by John Wilcox
The crowd paused in surprise for a moment, then black faces began to crease into smiles at the sight of a bedraggled Jenkins, his face beaming, waving aloft the hand of a sheepishly grinning Nkumo. At the back of the dispersing ring, someone began to stamp his foot. The action spread and soon, it seemed, the whole camp was stamping their feet and crying, ‘Usuthu! Usuthu!’
Dunn shook his head in mock despair. ‘He’s some man, your . . . associate, Mr Fonthill.’
‘I’m afraid so, sir. I’m sorry about all this. I just don’t know what to think.’ Simon called to Jenkins. ‘For God’s sake man, come here. Who do you think you are, Tom Sayers?’
Jenkins hurried over. ‘Funny you should say that, bach sir,’cos I did see ’im fight once, in Hereford. O’ course, ’e wasn’t champion then, but, goodness, ’e was a rare fighter. Only ten stone nothin’ he was, see, but ’e ’ad a left ’and like nothin’ you’ve ever—’
Simon pushed the Welshman towards the women. ‘Get on with you and stop talking. Get the arm bandaged and get to bed straight away. And no more beer. We must talk tomorrow. I have to tell you about a most important journey you’re about to start. Perhaps the most important of your life.’
Jenkins looked up with interest. ‘Oh yes, sir. What would that be, then?’
But Simon just shook his head and led the little champion towards the women.
Chapter 9
Alice Griffith tapped her foot with impatience on the wet cobblestones outside Paddington station. It was always the same. When it rained, one could never get a hansom cab in London. Mind, she reflected, it was never easy for a woman alone to stop a cab at the best of times. Perhaps women didn’t tip as well as men. Ah, well . . . ‘Cabby!’
The horse clattered to a standstill opposite her and the driver, perched high at the rear, the rim of his bowler hat just peeping out from under the glistening black cape that covered him, raised a mittened finger to his moustache in acknowledgement.
Alice paused, her umbrella aloft, one foot on the step of the cab. ‘Do you know the offices of the Morning Post newspaper in Fleet Street?’ she enquired.
The cabby nodded glumly.
‘Then please take me there. I am a little late and would be greatly obliged if you could make whatever haste you can in this dreadful weather.’
Alice stepped up and the cab sashayed backwards on its high springs as she settled into her seat. Then it was off. The young woman adjusted the hat pinned on to her piled hair and wiped the condensation from the little window so that she could see the crowded pavements. How she loved London, even in the rain! The city was always so alive. Everyone seemed to have a purpose, unlike the country, where the set rhythm of the seasons gave a sleepy certainty to everyone’s movements so that there was never any need to bustle. The crops would still be there to cut down and take in, even if the harvest was poor and late. Her eyes sparkled as she observed a middle-aged man, elegantly spatted and top-hatted, running - yes running! - down Park Lane as if his life depended upon it. Perhaps it did. Perhaps he had news of some vital development in the Empire that had to reach the City before the markets closed. Alice looked at the watch on her fob. Fifteen minutes to three. He did right to hurry. She sat back and then remembered to be nervous again. She must try and look older, and she settled her hat at a slightly less rakish angle. The appointment that faced her was quite as important as any which impelled that gentleman.
The cab reached the Morning Post with just three minutes to spare and she composed herself before stepping down and paying her fare, making sure that she tipped adequately. The tall commissionaire, looking like a major general, saluted her, opened the door and ushered her to the reception desk. The clerk behind it, with his high collar and loosely knotted black tie, might have stepped from one of Mr Dickens’s novels.
‘I have an appointment with the editor,’ Alice said firmly.
‘Yes, madam. Which editor?’
‘What do you mean, which editor?’
The clerk sighed. ‘Well, we have an editor for the news, one for the letters page, one for what we call features, and indeed, madam, we even have an editor for ladies’ affairs. No doubt it is he you would wish to see?’
Alice flushed. ‘My appointment is with the editor, the editor of the Morning Post. And if we are not careful, I shall be late for it.’
The clerk looked at her sharply, gave a half-bow, half-nod, and summoned a diminutive pageboy, whose brightly polished buttons ran from throat to midriff like illuminated vertebrae. Within a minute, Alice was sitting in the editor’s anteroom. The door opened and a middle-aged man with cigarette ash down a badly buttoned waistcoat enquired politely, ‘Forgive me, madam, but you did say Miss Griffith?’
‘Yes.’
‘Miss A.C. Griffith?’
‘That is my name, yes, and I have a letter from Mr Cornford, the editor, agreeing to see me at three p.m. today.’
The man bowed and retreated. It was five minutes before he reappeared. ‘The editor will see you now, mad - miss.’
Alice was ushered through the door and announced: ‘Miss . . . ah . . . Griffith, sir.’
The room was large and wood-panelled. A table piled high with that morning’s newspapers stood against one wall and a cheery coal fire burned from a grate in another. Opposite the door a large desk dominated, from behind which a portly man rose to greet her. She observed a well-cut morning coat, carrying a yellow carnation in the lapel, and two blue eyes smiling at her above a full beard and moustache. He looked, she thought, like an older version of the Prince of Wales.
‘Charles Cornford,’ he introduced himself as he held out his hand. ‘Please do sit down, Miss, or is it Mrs Griffith?’
‘Miss,’ said Alice firmly, arranging her dress and sitting.
‘You must forgive the slight delay in receiving you, Miss Griffith,’ said Cornford, a faint smile playing behind his whiskers, ‘but, you see . . .’ His voice trailed away.
‘You were expecting a man.’
Cornford bowed his head. ‘I fear that there has been some mistake, my dear young lady.’
‘No, sir, not at all.’ She had rehearsed this confrontation so many times that it was almost a relief that it was going exactly as expected. ‘You see, I always sign my writings with my initials.’ She smiled at him in turn. ‘As do most men, I believe - when they are fortunate enough to write above a by-line, that is. There has never been any attempt to deceive - as, one must admit, there has been with Miss George Eliot, for example.’
Cornford bowed his head courteously again. ‘Quite so. But my letters, I seem to recall, were addressed to A.C. Griffith Esquire. Our meeting was delayed a moment or two because I took the trouble to check.’
Alice felt her cheeks colouring annoyingly. ‘Really? I fear I did not notice.’ She leaned forward and spoke quickly. ‘Mr Cornford, you have been good enough to print four of my articles on the Afghanistan situation and one on South Africa, and kind enough to write and congratulate me on their tone and accuracy. Surely the fact that the author of those articles is a woman makes not the slightest difference to their validity?’
Cornford rocked his chair back and nodded in affable agreement. ‘Quite so. Quite so. However,’ his blue eyes sparkled as though he was enjoying the debate, ‘it does make every difference to your request that we should send you to north-west India as our correspondent there.’
‘But why should it?’
The editor shrugged his shoulders and spread his hands. ‘Because, my dear young lady, the frontier is no place for a woman.’ He leaned forward. ‘I know of no newspaper in the world which employs a woman on its staff to report from a war - no, I am wrong. The Times did it once, but that was most unusual. In the first place, you would cause embarrassment to the general staff there and they would never give you accreditation. In the second, during the course of your duties, you would have to live like a trooper and endure virtually the same privations on campaign as he does - rough living, rough riding and great danger
. No,’ he shook his head sorrowfully, ‘a war is no place for a woman, however well she can write and comprehend military strategy.’
Alice gripped her hands in her lap tightly. ‘Mr Cornford, I ride to hounds regularly over some of the roughest terrain in the Welsh Borders. I am told by the Master that I ride better than most men. When I was in Switzerland, I climbed six Alpine peaks over ten thousand feet in four months. I was accompanied only by a guide in each case and, because I rather anticipated your reservations, I have in my handbag a letter from him confirming this. Although this may not help me in Afghanistan, I speak fluent French and German, and, I can assure you, I am as fit as any man. I have not only lived rough in the mountains of Switzerland and Wales but I have positively enjoyed doing so.’ Alice sat back, flushing a little. She disliked having to make claims for herself.
Mr Cornford sat forward and selected a cigar from a box on his desk and struck a match. ‘Ah,’ he said, in some confusion. He offered the box. ‘Do you . . .? Would you care to . . .?’
Alice shook her head. ‘Not a cigar, thank you. But perhaps if you have a cigarette . . .?’
‘Of course.’ The editor fumbled in a drawer and produced a silver box that he took to his guest, carefully lighting her cigarette for her. Alice puffed blue smoke towards the ceiling.
Cornford returned to his chair and to the attack. ‘I fear that I haven’t made myself quite clear,’ he said. ‘The rigours of campaigning are only part of the problem.’ He sighed. ‘Our world is changing so much that I do not doubt that there are women who can compete with men in handling the more, what shall I say, physical side of reporting. Your achievements seem remarkable and do you credit. But there are other considerations I must take into account.’
He leaned back in his chair and pulled on his cigar. ‘You write very well on the issues. Why,’ he waved his cigar in emphasis, ‘only the other day Hicks-Beach, the Colonial Secretary, stopped me in the House and complimented me on your piece on the dangers of moving too quickly towards confederation in South Africa. But - there is a great deal of difference between contemplatively penning an article on policy in the comfort of an office or living room and in reporting hard facts from a battlefield, usually in competition with other reporters on the spot. Eh? What? Do you take my point?’
Alice nodded. ‘Yes, I do, Mr Cornford.’
‘And there are other factors. Our man in the field must be accepted by the army. D’you know, the Horse Guards and our generals are the most conservative - some would say reactionary - bunch of people in the whole of the Empire. I have to acknowledge that Russell of The Times pioneered the way for us to report directly, and sometimes critically, when he was in the Crimea and in America for the Civil War. But the idea of the press being on the spot to report mistakes as they are being made, so to speak, is still not completely accepted. Our people in the field need to tread warily and they need contacts in the army to do their job. I fear a feminine presence in this hard male world would complicate things frightfully.
‘One last point.’ Cornford spoke now with the air of a man who had made his case convincingly. ‘We already have a man out with General Browne in Afghanistan. We could certainly not afford two.’ He settled back in his chair.
‘Why then, pray, did you agree to see me?’ asked Alice.
‘Ah yes, well, I have to confess that I wished to meet this Mr Griffith who had been writing for us so perceptively from the far-flung borders of England.’ He smiled, half apologetically. ‘It might have been possible to have offered him something abroad, as it happened, if he proved to be suitable. But, for the reasons I have already explained, I am afraid that it is out of the question, Miss Griffith.’ He put a very faint emphasis on the word Miss.
Alice breathed deeply and stubbed out her cigarette. ‘I quite understand all that you have said, Mr Cornford, and I am grateful to you for seeing me and for explaining the situation so frankly. But I must be frank with you, in turn.’ She smoothed her dress and sat bolt upright. ‘I am determined to become a professional journalist on one of the great newspapers of this country - even, perhaps, one day becoming as great and powerful an editor as you.’
Cornford inclined his head and smiled, more with amusement than appreciation of the flattery, but he listened attentively as Alice continued.
‘I have fixed my mind on reporting on great matters from abroad. If you will not have me, then I shall try The Times and the other newspapers in London until I find one that will allow me to exercise my talents. However, the Morning Post suits me well. Perhaps I am not fully supportive of its political stance but I do feel that I have a small, shall we say, investment in it as a result of my articles. Indeed,’ Alice’s eyes held those of Cornford, ‘I believe that I may claim even to have built up a modest following among your readers.’
Cornford gave a gentle acquiescence with his head. ‘That may well be so, my dear.’
‘And so, Mr Cornford, I have a proposition to put to you. The North West Frontier may perhaps not be for me at this stage. But why can I not go to a less active theatre, which has news potential but where you are not already strongly represented and where, so to speak, I might win my spurs before going on to greater things?’
Cornford raised his eyebrows. ‘Such as?’
‘From my readings of the Post you do not have a strong representation in Cape Town. You only have there a stringer, if I have the terminology correct?’
‘Both your terminology and your presumption are correct.’
‘Good. Then I propose, sir, that I become your accredited correspondent in South Africa, with the task of reporting upon all of the developments there, from the Cape to the Transvaal to Zululand, and covering matters political, economic and military.’
Cornford made to speak but Alice went on quickly. ‘Of course, I would prefer to be in Afghanistan, and South African affairs are undoubtedly of less importance to your readers. There is no Russian threat there, for instance. But I sense that this land dispute between the Boers and the Zulus could be the catalyst that could make the Cape of greater interest to us back home. And I have studied the matter, as you may know from my last piece.
‘You mentioned that your representative in the field must have contacts. Well, I am a brigadier’s daughter and he served in the 24th Foot, both regiments of which are out in South Africa at this very moment. If war did break out there - and even if it didn’t-I would have the most splendid contacts among them which I would have no hesitation in exploiting in reporting on events.’
A smile had now spread completely across Cornford’s face, lifting his whiskers and bringing a mischievous twinkle to his blue eyes. Alice, however, failed to notice. Engrossed in the urgency of her argument, her eyes fixed on his waistcoat buttons as she concentrated, she ploughed on.
‘Now. I accept your point about my inexperience and I appreciate that you would be taking a risk with me. I do not think, therefore, that it would be fair for you to shoulder the not inconsiderable expense of my steamer fare to the Cape and back. I have modest means of my own and such a cost is well within them. So I am prepared to meet it. But that is the only indulgence I am prepared to allow. I must be paid whatever is the fair rate for a junior correspondent, together with the necessary allowances for living expenses, travel within the country and so on.’
Alice finished with a rush and the room fell silent, except for the crackle of the coal in the fireplace. Cornford stroked his beard reflectively, the smile still in his eyes.
‘I confess, Miss Griffith,’ he said, ‘that I don’t quite know what to say to you. I have never met so, ah, determined a young woman before. You make a good case. But what of your parents? Forgive me, I do not wish to pry, but you cannot be very old. I presume you live at home. Would your parents give their consent?’
Alice’s heart leapt slightly. Was he relenting? Then she frowned at the condescension. ‘My age, Mr Cornford, has nothing to do with it, except that I assure you that I am over the age of consent. I do not ne
ed my parents’ permission to work for you, but if I did, I am sure that it would not be withheld. I am an only child and I am determined to make my own way in the world.’
Cornford coughed. ‘I can quite see that, madam.’ He rose to his feet. ‘Do you know, I am rather taken by the idea of being the first editor formally to employ a woman as an overseas and, possibly, a war correspondent.’ He chuckled. ‘Perhaps it is the only thing for which I shall be remembered.’ He held out his hand. ‘Very well, young lady. I accept your terms. If you prove a success - and I must be the judge of that - then the Post will reimburse the cost of your fare to and from Cape Town. If you fail, then it shall remain your cost.’
Alice rose to her feet. She felt that her cheeks were burning bright red. ‘Oh Mr Cornford,’ she said, ‘I am so very grateful to you for giving me this chance. You will not regret it, I promise.’
‘I do hope not, my dear. Certainly my colleagues, when I tell them, will feel that my judgement is failing in my old age.’ He smiled genially. ‘But somehow I think I shall prove to be right. Now, I shall write you a formal letter of appointment and you must respond agreeing to my terms - we won’t discuss them now but I think you will find them satisfactory. Please consult the steamer schedules and let me know the earliest time you can leave for the Cape. Bear in mind, however, that we shall need you in the office here for a few days before you embark, working with the foreign editor and so on to learn some fundamental ropes. He will advise you on the sort of kit to take, though . . .’ his eyebrows rose in further merriment, ‘I don’t suppose for a moment that he will have much idea of what advice to give to you, my dear.’
He ushered her to the door. ‘Can you be back here in, say, a week’s time?’
‘I certainly can, sir.’
‘Then best of luck to you, Miss Griffith. Please don’t make a fool of me, there’s a good young lady.’
The journey back home on the Great Western Railway, changing trains at Cardiff on to the branch line to Brecon, was one of the happiest of Alice’s young life. Her heart sang at her success. She had embarked on the interview quite convinced that she would fail. There was no precedent for her appointment and she had only her previous articles and the force of her personality to support her. She had had no real faith in either. But she had won!
