Delia Blanchflower Part 51

"Can anyone help?"

"No. The poor thing's safe--with good people who understand."

He asked no more about her errand. He knew very well that day after day, and week after week, her tired feet carried her on the same endless quest--seeking "that which was lost." But the stress of thought in his own mind found expression in a question which surprised her.

"Would the vote help you? Is that why you want it?"

She smiled.

"Oh, no! Oh, dear no!" she said, with emphasis; after a moment, adding in a lower tone, scarcely addressed to her companion--"'_It cost more--to redeem their souls_!'" And again--"Dear Mr. Mark, men are what their mothers make them!--that is the bottom truth. And when women are what G.o.d intended them to be, they will have killed the ape and the tiger in men. But law can't do it. Only the Spirit." Her face shone a little. Then, in her ordinary voice--"Oh, no--I want the vote for quite other reasons. It is our right--and it is monstrous we shouldn't have it!" Her cheeks flushed.

He turned his friendly smile upon her, without attempting to argue.

They walked back over the bridge together.

The following day rose in wind and shower. But the February rain cleared away towards noon, and the high scudding clouds, with bright s.p.a.ces between, suddenly began to prophesy Spring. From Hyde Park, down the Mall, and along Whitehall, the troops gathered and the usual crowd sprang up in their rear, pressing towards Parliament Square, or lining the route. Winnington had sent a note early to Delia by messenger; but he expected no reply, and got none. All he could do was to hide a motor in Dean's Yard, to hold a conference or two with the friendly bobby in Parliament Square, and then to wander about the streets looking restlessly at the show. It duly pa.s.sed him by, the Cinderella-coach, with the King and Queen of fairy-tale, the splendid Emba.s.sy carriages, the Generals on their gleaming horses, the Guards, in their red cloaks--and all the rest. The Royalties disappeared up the carpeted stairs into the House of Lords, and after half an hour, while the bells of St. Margaret's filled all the air with tumult, came out, again; and again the ermined Queen, and the glistening King pa.s.sed bowing along the crowd. Winnington caught hold of a Hampshire member in the crowd.

"When does the House meet?"

"Everything adjourned till four. They'll move the Address about five.

But everyone expects a row."

Nothing for it but to wait and stroll, to spend half an hour in the Abbey, and take a turn along the Embankment.... And gradually, steadily the Square filled up, no one knew how. The soldiers disappeared, but policemen quietly took their places. All the entrances to the House of Commons were carefully guarded, groups as they gathered were dispersed, and the approaches to the House, in Old and New Palace Yards, were rigorously kept free. But still the crowd in Parliament Square grew and thickened. Girls, with smiling excited faces, still moved to and fro in it, selling the _Tocsin_. Everybody waited expectant.

Then the chimes of the Abbey struck four. And as they died away, from a Westminster street, from Whitehall, and from Milbank, there arose a simultaneous stir and shouting. And presently, from each quarter appeared processions of women, carrying black and orange banners making their way slowly through the throng. The crowd cheered and booed them as they pa.s.sed, swaying to this side and that. And as each procession neared the outer line of police, it was firmly but courteously stopped, and the leaders of it must needs parley with the mounted constables who sat ready to meet them.

Winnington, jumping on the motor which he had placed opposite St.

Margaret's, drew out some field-gla.s.ses, and scanned the advancing lines of women. The detachment coming from Whitehall seemed to be headed by the chiefs of the whole organisation, to judge from the glistening banner which floated above its foremost group. Winnington examined it closely. Gertrude Marvell was not there, nor Delia. Then he turned westwards. Ah, now he saw her! That surely was she!--in the front ranks of the lines coming from Milbank. For a moment, he saw the whole scene in orderly and picturesque array, the cordons of police, the mounted constables, the banners of the processions, the swaying crowds, Westminster Hall, the clock tower, with its light:--the next, everything was tossed in wild confusion. Some savage impelling movement in the crowd behind had broken the lines of police. The women were through! He could see the scurrying forms running across the open s.p.a.ces, pursued, grappled with.

He threw himself into the crowd, which had rapidly hemmed him in, buffeting it from side to side like a swimmer into troubled waters. His height, his strength, served him well, and by the time he had reached the southern corner of St. Margaret's, a friendly hand gripped him.

"Do you see her, Sir?"

"Near the front!--coming from Milbank."

"All right! Follow me, Sir. This way!"

And with Hewson, and apparently two other police, Winnington battled his way towards the tumult in front of St. Stephen's entrance. The mounted police were pressing the crowd back with their horses, and as Winnington emerged into clear ground, he saw a melee of women and police,--some women on the ground, some held between police on either side, and one group still intact. In it he recognised Gertrude Marvell.

He saw her deliberately strike a constable in the face. Then he lost sight of her. All he saw were the steps of St. Stephen's entrance behind, crowded with Members of Parliament. Suddenly another woman fell, a grey-haired woman, and almost immediately a girl who was struggling with two policemen, disengaged herself and ran to help. She bent over the woman, and lifted her up. The police at once made way for them, but another wild rush from behind seemed to part them--sweep them from view--

"Now, Sir!" said Hewson, on tiptoe--"Hold on! They've got the old lady safe. I think the young one's hurt."

They pressed their way through. Winnington caught sight of Delia again, deadly white, supported by a policeman on one side, and a gentleman on the other. Andrews!--by George! Winnington cursed his own ill-luck in not having been the first to reach her; but the gallant Captain was an ally worth having, all the same.

Mark was at her side. She lifted a face, all pain and bitter indignation. "Cowards--Cowards!--to treat an old woman so!--Let me go--let me go back! I must find her!"

"She's all safe, Miss--she's all safe--you go home," said a friendly policeman. "These gentlemen will look after you! Stand back there!" And he tried to open a pa.s.sage for them.

Winnington touched her arm. But an involuntary moan startled him.

"She's hurt her arm"--said Andrews in his ear--"twisted it somehow. Go to the other side of her--put your arm round her, and I'll clear the way."

Delia struggled--"No--no!--let me go!"

But she was powerless. Winnington nearly carried her through the crowd, while her faintness increased. By the time they reached the motor, she was barely conscious. The two men lifted her in. Andrews stood looking at her a moment, as she sank back with Winnington beside her, his ruddy countenance expressing perhaps the most acute emotion of which its possessor had ever yet been capable.

"Good-night. You'll take her home," he said gruffly, and lifted his hat. But the next moment he ran back to say--"I'll go back and find out what's happened. She'll want to know. Where are you taking her?"

"Smith's Hotel," said Winnington--"to my sister." And he gave the order to the chauffeur.

They set out. Mark pa.s.sed his arm round her again, to support her, and she drooped unconsciously upon his shoulder. A fierce joy--mingled with his wrath and disgust. This must be--this should be the _end_! Was such a form made for sordid violence and strife? Her life just breathed against his--he could have borne her so for ever.

But as soon as they had revived her, and she opened her eyes in Mrs.

Matheson's sitting-room at the hotel, she burst into a cry of misery.

"Where's Gertrude!--let me go to her! Where am I?"

As they wrestled with and soothed her, a servant knocked.

"A gentleman to see you, Sir, downstairs."

Winnington descended, and found Andrews--breathless with news.

Eighty women arrested--Miss Marvell among the ringleaders, for all of whom bail has been refused? While the riot had been going on in Parliament Square, another detachment of women had pa.s.sed along Whitehall, smashing windows as they went. And at the same moment, a number of shop-windows had been broken in Piccadilly. The Prime Minister had been questioned in the Commons, and Sir Wilfrid Lang had denounced the "Daughters'" organisation, and the mad campaign of violence to which they were committed, in an indignant speech much cheered by the House.

The days that followed were days of nightmare both for Delia and those who watched over her.

Gertrude Marvell and ten others went to prison, without the option of a fine. About forty of the rank and file who refused to pay their fines, or give surety for good behaviour, accompanied their leaders into duress. The country rang with the scandal of what had happened, and with angry debate as to how to stop the scandal in the future. The Daughters issued defiant broadsheets, and filled the _Tocsin_ with brave words. And the Const.i.tutionalists who had pinned their hopes on the Suffrage Bill before the House, wrung their hands, and wailed to heaven and earth to keep these mad women in order.

Delia sat waiting--waiting--all these intolerable hours. She scarcely spoke to Winnington, except to ask him for news, or to thank him, when every evening, owing to a personal knowledge of the Home Secretary, he was able to bring her the very latest news of what was happening in prison. Gertrude had refused food; forcible feeding would very soon have to be abandoned; and her release, on the ground of danger to life, might have to be granted. But in view of the hot indignation of the public, the Government were not going to release any of the prisoners before they absolutely must.

Delia herself was maimed and powerless. How the wrenching of her arm had come about--whether in the struggle with the two constables who had separated her from Gertrude, or in the attempt to raise her companion from the ground--she could not now remember. But a muscle had been badly torn; she wore a sling and suffered constant and often severe pain. Neither Alice Matheson, nor Lady Tonbridge--who had rushed up to town--ever heard her complain, except involuntarily, of this pain.

Madeleine indeed believed that there was some atoning satisfaction in it, for Delia's wounded spirit. If she was not with Gertrude in prison, at least she too was suffering--if only a fraction of what Gertrude was enduring.

The arm however was not the most serious matter. As France had long since perceived, she had been overstrained in nursing Weston, and the events since she left Maumsey had naturally increased the mischief. She had become sleepless and neurasthenic. And Winnington watched day by day the eclipse of her radiant youth, with a dumb wrath almost as Pagan as that which a similar impression had roused in Lathrop.

The nights were her worst time. She lived then, in prison, with Gertrude, vividly recalling all that she had ever heard from the Daughters who had endured it, of the miseries and indignities of prison life. But she also lived again through the events which had preceded and followed the riot; her quick intelligence pondered the comments of the newspapers, the att.i.tude of the public, the measured words and looks of these friends who surrounded her. And there were many times when sitting up in bed alone, suffering and sleepless, she asked herself bitterly--"were we just fools!--just fools?"

But whatever the mind replied, the heart and its loyalty stood firm.

She was no more free now than before--that was the horrible part of it!

It was this which divided her from Winnington. The thought of how he had carried her off from the ugly or ridiculous scenes which the newspapers described--scenes of which she had scarcely any personal memory, alternately thrilled and shamed her. But the aching expectation of Gertrude's return--the doubt in what temper of mind and what plight of body she would return--dominated everything else.

At last came the expected message. "In consequence of a report from the prison doctors and his own medical advisers, the Home Secretary has ordered the immediate release of Miss Gertrude Marvell." Winnington was privately notified of the time of release, information which was refused to what remained of the Daughters' organisation, lest there should be further disturbance. He took a motor to the prison gate, and put a terribly enfeebled woman and her nurse into it. Gertrude did not even recognise him, and he followed the motor to the Westminster flat, distracted by the gloomiest forebodings.

Delia was already at the flat to receive her friend, having quietly--but pa.s.sionately--insisted, against all the entreaties of Mrs.

Matheson and Lady Tonbridge. Winnington helped the nurse and the porter to carry Gertrude Marvell upstairs. They laid her on the bed, and the doctor who had been summoned took her in charge. As he was leaving the room, Winnington turned back--to look at his enemy. How far more formidable to him in her weakness than in her strength! The keen eyes were closed, the thin mouth relaxed and bloodless shewing the teeth, the hands mere skin and bone. She lay helpless and only half-conscious on her pillows, with nurse and doctor hovering round her, and Delia kneeling beside her. Yet, as he closed the door, Winnington realised her power through every vein! It rested entirely with her whether or no she would destroy Delia, as she must in the end destroy herself.