Summer's End (39 page)

The words seemed familiar, and after a moment she recalled Shaw's
Pygmalion.
She spoke briskly. ‘So, Lord Banning, have the police, and I shall not diminish the number of their opportunities.'

‘I understood Mrs Pankhurst had suspended suffragist activity. And pray, Miss Lilley, do not grasp that suitcase handle so firmly. The footman would take it as a slight to his professional status.' He took the case from her hand and set it down.

‘That is so. But Christabel Pankhurst has made their attitude quite clear. I heard her speak in the London Opera House. If the Kaiser were to win this war, all hope of the vote for women would be lost. Besides, we have sought for a long time to be regarded as men's equals in our daily lives. It follows we must be part of this war; if not marching with the troops then doing everything we can to support them, and to encourage them to go.'

‘Help recruitment, you mean?'

‘Certainly. Too many men will do nothing – it is their nature – unless shamed into going by their womenfolk.'

‘And what of those who do not believe in violence, Miss Lilley? And pray do sit down. I feel I am at a public meeting, and I cannot sit unless you will.'

Against her will she laughed, and obeyed, recognising a foe who, although he did not use her weapons, was worthy of her mettle. ‘You want me to say there is a difference between fighting to defend the cause of right and fighting on the offensive, so that you can point out there were no such moral issues when I burned churches. I won't oblige you, Lord Banning. I merely say I must help beat the enemy by encouraging recruitment at the moment and, when I am completely well, by using any and all means at my disposal.'

‘You're not looking your best,' he agreed. ‘I daresay Holloway is to blame.'

‘Do not tease me, Lord Banning, if you please. I assure you that aspiring to be a womanly woman is not part of my convalescence. Planning how other women are to be made a little less wretched is.'

‘I assure you, Miss Lilley, that working for the WSPU, the Women's Emergency Corps, the Women's Convoy Corps, the FANYs, the Women's National Service League, or any of the other thousand or so organisations now fighting for the war effort, has no bearing on whether or not you are a womanly woman.'

‘And what has? The trailing of admirers calling at my door – or rather your door – with bouquets of flowers?'

‘No.' He smiled at her.

‘What then?' she asked, impatient with such trivialities.

‘Yourself alone. The same imp of self that has sent my daughter galloping off on her white metaphorical charger to Serbia with Lady Paget's mission.'

Tilly trod carefully on this delicate ground. ‘It must be a great worry to you, Lord Banning, but she is a resourceful as well as a brave girl.'

He said nothing for a moment, pressing the tips of his fingers together in a clichéd gesture, she noticed. Whatever would come would be a diplomatic cover over deep water. ‘Her decision was made on humanitarian grounds, to help the Serbs, not the cause of women's role in society. Male surgeons accompany the unit. Leila – Lady Paget – was the most unlikely person, so it seemed, to have
organised such an enterprise. But that was a verdict I made based on my acquaintance with her before the war. Now everything and everyone must be reappraised in the light of changed circumstances. We are all called to our personal colours, Miss Lilley. Therefore how can I presume to comment on yours? And in such a spirit I suggest you remain under my roof.'

Tilly eyed him doubtfully – and took up the challenge. ‘You are kind indeed, Lord Banning. I shall remain – regardless of our joint reputations – until my activities displease you.'

‘Then I may send the cab away?'

‘You may.'

‘I have in fact already done so. A glass of sherry, Miss Lilley?'

‘H
e is still missing.' Felicia sat on the edge of her bed on the Monday evening. ‘Sir John can't tell me
anything
other than that it's hard to get information with the army across the Marne and on the move. I suppose it's encouraging –' her voice trembled for the first time – ‘that he's not on the casualty lists for the first four weeks, but then I remember that the new lists are only for those lost during the Marne battles. Daniel was lost much earlier and if there
were
terrible news it wouldn't now be in the lists. So Sir John says,' she added forlornly.

‘He might be a prisoner.' It was hard for Caroline to sound positive about this, faced as she was with Felicia's stoical attitude, and feeling all the worse because of her own relatively good news about Reggie.

‘No. He's lost – at least to me.'

Caroline longed to ask how Felicia could be so sure, but she knew it would be no use. Felicia probably did not know herself, so how could she explain? If it were Reggie, she too might have that certain knowledge. Caroline pushed that fear away; it prowled in circles round her continuously, kept away by the bright camp-fire of her own determination. If she let her guard down, the nightmare would close in. The idea that had been formulating in her own mind, however, suddenly gained strength. What if Felicia were to come too? That might prove the way for her to endure this time of terrible suspense. ‘Felicia,' she urged, convinced she was right. ‘You remember I told you the Red Cross are asking for volunteers to travel with Mrs St Clair Stobart to set up hospitals for the wounded in Antwerp. I want to apply, so why don't you come too?'

‘Me?' It was hard to tell Felicia's reaction from her tone.

‘I know what we are doing in the Royal Herbert is valuable work and that we have to be trained, but someone will be needed to scrub basins and empty bed-pans there too. Why not us, if the Red Cross would sanction it? Just as Reggie and Daniel felt they ought to go abroad to fight the enemy, so should we. If women are equal to men,
we too should go to the front line, even if we're not carrying muskets. Lots of this year's debutantes have already gone abroad. The Munro Corps is leaving at any moment for Belgium, taking an ambulance unit. Lady Dorothie Fielding is going with it – remember her? – and one girl, Mairi Chisholm, is your age, eighteen.'

Felicia said nothing but Caroline could see she was listening, and grew even more enthusiastic.

‘I'm going to apply, Felicia. That way I feel I'm standing at Reggie's side. Mrs St Clair Stobart is leaving on the 20th, and I'm determined to be with her. Do come. We could even suggest it to Eleanor.' They had been amazed to hear that Eleanor had actually defied the Gorgon and offered her services as a VAD in Tunbridge Wells, and was just about to get her initial certificate in first aid.

Felicia spoke at last. ‘Yes, ‘I'll come if they'll have me. It will be one way of shouting “No” to the Kaiser, just as Daniel did.' She jumped off the bed. ‘We'll do it tomorrow.'

‘Elizabeth.' Laurence didn't stop to ask if she were busy this time. He almost ran into the boudoir to find her; as usual she was surrounded by heaps and heaps of knitted garments donated by enthusiastic volunteers, ranging from scarves that could have enfolded entire platoons from their length, gloves, ‘comforters', and baby clothes for sailors' wives. Why the latter should be particularly necessary now was a matter of bewilderment to Elizabeth, but she had obediently followed Edith Swinford-Browne's excited instructions. ‘I have the strangest news from Sir John.'

‘News of Daniel?' Elizabeth dropped the pile of comforters.

‘No. Maud has disappeared.'

‘
What?
' Elizabeth sat down faintly in the basket chair, conjuring up an image of a pantomime Maud vanishing in a puff of smoke.

‘Eleanor returned from her first aid course after three days away to find her mother gone, and the staff ignorant as to her whereabouts. Sir John is alarmed for her sanity.'

‘You mean suicide?' Elizabeth was blunt. ‘No, Laurence, Maud is not of such stuff as that.'

‘She may be very disturbed.'

‘Which would spur her on, not defeat her. Remember the year the peach trees were so diseased the gardener insisted on burning them
down, and she personally sprayed them with soap and water, willing them to survive, and they did?'

‘This is not quite the same as peach trees.'

‘It is her reaction to crisis – relative, of course.' Elizabeth remembered her own emotions and the terrors that had raced through her mind when Isabel was in Paris, and multiplied them several times. She realised what must have happened to Lady Hunney. ‘If I were she, Laurence, I would go in search of my son.'

‘Even Maud could not storm her way through to the battle front: it is still on the move. She would find herself in German-occupied territory.'

‘Only the advanced dressing stations move with the army, surely.' Elizabeth was convinced she was right. ‘If he is still alive, he could have been moved. Has Sir John made enquiries at the Foreign Office to see if she has applied for permission to travel to France, and a passport?'

‘I do not know. All that is known is that the Lanchester was found at the Tunbridge railway station, but the chauffeur did not take it there.'

‘Then Maud drove herself, and has taken a railway train.'

‘Times are out of sorts indeed.' There was no humour in Laurence's comment; he meant it, and Elizabeth understood him perfectly. Two months ago the idea of Lady Hunney driving herself to take a train would have been ridiculous. Now it seemed quite rational.

‘I will go to see Eleanor immediately.' Elizabeth ignored the afternoon pile for the post office and went to find her hat.

Mrs Dibble waylaid her on her way out and from the look on her face there was no gainsaying the summons.

‘We'll have to make do, Mrs Lilley.' The folded arms and ominous tones meant time had to be found to deal with this problem. ‘Mrs Thorn's put banister brushes up to one shilling and sixpence. And we're running low on tea. Costs going up and my budget going down. It's not right, surely.'

‘It's the war, Mrs Dibble. Our
income
's going down. So many farmers really won't be able to pay their Michaelmas tithes this time because of hardship. We must be prepared.'

‘If they don't pay you money, stands to reason they should pay you in kind. We'll have the corn.'

‘I'm afraid they don't see it that way any more.' Indeed the farmers did not. There was already enough resentment over paying tithes, without the extra burdens that war had unexpectedly thrust upon them. Rents, yes, that was considered fair, but tithes were a different matter.

Mrs Dibble paused, awaiting her moment. ‘And there's poor Mrs Hubble.'

‘What of her?'

‘She's had one.'

‘One what?'

‘I heard in the post office only an hour ago. The telegram.'

‘What –' Elizabeth broke off. ‘Not her son?'

‘Killed in action. God rest him.'

‘I shall go to her.' Eleanor must wait; shared anxiety must give way to present grief. Until war had come, one decided one's own priorities; war now took command and decided them for you. Tim Hubble had helped Percy out in the Rectory gardens on occasion before he signed on in the Regular Army, they all knew him, and now he was dead.

This afternoon the carrier would be delivering the green window holland she had had to order for blinds for the whole of the Rectory to conform with the Emergency Light orders. She was unsure whether this was to save fuel or in expectation of the enemy in the air. Surely the former, for the idea of the latter was inconceivable. How the Germans would see their dim oil lamps from the sky was a mystery to Elizabeth, and surely no aeroplane or Zeppelin would dare cross to England anyway. But laws were laws. Unfortunately cost was cost. Try as she would, she could not avoid the uncomfortable feeling that Percy was up to no good on the matter of fuel. The coalman had paid a suspicious number of trips to the coal cellar yesterday, after there had been rumours of the price of coal rising steeply. They must burn wood, she decided. It was a pity they were not sufficiently near the Forest to claim the right of estover, in gathering peat for fuel and wood for burning.

Sometimes she glanced with some amusement at the ‘What women may do' column daily in
The Times.
There seemed to be so many vital tasks for women that she wondered how the country had managed to fare without these helpful hints before. Very few of them had any relevance to her. Or perhaps ‘Keep calm and hopeful' was
aimed at Elizabeth Lilley. Or sewing nightingales as inspired by Florence for the wounded in the Crimea. Or making comforting puddings. No, there were no rules.
The Times
had no guidelines for the vast majority of women, merely eager ideas, and those spouted out in profusion all around her and all over the country. It was becoming patriotic not to indulge in luxuries, and as a result the luxury food market was collapsing bringing hardship to many thousands who worked within it; it was becoming patriotic not to clothe oneself extravagantly, and already Mrs Hazel was complaining of the slackening trade as women decided not to order dresses for the new season. Once there was a river of life in the Rectory which flowed swiftly but safely with herself at the helm. Now there were two, no, three rivers of daily life in which the currents were dangerously unpredictable: their private family life, which had suddenly split asunder; the life of Ashden; and what was going on in the catastrophe that had embroiled Europe. It was a situation that needed a greater navigator than herself.

It was five o'clock on Friday 18th September when Caroline and Felicia arrived home unannounced after a tedious train journey with two changes. The railway trains were crowded, and their arrival bore little relation to timetables. Felicia bore it calmly. Caroline did not, and was hot, cross, and not the least excited about their coming departure from England. By the time they arrived at the Rectory, her spirits and enthusiasm had somewhat recovered.

‘Antwerp? Tomorrow?' Elizabeth cried. No sooner was she over the shock and delight of seeing her daughters back than this terrible news was broken. ‘But that's in
Belgium.
'

‘Of course, Mother. That's where the war is.' Caroline laughed. ‘It's no use going to a nice safe hospital in Boulogne – it's at the front that we are needed.'

‘But you are both so young and inexperienced.'

‘And both so strong and willing,' Caroline countered firmly. ‘There's no danger. It's a port, so we can be taken off by ship at a moment's notice.' It sounded good but she didn't have the faintest idea whether it was true or not.

‘But darlings, men will be wounded.' Elizabeth felt helpless. How could she point out once more that the men would have to be washed and administered to in intimate detail, and not in a clean
scrubbed hospital, perhaps, but straight from a battlefield into a tent? Her imagination ran riot. She had been so careful to shield her daughters' modesty, and George's too. ‘Who is in charge? The Red Cross?'

‘The Belgian Red Cross.'

‘Then Sir John might be able –'

‘No, Mother, we're just two very ordinary as yet untrained orderlies going over to help. We don't need help ourselves. Mrs St Clair Stobart is a superb woman. She refused to be presented at court – just like me, you see. She's worked in the Transvaal, running a shop, she launched the Women's Convoy Corps several years ago, where she drilled and trained women just like us. She went to the Balkan Wars two years ago, and set up a hospital. She knows exactly what she's doing, and now she's started the Women's National Service League. Eleanor wants to apply too, she's passed her exam.'

‘Lady Hunney has vanished. Eleanor may not be able to come.'

‘Vanished?' Caroline giggled, taken by surprise.

‘The family is very worried,' Elizabeth said reprovingly.

‘I hope she returns – Eleanor will be so upset not to come.' Caroline was horrified.

So was Elizabeth. ‘
Hope?
Really, Caroline, have you young people any idea of the agony mothers go through, or do you think it irrelevant? Poor Lady Hunney has gone on a no doubt fruitless mission to find her missing son. She will not find him –' a small exclamation from Felicia – ‘and what kind of a homecoming to find the daughter she relies on for support gone to Antwerp, possibly to be in danger herself?'

Caroline was ashamed. ‘I'm sorry, Mother. I didn't put that well. But I'm afraid I think Eleanor's right to go, despite all you say. Women, and that's what we are, not just daughters, have a right to follow our duty just like men. Surely you can't think that a woman's duty is to be subservient to what her family wants?'

‘Like me?' Elizabeth was still angry.

‘No!' Caroline was truly contrite now, and put her arm round her mother. ‘Of course I didn't mean you. Oh, how can I explain? You stay here, we depend on you, because you have chosen that. We want choice, too. What choice has Eleanor if she must subordinate her will to her mother's?'

‘The choice of choosing love, perhaps.'

‘That love will be stifled if given no air.'

‘Do I,' Elizabeth asked stiffly, ‘give you air?'

‘You allow it,' Caroline said seriously. ‘It is almost the same.'

‘Tomorrow,' Elizabeth observed, mollified, ‘the blinds will be installed over the Rectory windows. Mrs Dibble and I are to finish sewing them tonight. Perhaps they will stifle us here in the Rectory.'

‘Not while the door is open for all in need to enter and for all who must to go out.' Caroline hugged her mother.

‘Where's Phoebe?' Caroline looked round the dinner table, disappointed that on this, their one night at home, there was no sign of her sister. She had been here earlier, so why go out now?