A Woman's Place (9 page)

Then she saw him. He was buying an evening paper from the newsboy by the entrance. Now elation turned to indecision. Should she say hello or just walk by? She had spoken to him only that once. She didn’t know his name and it wasn’t a young lady’s place to make the first move, yet if she ignored him he would think her stand-offish and keep his distance from then on. She could of course pause to buy a newspaper …

Hurrying forward, purse at the ready, she came to stand beside him, selecting the
Evening Standard
, all she could think to pick up, very seldom buying a paper. To her joy he looked at her.

‘Hello, again!’ His voice held a cheery ring. ‘I never thought to see you a third time. Do you catch the same train every Saturday?’

She normally didn’t, but she’d come away early, not to get home quickly but to leave Eveline with that young man. Also at the back of her mind was the knowledge that this particular train had twice held her own quarry and could again. That hope of course had been realised.

‘I have done so these last few weeks,’ she said truthfully.

He handed a penny to the newsboy and then another. ‘For the young lady’s paper,’ he said.

‘Oh, no, please don’t!’ The action flustered her. ‘Please, you mustn’t!’

Her protest seemed to be ignored. ‘So will you be on the same train, say next week?’

‘I don’t know. I hope … I mean I might …’

She tailed off, anxious not to commit herself too much. ‘Please, you must let me pay for my newspaper.’

He was smiling. ‘I wouldn’t dream of it,’ he said lightly, folding his own paper under his arm.

She couldn’t go on protesting but she had to say something. ‘I … I thought I saw you run by my carriage, the end one. Did you get in the next one along?’

‘Full. I had to dash on to the one after that. Made it only by the skin of my teeth in fact.’

That was why she hadn’t seen him get out; her eyes had been trained only on the carriage in front of hers. ‘Saturday afternoon trains are always pretty full, people going home,’ she said in an effort to make small talk. ‘You said you work in a bank?’

‘That’s right.’ He was eyeing the leaden sky and began unfastening the long, black umbrella he carried. He was in a hurry to be away. Connie’s heart sank.

‘I’d best be on my way then,’ she said inadequately. ‘Before it really comes down.’

‘Haven’t you a brolly?’

‘I didn’t think it would rain.’

‘Then, look – we’ll use mine. I’ll see you home, safe and dry.’

‘Oh, no.’ She had visions of her father seeing her with a strange man. ‘It’s all right, I’ll try to get a taxi.’

He smiled. It was a gentle, kindly smile. ‘Why waste money? Please – allow me to escort you. I’m sorry, I don’t know your name.’

It was usual for a young lady of her standing to rely on a third party to make introductions, but that world was changing, and after all wasn’t she a suffragette, working for women’s rights, and not just to get the vote? So she should flout the old niceties. She would let him walk her home.

‘My name is Constance Mornington,’ she offered without hesitation.

‘George Towers,’ he obliged and crooked an arm for her to take, which she did, aware of warmth even through her thin black leather glove.

It seemed the most natural thing walking beside him under the one umbrella. With her other hand she lifted her skirt clear of the now wet pavement; she told herself that holding his arm was merely to keep them both dry.

There was a wonderful sense of ease between them, even to the extent of laughing together as her large and cumbersome hat got in his way to be knocked slightly sideways so that she had to stop twice to readjust it.

Conversation too came quite naturally as though they had known each other for ages. By the time they’d gone the ten minutes to her home, she knew all about him.

He said he lived with his widowed mother in rented accommodation; that she was ailing with a heart condition, so that looking after her impeded any social life he might have had; that, and not a lot of money coming in.

‘Only my wages,’ he said. ‘I’m merely a bank clerk. Had I not lost my father, who worked there and would have spoken up for me, I might have had promotion by now, but that’s how things go. I could have done worse.’

He spoke with no bitterness, almost as if amused by the tricks fate could play on a person.

She in turn told him about her own life, managing to play down her family’s high standing. She even had him laughing as she described her shocking rejection of the young man her father had wished her to become engaged to.

‘I don’t think he’ll ever forgive me,’ she giggled, hearing him chuckle. It seemed to matter little to him that her family were well off and he wasn’t.

At the gate of the drive she broke away from him for all her determination to appear emancipated, fearing her family seeing her with this strange man. Thankfully her house was shielded from the road by trees.

‘This is where I live,’ she stated. ‘I’ll be fine from here.’

He grimaced up at the now steady rain. ‘It’s starting to come down a bit. The least I can do is to see you to your door.’

‘No,’ she said in alarm. ‘It’s a short step. I shall run.’

He hovered. ‘Will I see you on the train next week? I could wait for you.’

‘I don’t know. I can’t say.’ But he was looking so hopeful and she wanted so much for him to meet her. Suddenly she knew that even if there were no meeting next week, she would go into London just to catch that particular train home. He’d said he would be waiting for her.

‘Come to think of it, I expect I will be catching the same train.’ This surely was being quite mad.

‘Splendid!’ he burst out. ‘Then, same time, same place?’

‘Yes. And thank you for the paper. You really shouldn’t have. A lady shouldn’t accept gifts from a man she has hardly—’

‘A penny,’ he broke in with a laugh. ‘Hardly a gift.’

She found herself laughing with him but saying she must go.

Moving off and forgetting to thank him for escorting her home through the rain, she hurried up the driveway, almost breathless with excitement. Somehow it did not matter that he obviously had very little money. All she knew was that she could hardly wait to see him again.

Mum was being awkward. ‘Always swarming off out, you are,’ she flared at Eveline as May got up to clear away their tea. ‘Bad enough Fridays and Saturdays but it’s Tuesday. Yer’ve just come in from work an’ look at yer, golloped down yer tea like you ’adn’t two minutes ter spare. I s’pose yer off now ter put on yer glad rags. Can’t even stop to ’elp yer sister. What’s so special about tonight?’

Eveline smothered her frustration and turned back to at least offer them a token helping hand. Not to have done so would start an argument and delay her all the more. The pageant was her first ever rally, the last thing she wanted was to be late. Laurence had said he would be there waiting for her.

‘I’m meeting someone,’ she said, helping to gather up the dirty plates.

Her mother took them from her to regard her closely. ‘Is it this new bloke you met?’

‘I don’t want him to think I’ve let him down.’

Her father glanced up from his paper. ‘If he’s orright, he’ll wait.’

Mum ignored him. ‘Serious then, is it?’

Was she thinking this might be the one and didn’t want to spoil her daughter’s chances? There was nothing to do here this evening but watch her darn Dad’s socks, him with his face in his evening paper, May with hers in a penny magazine, Jimmy and Bobby at the table playing draughts. Little Alfie was already in bed. Len would be out with his mates. Even so, her mother had to have one last dig.

‘I wouldn’t mind, Ev, but yer don’t do a thing around the place.’

At home she was called Ev. Having gone to the trouble of giving her a nice name, Mum and Dad spoiled it by shortening it to that horrid-sounding one.

‘I do as much as I can,’ she protested. ‘But I work all the week. I’m not out every night.’

May caught her eye and smiled apologetically, but Mum wasn’t done yet.

‘It’s practic’ly getting that way. There’s me and yer dad slaving in the shop all day ter keep this family together and all you can think of is looking after yer own pleasure.’

Dad looked up. ‘Yer Mum’s right, gel. Yer should stay in more.’

He turned back to his paper, seldom interfering in what Mum said unless something concerned him personally.

True, he did work hard in his shop, on his feet all day. But once the shop closed, his paperwork done, all he wanted to do was put them up.

Dad’s feet were the most noticeable thing about him, slightly splayed out. ‘Quarter-to-three feet,’ Mum called them; it gave him a somewhat flat-footed gait. Like a lot of East End Cockneys, he was wiry and pale, but he made up for it with a mane of tawny hair, which he plastered flat with Brilliantine, hardly a strand of grey anywhere. His walrus moustache too was tawny, stained by the strong tea he drank.

It was from that moustache that he now noisily sucked the drains of his teacup as he settled back to his paper.

Looking over at him, Eveline briefly wondered how he and Mum had ever got together. She at forty-one still showed traces of the beauty she had once been and stood an inch or so taller than him. He’d probably been handsome once or Mum wouldn’t have chosen him. She often said she had been a choosy one. Eveline herself was choosy and this time it seemed her choosiness might be paying off with the young man, Larry, saying he’d see her at the pageant. She just had to be there.

‘I promise to help twice as much, but not tonight. I can’t not meet him. He’s taking me to the Albert Hall. We’ll be with other people so we won’t be alone. He’s very polite and well brought up.’

Mum looked at her for a long time while May went off to the kitchen with her load. Mum was finally melting, thankfully forgetting to ask what was on at the Albert Hall.

‘Well orright then. But don’t be too late ’ome. And mind you stay with these other people,’ she added with dark warning, but Eveline was already making for her bedroom to change into her best skirt and blouse, her coat and new hat. When she reappeared, Mum followed her to the door.

‘Remember ter stay with other people,’ her voice trailed after her as Eveline hurried down the stairs to the side door by the shop. ‘Yer don’t know ’im enough yet ter be alone. That’s of course if he meets yer. Remember, be ’ome by ten or yer dad’ll ’ave somethink ter say. Ten o’clock, remember.’

‘Ten thirty, Mum,’ Eveline called up.

‘Orright, but not a minute—’

Closing the street door behind her, Eveline didn’t catch the rest.

It was a gusty evening, overcast skies bringing in the dusk all the quicker. Eveline craned her neck to see over the thousand or more women milling under the trees of Eaton Square to join their respective blocks before moving off. It was going to be hard finding Laurence Jones-Fairbrook in this crowd. That was if he’d really intended to be here. Mum’s parting remark about that now left her uncertain. Perhaps he had been just flirting with her the other afternoon and having weighed her up had changed his mind.

After Connie left, he’d lingered on, asking where she lived, what she did. He’d volunteered nothing about himself and she’d not had the cheek to ask, but he hadn’t seemed put off by what she told him about herself.

He had said he’d be at the pageant but he hadn’t really struck her as being one of those men who sympathised with or even worked for the suffragettes’ cause. Was it was only on a whim that he’d said he’d be here, adding that if they didn’t find each other in the throng in Eaton Square he would probably look out for her when the rally reached the Royal Albert Hall.

Thinking of it, her excitement at this bustling crowd that had set her blood tingling slipped away. What a fool she was to imagine someone like him would be interested in someone like her. But he’d sounded so genuine.

‘I’ll be at the south steps or just inside,’ he’d said jauntily. A little too jauntily it struck her now.

‘Oh, there you are!’

She turned at the sound of Connie’s voice, and in the light of a nearby lantern, hurriedly mustered a welcome smile to cover her disappointment.

‘I hoped you’d come,’ Connie went on. ‘Isn’t it wonderful?’

It was wonderful, thrilling, a sight never to be forgotten. Orderly, dignified, for a second Eveline thought of her father – if he could only see this he would never again view them as what he called frantic females and a thorough waste of time. But her mind wasn’t on Dad or even the wonderful scene here in this brightly lit square, or even on Connie, but on Laurence Jones-Fairbrook.

A woman came up handing out sashes to each person according to the block she would be joining.

‘I’ll see you there,’ called Connie as she donned her sash and went off to find her own group, leaving Eveline to find hers.

Eveline moved off too. There was still no sign of her quarry. Perhaps he had decided to make his own way to the Royal Albert Hall. Or perhaps he had changed his mind after all; he probably had better things to do. Trying not to feel despondent, she found her own group containing secretaries, office workers and the like, all making ready to move off.

Soon the pageant would string itself out into proper order, banners and emblems lit by lanterns hanging from decorated poles like a blaze of stars in the dusk, each block headed by a young Church Brigade lad and flanked by policemen who, if they were expecting trouble, would be doomed to disappointment. This was to be a peaceful procession.

As her group finally began to move she experienced a deep twinge of excitement. She was one of them. A few weeks ago, she’d never have dreamed of being here. But here she was and her heart swelled with the pride she felt.

The procession was long. Connie’s section would be well down Sloane Street, turning into Kensington Road to skirt Hyde Park and nearing its destination, by the time her own section really got started.

It wasn’t a swift march. Orderly and dignified, they walked with a steady but purposeful step, every face, every banner, glowing under the gleam of their lanterns and street gas lamps. Good-humoured, some women even held conversation with the flanking police who so far bore them no ill will.