by Holly Webb
“So I’m spending all that time on my knees chalking messages on the pavement just so’s the missis can make me wash them off again.”
“Oh. I didn’t think of that.” Lottie’s shoulders slumped, and Sally hugged her.
“I’ll still do it, silly. Find the chalk, and the day after tomorrow I’ll wake you early.”
“Lottie.”
Lottie blinked, the smiling dream of her mother fading away.
“Lottie, it’s time. You coming?”
She stared at Sally in the half-light of the morning, and the older girl sighed.
“Wake up. You told me to wake you, remember? Hurry, Lottie, we ain’t got long.”
Lottie sat up in a rush and flung off her blankets, scrambling out of bed and grabbing for her dress and petticoats. “Wait, wait. I won’t be a minute.”
Her heart was thumping and her fingers kept slipping on the mother-of-pearl buttons down the front of her dress.
“Here, give me that.” Sally took over, buttoning swiftly, and Lottie sighed. “Aren’t you nervous at all?”
“’Course I am. I just want to get it done. Come on.”
Sally led them down the stairs and through the green baize door into the kitchens, which were dark and smelled of cabbage and burned grease. Lottie shuddered, still half-asleep, and as Sally unhooked the key and started up the area steps to the street, she started to feel sick. She clenched her fingers around the sticks of chalk in her pocket and felt one of them snap.
“Here?” Sally whispered, as they stood by the steps leading up to the grand front door.
Lottie nodded. “‘Votes for Women’, really big. And then ‘Deeds not Words’ underneath.”
“All right.” Sally flinched as a milk cart rattled by and the driver peered at them curiously. “We need to keep an ear out. There might be more deliveries. Or servants who live out walking to work, even. We can’t get caught.”
“I know. I promise we won’t. And if we do,” Lottie added suddenly, “you can pretend that you caught me first. I don’t care what Miss Minchin does.”
Sally laughed, but she sounded too scared for it to be really funny. They crouched down and started to draw out the letters, bumping the chalk over the rough stones of the pavement.
“It’s harder than I thought it would be,” Sally muttered. “The ground’s bumpy. There’s hardly any of this piece left. Most of it’s all over my fingers. Are we going to have enough?”
Lottie shook her head. “Stick to ‘Votes for Women’. There, look. That’s all of it written. We just need to fill it in better. Oh! It’s all over your dress!” Lottie stood up and tried to brush the chalk dust off Sally’s black frock.
“I thought my apron would cover it.” Sally rubbed frantically at the dusty cotton. “Cook’ll see!”
“She won’t, we’ll get it off.” Lottie swiped at the fabric, but the chalk only seemed to be spreading itself around.
“What you doing?”
Both girls whipped round, panic in their faces. They’d forgotten to keep an eye out for passers-by and two boys were standing behind them, smirking.
“‘Votes for Women’, eh? Suffragettes, are you?” They were scruffily dressed and Lottie guessed that they were shop boys or apprentices on their way to work.
“Yes,” she said, raising her chin. “What’s it to you, anyway?”
“Bunch of old cats. You’re too young and pretty to be one of them, sweetheart. Here, give us a kiss.” The boy slipped his arm around Lottie’s waist and she squeaked with horror, wrenching her face away from his. She hardly knew any young men – only Sara’s friends, the boys from the Carmichael family who lived across the square, and she was sure none of them had ever even thought of trying to kiss her.
“Get off her!” Sally hissed, trying to grab his arm, but he wheeled round, swinging Lottie away, and the other boy pushed Sally against the iron railings, making her gasp as they thudded into her back.
“What do you think you’re doing?” A cold, furious voice cut through Lottie’s frightened panting.
“Mind your own business, miss,” the boy holding Lottie said carelessly. “Go on.”
“Sara!” Lottie gasped, looking over his shoulder.
“Let her go.”
“I won’t, dirty little Suffragette. She’s no better than she should be.”
“Miss, get someone from the house,” Sally begged. “Knock on the door. Call Miss Minchin.”
“No!” Lottie tried hard to kick the boy’s shins, but he only laughed at her – until a long, low growl made him turn again, staring properly at Sara this time.
Boris had come up behind her and she had both hands holding tightly to his collar, pulling him back. He was straining against her, his teeth bared, and he looked terrifying. Lottie had never seen him angry – he was the calmest dog, even when the monkey was pulling his tail and grabbing at his ears. All he ever did was lift his lip a little and shake the irritating creature off. Now the hair on his great neck was standing up and Lottie couldn’t take her eyes off his teeth – neither could the two boys.
“Here, you hold that beast back,” the boy not holding Lottie said nervously. “Don’t you let go of his collar. Alfie, come on. That thing’s the size of a horse, look at him.”
“All right, all right.” Alfie pushed Lottie away, quite gently, so that she stumbled towards Sara, and then to hug Sally, who was still standing limply against the railings. “We’re going,” he told Sara, holding his hands up peaceably. “Don’t get any ideas about letting him go, missy.”
“You’d better run, then,” Sara said. “I can hardly hold him.” Boris growled again, harsh as sawing wood, and both boys dashed away around the corner.
Lottie stared silently at Sara, wondering what she was going to say. She could feel Sally shaking against her, and she realized that Sally had never met Sara, only seen her in the street, getting in and out of her beautiful carriage. All Sally could see was a grand lady – Sara was fifteen now and she wore long dresses, and her dark hair coiled around her head. Even dressed plainly to walk with Boris in the early morning, she looked exquisite.
“She won’t tell,” Lottie murmured to Sally. “She’s a friend. Becky, her maid, she spoke to you when you started at Miss Minchin’s, remember?”
“Lottie, what were you thinking?” Sara asked urgently. “What would have happened if Miss Minchin or someone else from the seminary had seen you? It’s all very well for you, but Sally would have lost her place, I’m sure of that. You’d better scuff this out.” She tried to rub at it with the toe of her beautifully fitted boot, but the chalk only smudged a little.
“Don’t!” Lottie cried, and then she glanced round anxiously at the house behind them. The other servants would be rising soon – they needed to get back inside before they were caught. “Don’t you think we’re right?” she whispered hopefully to Sara. Lottie had never spoken to her about the Suffragettes before, but it was hard to believe that someone she loved so much – someone she thought of as so clever – wouldn’t agree with them.
“Oh – I don’t know. Maybe. But Uncle Tom doesn’t, Lottie. I can’t talk about it now. Get inside. And ask Miss Minchin if you can come to tea. I’ll send a note.”
Lottie nodded reluctantly. Sally was still trembling and Lottie took her hand to lead her back down the steps and into the kitchen. Sally seemed to wake up as soon as she saw the kitchen clock. “I’ve not lit the fire! Cook’ll kill me – get out of here, miss.”
Lottie swallowed, hurt. Sally never called her “miss” now, not unless they could be overheard. Sally seemed to have pulled away, as if Sara had reminded her of the gulf between them. “Let me help,” she pleaded.
“I’ll be quicker on my own. Go on, you can’t get caught down here.”
Lottie crept away, scuttling up the stairs to hide in her room, all the triumph and excitement she’d expected to feel wiped away.
By the time she was waiting in the hallway to be inspected by Miss Amelia before
going out to tea, Lottie had recovered a little. Miss Minchin had been told about the chalked message at breakfast, by Mary, who was bringing her toast. The parlour maid was clearly trying not to laugh and Miss Minchin was furious. She swept across to the dining room windows, which looked out on to the street, like the schoolroom, and glared at the pair of little boys who were standing by the chalk sign, sniggering.
“Remove that at once!” she hissed to Mary, but the maid drew herself up very straight and said that she felt it was not her place. She didn’t actually say the words, but what she meant was that she was a parlour maid, not a skivvy. “Then send someone else to do it – the girl in the scullery. It must be cleaned away, I have Lady Nugent and her daughter visiting this morning!”
By now all the girls were trying to peer over at the windows to see what was going on, but no one could see out. As soon as Miss Minchin had crumbled her toast to pieces and swept out of the room, the whole upper class dashed to the windows, leaving the babies of the school begging plaintively to be told what the joke was. Lottie realized she had better look too, otherwise it would seem suspicious.
As they watched, Sally came up the area steps, lugging a bucket of soapy water and a scrubbing brush, and Lottie sighed.
Ermengarde turned to look at her. “What is it?”
Lottie shook her head. “Oh … I only wish it could stay, that’s all.” She smiled brightly at Ermie. “Wouldn’t you like to see Miss Minchin’s face as she tried to explain that to Lady Nugent?” She tried to keep her voice light, but Sally was on her knees scrubbing the pavement, just as she’d said she would be.
She lingered in the dining room, nibbling at a toast crust, until all the others had gone. Then she ran back to the window, heaving the lower half up with a creak. Sally sat back on her heels, wiping her face with a hand coated in greyish suds.
“I’m sorry!” Lottie hissed, glancing quickly down the area steps in case anyone was there to hear.
“What for?” Sally called back. “We showed those two oiks, didn’t we?”
“Well, Boris did…”
Sally got up, easing her knees straight slowly, and came back through the iron gate. She stood on the steps so she could whisper to Lottie. “Remember the lady I told you about, who sold Votes for Women outside the teashop? And the things the men would say to her, about how she was a loose woman and no better than she should be? She just stood there and let them and smiled, as if she was a … a princess. I don’t care what those boys said, Lottie. We were there. They know we were there. We stood up.” She grimaced at the dusty, wet mess on the pavement. “Even if I do have to scrub it away. We stood up.”
“Yes.” Lottie stretched her hand out of the window and clutched at Sally’s. “And we’ll do it again?” she whispered hopefully.
“Too right.”
Lottie smiled to herself as Miss Amelia scolded her to straighten her hat and tuck up the petticoats that were showing under her skirt. She wasn’t seeing Miss Amelia fussing, she was remembering those boys racing away round the corner of the street. She only wished she had a present for Boris. Perhaps Sara would let her feed him a biscuit.
The chalk still showed a little as she hurried along the street to Mr Carrisford’s house. The words were gone, but there was a faint pale ghost of something left behind and Lottie’s heart glowed. She was grinning to herself as she rang the bell and Mr Carrisford’s servant Ram Dass answered the door.
He bowed politely to her. Lottie nodded back. “Missee Sahib is in the blue drawing room,” he murmured, and Lottie raced past him to the stairs.
Sara was curled on the hearth rug like a child, her cheek pillowed against Boris’s dappled fur, but she jumped up when Lottie came in. She seized Lottie’s hands and gazed into the younger girl’s face, her grey eyes worried.
“Lottie, how could you?”
“Oh, don’t!” Lottie pulled her hands away. “Don’t spoil it.”
“I spoil it?” Sara looked angrier than Lottie had ever seen her. “How can you say that? What would have happened if I hadn’t woken early this morning? If I hadn’t decided that it was so beautiful I’d take Boris out for an airing?”
Lottie slumped next to the great dog, who was looking back and forth between them anxiously. She rubbed her hand round one of his huge silken ears, threading it between her fingers over and over. “I don’t know,” she admitted. “But we did it, don’t you see? It was important.”
“What will you do now?” Sara asked quietly, sitting beside her. Boris thumped his heavy tail into the hearth rug twice and settled back down.
“Try and think of other things to do.” Lottie glared at her determinedly. “And when I’m older, I don’t care what Papa says, I shall join the WSPU and be a proper Suffragette.”
Chapter Six
After Sara had rescued them that morning, she seemed to feel responsible for distracting Lottie from the Suffragettes. She invited her to tea almost every week, and kept lending her books. Most of them were rather long, and about history, which was Sara’s favourite subject, and Lottie did not read them all, although she tried. She had her own tiny library in her room now, mostly books and pamphlets that she had sent Sally to buy for her from the WSPU shop. They were hidden between the books Sara had lent her, so that Miss Amelia wouldn’t see what they were.
Early in June, Miss Minchin called Lottie and Ermengarde to stay behind at the end of morning lessons. This usually meant that whoever she wanted to talk to had done something wrong, but Lottie really couldn’t think of anything, for once. She and Ermengarde hadn’t been gossiping together. Even her composition had been remarkably free of blots and smears this morning. Ermie had been shamefully forgetful in the French lesson, but then she usually was.
“I have had a note from Miss Crewe, inviting you both to spend the day with her this Saturday.” Miss Minchin’s lips were pursed, as though she were sucking on a lemon. “I feel it is most inappropriate of her to have asked you, as you will miss your morning’s work. But there we are.” She sniffed disapprovingly. “I suppose that you would like to go?”
“Yes, Miss Minchin,” Ermengarde said politely, and Lottie nodded. “Yes, please.”
“Very well. You may both write a polite note to her this afternoon, expressing your pleasure at the invitation.”
“Miss Minchin would be even more horrified if she knew where Mr Carrisford was going to take us,” Ermengarde whispered to Lottie, as they left the schoolroom. “She told me about it yesterday when I went to tea.”
“Where?” Lottie demanded eagerly, pulling Ermengarde up the stairs and out of Miss Minchin’s earshot. “What are we going to do?”
“To the races, to watch the Derby. I should think Miss Minchin would say that racing is terribly vulgar, but it can’t be, since the king and queen will be there. It’s very dressy and sociable, Sara said.”
Lottie stared at her. “Really? We’re all to go?”
“Yes, and Mr Carrisford told Sara that he will hire a tall carriage, with space on the roof for us to sit and watch. And there will be a picnic, with the most delicious things, and a supper too. We won’t get back to school until quite late.” Ermengarde sighed delightedly.
“Have you ever been to a horse race before?” Lottie asked curiously.
Ermengarde laughed. “No. It isn’t at all the sort of thing that Papa or the aunts would take me to. Museums and picture galleries, that’s where they like to drag me. Oh, and events like the Festival for the coronation, because of that awful historical pageant, and all the interesting facts that I could learn about the countries of the Empire. A horse race is much more exciting. There’ll be crowds and crowds of people and we will get to see all of it, Lottie.”
“And a whole day away from here.” Lottie sighed.
Ermengarde stared at her. “Do you really dislike it so much?” she asked.
Lottie shrugged uncomfortably. “I don’t know why. I’ve never known anywhere else, since I can hardly remember living at home. But yes. Ma
ybe I wouldn’t be happy anywhere, Ermie. Perhaps I’m a person who is always destined to be miserable.” Lottie sat down on the stairs and sighed mournfully.
Ermengarde sniffed. “If Miss Amelia hears you talking like that, she’ll say you’re bilious and dose you with Milk of Magnesia.”
“Ermengarde St John, you are the least sympathetic person I have ever met,” Lottie muttered.
Lottie was sure that she had never seen so many people. They were everywhere, crowding against the barriers, men and women in their best summer clothes, all talking and laughing and shouting. It was almost frightening, to be surrounded by so many, and it reminded her of the crush around the coronation procession, two years ago this same month. Back then, she’d hardly even heard of Suffragettes.
Mr Carrisford had swept up in front of the seminary not in a carriage, as the girls had expected, but in a motorcar, a huge, shining, chauffeur-driven car, with room for all four of them, and several wicker hampers.
“Atkins here knows the very best place for us to watch from,” he had assured Lottie and Ermengarde as they climbed in. “By the curve of the track. We shall be there nice and early, and you will have the best of views, I promise. And once we’ve eaten lunch, you can stand on the hampers too.”
Atkins had been quite right – the view from up above the crowd was very clear. On the other side of the course were several men with film cameras, positioned to catch the horses as they came out of the bend.
“The next race is the important one, the Derby itself,” Mr Carrisford explained, leaning down to pull Lottie on to the seat of the car so she could see properly. “See, everyone’s pushing back towards the rails now. No one wants to miss this.”
Lottie peered past the sea of straw boaters and flowered hats at the course, watching the runners come galloping to the corner. Her heart beat faster as the horses raced towards them, and the crowd roared and shifted and danced.
