Трейси Шевалье - Falling Angel

We packed up in silence. I was glad it was too dark for Daddy to see my face, for I had gone bright red. I trailed down the hill after him, forced to slow down when the pain got too strong. Daddy didn’t seem to notice, but continued down the path as if nothing were wrong. When I could I hurried to catch up with him.

We reached the edge of the heath, where the Bull and Last spilled men with their pints into the street. “I can walk home from here, Daddy,” I said. “It’s not far and there are plenty of people in the street. I’ll be fine.”

“Nonsense.” Daddy kept walking.

When we got home he unlocked the door. A lamp was burning on the hall table. Daddy cleared his throat. “Your mother is out visiting a friend who’s taken ill, but Jenny can see to you.”

“Yes.” I kept my back to the wall in case there was a stain on the back of my dress. I would have died of shame if Daddy had seen.

“Well, then.” Daddy turned to go, pausing at the door. “Will you be all right now?”

“Yes.

When the door closed behind him I groaned. My thighs were sticky and chafed and I wanted to lie down. First, though, I needed help. I lit a candle and went upstairs, hesitating outside Mummy’s morning room. Perhaps she was there after all, sitting on the sofa reading a book. She would look up and say, “Hello there, what heavenly sights have you seen?” the way she used to.

I opened the door. Of course Mummy wasn’t there. Sometimes I felt as if the room was no longer Mummy‘s, but a cause’s. The old traces of Mummy-the yellow silk shawl on the sofa, the piano with a vase of dried flowers on it, the prints of plants-were still there. But what I noticed instead was the half-finished banner draped across the sofa that read DEEDS NOT WORDS; the stack of WSPU pamphlets on the piano; the scrapbook on the table, newspaper cuttings, letters, photographs piled next to it along with scissors and a glue pot; the box of chalk, the handbills, the sheets of paper scribbled with lists. Daddy never came in here. If he did he would be very surprised.

I closed the door, climbed the stairs to Jenny’s room, and tapped on it. “Jenny?” I called. There was no answer at first, but when I tapped again I heard a grunt, and Jenny opened the door, squinting, a red crease across her cheek where it had pressed against the pillow. She wore a long white nightgown and her feet were bare. “What’s wrong, Miss Maude?” she murmured, rubbing her face.

I stared at Jenny’s thick yellow toenails. “I need your help, please,” I whispered.

“Can it not wait till morning? I was asleep, you know. I have to get up earlier than you lot.”

“I’m sorry. It’s… my courses have begun and I don’t know what to do.”

“What?”

I repeated myself and turned red again.

“Oh, Lord, the curse,” Jenny muttered. She looked me up and down. “Blimey, Miss Maude, twelve’s young to start-you’ve not got even a trace of bubbies yet!”

“I’m not so young,” I cried. “I’ll be thirteen in-in eight months.” I knew how silly I sounded and began to cry.

Jenny opened her door wide. “There, now, no need for that.” She put her arm around me. “You’d best come in-it won’t get sorted out with you standing there bawling.”

Jenny’s room had been Nanny’s room when I was small. Although I had been in it only once or twice since Jenny moved into it, it still felt familiar. It smelled of warm skin and wool blankets and camphorated oil, like the presses Nanny used to heat for my chest when I had a cold. Jenny’s dress, apron, and cap were hung on pegs. Her hairbrush sat on the small mantel over the fire, and also a photograph of Jenny with a baby in her lap. They were sitting in front of a backdrop of palm fronds, and Jenny wore her best dress. Both looked serious and surprised, as if they had not expected the camera to flash.

“Who’s that?” I asked. I had never seen the photograph.

Jenny was wrapping a robe around herself and barely looked up. “My nephew.”

“I’ve not heard you mention him. What’s his name?”

“Jack.” Jenny crossed her arms. “Now, has your mum told you anything, or sorted out anything for you?”

I shook my head.

“Of course not. I might’ve known. Your mother’s so busy saving women she don’t even look after her own.”

“I know what’s happening. I’ve read about it in books.”

“But you don’t know what to do, do you? That’s what’s important, what you do about it. Who cares what it is? ‘Deeds not words,’ ain’t that what your mum’s always saying?”

I frowned.

Jenny pursed her lips. “Sorry, Miss Maude,” she said. “All right-I’ll lend you some of mine till we’ve got you what you need.” She knelt by a small chest where she kept her things and took out a few long thick pieces of cloth and a curious belt I had never seen. She showed me how to fold the cloth in three and fasten it to the belt. She explained about the bucket and salt water to soak the cloths in, to be left under the bed by the chamberpot. Then she went downstairs for a bucket and a hot-water bottle for the pain, while I washed myself and tried on the towel and belt in my room. It felt like my petticoats and bloomers had become all wadded up and caught between my legs, making me waddle like a duck. I was sure everyone would be able to tell.

As awful as it had been having such a thing happen when I was with Daddy, I was glad at least that Lavinia was not there too. She would never forgive me for starting first. She has always been the pretty one, the womanly one-even when we were younger she reminded me of the women in pre-Raphaelite paintings, with her curly hair and plump figure. Jenny was right-I am flat, and as Grandmother once said, my clothes hang from me like washing from a line. Lavinia and I always assumed that she would get her courses first, would wear a corset first, would marry first, would have children first. Sometimes I’ve been bothered by this, but often I’ve been secretly relieved. I have never told her, but I am not so sure that I want to be married and have children.

Now I would have to hide my belts and towels and pain from her. I didn’t like keeping secrets from my best friend. But then, she was keeping one from me. Ever since Mummy took up with Caroline Black, Lavinia has been peculiar about her, but won’t say why. When I ask her she simply says that suffragettes are wicked, but I’m sure there’s more to it than that. It was something to do with Simon and being down that grave. But she won’t say, and neither will Simon. I went to the cemetery on my own and asked him, but he just shrugged and kept on digging.

When Jenny came back with the bucket she gave me a hug. “You’re a woman now, you know. Before you know it you’ll be wearing a corset. That’s something to tell your mum tomorrow.”

I nodded. But I knew that tomorrow I would say nothing to Mummy. She wasn’t here now when she was needed most. Tomorrow did not matter.

To my surprise, it was harder facing Maude than Richard.

Richard’s response was predictable-a rage he contained in front of the police but unleashed in the cab home. He shouted about the family name, about the disgrace to his mother, about the uselessness of the cause. All of this I had known to expect, from hearing of the reactions of other women’s husbands. Indeed, I have been lucky to go this long without Richard complaining. He has thought my activities with the WSPU a harmless hobby, to be dabbled in between tea parties. It is only now he truly understands that I, too, am a suffragette.

One thing he said in the cab did surprise me. “What about your daughter?” he shouted. “Now that she’s firmly on the road to womanhood, she needs a better example than you are setting.”