by Mary Mackie
‘I’m not!’ said I hotly. ‘And I’ll prove it.’
Which is why, one bitter February evening, I found myself among a crowd of men, women and children, marching with placards and banners, singing as we went, ‘See, the light of dawn is breaking…’ We planned to disrupt a meeting where hostile councillors were speaking against the WSPU.
Beneath my skirts, calico bags full of flints for breaking windows banged against my legs as I walked. Hermione Harmistead had talked me into carrying them, ‘to prove yourself a true suffragette’. She strode beside me, her voice loud and clear raising the anthem, but my own throat felt dry, harbinger of a head cold. Ever a reluctant militant, I wished I had stayed indoors by the fire.
As we approached our target, we marched into darkness – the streetlamps in that area had been extinguished. Next moment, mounted police hemmed us in, jostling us against one another, herding us into a cul-de-sac where other policemen waited. We had expected resistance, but not a cowardly ambush. We were crushed together, women screaming, men shouting, squirming bodies, jabbing elbows, stones flying, sticks and truncheons flailing… As I fought to protect a smaller colleague from a horse’s iron-shod hooves, something struck me on the head. Dazed, I fell, the weight of stones under my skirts pulling me down. Others fell on top of me. I found myself fighting for my life, hardly able to breathe…
I came to in a house I did not recognize, among kindly strangers who tended the walking wounded. Children cried pitifully – one little girl had been half blinded by an elbow, a young woman had been trampled by a horse. A token few had been arrested and dragged off – Miss H among them, I learned – the rest had dispersed, many of them bruised and bloodied as we were. Memories of the evening sickened me. Had it been necessary to send mounted men against a crowd made up largely of women and children?
I trailed back to Lincoln Square nursing fresh grievances, bruised all over, head aching and hair still matted with blood around the wound on the side of my head. Mrs Armes took one look at me and put me to bed, where I remained feeling sick, unable to eat, wanting communion with no one.
At my lowest ebb, I huddled by the fire in my room that night, nursing a hot whisky toddy which Mrs Armes had made to soothe my throat. I was about to go to bed when a tap on the door announced the arrival of Win. She stood in the doorway, still wearing her coat and hat, blinking through her gold-rimmed spectacles. We hadn’t really spoken since our quarrel.
‘You look perfectly frightful,’ she informed me.
‘Thank you,’ said I without rancour. ‘I feel frightful, so if you’ve come to lecture me again—’
‘As a matter of fact… I’ve been to hear Mrs Bly. I know you don’t approve, Kate, but her meetings are a comfort to me, and to my aunt. She’s always pleased when I write and tell her Stanton came through.’
Who was I to argue? ‘Did he come through tonight?’ I asked thickly, blotting my nose on a damp hanky. ‘Please – come in and shut the door. There’s a terrible draught.’
She came, and stood drawing her gloves through her fingers, watching me with worried mouse-brown eyes. ‘Kate… Miss Love is here.’
Miss Love? Who? I could hardly think for my thick head. ‘Judy Love? What – here in the house?’
‘I asked her to come back with me. I thought you’d want to see her. The thing is, Kate, she was at the meeting tonight. She wanted to ask Black Hawk about a friend who’s in hospital.’ She paused, chewing her lip.
‘And?’ I prompted.
‘The friend – the one who’s ill… It’s your uncle, Kate. It’s Frank. He had an emergency operation this afternoon.’
Deciding that dying could wait, I ran down to the front parlour, where Judy Love sat on the edge of a chair nibbling her thumb. That evening her blond curls trailed over the mole-fur collar of a cheap plum-coloured coat. She overdressed, wore too much powder and lipstick, and I guessed she bleached her hair, but there was no artifice in the wan blue eyes. She had obviously been crying.
‘You’re ill!’ she exclaimed when she saw me.
‘Just a cold.’
Her glance questioned that, but she had other things on her mind – she was worried sick about Frank. ‘When we were in Llandudno last year, he collapsed and they took him to hospital for tests. I was frantic, but we were just off to Amsterdam and I couldn’t stop behind and let the girls down. Lor’, was I glad to see him when he turned up in Paris.’
‘You mean…’ I couldn’t take this in. ‘He was travelling with you?’
‘Not “with us” exactly, dear.’ She gulped back her distress, dabbing at her tears with a wisp of darned lace. ‘But he travels about doing his work and he often turns up to see us. We’ve kept in touch ever since that night you brought him round to the stage door after the show. Didn’t you know?’
The medicinal whisky made my thoughts sluggish. ‘Well… not exactly.’
‘Anyway…’ she went on, ‘since Christmas I’ve been getting really worried. I finally persuaded him to go and see his doctor in Harley Street, and they rushed him into hospital. They were operating this afternoon. I went over there, but the ward sister’s a dragon! Wouldn’t give me ten seconds with him!’ Fresh tears shimmered in her eyes as she blotted her nose. ‘I said to Elsie, you’d have thought I wanted to poison him or something. I cried all the time I was doing my make-up for the show tonight. I didn’t feel like singing and dancing, but you know how it is – the show must go on. I was in a right stew, though. Got my steps all wrong and forgot my words. As soon as we came off, I rushed round to Mrs Bly’s – I thought Black Hawk might be able to give me some word of hope. He did say Frank would be all right, but—’
‘I’m sure he will,’ Win put in. ‘The spirits know these things.’
I wanted to believe that, because suddenly I was afraid. Had I been too wrapped up in my own selfish problems to care about my favourite uncle?
The following afternoon, I took care to camouflage my bruises before I went to the hospital, where I waited with other prospective visitors in a draughty corridor, clutching a handkerchief to stifle my sneezes. Banging doors, muted voices and heavy footsteps echoed along a stone floor and winter light through high windows made the chocolate and pea-green decor ever more dreary. At length, the ward doors opened and a severe-faced nurse glared at us. ‘Keep your voices down. Do not sit on the beds. And leave as soon as the bell rings.’
Long rows of beds lined the ward, patients swaddled like corpses under green coverlets. And the smell – carbolic soap and antiseptic covering less healthy odours… I have always hated hospitals.
Frank looked awful, hardly recognizable as himself, his face thin and yellow against starched pillows, his long hair matted and great hollows under his eyes. As I paused beside the bed, he looked at me with a glimmer of rueful humour.
‘Hello, Kate.’
I could hardly speak for concern, resentment, and the cold in my head that had left me with a thumping headache. ‘Why didn’t you let me know?’
‘What could you have done?’
‘I could have been here!’ I was sick with worry. ‘Oh, Uncle Frank, why didn’t you tell me you were so ill? Does anyone else know?’
They did not, it seemed. He hadn’t wanted to worry the family.
‘But you could tell Judy Love!’ I accused him.
‘Judy’s a good friend of mine. I thought you liked her. She’s very fond of you.’
‘I do like her. But she’s hardly the kind of person—’
‘Snobbery, Kate?’ His voice was weak, but the gentle reproval in it made me flush. ‘You didn’t scorn to fall for a farmer, I seem to recall.’
How could he tease me about that? A breath caught in my throat and set me coughing. I turned away, bent almost double by the paroxysm, leaning on a windowsill until the fit subsided and I slowly forced my painful lungs to expand again. Before I could properly recover, Judy Love rushed down the ward in a clatter of heels and a cloud of cheap perfume, her arms full of fruit, sweets, ev
en a bunch of tight-budded early daffodils. ‘Frank!’ She threw her gifts on the bed and herself to her knees beside him. ‘How are you, dear? You look terrible. How are you feeling?’
‘Better for seeing you,’ he replied with a fond smile that included both of us. ‘But shouldn’t you be on stage about now?’
‘They cancelled the matinee. The water pipes froze last night. Floods all over the auditorium. So I said to Elsie, well, that’s me off the hook, then, I’m off to see old Frank. I couldn’t wait, dear. What was it, then, what’ve they done?’
His problem, he said, had finally been diagnosed as an inflamed appendix which might have ruptured and killed him had it not been removed. I didn’t follow it in detail, being too blocked up with cold, too worried, and anyway happily ignorant of things medical. Unlike many girls of my acquaintance, I had no secret yen to be a nurse.
‘The thought of convalescence is pretty baleful,’ he added, ‘but my pals in Torquay will harbour me till the worst’s over.’
‘You ought to be at home – at Denes Hill!’ I chafed.
Frank shook his head. ‘No, Kate. They’d only fuss. The Mater can’t abide anybody to be sick. It makes her angry. Reminds her of her own mortality. No, I won’t trouble her. And I’m relying on you not to tell, either. That’ll be several secrets you’re keeping for me.’
His glance said he included in that his friendship with Judy.
Listening to them, watching her hold his hand so anxiously and tenderly, I felt myself the unwanted third. So I made excuses and left them together.
A freezing mist of ice and smoke hung in the air, grey veils through which noisy motors and clopping horse-drawn traffic vied for space and people hurried with hunched shoulders. Light-headed with fever and thoroughly sorry for myself, I was crossing a busy road junction when a crowded horse-drawn omnibus loomed out of the mist towards me. I seemed to hear someone call my name and when I glanced back I saw a dark, coat-clad figure, collar up and a homburg hat pulled low over his brow. Oliver? Before my fuddled mind could identify him for certain, the blare of a horn made me jump. A motor van came roaring out of the mist towards me. Oliver lunged for me, wrenching me out of the van’s way, shouting annoyance at the driver. Then he dragged me with him to the further pavement where I leaned on a railing shaking, coughing, breathless with fright.
‘You could get yourself killed stopping in the road like that!’ he chafed, dark eyes snapping in the second before he got his first good look at me. ‘Kate?’ His horrified concern acted like a mirror, making me see the hollow-eyed wraith I had become in the past few months. I turned away, blundering into passersby who sidestepped to avoid me. But Oliver was close behind me, catching my arm. ‘For heaven’s sake, Kate, what’s wrong? Mrs Armes told us you’d been hurt, but this…’
I glanced over my shoulder at him, bleary-headed. ‘What? Mrs Armes…?’
‘Why do you think I’m here? Your grandmother sent me.’
They were using Mrs Armes to spy on me! Tucking my scarf more closely round my mouth, I forged on, dodging a lamppost that seemed to leap from nowhere. ‘Why can’t people mind their own business!’
‘I only wish someone had informed us before now! You didn’t get this thin in a few days. And certainly not as a result of one suffragette demonstration.’ When I made no reply he caught my arm, stopping me. ‘What is it, Kate? Please, talk to me. Are you ill? Mrs Armes says you’re not eating.’
‘How can I eat,’ I cried, ‘when my friends are on hunger strike, being tortured in prison, and people everywhere are starving?’
‘That’s emotional twaddle! What good will it do them if you kill yourself? My dear girl…’ He moved closer, taking hold of me, the worried note in his voice destroying all my pretensions. ‘Kate, my dear…’
‘Oh, Oliver!’ I leaned on him helplessly, because he was there, because he was familiar, because he cared…
With an arm about my shoulders, he hailed a passing hackney – one of the old-style horse-drawn cabs – and helped me into it, telling the driver, ‘Anywhere,’ before climbing in after me and closing the door. The cab smelled of old leather and tobacco smoke. Blinds across the windows cloaked the interior in kindly shadows, shutting out curious eyes, rushing traffic and clinging, choking fog.
When my tears defied all efforts to stem them, Oliver drew me against him and held me as I wept against the astrakhan revers of his coat. Months of grief, knotted into one numb mass, began to unravel. It was the first time I had really cried over losing Philip. Now, as if a dam had burst, I thought the tears might never stop.
After a while, Oliver bent his head over mine, gentle fingers stroking a strand of damp hair from my face. ‘Kate,’ he murmured. ‘Kate, my dear… Enough. You’ll make yourself ill. Please…’
Strong, warm fingers hooked under my chin and I felt his moustache soft against my cheek in the moment before his lips brushed my skin, light as the caress of a falling leaf, tasting my tears. He murmured soothing words, whispering comfort as if I were a child. And I needed comfort. I needed someone to care. I had felt so alone…
Responding to the gentle pressure of his hand under my chin, I turned my head and let him kiss me. It began as gratitude, allowing him a moment of intimacy as a reward for his kindness, but when his mouth hardened something jolted inside me and I found myself reaching up to slide my hands round his neck and answer him in kind. But my head was growing lighter, black wings threatening to claim me.
I twisted away, ducked my head and hid my burning face in his black silk scarf. Beneath my ear his heart, too, sounded erratic and he was breathing fast, his arms hard around me. ‘Kate…’ he whispered.
‘Did you hear what you told the cabby?’ I wheezed. ‘“Anywhere.” He might be taking us to Land’s End. Or John o’ Groat’s.’
‘Shall I tell him Gretna Green? No…’ as I tried to move, ‘stay where you are. Rest, my love. You’re not well. I’ll take you home.’
I relaxed against him, wishing all this scene unplayed. He was right – I did feel unwell; my lungs struggled for every breath and not only my face but my whole body was burning. My head seemed to be floating, then swooping like a seagull. Standing on the edge of a black pit, I succumbed to growing faintness which took me spiralling down, down, into warm dark clouds of nothingness.
Seventeen
I have Mrs Armes and Win to thank for my care, and possibly my life, for I myself knew little about the next week or two as I fought the effects of pneumonia. When at last I began to take note again, spring had arrived. My convalescence dragged on towards Easter.
Through Judy Love, I heard that Uncle Frank was recovering. He had been annoyed when the family found out about his illness; he had blamed me, until he had discovered that Oliver was responsible. He had also heard that Oliver was now visiting my sickbed. According to Judy, my uncle was ‘dreadfully worried about you, dear. Seems to be afraid you’re getting too thick with Mr Wells.’ I was not sorry when, after Frank departed for Torquay, his girlfriend went on tour again and stopped playing go-between.
During those weeks, Oliver came to London frequently, bringing me snowdrops, violets, and messages of concern from Grandmother. I gathered that if I remained tractable she might be prepared to overlook earlier sins, especially if I were kind to Oliver. What Vicky thought of it all I don’t know: she didn’t communicate with me. Oliver said that, when business obliged him to call at Denes Hill, she hardly spoke to him.
My two nurses coyly withdrew when he called, evidently considering him a welcome suitor, whose presence could only aid my recovery. They both found him charming – Mrs Armes said he reminded her of her late husband, and Win repeated her assertions that older men were more reliable.
One April weekend, Oliver and I sat quietly in separate chairs either side of the fire in the drawing room of the house on Lincoln Square. I was drifting, cocooned by the warmth from the fire and the soft hug of the shawl Mother had made me. Even so, when Oliver leaned for a fourth time to stir
the fire and add another coal, I realized he hadn’t spoken for at least ten minutes.
‘Oliver…’ I ventured. ‘You know, it’s not necessary for you to keep coming every weekend. I’m much better now. I’m even starting to catch up with my studying. If there’s something you would rather be doing…’
Sombre bark-brown eyes sought to read my soul. ‘I thought you looked forward to my visits.’
‘I do. You know I do.’
‘You also know, do you not, that my feelings for you are unchanged?’
Unable to bear that steady gaze, I glanced at the fire. Of course I knew. But while it went unspoken I could pretend it didn’t exist. ‘Yes.’
‘Then I think I have a right to be told the truth.’
A little ripple of warning stirred at my nape. Oliver was no fool. He had seen how thin and ill grief had made me; he had held me while I wept. ‘About what?’
‘I think you know about what.’
I got up and, clasping my shawl more closely round my shoulders, went to stare out of the bay window. In the gardens at the heart of the square, birds flitted and buds plumped the end of every branchlet. Sunlight fell bright through lace curtains, drawing attention to the cushion-like cactus which bristled with tiny acid-yellow flowers on a table in the bay.
‘Even Giorgio seems to think it’s spring,’ I remarked.
‘Giorgio?’
‘The cactus. Mrs Armes calls it Giorgio. This is the first time I’ve seen it in flower.’
‘I believe cacti are rather unpredictable in that respect,’ Oliver said, and I heard the cushions whisper as he got up. ‘Kate… why are we discussing house plants?’
Aware that he was coming closer, I blurted, ‘You do know that… that I was seeing Philip Farcroft last summer?’