THE GREAT WAR SAGAS: Box set of 2 passionate and inspiring stories: A Crimson Dawn and No Greater Love

by Janet MacLeod Trotter

  Mrs Johnstone cleared her throat politely.’ I have a suggestion about who might help Maggie.’

  ‘Go on, Mother.’

  ‘Mr John Heslop, the lay preacher at the chapel.’

  ‘You mean the old butcher?’ Maggie laughed ‘Why should he help me?’

  ‘He’s sympathetic to our cause, and you used to attend his Sunday School, I believe.’

  ‘Few year ago,’ Maggie admitted. ‘He was good to Mam after me dad died - helped us flit. Aye, and I once went on his mission to the quayside, an’ all. But—’

  ‘There you are,’ Mrs Johnstone interrupted ‘John Heslop has a strong sense of what’s right. I think we should trust him.’

  Rose looked doubtful. ‘Being sympathetic is not quite the same as agreeing to harbour someone about to deliberately breach the peace.’

  ‘I don’t have to tell him what I’m going to do,’ Maggie said, ‘and then he’s not responsible. I’ll tell him I’ve had a row at home - he’ll believe that quick enough.’

  ‘You’ll have to hide your disguise there,’ Rose said. ‘You can’t risk coming back here until it’s all over.’

  Maggie felt suddenly overwhelmingly alone. None of them knew when they would meet again or how her actions in three days’ time might change things. Mrs Johnstone carefully packed the sombre navy dress she was lending Maggie into an old box, along with the powder to whiten her dark hair and make her look older. Maggie would also wear one of her grandmother’s lace caps and voluminous capes.

  She kissed the placid widow and hugged Rose tightly.

  ‘I’ll make you proud of me,’ she promised.

  ‘I’ve been proud of you for a long time, little sister,’ Rose smiled fondly and kissed her forehead. ‘Whatever happens, you always have a home here with us,’ she added gently. ‘Never forget that, Maggie.’

  ‘Thank you,’ Maggie gulped and turned quickly, picking up the box. She hurried out of the house without looking back.

  At the end of the street her courage wavered and she almost dropped the box and ran to the haven of the Johnstones’ decaying, civilised home. But Rose’s disappointment in her would have been far worse than her present apprehension and she craved her friend’s approval above all others. So Maggie steeled herself for the lonely days ahead and the uncertainty beyond, with angry thoughts of Alice Pearson hobnobbing with the hated Prime Minister and betraying her sisters-in-arms.

  That night, she got Granny Beaton to hide the box under her bed in the parlour. Her grandmother asked no questions and Maggie felt a flood of affection for the old woman for standing by her without judgment.

  The next day seemed the longest in Maggie’s life. She could hardly settle to her work and Eve Tindall’s curious questioning began to tell on her nerves.

  By three o’clock, Maggie was genuinely able to say, ‘I’m feeling that bad, Eve, I think I’ll have to stop off tomorrow.’

  ‘You’ve never missed a day!’ Eve answered astonished. She squinted at her behind her glasses. ‘Perhaps you’re sickening for something. It’s the hot weather, there’s always sickness going about in hot weather. You take care of yourself now. Best not to come here spreading it around if you’re poorly. I don’t want to miss the launch.’ She went back to her work and did not approach Maggie again that day.

  When the hooter blew. Eve hurried out ahead, mumbling she had shopping to do.

  ‘Ta-ra, Eve.’ Maggie watched her go. She would probably never work with Eve Tindall in this dusty office again, Maggie thought. She said a mental goodbye to her office job and her ambitions as secretary and forbade herself to fret about the future. The most important job she might ever have to do was to carry out her protest in two days’ time; she must concentrate on that alone.

  As Maggie turned up Gun Street, she stopped in her tracks. A police constable stood hovering in the entrance to their stairs. A moment later another one emerged from the doorway and began to talk to him, thumbing over his shoulder at the Beatons’ flat as he spoke. Maggie was aghast they had bothered to track her down; she had thought Rose was being over-dramatic about a police threat. Any minute now they would glance along the street and see her standing there indecisively. Would they recognise her? Had they come to arrest her or just issue a warning to stay off the streets?

  Just as she pondered the thought, the constable who appeared to be in command turned and looked down the street. He ordered the other one to stand at his post by the door and began to walk towards her, his nailed boots ringing on the cobbles. Maggie’s heart thudded in alarm. If she fled now she would give herself away and she would never be able to outrun this lanky policeman. Yet somehow she must get rid of him.

  As he approached, Maggie began to sway and sing.

  ‘Hello, hinny!’ she called at him and rolled her eyes drunkenly. There were plenty of women around Gun Street she could ape, including her mother on occasion, and Maggie played the drunk with zest.

  ‘Gis us a kiss, hinny. Gan on,’ she cackled.

  The constable slowed down as he neared, suddenly unsure if this was the woman they were after. Maggie, through hooded eyes, could tell what he was thinking. Suffragettes might be awkward and abusive, but the young woman they were seeking could not be this common drunk. He must not get too good a look at my face, she thought. ‘Eeh, hinny,’ she screeched, ‘just a minute.’

  She staggered a few steps up the street and turned her back on him. Then planting her legs apart and lifting her skirts above her ankles, Maggie half lowered her drawers and began to urinate over the cobbles. So nervous was she that it came in a great flood, splashing her boots and the hem of her skirt and running in crazy rivulets towards the unsuspecting policeman. Even Maggie was shocked by what she had done and glancing over her shoulder she saw the horrified disgust on the young constable’s face as the steaming urine trickled around his boots.

  He cursed her foully and stalked past, shoving her roughly out of the way. Maggie flung an obscenity after him for good measure, then turned and weaved her way down the street as quickly as she dared, praying that none of her neighbours or family had witnessed the spectacle.

  Once out of sight, she began to laugh hysterically at the thought of the man’s polished boots stained with her pee, elated with relief at her escape.

  ‘Votes for women!’ she shouted at an organ grinder and his monkey as she hurried onto Scotswood Road. She did not stop laughing until she was two tram stations distant from Gun Street.

  When the euphoria of tricking the police had subsided, Maggie realised with a sudden panic that she could not return home until after the launch. The police might tire of waiting for her, but her family would not let her out of their sight if they suspected she was up to something. Disguise or no disguise, she would carry out her mission, Maggie determined, so there was nothing for it but to throw herself on the mercy of John Heslop whom she had not seen to speak to for the last four years.

  The unassuming butcher lived alone in a flat above his shop on Alison Terrace and Maggie remembered visiting once or twice for singing evenings when she had attended his Sunday School. She remembered him playing the piano with coat tails hanging over the stool, glancing over his shoulder with a genial smile of encouragement to the squalling choir from the chapel. Maggie had been fascinated that the thick sideburns that grew down to his chin were copper red while the hair on his head was black.

  She recalled that for a time John Heslop had come regularly to tea on Sundays to Gun Street and she and Susan had discussed whether he was going to marry their mother. But the visits had dwindled and eventually stopped and the girls only saw him at the chapel. Susan had taught in the Sunday School and Maggie had been enthusiastic about Heslop’s mission to the poor of the quayside. But her mother had been furious when Heslop had taken her to the dark, disease-infested alleys along the quay and forbade her to go again. Luckily a battle of wills had been avoided by Maggie’s sudden conversion to suffragism. She had railed at Heslop for the church’s message that people w
ho suffered in this world gained their rewards in the next; she wanted the burdens and oppression of women to be lifted in this world and in her lifetime.

  She had argued with Heslop and left the Methodist chapel on Alison Terrace, abandoning religion for a while. Gradually, her grandmother had coaxed her into accompanying her to the Presbyterian Kirk in Elswick and she had begun to look forward to the Sunday escapes from the wrangling in Gun Street and enjoyed listening to her grandmother’s fervent high-pitched hymn singing.

  Maggie had never patched up her differences with Heslop and she had avoided using his shop out of embarrassment at the way she had lectured him as an outspoken sixteen-year-old. She was quite prepared for him to shut the door in her face, but there was no harm in trying.

  For a couple of hours, Maggie skulked around the back lanes and sat in the park, until the shops on Alison Terrace emptied and people were busy indoors with domestic chores. She walked past the entrance to the butcher’s three times before she was satisfied that the two assistants had departed on bicycles and no one was left except the butcher. Then she went inside.

  ‘Maggie Beaton?’ John Heslop gasped as he emerged from the back, wiping his knuckled hands on a cloth. He was thinner and more gaunt than she remembered, his cheekbones prominent above the thick red side-whiskers. His dark hair was greying at the temples and in retreat, but his brown eyes were as lively and welcoming as ever.

  ‘Aye, it’s me,’ Maggie said, blushing and suddenly unsure.

  ‘Grand to see you, Maggie,’ Heslop replied. ‘I get news from your Susan at chapel, of course, but it’s good to see you’re well. Can I get you something?’

  She was astonished at his open, friendly manner when his last impressions of her must have been of a rude, censorious girl, still in ringlets, condemning his old-fashioned beliefs with all the conviction of a new convert.

  ‘I haven’t come to buy anything,’ Maggie said.

  ‘No?’ Heslop raised his bushy eyebrows a fraction. ‘And I take it you haven’t just come for some debating? By heck, I missed our discussions once you left the mission.’

  ‘Did you?’ Maggie was taken aback.

  ‘Yes,’ Heslop laughed, ‘and the mission needed people like you who weren’t afraid to go in there and preach the word. But Susan says it’s politics you preach these days. And I don’t blame you. Stick up for your rights, I say. I don’t hold with violent revolution, of course, but injustice is the curse of our society. All the wealth of our glorious empire counts for naught when there are people begging on our streets and living in darkness under our very noses.’

  Maggie gawped at him. She had forgotten how John Heslop liked to talk and would tackle the thorniest of subjects with customers concerned only with the price of his meat. Their preoccupation with brisket or scrag end faintly annoyed him, while he wheeled his sharp blades and put the world to rights.

  ‘You believe in votes for women, then?’ Maggie asked cautiously.

  ‘Universal suffrage, I say,’ Heslop nodded ‘You’re one of God’s children; you’ve as much right to representation as I have.’

  Maggie searched for words to express her amazement, but floundered.

  The butcher chuckled. ‘You think I’ve queer notions for a man of my advancing years, eh?’

  ‘Aye, I suppose so,’ Maggie blushed. ‘And you not having .... not being…’

  ‘Being a single man,’ he finished for her. She saw a muscle working hard in his cheek under the bushy sideboard and for a moment thought she saw a flicker of anger in his eyes. But then he smiled. ‘So what do you want with this crusty old bachelor?’

  Maggie looked at him hard and decided to be candid. ‘I need somewhere to stay for two nights. The coppers are watching out for me - all suffragettes are under a banning order until after the launch. I wondered if you could let me sleep in the back of your shop - somewhere to shelter after dark. I’ll make meself scarce during the day.’

  John Heslop looked at her for a moment, showing no surprise. ‘Are you going to tell me what it’s about?’

  ‘No, Maggie said. ‘I can’t.’

  ‘But you don’t want to be housebound on the day of the launch?’ he asked wryly.

  They exchanged looks. Maggie nodded.

  ‘You can stay in the flat. I’ll sleep in the back of the shop,’ he offered.

  Maggie shook her head. ‘Mary Smith, my neighbour, cleans for you. I couldn’t risk her seeing me and telling Mam. She’d be up here like a shot and dragging me off by the ear. ‘I don’t want to bring you any trouble.’

  Heslop grunted. ‘Your mother doesn’t hold me in much regard anyway.’

  ‘I never understood that, after the way you helped us when me dad died,’ Maggie said.

  ‘No,’ Heslop sighed. ‘Well, we had words. Anyway, that’s water under the bridge, as they say. Your problem is to have somewhere safe to stay and to escape detection from friend or foe until after Saturday.’

  Maggie smiled. The butcher tugged on one of his side-whiskers as he thought.

  ‘I know just the place. No one will come looking for you - but you’ll have to do me a favour in return.’

  Maggie looked at him suspiciously. ‘What favour?’

  ‘You can stay at the mission hall on the quayside - and help give out sustenance.’

  Maggie laughed. ‘You’re a trier, Mr Heslop.’

  ‘Do we have an agreement?’ he asked.

  ‘Why-aye!’ Maggie answered.

  ‘I’ll take you down in the van,’ he said briskly, not hiding his delight. ‘Just sit in the back shop a minute while I finish off.’

  ‘There’s one other thing,’ Maggie said, stopping him. ‘I need a box of clothes from Gun Street.’

  ‘Who can you trust?’

  ‘Granny Beaton, but she’s too blind and frail to find her way across town.’ Maggie thought hard. She dismissed Helen and her mother immediately. Susan might take pity, but she would look in the box and discover the disguise and tell their mother anyway.

  ‘Tich,’ Maggie said. ‘I trust Jimmy to do an errand and not blab.’

  ‘I’ll send word with Mary Smith then,’ Heslop replied. ‘Jimmy sometimes brings me bundles of firewood - I’ll say I’m needing some.’

  ‘Thank you,’ Maggie smiled at him, ‘it’s more than I deserve.’

  ‘Oh, I’ll make you work for it.’ He grinned through his whiskers like a brindled cat.

  Twenty minutes later they were setting off for the quayside, Maggie secreted inside the butcher’s dusty horse-drawn van. She was entering the unknown, she thought nervously, choosing to leave behind the relative security of Gun Street for ever. She had delivered herself into the hands of an eccentric, radical preaching butcher and in two days she would break the law attempting to ruin a prestigious ship launch.

  Sitting among the sawdust with the smell of blood in her nostrils, she already felt like a fugitive.

  Chapter 11

  The mission hall was a leaky cellar in the bowels of an antiquated warehouse. John Heslop abandoned his van on the quayside where two boys were paid to tend the horse and keep watch, while he and Maggie made their way through a warren of alleyways in the slum area of Sandgate.

  Maggie knew the open area of Sandgate where her mother took clothes every Saturday to sell, but she had seldom ventured into its dank and overcrowded hinterland. Only at the start of the mission had she visited some of the tenements with Heslop, appalled at the evil-smelling, almost pitch-black dwellings where children teemed around the stairwells like rats and mothers’ shrill voices competed over the wails of babies and hacking coughs of the unseen. Maggie thought she knew poverty, but never in her worst nightmares had she seen or smelt such degradation.

  ‘The hall has been gifted by the merchant who owns the building,’ Heslop told her as they entered.

  ‘How generous,’ Maggie answered, pulling a wry face at the spartan cellar as her eyes grew accustomed to the gloom. The bare stone walls glistened with damp in the splu
ttering light from oil lamps that hung from low beams over rows of wooden tables and benches. The hall was already filling up and Maggie tried not to gag at the stench of unwashed bodies and paraffin fumes. Men and women of all ages were occupying the wooden forms, exchanging subdued comments. After the noise and bustle of the Sandgate outside, where families were sitting and playing in the dust, chatting, knitting, shouting, spitting and courting, this twilight place seemed unnaturally quiet.

  ‘How do you get so many to come to your service?’ Maggie whispered, astonished by the mix of vagrants, sailors, prostitutes, hawkers and elderly. Some appeared respectably dressed but their neatness was frayed, their faces careworn and ill.

  ‘Word soon gets round if there’s a bowl of soup on offer,’ Heslop replied candidly.

  Maggie glanced towards the curtained-off area in the corner which she had assumed was a store of hymn books and tracts. Now she noticed the steam rising from behind the hangings.

  ‘You’re running a kitchen?’ Maggie asked in surprise. ‘You’re not just preaching at them?’

  Heslop tugged at his sideburns. ‘Most of these people are destitute,’ he growled. ‘We attempt to sustain their bodies as well as their souls. You can’t transform people’s lives on empty stomachs. We don’t give them much, but it’ll keep some of them out of the workhouse a while longer.’

  Maggie felt humbled. She knew from first-hand experience that the greatest fear of the poor was to be consigned to the workhouse where families were separated and treated like prisoners, carrying out menial tasks with little prospect of escape. It was the perpetual humiliation of the workhouse, Maggie thought, which weighed heaviest in the minds of these people. It was the spur that had driven her own mother to find work at all costs and provide shelter for her family after Pearson’s had cut off their security so abruptly on the death of her father.

  She wanted to say something encouraging to Heslop about what he was attempting to do here but he had already crossed to the makeshift kitchen and disappeared behind the curtain.