Women of Courage

by Tim Vicary

Jonathan tried again. ‘Of course I understand, you know that, but …’

  ‘Do you? Do you really understand, Jonathan?’

  ‘Look, you’re my wife — I don’t want you in a place like this! When they let you out under the Cat and Mouse Act last time I did my damndest to protect you — I even wrote to McKenna and told him you’d promised to stay out of trouble, in the hope they wouldn’t arrest you. And now this!’

  She hadn’t known that but it made sense, like so many other things she was finding out about him. Jonathan was a Liberal MP, ambitious, eager for office; her suffragette activities were an embarrassment to him. He would do a deal behind her back if he could. Even with McKenna, the Home Secretary, who loathed all suffragettes.

  She flicked her head back, to toss a loose curl away from her eye. ‘A deal cooked up by men!’

  His blue eyes widened, as they did on the edge of anger. ‘For God’s sake! It was a gentleman’s agreement to protect you, Sarah! You’re my wife. Am I not entitled to do that?’ He reached out his hand, round the candle, and squeezed her shoulder. She flinched — it was the site of one of many bruises she had received that afternoon.

  ‘Don’t you dare touch me!’ She jerked away from him, got up, and stood by the wall under the high barred window. The dim candlelight made it hard to see, but he thought she was trembling.

  ‘Sarah? Why ever not?’

  ‘Don’t you know?’

  He thought back over the past few years — the miscarriages, the frustrations, the way he had been banished from her bedroom. This was not the first such scene. Rage flared in him.

  ‘No, I do not know. You are my wife and I have come here expressly to bring you comfort. If my offer is to be spurned then I . . .’

  ‘You liar!’

  She ran towards him suddenly and before he could get up from the bed she knocked the top hat from his head. He felt a hot, searing pain as she raked her nails down his cheek, near his eye. He lashed out to defend himself, pushing the palm of his hand against the first thing that he found, which was the soft flesh of her nose and mouth. She bit him, hard, near the base of his thumb. He yelled, lurched to his feet, and shoved her away. As he got up the candle fell over and went out. For a moment they both stood, blinded by the sudden pitch black. Each could only guess where the other was by the sound of laboured, frightened breathing.

  He said: ‘Sarah, please!’

  ‘Leave me alone!’

  A hand came suddenly out of the darkness and caught him a stinging crack across the cheek. He staggered and cried out: ‘What the devil are you doing?’

  A sound between a laugh and a sob came from somewhere just ahead of him, to his left. ‘It serves you right! You know why!’

  This time he had his own hands raised like a boxer, so when her hand came out of the darkness he managed to shield himself from the blow with his forearm and catch hold of her wrist before she could move away. He pulled her roughly forward and reached out with his other hand, trying to catch her other arm, but instead he found her hair. He wound his fingers in it and held on.

  ‘Sarah, stop this. What are you doing?’

  ‘Let go of me, you betrayer! Guard! Help! Get this man out of my cell!’

  As she screamed he felt a sudden hard, agonising blow on his right shin, just below the knee. He let go of her hair and wrist and stumbled back, trying to get away from her. Then the door opened and a burly policeman stood framed in the yellow gaslight flooding in from the corridor. He coughed.

  ‘Yes, sir? Madam? You called?’

  Jonathan fumbled for a handkerchief and dabbed it across his cheek, to cover the blood. ‘Yes, man. The candle . . .’

  ‘Get this man out of here!’

  ‘Beg pardon, madam?’ It was not easy to see without a candle in the gloomy cell, but the policeman could make out the silhouette of the lady, shaking in the middle of the cell, and the gent, dabbing at his face with a handkerchief. She was a prisoner of course, but not the usual sort. ‘But he’s your husband, ain’t he, ma’am?’

  ‘He may be — but I don’t want to see him! Get him out, can’t you? I can’t bear him near me!’

  ‘Well, sir . . .’ The constable hesitated. ‘We usually only allow minutes as a rule . . .’

  ‘Don’t trouble yourself.’ Jonathan fumbled for his hat on the floor, and dusted it off against his sleeve. ‘It seems my wife is not well.’ He stepped out, past the policeman into the corridor. Then, before the door was closed, he turned.

  ‘I have no idea what is the matter with you, my dear, but I hope you recover. In the meantime, for God’s sake be sensible in prison — and eat!’

  Sarah’s answer was not hysterical, as the constable had expected. Instead her words were very soft and determined, and they stayed in Jonathan’s mind all night.

  ‘Jonathan, go away, and let me face these horrors on my own. If I eat a single mouthful in here, you know I shall have betrayed the cause.’

  3

  WHEN JONATHAN had gone, Sarah paced the dark cell restlessly until the violence of her emotions began to subside. The drunk down the corridor sang in a loud, bleary monotone until a policeman hammered on his door to shut him up. In another cell a woman was cursing steadily, repetitively, with sudden loud bursts of fury when she shook the bars. In the occasional moments of silence Sarah could hear the hiss of the gas-lamp in the corridor outside, and somewhere, far away, another woman crying.

  The top pane of her window was open and she guessed it must be just below the level of the pavement. Once, she heard the clatter and rattle of a tram approach, and the ding! of its bell As it stopped outside; at another time, the clop of a horse’s hooves, and the shout of a man hailing a cab.

  She thought of Jonathan, getting out of a similar cab a few miles away. In her mind she saw him drop coins into the hand of the driver. He would have to use his left hand, she thought. She had bitten his right! He would have a handkerchief round that and another to dab at his face. The cabman would notice but he would ignore it. He would raise his cap in gratitude for the tip, Jonathan would nod, the driver would shake his reins, and the cab would clop quietly away around Belgrave Square. Jonathan would sigh, and walk slowly up the steps to the front door. The door would open, and he would hand his top hat and gloves to Reeves, their butler, and go into his study, alone.

  I wonder how he will explain those scratches to Reeves, she thought. Spot of bad luck, he might say, I picked up a cat and it scratched my face. Something like that . . .

  And it’s true, too, she thought grimly, except that this cat is his wife. The woman he promised to share his whole life with.

  I don’t feel like a cat, I feel like a coward, she thought. I should have told him what I know, why didn’t I dare?

  A little voice in her mind answered: because you’re not sure it’s true.

  Of course it’s true, it all makes sense, no one would send me a letter like that if it wasn’t true. And it’s not just the letter — I saw him with my own eyes. Anyway I don’t want to think about it. I can’t remember it all.

  Remember it. You must. All of it.

  She remembered what had happened two days ago. Two days! It seemed like a hundred years . . .

  She remembered being in her own drawing room in the house in Belgrave Square. She could see the pale cream wallpaper studded with small, delicate patterns of roses and lilies; the long red curtains; the white sofa and armchairs scattered with red and yellow cushions. It was a cheerful room, flooded with sunlight in the late afternoon. A good place to convalesce.

  She was sitting at a table near the window with Alice Watson, her nurse. Mrs Watson was the main reason she had agreed to spend so much time at home, away from the WSPU offices. She was a friendly, businesslike woman, a qualified nurse devoted to the suffragette cause. She had first arrived when Sarah had been released, weak, delirious, exhausted, from her last stay in prison. The WSPU had wanted to take Sarah to a suffragette rest home in Sussex, quite away from her husband; Jonathan had
wanted to keep her in his own house, quite away from all suffragettes. Mrs Watson had been the compromise.

  At first she had seemed a triumph. Mrs Watson was undoubtedly a skilled nurse; under her care Sarah relaxed and grew better day by day. She was also a diplomat; after a few rather prickly exchanges, she had deliberately praised some of Jonathan’s political work, and Jonathan had appeared to like and even respect her.

  Sarah wondered now how much of that was a fraud.

  The day Sarah remembered had been a Monday — two days ago. She and Mrs Watson had spent the afternoon going through a large amount of suffragette correspondence. It was useful work, but mundane — enquiries about membership, ladies wishing to subscribe to The Suffragette, queries about a forthcoming rally, and so on. It was, Sarah realised, part of Mrs Watson’s therapy — work that made her feel part of the movement, without exposing her to any risk or undue physical activity.

  It also kept her inside the house. Although she had seen no evidence of policemen outside, watching the house to see if she was well, it was quite possible that she would be re-arrested, under the Cat and Mouse Act, the first time she stepped out into street. She was only out of prison because she had refused to eat while she was in there, not because she had completed her sentence. She had been released under McKenna’s notorious Prisoners (Temporary Discharge for Ill-Health) Act — nick-named the Cat and Mouse Act. At any time the police could decide her health had recovered and re-arrest her to serve the remainder of her sentence. Then the whole dreadful business of the hunger strike would begin again. Mrs Pankhurst had been re-arrested six times like that, and she was so weak she could hardly stand.

  About halfway through the morning, the second post arrived. Sarah began to open it. Among the standard letters to ‘The Organiser, Women’s Social and Political Union’ and ‘The Women’s Suffrage Movement’ was one addressed to her personally. The writing on the envelope was bold, black, confident: Mrs Sarah Becket, 30 Belgrave Square, London W2. It was a hand she did not know. She opened it curiously.

  Inside was a single sheet of expensive, creamy paper, covered with the same bold black handwriting. Oddly, there was no address at the top. It began:

  Dear Mrs Becket,

  I suppose you know that your friends in the WSPU have recently been poking their noses into things which concern them even less than the vote. They have been troubling several of us young ladies and asking for the names of our gentlemen friends, which is none of their business at all, especially when they stand outside the house where we live and work and try to put men off, so we have to move house. This does no one any good and makes us all poorer. In particular, they have been troubling Dr Armstrong too, who is a decent man and a good help to us.

  Well, all this has got to stop. Tell your friends to stay away from our houses and Dr Armstrong or you will be sorry. Your husband gets the same treatment other men get, and whose fault is that? If you don’t want to read about him in all the newspapers tell your friends to STAY AWAY. That’s all.

  There was no signature.

  What did it mean? She read the letter a second time and this time a rushing noise roared in her ears as the meaning of the letter began to sink in. Young ladies with gentlemen friends . . . the house where we live and work . . . these could only be prostitutes, surely — but what had that to do with her or the WSPU or Jonathan? It was absurd to think that Jonathan had anything to do with women like that! But then, how did they know about Dr Armstrong? For there was a Dr Armstrong — Martin Armstrong. Jonathan had known Martin for years; he went to consult him sometimes for a stomach complaint he had. What had treatment for a stomach complaint to do with prostitutes?

  Sarah’s hand had begun to shake, and for a moment she had thought she was going to faint, but she recovered and held herself icy still. She looked across the table at Mrs Watson. Amazingly, despite the fanfare of shock and alarm in Sarah’s head, Mrs Watson had noticed nothing. She was diligently writing, looking down, her head bent. For a moment Sarah had wanted to scream and thrust the letter under the woman’s nose, but as Mrs Watson’s pen scratched slowly across the paper, she changed her mind.

  If what this letter said was true, no one must ever know.

  Very quietly, she stood up, walked across the room, and stuffed it casually into the back of her writing desk.

  Mrs Watson looked up. She was a good-looking woman of about fifty, with greying hair tied back severely into a bun, and round spectacles that made her look like a governess. Sarah was fond of her and they confided about most things, but this! What had the letter said? Your husband gets the same treatment other men get and whose fault is that? Her face flushed with anger at the thought of what it might mean and she felt a pain deep inside which almost deprived her of breath. But at the same time she felt an enormous sense of shame for Jonathan which said: no one shall ever know about this even if it is true. It is his shame and I shall never betray him.

  It is my shame too . . .

  It was an effort even to stand upright. Very carefully, keeping her poise one step at a time, she pulled the bellrope by the fire, and when her butler came, ordered tea. Then, as she and Mrs Watson sat drinking it, she forced herself to discuss the ordinary business of the day — subscriptions, replies to letters, arrangements for a demonstration next Thursday. The conversation seemed far away, trivial, a discussion between dolls in a children’s puppet theatre.

  All the time the words of the letter echoed in her mind. I suppose you know that your friends in the WSPU have been poking their noses in . . . But Sarah did not know. She knew that such work went on but she had deliberately not involved herself in it, because she thought it would be too upsetting, awake too many memories. Now she needed to find out, without letting Mrs Watson know why.

  Casually, she said: ‘I read the other day that some women are investigating prostitution in the East End. Do you know anything of that?’

  Mrs Watson glanced at her in mild surprise, and Sarah thought: Am I so transparent? Did I shout? But it seemed Mrs Watson’s surprise was only transient and she was quite willing to talk about it.

  For some time, she said, ever since the Piccadilly Flat Case last year, the WSPU had been concerned at the outrageous double standards involved in high-class prostitution. In that case, a woman, Queenie Gerald, had pleaded guilty to keeping a disorderly house — a brothel — in a flat in Piccadilly. When the police had raided the place they had found three young girls there, aged 17, 18, and 19, and a detailed ledger explaining how they earned their money. There were also letters, many from a man who lived in the Ritz Hotel, arranging appointments for his clients. As a result of the raid, Queenie Gerald pleaded guilty and was sentenced to three months imprisonment in the second division.

  Several things outraged the suffragettes about this case. Firstly, the fact that it happened at all. Secondly, the fact that the madam of this brothel got off with three months, whereas Mrs Pankhurst, whose crime was to ask for political rights for women, had been sentenced to two and a half years. And thirdly, the fact that none of the girls’ clients, believed to have been rich and famous men in the public eye, had been named at all.

  ‘I remember it, yes,’ Sarah said, ‘Christabel Pankhurst has written a pamphlet about it, hasn’t she? The Great Scourge. But what has that to do with us now?’

  ‘Well, Mrs Becket, since then, several ladies in the Union — my cousin is one of them — have been watching houses which they believe to be bawdy houses. They want to find out how they are run and who uses them. Very unpleasant work — several times they’ve been approached by men themselves.’

  ‘Yes,’ Sarah shuddered. ‘And?’

  ‘Well, it’s hard to find out much. Most of the girls are uncooperative, and when they think we’re watching them they send their bully-boys out to harass our ladies and drive them away. But we’re making progress slowly. One of the things we’d like to find out is who is making a profit and organising it. And another thing . . .’ Alice Watson hesitated, peering
at Sarah cautiously over her glasses.

  ‘Yes, go on. What other thing?’

  Mrs Watson sighed. ‘There is a possibility that young children may be involved. Some ladies were watching a house in Hackney last week when they saw a middle-aged woman go in with two little girls, about thirteen or fourteen. She came out half an hour later with the same children dressed in gaudy clothes and feathered hats — not at all becoming. They got into a cab and our ladies tried to follow but they lost it in Kensington somewhere.’

  ‘Children?’ Sarah sat down weakly. ‘You mean little girls are still involved in prostitution today?’

  ‘So it seems. We can’t tell for certain. The suffragettes went back to Hackney and knocked on the door and asked for the owner of the house. A man came out but he didn’t help, far from it. He told them it was a respectable neighbourhood and called his manservant to throw them out.’

  ‘How awful!’ Sarah shuddered. ‘But why didn’t they call the police?’

  She knew the answer even before Alice Watson confronted her with a resigned, reproving look. ‘Call the police and expect them to take the word of two suffragettes against a male householder? Where would that lead? There was no proof that he had done anything wrong, and in fact very few men were seen going into that building, no more than any other house. So perhaps the girls worked elsewhere and were just brought to that place on the way. We need evidence before we can move, evidence that will stand up in a court of law.’

  ‘Evidence of what, exactly? You say they saw these children come out.’

  ‘Yes, but where did they go? There is no crime in dressing a child in gaudy clothes. We need evidence that the children are actually under age and being exploited; we need to know who is procuring them and how; and then, if we are lucky, we need the names of the men who go to these places, as well as evidence against the madams who run them. If we knew all that, we would have a scandal to shake the streets of London!’

  ‘But what about the little girls? Surely they should be rescued, if possible. What about their parents?’