The Liberation of Celia Kahn

by J David Simons

  “Why do men always disappoint me?” she thought. “Why do they always disappoint me?”

  * * *

  Celia had been in his office for over five minutes and he had not said a word. Instead, Mr Ronald Sneddon, senior partner of Sneddon, Baxter and Co., Solicitors and Notaries Public of West Nile Street, Glasgow merely perused the legal documents before him, occasionally glancing up at her over his glasses and muttering, “hmmhmm, hmmhmm.” It was a dark office with any light that could have shone through the large window being blocked off by the closeness of an ugly blank wall opposite. Within this lack of sunlight, Mr Ronald Sneddon presented himself as a rotund silhouette, hunched over a desklamp that bore down exclusively on the text in front of him. She read off some of the titles on his bookshelf – The Principles of Scots Law, Cases Decided by The Court of Session, The Scottish Law Review, Acts of Sederunt – until the lack of light forced her to give up her task. She took off her gloves, folded them on her lap. Mr Ronald Sneddon emitted some more ‘hmmhmms’ before finally looking up.

  “Do you know why you are here, Miss Kahn?” he asked. “Apart from the fact that the late Mrs Ferguson left you a note to come to these offices.”

  “Mrs Ferguson? No – I’m here because of Miss Calder.”

  “Ah, yes. You could be forgiven for not knowing such a thing. For Miss Calder was only wed for a few weeks. She and her husband, Kenneth Ferguson, married just before the war. Then in a pique of patriotism I have never understood, he volunteered as soon as hostilities broke out. He was one of its first casualties. He was a captain. He was also a partner in this law firm. A dear friend.” Mr Sneddon poked his glasses further up his nose. “I can see you are nonplussed by this information, Miss Kahn. Well, I am afraid I am going to surprise you some more. Perhaps you would like a glass of water before we continue? Or I can ask my secretary to bring us some tea?”

  She did not want water or tea. She only wanted to know why her late friend would conceal such an important detail from her. And yet she had to prepare for more news to come. She shivered herself further upright on her chair, altered the position of the gloves on her lap so that the bottom one was now at the top. “That is very kind of you, Mr Sneddon. But please continue.”

  “I will therefore ask you again. Have you any idea why the late Mrs Ferguson asked you to attend these offices?”

  “I can only assume it is to help with organising the disposal of any furniture or personal items. She rented a flat in the West End. I visited there many times.”

  “The rented flat to which you refer was actually owned by my late partner who, on his death, left it to his widow. Mrs Ferguson was a woman of property. And coupled with the fact that she would have been over the age of thirty years had she continued living, she would have had the right to vote under the restrictions of the Representation of the People Act 1918. A fact which I am sure would have pleased her suffragette sensibilities. Hmmm.” Mr Sneddon glanced down at his papers, ran a fat forefinger from one line of text to another, then continued. “All this brings me to the point of this visit. Which is that Mrs Ferguson has willed you a liferent in this property to which we are referring.”

  “A liferent, Mr Sneddon?”

  “Yes, a liferent. The name is an apt description of its purpose. You have the right to live in Mrs Ferguson’s property for as long as your natural life. Should you choose to give up this right at any time, then be so kind as to inform me accordingly. I will then arrange for the disposal of the asset and the proceeds will be distributed to various charities as instructed.”

  She touched her breastbone as she had been taught in deportment class. Inhale. Then a long exhale. Inhale. Then a long exhale. Calm the nerves and the female disposition. Act like a young lady. Back straight. “Do I understand correctly that I am to receive a free tenancy of Agnes’ … Mrs Ferguson’s flat?”

  “Under certain conditions.”

  “But Mr Sneddon. Even if I wanted to, I cannot afford to live in a flat on my own. I have no income. I cannot pay bills or rates or insurance.”

  “Your concern is perfectly understandable. But let me assure you that all bills for your necessary use of the property shall be paid for by this firm on behalf of Mrs Ferguson’s estate. For a period of five years. After that time, while your actual occupation shall remain rent-free, you will have to assume responsibility for these other costs. At such time, you may decide to give up your liferent and I will dispose of the property as previously described.” Sneddon sat back in his chair, causing his buttoned-up waistcoat to expand dangerously over his large belly. He fanned himself with the pages of Agnes’ will. “Mrs Ferguson also stipulated in her final testament that the property … and here I shall read … ‘should be used partly for the continued hosting of committee meetings for socialists and feminists alike as well as to provide a focal point for the distribution of information related to … hhhmmm … birth control.’ These are the only conditions.” Sneddon rose from his seat, walked his bulky frame to the door, switched on an electric light as if this somehow would help illuminate her thoughts. She could hear his breathlessness as he waddled by her on his return to his chair.

  “I understand that this may be a bit of a shock to you,” he continued, his complexion now reddened from his brief excursion. “A pleasant one I hope. As you know, it is a rather attractive property in a tree-lined West End street. But, if you will allow me, I also believe that I can help clarify Mrs Ferguson’s intentions towards you. She did say to me when I asked the reason for her rather unusual bequest that she would like to offer you an opportunity. ‘So that Miss Kahn will have a chance to be herself,’ she said to me. ‘To be herself.’ Those were her words. Only you, of course, know what that means. Would you like some time to think about all of this?”

  “Yes… yes, I would. I cannot respond to this now. All this information is rather overwhelming.”

  “I am sure it is. Why don’t you take the keys from reception, Miss Kahn? Take yourself over there for a visit. Perhaps after that, you can tell me what you decide. For five years at least, the property will be totally paid for, maintained, and administered by myself. On production of the relevant receipts, of course. You have been allocated some public duties. But beyond that, all you have to do is enjoy the accommodation as you please.”

  She had never visited the vacant home of a deceased person before. As soon as she had crossed the threshold, it felt that all of Agnes’ furniture and personal possessions in this flat were dead too. As if Agnes by virtue of her ownership had infused these items with a certain essence that had now disappeared with her passing. The armchair sagged, the upright piano silenced, the desk-ink dried to a crust, the fire-irons redundant, the silver-handled hairbrush rendered obsolete, the uncollected post unread and irrelevant. Surfaces were layered with dust. The wall clock in the hall had stopped. She stood on a chair, took down the rather heavy timepiece, wound up the mechanism, put it back. She listened as the renewed ticking began to restore some of the lifeblood back into the empty flat. She opened windows, cleaned surfaces, beat carpets, polished brasses, sorted out piles of clothes, stacked out-of-date pamphlets, so many pamphlets, it was a wonder the place had not gone up in smoke. A solitary spark from the fire onto one of these piles and Agnes could have been burned alive by her own pamphlets of protest. A suffragette sacrifice. A witch at the stake. She bundled up the piles of papers, took them out to the midden.

  Back in the flat, she collapsed into an armchair, sat splay-legged like a man, like Agnes, lit up a cigarette, watched the smoke curl around this space she had the right to live in for the rest of her natural life. She had a liferent in that fireplace over there, that dresser, that Ottoman, that coat-stand, that piano, those samplers. Come the revolution, Agnes, and we’ll all have liferents to fancy flats in the West End. She smiled to herself at that notion. But what was she thinking of? She couldn’t live here by herself. What would she tell her parents? Young women didn’t live alone unless they were elderly spinsters
with deceased parents, war widows with young children, or prostitutes. Yes, that was what her mother would call her if she told her the truth. A prostitute. Or more likely in Yiddish – kurveh. She rose from the armchair, moved into the bedroom, dusting surfaces as she went. She had a liferent in this bed, this mirror, these ornaments, this tallboy. “Why not just leave me a few pieces of your silverware and be done with it, Agnes? Those I could have sold to pay off my uncle’s debts.” She opened up a drawer in one of the bedside cabinets. Inside, a bag of Soor Plooms, stuck together, covered in fuzz.

  She sat down at the dressing table with its smell of stale make-up powder, picked up the silver-handled hairbrush, faced the mirror. It was divided into three hinged sections, so she played with the wings until she could see the profiles of all these Celias stretching back forever and into infinity. What did the millionth image of her reflection look like? Or the billionth? Would she be older or younger in time? She scraped the brush through her hair, feeling the bristles harsh against her scalp. She stroked harder, watched the tears wash over her eyes, dampen her lashes. “I should have been there for you, Agnes,” she said to her reflection.

  “I should have been there for you.” She leaned into the mirror, nipped some colour into her face. “But if that Jimmy Docherty finds it was your own smoke-stained lungs that got you…” She twisted open one of Agnes’ compacts, patted some powder on to her cheeks. “…I might just take you up on your bequest.”

  Glasgow

  1923

  Nineteen

  “CELIA, CELIA,” HER MOTHER CALLED. “Come and see this. Komm, komm, komm.”

  “A minute.” She finished pinning the brooch to her collar, glanced quickly at her reflection in the mirror above the kitchen mantelpiece, went out into the hallway. The electric lights, full on even though it was still afternoon, illuminating the shiny black device that sat on the hall table. Her father, mother and Nathan standing there beaming smiles at her as if Moses himself had arrived on their doorstep with the Ten Commandments.

  “Well?” Nathan asked. “What do you think?”

  “What can I say? The Kahn family have finally entered the modern era.”

  “About time too,” Nathan added. “Every home should have a telephone. I can’t believe you waited this long, Papa.”

  “Just because it is new, does not mean it is good,” Papa Kahn said. “Before if you wanted something done, you would go and ask. If you wanted to see a friend, you would go and visit. There would be real, human contact. You shook a hand, you kissed a cheek, you saw the look in their eyes. Now you get lazy. You stay at home. You only hear a voice.”

  “It’s not such a bad thing,” her mother said. “With my varicose veins, I shouldn’t have to schlep up and down this building shaking hands and kissing cheeks with my neighbours.”

  “It pushes human relationships further apart,” Papa Kahn warned with a wave of a bony finger to no-one in particular.

  “And it brings those further apart closer together,” Nathan countered.

  “Who is so far apart?” Papa Kahn grumbled. “Everyone I know lives in the Gorbals.”

  “What about Avram?”

  “Avram?”

  “Yes. Why don’t you call him? I have the telephone number of his clothing shop in Oban.”

  “I can do that? I can telephone all the way to Oban? This is a miracle.”

  “Yes, Papa,” Celia said. “Call Avram. Tell him it is time to come home. Staying away from us all these years, it is ridiculous.” She put on her beret, ran her fingers over the telephone as she passed. Quite beautiful it was, like a glossy black daffodil. “Now, I must go.”

  “Where to this time?” her mother asked.

  “A meeting in the West End.”

  “Another meeting? We are like a bed and breakfast for you. Kahn’s B&B. At Celia’s convenience. When will it be time for you to come home?”

  “I don’t know. I will probably stay overnight at Charlotte’s. It is safer than travelling across the city in the dark.”

  “I see. And this Charlotte? Do her parents own a telephone too? In case we need to speak to our only daughter.”

  There were five of them. Five women. They made up the core. Apart from herself, there was Charlotte, Maggie, Big Bessie and Christine. The Suffragette Five. She had known them for several years now, up through the ranks of the socialist Sunday schools, then the Women’s Peace Crusade, sitting together on various other committees on the way. Intimidating they had been to her at first, before she settled down to being one of the pack. A pack of she-wolves. Or bitches. Ready to scratch and bite if threatened. Not only by men, but also by each other.

  Big Bessie was large and in charge with a wrinkled face that could collect raindrops in its folds, plump upper arms that wobbled when she laughed. Charlotte was the wealthy, stylish one, the one with the men’s suits, the crimson slash of lipstick, the long cigarettes. Then there was Maggie, the former munitions worker with real muscles from handling all those shell-casings during the war, still wearing her boiler-suit even though it had been years since she’d seen the inside of a factory. And finally, Christine, a tiny bird of a church-going woman who barely spoke a word, making Celia feel heavy and loquacious by comparison.

  Charlotte was her favourite. She got on well enough with the rest, but they tended to come together as comrades and part as comrades once the work was done, without a real friendship struck in between. These flexible relationships reminding her that feminism and socialism could unite them yet the day-to-day demands of religion and class could still divide. But here they all were now, sitting around a table in the kitchen of her liferent flat, passing round a bottle of cream sherry to share, four candles at the centre lit in memory of the years since Agnes’ death, Maggie with a reminiscence to tell.

  “I recall one time Agnes was out on one of these big union marches,” she said, her mouth turned down grim even though the anecdote was a fond one. “You know what she was like, looking around for some kind of raised spot from which to better berate the masses. She ended up getting four hefty miners to fetch a wooden hoarding, hoist her up on it onto their shoulders so she had herself a platform. Half-way through her speech about higher wages for the workers, one of the miners below her shouted: ‘I can see up your skirts.’ To which she replied quick as a wink: ‘Well, that’s the only rise ye’ll be getting if ye dinnae let me get on with ma speech.’”

  Celia laughed along with the rest of them despite having heard the story many times before. Still it was good to think about Agnes again. She just hoped she could properly honour her memory this night. After all she had been preparing for it for years. Big Bessie picked up a small brass bell, gave it a delicate shake. The meeting came to order.

  “Comrades, comrades,” Big Bessie said. “It is four years since our dear friend passed. If she were alive today she would probably be turning in her grave at the sight of what’s been going on in this great city of ours…”

  “Ye cannae say that,” Maggie hissed.

  “What can’t I say?”

  “If she were alive today, she’d be turning in her grave. That’s a mixed metaphor or something.”

  “Jesus Christ, Maggie, I was only making a point.”

  “And the point is…?”

  “That poverty has bitten so hard in this city, it breaks my heart to witness. The dole queues are longer, the women can’t eke out a living from the parish relief, more and more bairns are dying of the tuberculosis, free milk in school is being restricted. Half the children in my wee lassie’s gym class cannae exercise because their limbs are twisted with rickets. People are sick and starving. They used to talk about Glasgow being Moscow on the Clyde. But any socialist fight’s been beaten out of the working class by the twin fists of unemployment and despair. It’s a disgrace and an embarrassment. Families are better off in Munich and Vienna. And they’re the ones who lost the war. We’ve done our best to support the political struggle with a few successes. We’ve now got ten Labour MP
s pleading our cause in Parliament. But what are we women to do? We need to change our tactics to tackle the wretched nature of things. And given that this day is the anniversary of our comrade Agnes’ death, I believe Celia has something to propose regarding our old friend’s legacy.”

  Celia stood up, looked around at the four faces staring back at her through a fug of tobacco smoke, strange to be feeling so nervous given she’d spoken out to these women so many times in the past. She picked at the brooch at her collar, Agnes’ brooch, the one that had come to her in that plain brown package from the jail. “As you know, when Agnes died she left me a liferent in this flat…”

  “Why you?” It was Maggie again, folding her thick arms as she stared straight at her. “Aye, why you? I always wondered that.”

  “Oh, Agnes always had a wee fancy for our Celia,” Charlotte interrupted with a couple of puffs of her cigarette into the air. “Didn’t you know that, Maggie? She preferred those dark, svelte young things to you big beefy types.” Charlotte’s bright red lips broke into a smirk. “Isn’t that right, Celia?”

  She said nothing, knew it was better to leave Charlotte’s little innuendos alone, otherwise she would just come back at her with another.

  “Don’t play coy with me,” Charlotte continued to poke. “I’ve never known you to mention any male love interest in your life. We just assumed you and Agnes were… how shall I put it? … sapphically entwined.”

  “Well, you assumed incorrectly,” Celia said, left with no choice but to defend the blush to her face. “In fact, with your gents’ tailoring, I always thought it was you who were…”

  “… I’ve no heard ma Archie complain about my beefy proportions,” Maggie piped into the conversation.