Suffragette Girl

by Margaret Dickinson

  Florrie squeezed her arm. ‘Of course you’d have coped. It’s surprising what you can do if you put your mind to it.’ She turned back to Lady Lee. ‘So, how has that precipitated Britain getting into a war? And who with?’

  ‘It’s all to do with alliances. It’s said that the young student who killed them was a Serb, or at least the Serbs were behind the plot. If so, we can expect Austria to retaliate against Serbia.’

  ‘But what’s that got to do with Britain?’ Florrie frowned.

  ‘Germany has an alliance with Austria. And Russia,’ she added ominously, ‘is Serbia’s ally.’

  ‘I still don’t understand how it involves us.’

  Lady Lee gave a wry smile. ‘Well, I have to admit I had to ask Tim to explain it all to me. He’s been down at the House of Commons in the public gallery all week. France has an alliance with Russia and we have an “entente” with France.’

  ‘What’s that mean – exactly?’

  ‘A gentleman’s agreement.’

  ‘Ah.’ Isobel sighed and murmured with a little sarcasm, ‘And of course the British are always “gentlemen”.’

  ‘I think there’s a treaty – Tim said so anyway – that binds us to protect Belgium’s neutrality. So,’ Lady Lee said finally, ‘if there is a war, this will alter things for us.’

  ‘How – how do you mean?’

  ‘Word has already gone round. Mrs Pankhurst feels that, if war does break out, we should suspend our activities for the duration of the war. England’s need is greater than our own. We should devote ourselves to serving our country in a time of crisis. And who knows,’ she added with a brief glint of her impish humour, even amidst such trepidation of what was to come, ‘if we show our mettle in such difficult times, well, it might do our Cause more good than all the arson and picture-slashing.’

  ‘You could be right,’ Florrie murmured and then added, ‘I think I ought to go home. James will be coming home from school very soon and . . .’ Her voice faded away as a new fear clutched at her heart. If there was a war, what would it mean for young men like her brother? He was only sixteen, but. . .

  ‘Me too,’ Isobel said, interrupting Florrie’s thoughts. ‘Is that all right, Lady Lee?’

  Lady Leonora nodded. ‘I think you should.’

  Seventeen

  Once more they returned to Lincolnshire, Isobel to Bixley Manor and Florrie to Candlethorpe Hall. When they’d been at home for almost two weeks, both young women were itching to get back to the city.

  ‘Nothing’s going to happen,’ Florrie moaned, when Isobel called for afternoon tea and they were sitting with Augusta and Clara in the drawing room. ‘I’m sure they’ve spread all these rumours of war just to put a stop to our activities.’

  Augusta burst out laughing. ‘I rather think the Prime Minister and his Cabinet have a lot more on their minds just now than a few mad women chaining themselves to the railing outside Number Ten.’ She replaced her cup on the tray. ‘But do stay until after the weekend. It’s the Bank Holiday, and my birthday on Tuesday. We’ve arranged a special party.’ She beamed. ‘I am going to be seventy, you know.’

  They all laughed. For months, Augusta had allowed no one to forget that she was about to reach such an auspicious age.

  ‘Of course we wouldn’t miss your party, Mrs Maltby,’ Isobel said. She turned to Florrie. ‘We’ll go back at the end of next week and see what’s happening.’

  ‘Gervase is here again with that noisy contraption of his,’ Augusta announced at breakfast on the morning of the August Bank Holiday Monday as she glanced out of the long windows overlooking the driveway. ‘No doubt he’s come to take you for a trip to the seaside. I’ve a mind to come with you,’ she added playfully. ‘What about you, James? Shall we both go with Gervase and Florrie? I’m sure there’s room in his motor car. And seeing as it’s my seventieth birthday tomorrow . . .’

  Gervase was good-natured about the suggestion, and not even the slightest flicker of disappointment that he would not be alone with Florrie showed on his face. Gallantly, he said, ‘It’ll be a pleasure, Mrs Maltby.’

  Half an hour later, the party set off to spend the day on Saltershaven sea front five miles from Candlethorpe Hall. Florrie perched on the front seat beside Gervase, whilst Augusta and James sat, a rug over their knees, in the back seat. Augusta was wearing her hat with the purple feathers, held on securely by a white silk scarf, and Florrie, as always, had the brooch that Gervase had given her pinned to the lapel of her jacket.

  Leaving the vehicle at a sea-front hotel, where Gervase ordered lunch for the four of them for one o’clock, they walked down the road from the clock tower to the beach. They stood for a moment, watching the holidaymakers.

  Little girls, barefoot with their skirts tucked up into baggy bloomers, paddled in the shallows, squealing with delight as the waves caught them unawares and splashed their legs. Then some boys, teasing and irritating, deliberately kicked water at the girls, making them shriek all the more. Women with wide-brimmed hats and parasols to shade their delicate complexions from the sun walked sedately along the beach, the hem of their skirts brushing the sand. Men, dressed uncomfortably in collars and ties and caps or boaters, took off their shoes, rolled up their trousers and paddled too. They stood watching as a bathing machine was manoeuvred into the water and two daring young women emerged from it, dressed in striped one-piece bathing costumes. They plunged into the sea, gasping and laughing at the shock of the cold water.

  ‘Now, off you young ones go,’ Augusta said, waving them away. ‘I’ll be quite happy sitting here on the sand.’

  Gervase spread out the rug he’d brought and Augusta sat down, arranging her skirts modestly around her.

  ‘You too, James. I don’t need looking after. I’m not quite in my dotage yet.’ She chuckled. ‘At least, not until tomorrow!’

  Arm in arm, Gervase and Florrie walked along the shore, in companionable silence, the only sounds the gentle lapping of the waves, the screeching seagulls and children’s merry laughter.

  James capered around them like a five-year-old.

  Gervase smiled. ‘You wouldn’t think he was a sedate sixteen-year-old from a private boarding school, would you?’

  ‘Sedate? James doesn’t know the meaning of the word. Besides, it’s time he had a little fun. He’s had a tough year, I think. Father’s pushing him to try for university.’

  ‘He’s a bright lad – he’ll make it. That’s if—’ Gervase stopped abruptly and changed the subject hurriedly. ‘Are you warm enough, Florrie? You’re so thin now. I worry about you. You mustn’t walk too far today. Just tell me when you’ve had enough.’

  She smiled up at him. ‘I’m fine. I’m tougher than I look.’

  His expression sobered. ‘You must be to go through all that. I’m so proud of both you and Isobel.’

  ‘Are you really?’ she said in surprise.

  They skirted two children building a sandcastle. Florrie smiled down at them as she murmured, ‘I thought you didn’t approve of the – the militant acts.’

  ‘I – didn’t.’

  ‘Didn’t?’ she questioned. ‘But you do now?’

  He sighed. ‘I don’t really agree with any form of violence, yet we could be on the brink of the very worst sort of fighting. A war. And if we are – well, I’ll be fully in favour of defending ourselves.’ He smiled wryly. ‘Defending our country and our rights. And I have to agree that that’s what you’ve all been fighting for. What you see as your rights.’

  ‘But you joined the army when you left school,’ Florrie reminded him. ‘Why, if you don’t really agree with fighting?’

  Gervase nodded. ‘Family tradition. But Father died just as I finished my training and I came home to manage the estate. I have to admit – though only to you, Florrie – that I was quite relieved. But then I felt guilty for feeling like that because it was my father’s death that had – released me, if you like.’

  She squeezed his arm understandingly, but steered him
away from a subject that was perhaps still painful for him. ‘So, you do agree with what we’re trying to achieve then? I mean, it’s not just because Isobel’s your sister and I’m – well. . .’

  He put his hand over hers where it lay through his arm. ‘Because you’re the girl I love? No, not altogether. I believe women should have the vote. At least, educated women. If it were given to women of all classes, some wouldn’t even know what they were voting for. Or, worse still perhaps, they’d just vote the way their husbands told them to.’

  ‘But that’s not a class thing,’ Florrie said thoughtfully. ‘Can you imagine my mother voting any other way than my father told her to do?’

  ‘Mm.’ Now it was Gervase’s turn to ponder. ‘I understand what you mean.’

  ‘As for being uneducated, that doesn’t hold true either,’ she went on. ‘I’ve met women from all levels of society recently. Some of those whom you would see as being uneducated, because they can’t speak foreign languages or, in some cases, can’t even read and write properly, are actually more intelligent than some of the upper-class society girls. Their empty heads are filled only with thoughts of the next party and which handsome suitor is going to propose to them.’

  ‘I expect you’re right, Florrie. They’re not all like you and Iso. You’ve both been so lucky to have had a good education. Not many girls – even from families like ours – can speak French and German.’

  Florrie laughed. ‘Well, that’s thanks to Gran in my case. “Just because your first-born is a girl, Edgar,”’ Florrie did a passable imitation of her grandmother’s clipped, authoritative tones, ‘ “doesn’t mean to say she can’t have the same education that you would have given a son.” And so, though I didn’t go to boarding school, she personally supervised my education with the three governesses I had at home.’

  ‘Well, Father was very keen on Iso being similarly educated. In fact, didn’t you take lessons together for a while, even though she was quite a bit older than you?’

  ‘Yes. She’d finished school by then but she’d always wanted to learn German, so she used to cycle over to Candlethorpe Hall to have German lessons with me. By the way, how is she?’

  ‘Fine. She had a day or so in bed when you first came home again, but now she’s eating like a horse and already talking about going back.’ He looked down at her and squeezed her hand. ‘She’s not had it as bad as you, though. She says so herself.’

  Florrie grimaced. ‘Bad enough, and just you tell her,’ she tapped his arm, ‘that she’s not to go back to London without me.’

  Gervase stopped and turned to face her. He put his hands on her shoulders, his expression more serious than ever she could remember. ‘My dear, things are getting very serious. I don’t think war can be avoided and if it does happen, it’s going to be catastrophic’

  She stared up into his anxious eyes. ‘You – you really think there’s going to be one then?’

  He nodded.

  ‘Oh no!’ she whispered and leaned her cheek against his broad chest. He put his arms around her and they stood together near the water’s edge, listening to the soothing sound of the waves and the distant happy laughter of children playing.

  ‘It’s difficult to believe it on a day like this; everyone enjoying their Bank Holiday in blissful ignorance of the storm clouds gathering.’

  ‘And you believe it’s going to happen soon?’

  Gervase’s face was grim. ‘I think it’s imminent.’

  Florrie turned a little in his arms so that they stood looking back the way they had come, back to the children playing and couples walking arm in arm along the shore. They stood for a long time, Gervase’s arm about her shoulders, watching the folk enjoying their day’s holiday and hearing the screams of laughter and shrieks of delight from the beach fairground, with its swings and helter-skelter. There was even a big wheel.

  James came running along the beach, his bare feet sending up a shower of soft sand. He ran to the water’s edge and played ‘catch me if you can’ with the waves.

  ‘Well, at least he’s too young to have to fight,’ Florrie murmured.

  Gervase cleared his throat. ‘It depends how long it lasts.’

  She twisted to look up at him. ‘What are you saying? That it could last for years?’

  Soberly, Gervase nodded.

  ‘Oh no! You’re wrong – I know you’re wrong. If there is a war, it won’t last long. It’ll all be over by Christmas.’

  ‘Look out, Florrie,’ James’s warning shout drifted towards them.

  Startled, Florrie looked down to see a wave, bigger than the rest, sweeping towards her. Together they both turned and tried to flee, but still with their arms around each other, they stumbled and fell into the sand, laughing together at the ridiculous sight they must make. The wave came on relentlessly and soaked their ankles, then retreated. For a moment they lay on the sand, staring up at the clear blue sky.

  ‘Oh, Florrie, darling Florrie, I wish we could stay here for ever.’

  ‘Well, we can’t,’ she said scrambling up. ‘Because my feet are wet.’ Laughing, she held out her hand and hauled him to his feet. They turned and began to walk back the way they had come. Grinning, James ran to meet them.

  ‘He’s no doubt going to tell us he saved us from drowning,’ Gervase laughed.

  Florrie said nothing. She was watching her brother coming towards them. A tall, lanky youth of sixteen, the sun glinting on his hair, his face young and innocent and carefree. A cloud passed across the sun and a dark shadow covered him. He tripped and fell and, for a moment, lay very still.

  Florrie shuddered with a sudden coldness that had nothing to do with her wet feet.

  ‘James—’ She started towards him, her hand outstretched, a fearful foreboding pounding in her chest.

  But the cloud passed away and the beach was bathed in sunlight once more. James scrambled up, grinned and waved and then galloped down to the water’s edge for one last paddle before lunch.

  Florrie breathed a sigh of relief, yet it was a while before she could fully shake off the feeling of dread that had come over her when she’d seen her brother fall.

  Eighteen

  ‘How dare they declare war and spoil my party?’ Augusta said, sitting at the head of the dinner table the following evening. She glanced around at the solemn faces, trying to raise a smile with her indignant remark. Lady Leonora, Timothy and the Ponsonbys were guests along with Gervase and Isobel, of course. At the opposite end of the table, Edgar bristled. Seated next to Lady Lee, he could think of nothing to say to the woman whom he partially blamed for his daughter’s wild behaviour.

  But Lady Leonora Smythe could be charm personified when she wanted to be and she exerted all her feminine wiles on the gullible country gentleman, whilst Matilda Ponsonby was beside herself with delight to meet a genuine member of the aristocracy. And such a zealous campaigner too.

  ‘Oh, Lady Leonora, I am so thrilled to meet you,’ the dear lady chattered, claiming connection with the Pankhursts by the very fact that they were from the same city. ‘I did meet Mrs Pankhurst once, you know, but it was at a meeting and she was surrounded by her ardent supporters. But to think – you know her personally.’

  ‘Well, a little,’ Lady Lee said modestly and smiled kindly.

  ‘And you, dear boy,’ Mrs Ponsonby leaned her ample bosom on the table to speak to James. ‘Are you going to enlist?’

  There was a stunned silence around the table and Clara gave a little cry of alarm.

  ‘Not on my birthday, I assure you, Mrs Ponsonby,’ Augusta said spiritedly. This time her guests laughed dutifully.

  ‘And not at all, I hope,’ Florrie muttered, but her remark earned her an angry glare from Edgar.

  ‘Now – no more talk of war or of suffragettes,’ Augusta decreed. ‘I don’t want my son having an apoplectic fit at the table.’

  But the conversation was stilted and awkward. The war was on everyone’s mind and, with so many supporters of the suffragette move
ment sitting around the table, the subject was scarcely avoidable.

  It was Edgar himself who brought the topic up again, but, for once, he seemed genuinely interested. Florrie glanced at Isobel and raised her eyebrows in surprise. Even they had underestimated Lady Lee’s charm offensive.

  ‘So, what will you ladies do now our country’s at war?’

  Lady Lee glanced down the table towards Augusta. She’d no wish to offend the woman whose birthday they were celebrating. But Augusta smiled and inclined her head graciously. She too wanted to hear the reply.

  Lady Leonora cleared her throat. ‘There are two schools of thought about what we should do. One section – which has never supported militancy – will no doubt continue the struggle in their own way. As for those of us who agree with Mrs Pankhurst – well, it looks likely that our – our operations will cease at least for the duration of hostilities,’ she added, with pointed emphasis. ‘Despite what you might think of us, Mr Maltby, we are patriots, and our country’s need at this time is greater than our own desires.’

  Edgar nodded, ‘Well said, my dear. I’m sure – in time – the vote will be given to the likes of you,’ he added condescendingly, ‘ladies of quality and education, but I shudder to think what would happen if it were extended to the lower classes. Personally, I never entirely agreed with the ’85 Act that gave the vote to most men over the age of twenty-one. What do illiterate labourers know about the way the country should be run?’

  Lifting his wine glass, he failed to see the spark of anger in Lady Lee’s eyes. Florrie saw it and hid her smile. But Lady Lee was a superb actress. Keeping her voice level and with deceptive mildness, she said, ‘But men from all classes will be expected to die for their country, now won’t they, Mr Maltby?’ She left the question hanging in the air, and to that even Edgar had no answer.

  Once the ladies had withdrawn, leaving the men to their port, the conversation in Clara’s drawing room became more personal.