A Time for Courage (35 page)

‘But the Pensions Bill is not through yet, Hannah.’ Frances was sitting back in her chair now, her fingers steepled in front of her face. ‘Do you remember what we discussed? This reform government is so important and I fear that the suffragettes will damage it. We must have social reforms, you know that.’ Hannah nodded, feeling the frustration build into a physical pain. Yes, she knew that and yes, she would wait until the Pensions Bill was through and it would not just be because Frances desired this but because she did too.

‘I know and the Government won’t be damaged, Frances. Women are not that strong, remember?’ Her tone was ironic and Frances smiled. At least she had bought some time but would it be enough? Please God, let Asquith give us the vote. She did not say this but tried to caution this young woman who had already faced so much.

‘I know I’ve said this before but I worry, I suppose, in case the demonstrations, the protests become too militant. I cannot condone violence, Hannah, and it would do our cause no good, and I use “our” collectively. You see, to have the vote requires a degree of responsibility, and should the militancy escalate I fear that all that would result would be the alienation of our supporters within Parliament and that it would become almost a purposeless act. Violence for violence’s sake is not healthy, neither is revenge.’ Frances looked up as the clock struck eleven. ‘Now I think the lecture is over, my dear, for tonight,’ and as she took Hannah’s cup from her she remembered herself at twenty-two, supported by two loving parents who had made everything seem possible. And so it had been until her fiancé died in India and even then the school had held her life together as, with the passing years, her father and then her mother had been ‘gathered’, as Hannah would say. As she held the door for Hannah to pass through she leant forward and kissed her cheek.

‘You must be careful, Hannah,’ she said and wanted to send her far from here, to Cornwall, where she belonged and where she would be safe with Joe. But all she could do was smile and hide the fear because had not her parents loved her enough to do that for her too?

On this warm May day in Frances’s dining-room Esther was wearing cotton gloves to paint ‘Votes for Women’ in black furniture stain on the white calico banner while Hannah crouched beside her, her own brush heavy in her hand, her bare fingers stained with black, but it was good to see them marked like this and to feel the soreness of her palm.

She knelt upright, easing the stiffness of her back, and as she did so she saw Maureen, one of her Sunday ladies, doing the same and they smiled. The woman wore the new suffragette ribbons, white, green and purple, pinned to her bodice in the shape of a bow, and Hannah turned to look at the bag on the trestle table at the side of the room. She must remember to wear some too.

‘Really, Hannah,’ Esther said as she also straightened. ‘I much prefer the meetings. This is all rather hard work. I do hope it isn’t all too hectic on the day.’ She looked across at the poles which lay by the table. ‘They look a little rough and heavy to me.’

Hannah laughed. ‘You’ll be all right and remember, you have ordered that rather fetching dress to set off your ribbons.’

She laughed again as Esther’s face broke into a smile. ‘Yes, indeed, and a new hat too. One should go into these things properly, you know, Hannah. Half-measures are not the thing.’

She patted her hair into shape, and Hannah laughed again. At least she had been able to write to Harry that Esther was now very busy and working with other women, so did it matter that it was all a game to her?

‘We must remember to pick up some ribbons before they’re packed away,’ Hannah said, stretching the calico out and painting the line of the ‘T’ a little thicker.

‘I’ll get one now,’ Esther said and Hannah smiled at the speed with which her cousin threw down her brush, rose to her feet and pulled off her gloves, throwing them on to the pile of calico scraps which was growing in the centre of the room.

She sat back on her haunches and eased her neck as Esther clutched her pale blue skirt and apron close to her and wove her way between the women who were working and talking, crouched on the floor like she was. It was good to work with colleagues who had become friends. The old dining-room was transformed. The desks used on Sundays were pushed against the walls for today but they would have to be moved back before the women left.

Frances had given Hannah the remains of the stain that her suffragists had used to paint their banners when they had marched to the Albert Hall but now, Hannah thought with satisfaction, it was the turn of the suffragettes. Hannah swept the hair which fell forward on to her face back into her bun, smelling the stain again, feeling the sweep of anticipation which had been growing since news of the march had reached them. Suffragettes would be converging on London from all over the country on Midsummer’s Day but before that there was all this work to do. Hannah looked around her. Everywhere in the country women would be painting and cutting and hammering their banners, their flags and their regalia. They would be gathering supporters, enlisting new members, arranging transport, determined that Asquith should never be able to say again that women’s suffrage had no support in the country.

‘What will Arthur say?’ Esther said and Hannah looked up, startled, as her cousin dangled three ribbons in front of her. She pointed to the black marks on Hannah’s hands. ‘You look like some dreadful washerwoman, Hannah. It’s not fair on him. He does have a position to maintain, you know.’

Hannah hushed her, looking round to see if her Sunday pupil had heard but she had not. ‘Maureen is a washerwoman,’ she hissed.

‘But she is not about to marry a Lord’s son,’ Esther replied sharply.

Hannah snapped, ‘And neither am I, not immediately anyway and if a bit of black stain ruins the man’s prospects it doesn’t say much for the position or the man.’ She took the ribbons with two clean fingertips and put them in the pocket of her apron; they were smooth and cool.

‘Let’s leave the banner to dry for a while and then we’ll attach it to the poles. Are you any good with a hammer?’ she asked, enjoying the look of horror on Esther’s face before pushing herself to her feet with a groan. Her knees were sore from kneeling all morning but her feet would be sorer still by the time they had walked the route of the procession. She hoped that this June would not be too hot.

It was not and the day dawned fresh and bright. The previous week Hannah had edged their white banner with purple and green once the stain had dried.

Now her group stood amongst the ranks upon ranks of women, holding their poles, which were heavy now and would be heavier still by the time they reached Hyde Park. Those who had been in prison wore white and held white pennants. Hannah tried not to hear Esther as she complained that no one could see her hat and that they must force their way to the edge of the procession so that her dress could be seen. But at least she was here, where Hannah could keep her busy for Harry.

‘Stand still for now,’ Hannah ordered. ‘We’ll move across before the start.’

Sylvia Pankhurst had designed borders for some of the banners and Hannah looked up at theirs and wished that Joe could have come up after all to design hers as he had hoped to be able to do, but the house was too full, he had written, and she knew that this was true for she and Frances had sent the families down last week, chosen from the ones that came on Sundays as usual.

‘There are so many here,’ Esther breathed, looking round.

‘It’s wonderful, isn’t it?’ Hannah said.

‘It would be, if I was on the edge,’ Esther murmured and Hannah gripped her pole more firmly, wanting to tip it hard on to that perfect green hat with the purple ostrich feather. But instead she looked about her and, seeing a gap, eased a way through, pulling Esther as she went until they were at the edge of the procession.

‘I do not want to hear one more word from you,’ she said. ‘And what if your father should see you?’ she asked.

‘Oh, he won’t be watching but he said I was to behave myself,’ Esther replied and Hannah laughed in her amazement. Uncle Thomas was quite extraordinary because not only did he not seem to object to Esther being involved in this political fight, he was in fact pleased that she was busy during the day teaching, and spending much of her other free time with Hannah and the suffragettes. Perhaps he also wanted Esther to wait for Harry, Hannah thought, and for the first time it occurred to her that Harry might indeed return with the wealth he had spoken of so often.

‘The leaders are marching,’ the woman in front told them, ‘so we’ll be ready soon.’

Hannah turned to the row behind her and passed on the message, grinning at Esther and lifting her head, not looking at the people who watched from the sidelines but aware of them. It was pride that coursed through her. Pride that women would travel from seventy towns on special trains and take part in the seven processions that were at this moment heading for Hyde Park. Pride that all these women felt as she did. How could Asquith ignore them now?

They were moving at last, the women in front hoisting their banners. She nodded at Esther and they did likewise and the seven miles did not seem long and she barely noticed the ache in her arms as she held the banner aloft. Esther changed places with a woman who waved a flag and so Hannah had a different partner and they talked of the north where she came from and the strength of feeling that was building in the provinces as well as the capital. The police directed traffic and allowed the procession to proceed without halting at any junctions. Any jeers were drowned by the louder cheers from within the spectators.

At Hyde Park they were able to drop their banners in a pile near the entrance and it was a relief to feel grass beneath their shoes instead of hard roads and to know that there was time now to walk around and listen as speakers talked of political liberty from twenty platforms. Esther clutched Hannah’s arm and walked with her from platform to platform through the thousands of women who were hot, who ached, who thrilled at the sight and sound of this display of power. Hannah craned her neck watching Christabel Pankhurst but not hearing her above the noise of the crowds. She heard one woman say that there were more than a quarter of a million people here, mostly women.

As they walked beneath the trees seeking shade Hannah heard how decorated buses had been driven through the streets and steam-driven launches bearing suffragettes had halted opposite the terrace of the House of Commons to lobby MPs taking tea and she hoped they had developed indigestion.

She and Esther ate the sandwiches which Beatrice had prepared and the cucumber was moist and the bread too. They drank cold lemon tea, which Esther said should have been champagne but Hannah replied that they did not need it because the air was so full of celebration.

They talked to women without introduction. They cheered along with thousands more when the resolution was carried ‘that this meeting calls upon the Government to grant votes to women without delay’. They cheered again when a letter was sent to Asquith by special messenger informing him of this resolution and asking what action his Government intended to take in response to this display of support for female suffrage. At last the women knew that he could not deny the proof of this mass meeting.

The next day he replied negatively to the letter and so votes for women were no nearer at all and Hannah could not bear the disappointment, the rejection, but she knew that she must for the Pensions Bill was not yet law. So she watched from behind with many others as a deputation of thirteen suffragettes set out ten days later to present a further plea to Asquith at the House of Commons.

She saw the police, big men in dark blue, barring the women from the House. She saw the Inspector informing them that Asquith refused to receive them. Esther was with her now. She had joined her late from a dress fitting. There were others too, many others who had met in Parliament Square and then crossed to Westminster, hearing the news of the police out in force to bar women from the place where the laws which governed women were made, and to which, in this democratic country, they were denied access.

She saw the height and the breadth of the policemen and she also saw her father in the dark of his house, his body as he loomed near her, and fear clutched at her as well as anger and, for now, the two were equal. Some women in their rage took a boat to the terrace, others entered Palace Yard by cab. Only one infiltrated the building. Arrests were made and Hannah heard the next day as she shared lunch with Frances before taking the afternoon lessons that twenty-seven women had been imprisoned.

‘Do men consider us such a terrible enemy?’ she asked again but aloud this time.

Frances heard the darkness in her voice and knew that it was beginning for Hannah and she fought to keep her voice level.

‘It seems somehow quite absurd,’ Frances said, ‘and the public do seem to be appalled at such draconian measures as well. Let’s hope their support continues and the Government might well change its mind.’ Her knuckles were white on her fork and she hoped that Hannah had not noticed but then she saw that hers were too and that the girl was not aware of anything at this table; that her eyes were on some distant scene.

That night window-breaking began and Number 10 Downing Street was one of the first to be struck. The perpetrators received two months in prison.

Hannah fought down her fear and continued to wait for the Pensions Bill to become law.

Harry stood looking at the headgear in the light from the moon, knowing that after today he would not be seeing it again. He felt his horse stir beneath him and leant forward, rubbing his hand along the sleek neck. Arthur would approve of this animal; he must write and tell him. The trader had asked too much of course but after three years out here in all the squalor and the dirt, the opulence and extravagance, he had longed for something of real beauty.

‘And you are that something, Kim,’ he crooned softly.

Baralong, his mate, had nodded when the trader brought Kim forward from the string of animals tied to the back of his wagon, but only slightly so that Frank would not notice the movement, for there must be no friendship between black and white, must there?