A Time for Courage

by Margaret Graham

  Beatrice served a steak pie and Hannah thought that she would be unable to eat but she was hungry and the gravy was thick and the vegetables crisp and lightly boiled. Was Joe so lucky, she wondered and pushed the memory of his thin body to one side because it gave her too much pain.

  She spoke to Miss Fletcher now of Joe and the home and was pleased when she smiled and nodded her approval. ‘You are indeed fortunate to have such a friend, Hannah.’

  Miss Fletcher put more steak on Hannah’s plate. ‘For you have become too thin, my dear, and you will need your strength.’

  As they ate Hannah spoke of her plans as Joe had said she should. Miss Fletcher listened as Hannah explained that she had waited for so long to take an active part in the fight for votes but that she feared it would be destructive to the friendship that she believed existed between the two of them.

  ‘Hannah,’ Miss Fletcher said as Beatrice cleared the plates and brought fresh fruit. ‘Before we discuss matters further I do feel that you should call me Frances, it is my name after all. I also feel that there is no likelihood that a difference of opinion will damage a friendship such as ours. After all, surely all women’s suffrage supporters are fighting for freedom to think and speak, so surely you and I can respect one another’s point of view. Our aims are the same even though perhaps our approach may differ.’

  Hannah sat back in her chair. The dog was sitting by her side, her nose lifted, her ears pricked, but Frances Fletcher sent her back to the rug.

  ‘Greedy beast,’ she laughed and soon they too moved to the fire and Beatrice brought coffee which was strong and black.

  ‘But, my dear Hannah, why do you feel you must leave the suffragists?’ Frances asked as she stirred her coffee, tapping the teaspoon on the side of her cup before placing it in her saucer. ‘After all the Liberal Government is one of social reform, and Mrs Pankhurst’s suffragettes are campaigning against this government; against them in by-elections, and are withdrawing their support for Labour who have been staunch supporters, though they, of course, have no hope of power at the moment. Our only hope lies with the Liberals and the only hope of improved general conditions lies with them too. I am worried that if the activities of the suffragettes continue the Government will not be re-elected and reform will lapse.’ She leant forward, a frown on her forehead. ‘Think very carefully, my dear.’

  Hannah bent to stroke the dog. ‘Good girl, Bess,’ she whispered before sitting up again. ‘I can understand what you are saying but I feel so impatient, so angry all the time at the way in which women have been ignored, the way they have been subjugated and humiliated. Look at the women’s suffrage bills, three dismissed since 1898. We have to pay tax but we have no representation. It is a crime, it is slavery.’ She swallowed and rubbed her lips with her fingers. It was important that she explained herself clearly. ‘The suffragettes have made our cause visible. The newspapers are writing for the first time about votes for women. Surely the Government will be forced to listen to our demands because they are just and now very public.’ She laughed quietly. ‘We women won’t bring them down. How can we with a few demonstrations and a bit of heckling? And I agree with you that they have much to do but in time they will see that they can also give us a chance. We will convince them by being vocal, by being as difficult as they are. That there will be no peace until we have the vote.’

  Frances drank the last of her coffee and looked across at Hannah’s cup which was almost empty. She lifted the pot and Hannah nodded, passing her cup across. Steam rose from the cup and she did not drink yet but watched Frances stir her own cup again and give another two taps.

  ‘I do fear, though, Hannah, that militant action will alienate those whose support the suffragists have carefully and painfully acquired both inside and outside Parliament. You know that we constitutionalists work on the basis of persuasion by example. I fear that the behaviour of the suffragettes will simply demolish what support women have so far gained.’

  Hannah was impatient to answer. ‘But don’t you see, Frances, militancy has turned women’s suffrage into a living question.’

  Frances smiled ruefully. ‘Yes, I do agree, Hannah. It has done that and I’m sure that we are all grateful but I am just concerned that the militancy you speak of will turn to something more. Will demonstration turn to violence and provoke general dismay among existing voters? That is counterproductive.’

  Hannah was leaning forward now, her coffee cold, but she did not notice.

  ‘But there is such an anger amongst women. There always has been and it is worse now with the imprisonments for what are, after all, simple demonstrations.’ She put her hand up as she saw Frances begin to speak. ‘I know that suffragettes have been charged with obstruction and assault but stamping on feet hardly constitutes that surely? I want to shout out at the unfairness of it all, the injustice, and it seems that it is only when you shout that anyone hears. Why should giving women the vote be so difficult. If we have a reforming Government, why won’t they reform the voting laws. I know that they’re frightened of creating a mass of female Conservative voters because of the existing property qualifications but that is no excuse. They would enlarge the franchise to universal suffrage if that were really the case.’

  Frances took her cup and Hannah watched as she walked to the table by the door and brought back truffles on a plate. They were rich and soft and stuck to her teeth and she remembered with sudden clarity the chocolate on Esther’s teeth the night they had danced for her father and her anger grew even more.

  ‘You will certainly make an excellent orator, Hannah Watson, and I can hardly quibble with what you have said. The creation of Conservative voters does concern them.’

  ‘And now you must be realistic, Frances. We have to go for what seems the most feasible and that is limited suffrage, because no government of today will agree to universal suffrage. They are scared that the undeserving poor would have a right to an opinion. Just imagine the horror if a prostitute had a vote.’ She lifted her eyes and Frances laughed so loud that Bess started in her sleep. Hannah thought of all those men like her father who sat in dark pews and condemned as animals women such as these.

  ‘No, once we have limited suffrage we will then be able to vote for universal suffrage,’ she continued. ‘Once we have the vote we can change so much that is unjust. We must have it. They must be made to give it to us, somehow we must make them.’

  Hannah was up now, and walking backwards and forwards, her words coming quickly and loudly as she drew them in the air until Frances laughed and told her to sit down or Bess would think it was time for her nightly constitutional and then there would be a barking heckler in the room and that would really be too much.

  Hannah smiled and crouched down by Bess, rubbing her ears and laughing. She felt invigorated, eager and in a hurry to join those who already spoke on platforms and challenged from the audience those who denied them their rights.

  Frances spoke and she was not laughing now. ‘At least, Hannah, hold back until the Pensions Bill is through. Surely that is very important, especially to the two of us because we can see just how bad things are. Then make a decision whether to stay with the non-militants or give your allegiance to the suffragettes. I’m not asking you to fight. You have been doing that for years with the suffragists but I am asking you to be responsible and not add to the Government’s problems or encourage others to while they try to force this important reform through.’

  Frances would not tell Hannah that she was only asking this of her because she feared that violence would indeed escalate within the ranks of the suffragettes and she wanted Hannah to be kept from it for as long as possible. After all, perhaps a miracle would occur and votes would be given, then she would never have to fight.

  As Hannah stroked the dog’s back and smelt her odour she saw Bernie again, watching from the cottage as they walked on to the moor, and Mary, the match-girl who was now dead, and she knew, filled with frustration though she was, that she could not
on principle campaign against this government as they fought in by-elections to be re-elected. She could not make their task more difficult as they tried to steer their Pensions Bill through the house. This would be her personal acknowledgement of their worth. But she also knew that she would shout and make demands when the Pensions Bill became an Act if the government did not then turn their attention to female suffrage because they would no longer deserve support.

  ‘I’ll wait,’ she said at last, taking comfort in the knowledge that it would not be long before she knew whether or not she would have to take up the struggle.

  As she lay in bed that night, watching the moon through the undrawn curtains, she could not sleep in this strange bed. It was an attic room and the eaves came low as they had done in the Cornish cottage, but there was no picture in heavy oils, just prints of garden flowers.

  It was a nice room, homely with pleasant furniture and a thick carpet and a fire which she had said she would look after since it was a long way up for Beatrice to come. Frances had smiled at her as she had said this. There were stocks in a vase by the bed and lavender amongst them. Their scent was not unhappy as she had feared it might be but brought her mother closer.

  She felt tired now but today had been a good day; the empty space had been filled and soon she would either have the vote or would be fighting to gain it and would therefore be a person and not a thing. As she turned on her side she wondered how Harry was and when she would see him again.

  And then she thought of Esther and knew that she must keep her close and too busy to forget her brother but as the clouds covered the moon she wondered how.

  13

  Harry sat on the stoep or verandah of his hotel. The voyage had left him feeling fit, he thought to himself, and he looked again at the telegram that he had received from the Ren Gold Mine, his employers.

  Frank Canon would be meeting him here, or should already have met him according to the brief clipped words, and it was in this man’s company that he would begin the journey into the interior. Harry looked out across the street with its trams and trees, way over to the mountains which stood at the back of this beautiful Cape Town. It was these mountains he would be passing through soon and he felt a stirring of tension, of anticipation.

  He walked now to the edge of the stoep, hearing the cicadas, watching the butterflies, brilliant in their blues and reds, first settling then moving from the bushes of herbs which grew around the hotel, their aroma thick in the air. He moved down the steps and along the streets until he could see the blue of the South Atlantic which was visible to the south from almost any street or window. Across the miles Esther would be wondering if he had arrived, if he was safe, and he longed to feel her body pressed to his, her white skin soft beneath his hands. She had not allowed him to make love to her and that was as it should be but how he had longed for it.

  He turned, impatient now to be at work, to be starting the life which would make such thoughts reality, and walked back to the hotel to sit again beneath the fan, waiting with diminishing patience for Canon.

  It was not until six in the evening that he arrived and Harry was still on the stoep breathing in the scent of herbs which seemed to grow everywhere in this climate; a climate which was nothing short of idyllic.

  Frank was keen to eat before having the first and last good sleep either of them would have for longer than he cared to think, he said, shaking hands with a firm grip, his smile broad against his tanned skin. Lines of tiredness were etched in the same red dust which coated his shoes and he cursed as he sat down on the rocking bench and motioned for Harry to join him. But Harry shook his head and chose instead the heavy wooden chair he had been sitting in when Frank had finally arrived.

  ‘I dare say you think you have come to a slice of heaven, Harry?’ Frank said, rubbing his sleeve over his forehead before removing his wide-brimmed hat and leaning his head back and closing his eyes.

  Harry smiled. ‘It’s not what I expected, that I have to confess – and yes, it is grand.’

  Frank did not open his eyes or move but murmured. ‘Make the most of it, old son, for tomorrow we travel and then you forget there was ever air to breathe.’

  Harry looked at him. ‘It’s that hot, is it?’

  ‘It is, I’m afraid, at this time of year. January is not the best time to arrive. It’s high summer for the next two months and there’s been little rain on the Rand, not even the few showers that the good God sees fit to bestow normally.’ He yawned and made no attempt to cover his mouth with his hand. The insects were louder now, Harry noted, and the sun had almost gone. ‘You’ll think you’re breathing nothing but dust and you will be right.’ Frank continued, dropping his head forward on to his chest for a moment and then heaving himself to his feet. ‘Come on, old lad. I’ll freshen up and then let’s have asparagus and then some fish. Both are ambrosia though we are not yet gods. But there is time, eh?’ He winked at Harry and left him in the lobby while he climbed the stairs to the room which had been booked by the company.

  Later they walked together into the dining-room where the coffee-coloured maids waited to serve them. There were many tables, all of them full, but conversation was muted, elegance was all around. As they ate Harry listened while Frank talked of his days in Venezuela where he had worked in the mines before coming out here to make his fortune and, before that, his time at Eton and Oxford.

  ‘I earn so much though that a fortune seems unnecessary. I’ve decided it’s safer to know that there’s money coming in, rather than living on nothing, hoping to find a diamond the size of an ostrich egg. I’ll be able to bring my fiancée over from Britain in a few years and we’ll set up house, in Cape Town, I hope. I love it here.’ Frank put down his knife and fork and leant back in his chair, pouring more wine for Harry. ‘They make a good wine in the Cape. What do you think of it?’

  Harry smiled and lifted his glass. ‘It’s a bit too nice,’ he said, hearing the slight slurring of his own speech, the slowness of his thoughts.

  Frank laughed and his blue eyes looked less tired as he did so. He wore his brown hair longer than Harry was used to and had a beard which was darker than his hair. His movements were deft and sure as he filleted the fish. His nails were cut short and square and Harry watched as Frank clicked his fingers towards the octoroon who stood waiting by the service door, watching their quarter of the dining-room. She wore a black dress with a starched white apron and walked towards them. Frank called, ‘Another bottle,’ pointing to the now empty one which stood on the small trolley by their table.

  Harry watched the coloured girl almost bow before walking into the kitchen. She had straight hair and fine features and there was a grace and beauty to her. He turned back and found Frank watching him, laughter in his eyes.

  ‘You can look, but don’t touch,’ he grinned. ‘She’s what we call a Cape Coloured, a mixture of black and white.’

  Harry lifted the backbone of his fish to one side of his plate, it was so fresh it tasted almost of the sea. He shook his head at Frank. ‘No fear of that.’

  ‘It’s as well, it only leads to trouble,’ Frank replied, patting his mouth with his starched napkin as the girl returned and placed the bottle on the table, the cork already removed. ‘Too much damned mating in the early days between the whites and the natives produced the likes of her. We each keep to our own sides of the track now.’ He bent his head to his meal again and Harry drank more wine.

  No, there was no fear of him touching, not when Esther was forever in his thoughts and was his whole being, his reason to live. He hoped that Hannah had remembered that she had promised to somehow make the waiting more bearable for the girl that he loved.

  They left early in the morning, taking the train which chugged away from the lushness of the Cape and on through the valleys which wound between the hills which were really mountains. They separate civilisation from the interior, Frank told him, settling himself back, lifting the pink Sporting Life, staining the pages with the sweat from hi
s fingers.

  Once they were through the hills, which seemed to take an interminable time, Harry looked out across red arid land where few cattle grazed but where ostriches occasionally walked, the heat making even them hang their heads. Frank pointed out the dry karroo bushes which in no way covered the red terrain. He told how wool had been the chief export before gold arrived and laughed at the red-dusted sheep which huddled around the pale, parched milk-bushes. He told of the classics; hard-rock-rabbits which would come out when evening came and it was cooler.

  As Harry listened the heat made him want to die; it beat off the ground and the roof and in through the windows in spite of the shades pulled down. It took days and they slept when they could and ran water over their lips and Harry soaked his handkerchief and held it to his face and neck, listening as Frank told him of this country which was so hot and unbearable.

  He told him how the Transvaal, which was where they were now heading, had been flooded by a shallow sea millions of years ago and how gold had been deposited when the sea finally ebbed. He explained how, many miles north of the river Vaal, one long ridge had been thrown up when faulting occurred; a ridge which was some sixty miles long from east to west. How, many millions of years later, Boer farmers saw streams glistening on this upland and called it the ridge of white water, the Witwatersrand.

  ‘What we call the Rand, my son,’ Frank said. ‘The Mecca to all the gold hunters in the world and Johannesburg is the centre of it all.’

  Gone were the sheep and cattle, he told Harry, relegated to the land which they were now passing.

  Harry asked about the diamonds, for he knew that if he was to become as rich as Arthur it was these little bits of carbon which would make it possible.

  ‘The diamonds will have to wait, Harry,’ Frank said, his voice cracked and hoarse, his legs sprawled across the carriage, his boots as dusty as Harry’s. ‘But don’t worry, we’ll be going to the fields fairly soon so you’ll be able to see what it’s really like there. There’ll be some message we have to deliver, you mark my words. I seem to spend my life running about this bloody land.