No Greater Love (22 page)

‘You’ll have to take those flowers and that stuffed bird off the top!’ Maggie had protested at Millie Dobson that morning. Millie had been quite offended.

‘I paid good money for that hat. It’s not just any old bird, it’s a nightingale.’

‘It’s nowt but a spuggy,’ Maggie had contradicted, looking at the dusty, pathetic sparrow. ‘You’ll draw attention. I’m supposed to be an old widow, not part of a vaudeville act.’

‘All right,’ Mrs Dobson had huffed and given the offending hat to Annie to unstitch.

On Friday evening, John Heslop had handed over the box of clothes to Maggie, saying, ‘Jimmy got these out the house without a problem, or so he says. He’s itching with curiosity to know what you’re doing - and so am I.’

‘You’ll know soon enough,’ Maggie had answered, grinning. Then just as he was leaving, Maggie asked him, ‘I know Mam and Granny’ll be worrying over me. After it’s all over, will you go and tell them I came to no harm and I’ll see them when I get out.’

John Heslop had studied her a moment and then nodded, seeming to understand that Maggie was heading for imprisonment. ‘I’ll go and see your family,’ he had promised and departed.

There was a festive air about the crowds making their way towards Pearson’s shipyard. Maggie had to force herself to slacken her pace and remember that she was a frail elderly woman in Mrs Johnstone’s dark blue dress and her grandmother’s enveloping cape.

‘This is a canny day out,’ Millie Dobson declared, infected by the high spirits around her. ‘I’ve never been this far upriver in all me life.’

Maggie grunted ‘People don’t come down here unless they have to - it’s not exactly Gosforth Park, is it?’

‘Looks a fine place to me,’ Mrs Dobson replied, looking about the bustling street. But Maggie noticed that Annie was coughing in the dusty, smoky air, her face pale as china. She seemed to have difficulty keeping up with even their stately pace.

‘Not long now,’ Maggie smiled at the wan girl. ‘See the spiked gates over there? That’s Pearson’s.’

Maggie felt her stomach churn as she said the words. Her moment of immortality was approaching, she thought. Round her waist the suffragette flag was fastened by a cord and one pull on the bow would release it. If she never did anything worthwhile in her life again, Maggie thought, at least today she was going to make history. It never crossed her mind that she might fail in her protest, for she had dismissed Rose’s fears that the crowd would not let her through, or that she would be arrested before displaying her banner, or that Asquith would never notice her. Maggie was inspired by an inner conviction that her cause was just and therefore she would succeed.

About her, voices chattered and hooters on the river blew in anticipation of the event. Yet the yard seemed strangely hushed Maggie suddenly realised that the usual noises of industry had ceased for this short special time, while all the workers and their families came to see the launch of their ship. The ringing clang of plates falling into position and the din of hammer on metal had stopped. For a moment she was reminded of an occasion in her childhood when her father had proudly taken her to see the launch of a passenger ship he had helped to build. Swung high on his shoulders, she had been nearly sick with excitement as the men threw their caps in the air and her father had shouted, ‘Go, you bonny boat!’

The huge bulk had slid into the water with a screech of chains and snapping ropes like some primeval beast roaring out of its lair of scaffolding, to dip and roll triumphantly in the murky green water. Maggie had stared in wonder as her father described the luxury of its vast interior. ‘Like a palace, Maggie - and the nearest we’ll ever get to one!’

As they jostled forward now, Maggie looked round at the expectant faces, the array of flags and coloured bunting around the distant makeshift stand for the launching party. These people - her people - were just as excited as she had been as a child to see the birth of their ship. Briefly she wondered where George Gordon was. Probably boozing in the pub, she thought disdainfully. Well, she would show him and all of Pearson’s other workers how deluded they were. This ship was not their ship, it belonged to Pearson’s who cared nothing for the men who had sweated and toiled over its creation and would soon sell it to a government that kept women voteless and powerless.

Maggie’s anger ignited at the thought of how her father had died building one of their ships and she realised that she was not just protesting about the vote. She yearned to strike a blow at the heartless Lord Pearson and his haughty daughter. They were to blame for her family’s misfortune. The deep sense of loss for her father and the humiliation felt for her mother on the funeral day when Pearson’s had sent her a washboard and bucket engulfed her once more. For years she had nursed her anger and bitterness at the injustice they had suffered and she had to restrain herself from dashing forward at that very moment and tearing into the assembled Pearsons like a frenzied dervish.

They were near enough now to make out the figures on the platform. The men were dressed in well-cut coats and top hats, the women in a blaze of colourful summer dresses, all frills and lace and crowned with elaborate hats of feathers and ribbons. Maggie tried to peer over the heads of the crowd to make out the figure of Alice Pearson.

‘Haway, lads!’ Millie Dobson cried at the men around them. ‘Make way for me old mother. She’s walked all the way from Newcastle to see this. Give her a bit space, hinnies.’

Mrs Dobson’s ploy worked instantly; a path opened up before them and people pushed aside for the bent old woman and her family. Maggie knew she must gain the launch platform itself if she was to make any impact at all. As they approached through the heaving press of bodies, she could see the steps were well policed and the crowds were being kept back. But thanks to Mrs Dobson’s persistence they were as close to the launch party as they could get and she could clearly identify the tall imposing figure of Alice Pearson in a frock of mint green and cream and a hat of ostrich feathers. Was that Asquith next to her, or Lord Pearson? Maggie was suddenly unsure. Neither of them looked like the pictures she had seen of the Prime Minister in the newspapers. She realised with a jolt that, even if she came across him in the street, she would not know what Lord Pearson looked like and yet he controlled the lives of all around him. The only man she recognised was Herbert Pearson, Lord Pearson’s son, whom she had glimpsed on a rare visit to her workshop and who was standing at the far end looking bored.

‘You’ll have to cause a diversion,’ Maggie hissed at Mrs Dobson. ‘They must be about to start now the band’s playing.’

Above her, the gentry nodded and smiled in their finery and a bottle of champagne hung ready in its gaudy ribbons to smash on the battle-grey hull of the ship. HMS
Courageous
towered overhead as men in overalls swarmed over the unfinished boat. Later they would fit it out with its guns and trimmings, but now they were about to glory in its baptism, pride mixed with anxiety that the lumbering metal monster would float.

Maggie was filled with awe as she gazed up at the ship, then felt a lurch of panic at what she was doing. She was about to ruin the moment for scores of riveters and platers, joiners and smiths . . . Forcing the image of an outraged George Gordon from her mind, she elbowed forward towards the cordon of police. A tall, long-nosed man was starting to speak on the platform and Maggie realised the moment must be now.

It all happened in seconds and yet to Maggie it felt like the slow motions of an interminable dream. Beside her, Annie Dobson began an alarming coughing and choking, doubling up in agony. Her mother, Millie, cried for help. For a moment Maggie stopped in concern, but Millie pushed her roughly out of the way. Not knowing if Annie’s distress was genuine or a theatrical diversion, she crouched lower under her bonnet and hobbled towards the steps, clutching a battered posy of flowers. Gripping the arm of the nearest policeman, she gabbled, ‘Help the lass, she’s having a fit, please help the lass!’

He turned to look at the gasping Annie and stepped forward to help. Another constable by the steps did the same and opened up a gap in the protective cordon. No one on the platform seemed to have noticed the small commotion taking place beneath their dais and the man continued his speech. The policeman nearest to her now was watching the dignitaries, unconcerned by the fuss in the crowd over the fainting girl.

Maggie slipped past him, muttering about her flowers, and gained the steps. In seconds she had unhooked her cape and pulled the cord round her waist. Shaking the flag free, she dashed up the remaining steps and raised it in the air.

‘Votes for women, Mr Asquith!’ she shouted, pushing her way among the astonished party. Someone shrieked and behind her Maggie heard the thud of boots on the wooden steps. A man stepped into her path and attempted to hold her, but Maggie resisted and struggled free. She threw herself headlong at the aghast speaker, waving the purple, green and white banner in his face.

‘You can’t throw us all into gaol, Mr Asquith! Stop killing Mrs Pankhurst and give us the vote now!’

She felt a foot go out to trip her. She landed painfully on her outstretched arm and then gasped in agony as the hobnailed boot of a policeman pinned her hand to the ground. Hands seized her and dragged her up. She was aware of a ripple of noise from the crowd below and as she staggered to her feet, Maggie caught sight of Alice Pearson’s thunderous red face. The aristocrat’s brown unblinking eyes glared at her with astonished fury.

‘Remember Emily Davison!’ Maggie managed to shout, before being yanked round and pushed down the steps by her captors.

She saw no sign of the Dobson women but the mood of the crowd was openly hostile. People jeered and spat at her as she was led swiftly away behind the platform. One man came at her and punched the side of her head, spewing out a string of obscenities. The two constables gripping her did nothing to stop the assault.

With head pounding and nauseous from the blows, Maggie was dragged away, pursued by a crowd of onlookers baying for her blood like dogs. She was thrown roughly into the back of a Black Maria waiting by a side gate and was locked into a closet-sized cell in which she could not stand up. Slumping into a crouched position, her hand bleeding and pulsating from where the constable had ground his boot, she closed her eyes and fought back the urge to cry. As the horse-drawn police van lurched off over the cobbles and threw her against the opposite wall, she could hear and feel the banging of men’s fists as they angrily pursued.

Maggie was shocked into numbness by their hatred. Her noble gesture had turned into an ignominious scuffle that had hardly disrupted the launch. She had been dragged through the crowds like a common criminal, removed from the sight of the gentry and politicians as a piece of dung is tossed on the midden. Maggie felt humiliated and defiled. She began to shake and could not stop. She ground her teeth together to stop her sobs and wished for oblivion.

Then above the sound of the ringing hooves and fading abuse, Maggie heard it: not the jaunty tune as the Pearson shipyard band struck up but the triumphant screech as HMS
Courageous
stirred and juddered down the slipway. The launch was going ahead, contemptuous of her attempts to halt it. Nothing, she realised with desolation, could stop the might of the Pearsons.

Alice felt her father’s fury in the brief look he gave her as they stepped off the launch platform; it was ice-cold. He said nothing to her as they left the shipyard with their guests, and Asquith was ushered into the waiting Bentley to take him to Oxford Hall.

Only Herbert spoke to her in indignant tones. ‘How could you, Alice! And after you’d promised nothing would happen. There’ll be a fearful row over this.’

Her mother ignored her, but Felicity gave her a malicious little smile as if she had enjoyed the drama and Alice’s embarrassment. Alice said nothing but inwardly she seethed. How could that common little upstart, Maggie Beaton, evade all her measures to gag her and carry out her startling protest? She had ruined everything. Now her father would never let her near the Prime Minister and he would not hear her well-rehearsed and persuasive arguments for enfranchisement, Alice fumed.

She drove her own car through the smoky streets of West Newcastle and out into the winding lanes of the Tyne valley, following Asquith’s police escort. The hedgerows and meadows were burgeoning with flowers and butterflies fluttered up as she roared past, her rage making her blind to the beauty.

‘She’s set back our cause!’ Alice railed at the road. ‘Girls like Maggie Beaton making unseemly protests will only confirm Asquith in his belief that we’re not fit to be trusted with the vote. I hope they lock her up for ever, damn her!’ Rosamund barked, confused by her mistress’s anger.

By the time Alice reached Oxford Hall, her temper had subsided and she was once more in control of herself. She would not let her family see how much the incident had upset her.

As she suspected, she was seated well down the table from Asquith and the conversation was kept light and trivial. She tried to gain her father’s attention after lunch, but he politely rebuffed her.

‘I shall visit you at Hebron House next week,’ he told her, ‘and we’ll discuss things then.’

As Herbert seemed in a huff and Felicity was deliberately ignoring her, Alice decided to leave. Even her mother did not try and persuade her to stay for dinner and the night. They all wished to punish her for the spectacle at the launch, Alice thought, so she would not stay to be humiliated further.

‘They can all go to hell!’ she muttered as she drove off down the crackling gravel drive lined with orderly saplings.

That night she went to bed early, but could not sleep. She tried to read, but could not concentrate. It struck her then how no one from the movement had attempted to contact her for weeks. Where were all her friends? she wondered in bewilderment. How alone she felt.

Dressing again, Alice went out onto the terrace and sat on a wrought-iron chair staring at the hazy orange sunset over the trees. She could just see the gantry lights of the riverside cranes winking in the descending darkness.