Vanquished (17 page)

He responded with one of his infuriating shrugs. "Who are we to say that might not be a blessing?"

Could he really be that callused to the loss of a human life? "A blessing! Dear Lord, have you no human feeling at all?"

His mouth dipped downward; his eyes were as bleak as the soot-stained sky above. "Have a look about you, Callie. Can you not see where it is we are?"

Without waiting for her answer, he took hold of her shoulders, turning her so that she was facing across the street to where a clutch of women clustered about a rubbish bin. Hands outstretched, they took turns catching the warmth from the feeble flames coming up from the grate.

"That large and undeniably handsome brick building across from us is the Bryant & May Match Factory. Those women standing outside the entrance all work there as once did that poor devil we just passed."

She angled her head to look back at him. "What of it?"

"Have you never heard of a condition known as phossy jaw?"

As much as it irked her to admit ignorance, she admitted, "No, I haven't."

Sliding his hands from her shoulders, he blew out a breath. It hovered between them for a handful of seconds like pixie dust, a small cloud of crystallized air. "The yellow phosphorous in which the match-heads are dipped is highly toxic," he explained, sounding much as he had when he'd first taken her through the mechanics of photography. "Prolonged contact causes all manner of maladies--burns to the skin, shortness of breath, jaundice. And, in advanced cases such as that woman's, it eats away at bone until teeth and sometimes even pieces of jaw can be pulled out."

"Dear Lord." Callie fought nausea as the few bites of breakfast toast she'd had threatened to come up. She searched Hadrian's face, studying the resolute set of his own lovely squared jaw, before asking, "Is there no cure?"

He shook his head, confirming what she'd already suspected. "Phossy-jaw is fatal, I'm afraid, a cancer of the bone, so no, she is beyond help except for what numbing comfort there's to be found in a bottle. As for the others . . ." He shrugged again, but the intensity of his gaze holding hers told her he was far from past caring. "The company could substitute red phosphorous instead, which is essentially harmless."

"Allow me to guess--yellow phosphorous comes less dear?"

His expression lightened although she had the disconcerting suspicion that inwardly he was laughing at her. "Ah, Callie, you begin to catch on. Beyond that, improving working conditions would go a long way in minimizing the problem if not eliminating it altogether. Better ventilation to increase the flow of fresh air, a separate room where the workers might take their meals rather than eating at their benches, shorter shifts. But then implementing such measures would gnaw away at the owner's profits as surely as yellow phosphorous gnaws away at bone." He jerked his head toward the afflicted woman slumped against the wall. "And God knows we can't have that."

She was coming to see that he cared a great deal more than he let on. "Perhaps at first but surely healthier, happier workers would be more productive in the long term?"

"True, but then, that is at the very heart of the problem. Most people cannot see beyond the here and now. It takes a true visionary to look beyond present circumstances to the future. It takes someone like you."

Had he just paid her yet another compliment? Callie stared at him, trying to decide. Pulling her gaze away, she said, "Excuse me," and started back across the cobbled street.

From behind her, he asked, "Where the devil do you think you're going?"

Not stopping, she called back over her shoulder, "Why, to talk with those women, of course. I'd like to hear firsthand what their conditions are and, more to the point, for what improvements they're striking. Perhaps I can be of some help to them."

He caught up beside her, made as if to grab hold of her elbow again but this time she moved away before he could. "Leave it alone, Callie."

"Rubbish. I'll just dash over and chat for a few minutes and then we'll be on our way."

"Not on your own, you won't."

She whirled about, blocking him with a hand against his chest. "We are women. We settle things not by brawling, but by talking. It is men who use their fists to force their way whereas women employ reason to appeal to one another's sensibilities."

He looked down at her hand, the palm flattened against his sternum. Even though they wore winter coats and gloves, the intimacy of the gesture, and the perfect ease with which she'd touched him, caught her off-guard. She took her hand away.

"You are standing in the middle of Bow, Callie, not some Mayfair drawing room. I've known women who thought nothing of hammering away at one another like prize pugilists. Survival of the fittest is the only rule that applies here, or do you dismiss
Origin of the Species
outright simply because Darwin was a man?"

"We shall see." Leaving him standing on the sidewalk, she turned and walked toward the factory's smoke-charred facade.

Reaching it, she ran a practiced eye over the group congregated about the dustbin. It didn't take her more than a moment to pick out the leader, a rail-thin woman who stood slightly apart from the clutch of shivering bodies. Despite the blustery day, she wore a decades-old bonnet and only a thin calico shawl over her dress, but her air of authority was unmistakable.

Callie cleared her throat, though the women's stiffened stances and wary expressions told her they were well aware of her approach. "Hullo there. May I inquire as to which one of you is acting in the capacity of leader?"

Predictably, the woman with the calico shawl turned to face her. She might have been twenty-five or forty-five, it was impossible to tell. Lines bracketed the corners of her hard eyes and tightly drawn mouth, and the skin stretched over her sharp-boned face was the color of parchment.

"That would be me." The woman planted a knobby fist on either hip and ran her gaze over Callie with a slow thoroughness calculated to intimidate. "Who is it that wants to know?"

Callie stood her ground, the women in the circle stabbing her with hard, appraising stares that ran the gamut from envious to openly hostile. Plain and simple though her clothes might be, in this company they stood out as costly to the point of decadence. Then there was the matter of her name. While the Movement included women of all classes, there were still those working women who viewed the fight for suffrage as the pursuit of the privileged. If any of these women were of such a mind, then owning up to being Caledonia Rivers might well prove more liability than boon.

"For now, perhaps you might think of me as an interested bystander."

The woman scowled. "Then you'd best stand somewhere else. It's serious business we're about, and we've no time for curiosity seekers--or mealy-mouthed do-gooders, either . . ."

The rest of whatever she'd meant to say erupted into a hacking cough. In the throes of it, she pulled a handkerchief from her skirt pocket and, without apology, spat into the worn folds. She stuffed it back inside her pocket but not before Callie glimpsed the bright bloom of blood.

Lifting her gaze to the woman's worn face, she said in her most matter-of-fact tone, "Fair enough. If I say that I am sympathetic to your plight and that I have some experience in organizing protests, would you speak to me then?"

"She don't look like a strikebreaker, Mum."

Callie looked down to the small girl tugging at her skirt. Wide, intelligent eyes peered up at her from a thin, white face.

Addressing herself to the child, she answered, "That's because I'm not. I'm what people call a reformer--a person who works to try and make things better." Ignoring the snickers behind her, she squatted down until she was eye-level with the child. "And may I ask your name?"

"I'm June Brown. And she's me mum." She pointed to the leader.

Glancing back over her shoulder, Callie saw the mother's gaze soften as it rested on her child.
She's the joy of her life,
Callie thought and beyond all reason she felt a pang of envy.

She turned back to the little girl. "I'm pleased to meet you, June Brown. I'm Caledonia. Caledonia Rivers."

Sudden silence surrounded her, making it obvious they knew exactly who and what she was. Beneath her breath, one woman hissed, "Bloody suffragist," but Callie ignored her and held out her hand to the child.

June laid her tiny hand trustingly inside, and Callie felt her heart squeeze in on itself. She could well understand why Mrs. Brown would resign herself to slaving in the living hell of the match factory to keep this precious being fed and clothed.

"I'd be pleased if you'd call me Callie."

Brown eyes solemn, June nodded. "All right then. I like Callie better anyway."

"So do I." Smiling, Callie straightened and turned to face the women who'd moved in to form a circle about her. For a handful of seconds Hadrian's warning flashed through her mind, then she dismissed it. To a woman, the strikers were too tired, too dispirited, and, she suspected, too weak with hunger and despair to raise a hand in violence--particularly to someone who, though an outsider, was willing to help.

The leader stepped toward Callie and extended her hand. "I'm Iris. Iris Brown."

"Mrs. Brown, my pleasure." Callie grasped the roughened hand firmly in hers.

Iris Brown looked down at their clasped hands for a long moment before letting go. Apparently coming to a decision, she turned to indicate the others. "This lot is Doris, Jenny, Annie, Martha, and Old Emma."

"Ladies." Callie acknowledged each woman in turn, expensive kid leather joining hands with moth-eaten wool and bare, chapped skin. Breaking away from the last of the women, Callie asked, "May I ask then what terms you are proposing in order to resume work?"

Iris produced a folded paper from beneath her shawl and passed it to Callie. "I suppose it wouldn't hurt for you to have a look. We've nothing to hide."

"Thank you." Callie unfolded the limp paper and read through the list of demands, a half-dozen or so items scratched out in block letters and with the poor spelling and grammar characteristic of young children. Even so, the women were clear about what changes they wanted implemented. Elimination of the current system of fines--three pence to one shilling for talking, dropping matches, or going to the loo without the permission of the shift manager; a half-day's pay in punishment for lateness. Although the "offenses" were so minor as to be absurd, the fines didn't seem to Callie to be overly harsh . . . until someone explained that a week's wage was only five shillings.

Five shillings! From the little she'd read of sweatshop labor, she'd understood that working conditions in the factories were substandard at best, abysmal at worst. Even so, she hadn't realized the situation was this bad.

She skimmed the rest of the demands--a separate room in which to take meals so that the women wouldn't have to eat at their workbenches, an increase in pay to six shillings a week, and a half-day off every other Saturday so that they could spend more time at home with their families.

Handing back the paper, she said, "These all seem quite reasonable. What did the factory owner say when you met with him to present your grievances?"

Iris snorted. "I don't know as I'd call it a meeting exactly. Said he runs a business, not an almshouse, and that anyone who don't care for the way things are is free to go elsewhere. Then he fined me a week's wages for having the cheek to show my face at his office door. It meant June going without milk for a full week. Toward week's end, I had to keep her home from school; she hadn't the strength to walk."

This time Callie couldn't hold back. "But that's . . . that's outrageous."

Old Emma spoke up, "Hardcastle ain't exactly known for 'is Christian feeling, miss."

"Mr. Hardcastle is the proprietor, I take it?"

The women nodded in unison.

Old Emma turned her head and spat into the gutter. "Aye, and a miserable unfeeling wretch he is, as was his father before him."

The young woman introduced as Doris confided, "We call him Mr. Hard-Arse behind his back." She grinned broadly, revealing a patchwork of missing and brown teeth, a smile sadly out of step with her smooth, youthful face. "Why, when he caught Peg Yardley saying so, he docked her a full day's wages. Peg, God love her, said it was worth it to see the bugger's face go afire."

Tepid laughter made the rounds, but there was no real mirth in the women's faces, only misery.

A broad hand settled on her shoulder. "There are some things on which you can't put a price."

Callie whipped about to find Hadrian standing behind her, so close that were she to back up a step, she would find herself pressed against him. That thought alone sent a little shock of electricity shooting down her spine, making her shiver in a way that had nothing to do with the cold.

Doris shook her head, liberal patches of pink scalp showing through her thin brown hair, yet another effect of the phosphorous poisoning or poor nutrition or perhaps both, Callie suspected. "If we strike and fail, this time it's sure to be the sack for all of us." She brightened. "Then again, as they say, 'naught ventured, naught gained'."

Nothing ventured, nothing gained. Callie looked down at little June, who was stroking the top of Callie's kid leather glove with the reverence usually reserved for small, furry animals, and prayed the adage would hold true.