Crooked Pieces (16 page)

At last their sergeant blew his whistle. We laughed and told him he could not carry a tune and to show him, sang out with all our hearts, ‘Rise up, women!’ As we got to the chorus there
came a rumbling like thunder. A dark, angry noise. Not like before. The singing stopped.

Round the corner rode policemen on horses – not trotting as of normal, but charging towards us like cavalry. My heart leapt as it would leave my chest for terror.

We fled up on the pavements. They followed. Back into the road and they came after us. I was sick with fear. I do not care for horses when they are still, but to hear them snorting and whinnying, their eyes all rolling back into their heads, their stinking breath on your neck – I thought I should be trampled where I stood.

The walking policemen now began to shove us this way and that, any way but to the Parliament buildings. We scurried hither and thither, clinging to each other like drowning sailors, yet still, little by little, edging nearer, for we were so many that the police, for all their cruelty, could not contain us.

Far away in the distance I could hear Mrs Drummond.
‘Push. Push for freedom and a better life.’
So I pushed and shoved and wriggled and slithered until at last, breathless, battered, aching, there I was. At the foot of a great flight of steps and, at the top, the mighty Parliament doors.

I fixed my mind on dinner at the Savoy, and galloped like a mad thing all the way up. There a whiskery man in a very odd coat stepped forward to bar my way.

‘Who goes there?’ he asked. I said I went there, to which he replied, ‘In the name of the King, who goes there?’ I was not at all sure what to say to this but had no chance to anyway, for at that moment a big strong hand took hold of my shoulder and a voice said, ‘Now, miss. Better not go any further. You might get lost.’

My bobby. Not mine, but I had come to think of him like that. Well, not that I had thought of him at all, of course. He stood there, so tall and sunny with his crinkly smile that it was like a beam of sunlight going straight through me.

‘I have brought a resolution,’ I told him.

He lifted one eyebrow. ‘Have you?’

‘Yes,’ I said. ‘And I must deliver it.’

‘Who to?’

This I had not considered.

‘I must tell you that I am ordered to prevent such a thing,’ he said most helpfully. ‘And I must request you to descend these steps immediately.’

‘If I will not?’

‘I shall have to take you in hand.’

‘Does that mean arrest me?’ I asked, thinking how cold a cell would be just now.

‘Those are my orders.’

Down below in the square I saw women being herded and thrashed like cattle, squealing and sobbing beneath the bobbies’ truncheons. Still fighting to reach the steps.

‘I have to deliver my resolution.’

My bobby sighed. ‘Then I must do my duty.’ With that, he took me firmly by the arm and led me down the steps. At the bottom he let me go.

‘Am I arrested?’

‘Not yet.’

I stared at him. ‘So I can try again?’

‘If that is your determination.’

Back I went, him following. At the top he took my arm and led me down.

When we had done this six times over and I was about to set off once more, he caught hold of my wrist. ‘Do you remember when I left you at your office, what I said?’

I thought, or pretended to think. ‘That your name is Fred Thorpe?’

He laughed. ‘You remembered. But I also said that if I had cause to escort you back there again I should have to note down your name, miss.’

‘If I am arrested, you will know my name.’

‘Is that what you want?’

‘If I cannot have the vote.’

He looked unsettled. ‘Prison is no place for such as you, miss.’

‘There is no place for such as me if I am not allowed to choose who shall rule over me.’ (This is how Miss Christabel would often end her speech and it always got a cheer, but I felt somewhat guilty, for my bobby plainly thought it came straight out of my head.)

‘Well, miss, I cannot argue against such principles. You will be in good company, I’m sure, for half the ladies of Knightsbridge will be in court tomorrow.’

As if to prove his word, a cry went up that Mrs Despard was taken and, sure enough, she sailed by us, stately as on her way to launch a battleship, trailed by two shrivelled little policemen who looked as they should be laying a red carpet out for her, not setting her before a judge. I have never seen her look so cheery.

In her wake came a throng of women, singing and waving their resolution papers, and alongside hopped a bunch of bobbies, all sweaty from their efforts and grinning like
lunatics. It was hard to guess who had charge of who.

My bobby gave a kind of sigh and let go of my arm. ‘Well, if you will be charged, it shall not be by me.’ And he was gone. I confess I felt a little put out for I had slightly hoped he might walk with me to the police station. I did not have long to wait, however, for it seemed anyone downwind of the Parliament and wearing a skirt was arrested that day.

The next morning we appeared before another judge (quite as puffy as the first). As there were so many, we were sent before him in batches, twelve at a time. It was gone three o’clock when my lot were called and we had had no dinner. Not so the judge, I think, for his fatty face had gone from white to red. Also his words were fuzzy.

We were sent off to some prison fifty miles from London because there was no more room in Holloway. I was not sorry, for surely there is no place more vile than Holloway?

Well, yes there is. There is Aylesbury, where we were crammed together like sheep in a pen and not near so cosy, by my guess. The food was worse, the warders more foul, and there was no knitting. Only potatoes to be picked off a piece of scrubland called The Garden till our backs would hardly straighten. Chapel, morning, noon and night. If I had known there was so much of damnation in the Bible I would never have bothered with trying to be good. Never a word of forgiveness, only ‘Repent. Repent. Repent.’

I have listened to some of the women on my floor. I do not think they are
bad,
like the chaplain would have us believe. Is it
bad
to be so poor you cannot pay a fine for failing on your rent? If you cannot pay your rent, how can you pay a fine that is twice what you owe already? And is it
bad
to lay
with a man for a shilling so you can buy food for your children? And if it is, why is the man not
bad
also? The more I learn, the more I think men do not like women. They like horses better, and dogs, for they do not answer back or ask for justice, no matter how hard or how often they are beaten or kicked.

Is that how we should be? To take what we are given and be glad of it, however little or however ill? And if so, why have women been given great strong brains like Mrs Pankhurst and Miss Sylvia and Miss Christabel, who has taken exams to be a lawyer and come top in them, above all the puffy men, and yet must stand before one and be silenced when she questions his law-making?

And if that is right, and ‘the proper order of things’, as that poxy-faced chaplain keeps telling us, why do we feel it so hard? Surely if we are but creatures to be trained and commanded, we should not mind it, but strive to please our masters? Not rail against our fate and seek for betterment? Why, if we are not to use them, have we been given minds at all? What use are they?

I put this to one of the lifetime women when we were picking the other day. She came as close to laughing as I have ever seen her. ‘Ask the chaplain, why don’t you?’

So I did. He makes a daily visit in case you had forgotten between lunch and dinner just how wicked you are and deserving of the hell fires for all eternity.

‘If it please, Reverend, may I ask a question?’

He looked most surprised, as though such a thing had never been done before. ‘Ahem, ahem, ahem. I think I may allow it. Does it concern the morning text?’

I tried to remember what it had been for I spend most of his sermons thinking about what I would like to eat when I get out.

‘If it please, sir, yes.’

‘Proceed.’

‘Please, sir, if women are not supposed to think and determine for themselves, why has the mighty Lord God given us brains?’

Well, you would think he had been struck by one of his own thunderbolts. Pink, pinker, purple went his face so all his scars turned scaly. His mouth hung open like a pocket. Finally some breath comes back into his lungs. ‘Foul, sinful child.’ He turns to the warder woman. ‘See she has nothing but water till she has cleansed herself of this blasphemy.’ And off he puffs, so I never did get my answer. I wasn’t sure how long it would take to cleanse me, but next morning the lifetime woman slipped me a piece of bread for she had heard him bellowing and was sorry for telling me to ask. I said it was no matter for I had wanted to know the answer.

‘And do you?’

‘No.’

She shook her head. ‘Don’t look for answers in this life.’

But I will. And maybe, one day, the fog will start to clear.

While we have been locked up great things have happened. It seems that all the arrests that night stirred the public to action at last, and many have complained at our treatment to the newspapers, so now a Member of Parliament is to put forward a private bill on our behalf! It is not Mr Hardie, either, but another man called Mr Dickinson, so that’s two good men in the world – well, three, for I think my bobby has
all the makings of a thoroughly good man, and he is handsome, which the other two are not.

Poor Mrs Pankhurst has lost her job. The authorities in her home town said she must choose – either to return and fulfil her duties or resign from her post as registrar. Though she smiles and says it is no matter and the Cause is all, I know she feels it strongly, for she is not a wealthy woman, as some would think.

Mr Dickinson’s bill has been thrown out. We held another ‘Parliament’ to protest. Miss Christabel urged us all to march and keep on marching till we got inside the Parliament.

‘Seize the mace and you will be the Cromwells of the twentieth century!’

I did not know who either were, but everybody cheered and off we charged. I think I only escaped arrest for not knowing where to start looking. Since I was getting nowhere I thought I should go back to the office where at least I could type a few letters or stick some stamps on.

It was on my way there that I met Fred Thorpe. He was walking towards me and when he saw me his face broke out in a great golden smile. ‘Good day to you, miss. I had feared you might be on your way to court again.’

‘I should have been if…’

‘If what?’

‘If I had not been distracted from my task.’

‘How so?’

‘I was to seize the mace,’ I told him. ‘But he was not in his usual place.’ (This was only a small lie, for he might very well not have been.)

My bobby looked for a moment as though he would laugh
out loud, but he straightened up and said in a most serious voice. ‘Was he not? Well, that is most unfortunate. For you, if not for him.’

I said, ‘It is no wonder the bill cannot get passed if men like the mace are absent from their duties.’

He nodded gravely. ‘It must certainly hold things back. And where are you off to now?’

‘To my office. There is much to do.’

‘Will you let me walk with you?’

‘Are you not needed to arrest defenceless women?’ (I do not know how I got so bold, but Miss Christabel says that is what we are.)

Fred Thorpe shrugged his shoulders. ‘I think they can manage without me for today. Truth is, I am not very good at it, as you yourself are witness.’

‘Well, at least you are good at finding streets for people,’ I said, for I did not want him to think me quite unfeeling.

He smiled. ‘And I’m also good at finding out people’s names, Miss Maggie Robins.’

I stopped dead. ‘How do you know that?’

‘Oh, it’s easy enough. I saw it in the police station when you went to court.’

‘There were fifty or more of us that day.’

‘Yes, but only one from Argyle Place.’

‘You must be very good at catching villains,’ I said, ‘if you remember things like that.’

‘It’s my job. Anyway, I enjoy it.’

‘Remembering things, or catching villains?’

‘Both. But most of all I enjoy listening to music in the park on a sunny Sunday afternoon.’

‘Oh yes. That’s grand. I went with my brother once. All the bandsmen had uniforms. They looked like soldiers. And afterwards we had ices at a tearoom and sat outside and watched the swans.’

‘Would you like to do that again?’

‘Oh yes. But Frank’s away at sea. And anyway…’

‘With me, I mean.’

I stared at him.

‘We could go this Sunday if it’s fine. Or are you off getting arrested somewhere?’

‘Not on a Sunday. The Parliament men don’t work at weekends.’

‘Well then?’

I felt all pink. ‘I don’t know. I’ve never…’

‘Been out with a bobby before?’

I could have said ‘with a man’, but instead I just nodded like a great ninny.

‘You’ll come to no harm, Maggie. I promise you. And I’ll see you safe home after, so you don’t get lost.’

I laughed and he smiled, too. ‘I’ll call for you at three o’clock.’

My heart started pounding in panic. ‘What if it rains?’

‘We’ll go to a gallery. Did your brother ever take you to one of those?’

‘I don’t think so. Do they have ices?’

He smiled. ‘I’ll make sure of it.’

He left me outside the office. I hoped no one was watching for I really did not think I could take more twitting just right then.

When I got in Miss Kerr and Miss Lake wanted to know
what had happened at the rally, who had been taken, if any were injured? I was ashamed that my head was so full of Fred Thorpe and Sunday that I could hardly turn my thoughts to answering them.

It is as well I am so busy for else I should go mad with trying to decide which blouse to wear and whether to have my hair up in a roll, or brushed straight down with a ribbon at the back to keep it neat. Straight is easier, but a roll makes me look much older – at least sixteen, Mrs Garrud said, when I tried it out on her. I wonder how old Fred Thorpe is. At least twenty, I would say. He must be to be so fine and confident, and to know so many streets and to go to galleries. He will very quickly tire of me. I asked Miss Sylvia if she had any books on music I could borrow and she brought me a whole pile, but they are full of black squiggles with only a little bit of writing so it is more a mystery than ever to me. Perhaps I should pray for rain, but then my hair will get wet and go all straggled like string.