth would be at the theatre playing a matinée. She told Harriet Warren, whom she found at home in the drawing room, ‘I was just passing by, and knowing what great friends your niece and my son Harry are, I dropped in hoping to see Elizabeth.’
Harriet knew little of Harry Hislop, whom Elizabeth had never brought home, or discussed, except as another member of the theatrical company. At a loss, Harriet replied, ‘How nice of you to call – though unfortunately I do not know Mr Hislop.’
‘You’ve not met my son?’ exclaimed Harry’s mother.
Harriet said briskly, ‘Elizabeth’s mother is resting. Let me fetch her.’ Mrs Hislop made no polite effort to prevent Bella from being disturbed. After Harriet left th
e room she moved about it, examining the bookshelves, the pictures, even leaning over to study a letter Harriet had been writing on the small desk in the corner of the room. It was to the family’s butcher, disputing his bill. Then, hearing Harriet and Bella in the hall, she quickly went to the window at the end of the room and was looking out when they came in.
Emily was amazed at the small, tired woman who was Elizabeth’s mother, and even more astonished to feel Bella’s work-worn hand. Elizabeth and her mother are poor relations, she thought. She understood even less why, it seemed, Elizabeth had rejected her Harry, only son of a wealthy and well-connected family.
It could not be concealed that Harriet and Bella knew little of Harry Hislop. Harriet was annoyed at being put at a disadvantage. Bella was upset that apparently her daughter had not confided in her. The scene that ensued resulted in Elizabeth’s leaving Linden Grove for good.
She had continued to live in the house long after she might have gone for her mother’s sake. She had, guiltily, abandoned her original plan to take Bella away from Linden Grove. She knew that once they were living together, she would no longer be able to conceal her affair with Harry. The knowledge that her daughter was a fallen woman would destroy Bella. Nor would Bella be able to understand her work for the suffrage movement. Elizabeth was now spending much of her free time speaking on public platforms for the cause. On Sundays there were the plays and skits, the choral performances – anything to raise funds for the movement. Unable to face the loss of freedom that living with her mother would entail, she told herself hopefully that Bella might be better off where she was. After all, she had her friendship with Mrs Macfarlane. There was the church, where she was a devout parishioner, and she was on good terms with the new vicar and his wife.
Continuing to live at Linden Grove was made just about bearable because she saw very little of the family. Frannie had married her solicitor fiancé and moved away. The others were in bed when she came home from the theatre – except for Bella, who waited up for her, made her cocoa and chatted. She slept late in the mornings, thus missing Robert’s exit. He was frequently out in the evenings, having achieved his ambition of becoming an alderman of the borough. Cora, too, was often out, seeing friends. For the rest, Elizabeth managed by saying little and spending much of her time at home reading or studying her parts. It was odd for an increasingly respected and celebrated West End actress to go on living at home, and particularly a home where she had never been, and still was not, accepted. But she did it.
To assuage her guilt about not offering her mother another home – Bella never asked, reminded her or reproached her about this – she loaded her with presents until Bella pleaded for fewer, less expensive gifts. Apart from anything else Elizabeth’s generosity made Harriet ill-natured. She resented the gifts Bella received from her glamorous daughter and made hurtful remarks about them. Nevertheless, the giving continued yet Elizabeth, to her pain, watched her mother, only in her forties, dwindling into a little, lined, elderly widow.
When she returned from the theatre on the night of Emily Hislop’s visit, she discovered not just Bella, but Cora, Harriet and Robert all waiting up for her. Tired – the days when there was a matinée and an evening performance were always exhausting – she anticipated a scene with a sinking heart, though she could not imagine what the new argument would be about.
She was astonished to hear that Emily Hislop had called. Over the years at Linden Grove she had been forced to become a ready liar, but there was little she could say about the charge that she was going about with a young man without telling her family. She did assert that Mrs Hislop was mistaken in thinking the relationship anything other than a friendly one between two members of the same theatrical company, but this explanation seemed weak – even weaker when it emerged that Emily Hislop had mentioned the weekend Elizabeth had spent at the family’s house in Kent. Elizabeth had merely said she was staying with a friend.
‘Unwholesome secrecy,’ declared Robert Warren.
‘Is there anything wrong with this young man, that we should not know him?’ asked a distressed Bella.
‘I blame this on the stage,’ Harriet said. ‘It is not the life for an innocent woman.’
Elizabeth, still with the sound of an audience’s applause in her ears, ceased abruptly to explain and apologise. Tired of her own lies, she said, standing up straight, ‘I’m afraid if you can’t accept my answers, I shall have to go.’
Her mother cried out, ‘No! Elizabeth, no!’
Of the Warrens, only Cora, overshadowed by her cousin, looked pleased. Harriet and Robert were profiting by Elizabeth’s generous contribution to the household expenses. They were also aware that her leaving might make their hold on the house more tenuous. They attempted to smooth over the argument. But Elizabeth, the wind of freedom now in her nostrils, would not yield. She packed that night, and went straight round to Harry’s flat, sinking into his bed with a deep sigh of relief. ‘No more hasty rushing home, no more pretence.’ His arms went round her, and she sighed. ‘Home at last.’ She felt guilty about abandoning Bella, especially to the reproaches she would have to endure because her daughter had rejected the authority of her family. But for Elizabeth, the relief of not returning daily to Linden Grove, or lying if she did not, was enormous.
She assuaged her guilt by paying her mother a regular allowance, though she was never sure how, or if, Bella spent the money. Each week, unless touring, she visited her mother, usually on Thursday afternoons when Harriet was playing bridge with the local ladies. Only Cora was sometimes at home. One particular Thursday Elizabeth arrived in great dread. She was now concealing from Bella not only her political convictions and her lover, but also the fact that Constance had terminated her contract with the company at the Imperial, and that she was living on her savings. However, it was a pleasant meeting, and not only because the unacceptable facts of her life did not emerge. Cora was unusually cheerful; Bella seemed strong and well.
They all had tea in the drawing room, where the reason for Cora’s good spirits emerged. She revealed that she was using a small legacy she had received from a great-aunt to learn typewriting. Harriet had opposed the move, saying it was unsuitable, but her father had been more sympathetic. ‘Because he thinks I’ll go and work for him for practically nothing,’ Cora had said, ‘but no such luck – I don’t want to work for Father in that awful factory in the East End. Do you remember, Elizabeth? That dirty girl kicking up her heels on the workbench, and the smell—’
‘I do,’ said Elizabeth. ‘I’m sure you can get a better job than that.’
‘It’s a very good idea to get some professional training, Cora,’ Bella told her, with surprising firmness. ‘A woman should always have something to fall back on.’
‘Ma says it’ll turn me into a spinster,’ Cora said.
‘What rubbish,’ Bella told her. ‘You’ll meet all sorts of gentlemen in an office.’
‘Ma blames you, Elizabeth,’ Cora said with a grin.
‘Me?’ Elizabeth exclaimed.
‘Putting ideas in my head. Going on the stage, leaving home, all that.’
‘Many young ladies have careers these days,’ Bella said. Typewriting, working in telephone exchanges – all sorts of things that weren’t possible in my day. It’s a very good thing. And if one were to be left as a young widow, as I was – not that I suggest you might be, Cora – but if one were, the knowledge that one could earn one’s bread respectably would be a great comfort.’
Elizabeth had taken a bus back to her house, thinking little of all this. She was home by six. Harry was not due in from the theatre until after eleven. She had nothing to do but wait for him. Without realising it, she had absorbed Bella’s unusually firm statements about Cora’s efforts to train for a career. Some thoughts came to her, and she suddenly discovered herself sweeping bills and letters from her writing desk and beginning to write her first play.
Daughters of the Storm was set halfway through the reign of Queen Victori
a, and concerned the two daughters of a country solicitor, both waiting at home for suitors to come to them. One of the young women, Cordelia, is courted by and, urged on by her family, marries her father’s partner. The other, Susan, after turning down a local farmer’s offer of marriage, and following an argument with her family over the refusal, runs away. A year later, demoralised and near starvation, Susan is forced to return home. In the meantime her sister Cordelia has had one child and is expecting another. In a confrontation between Susan, her parents, her sister and her brother-in-law, it is only Cordelia, the obedient daughter, who takes Susan’s part, shattering the family peace and perhaps her own marriage permanently. She says that if she had known the real costs of a virtuous acceptance of her parents’ wishes concerning her marriage, she would have run away with her sister. Cordelia protests that she was reared in ignorance. She was told she would come to love her husband and children, but she knows now that girls coming to womanhood are told lies. She does not want another child. She detests her life and does not know how she will continue to endure it. She says she has done as she was told and married, and is bitterly unhappy. Her sister, in turn, disobeyed, ran away and the experience has nearly destroyed her. In Elizabeth’s last act matters are turned on their heads. Susan is proposed to by a man she loves; Cordelia’s husband, horrified by what she has said, leaves her.
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