The Daughters of Gentlemen (14 page)

As soon as the meeting was over, Frances, at grave risk of being very impolite to all those around her and exciting prurient gossip, quickly sought out the young poet.

‘Mr Quayle,’ she began, entirely forgetting in her eagerness the formalities of a preamble, ‘it is essential that I enlist your help on a matter of very great importance.’

‘Miss Doughty, it would be an honour to assist you,’ he said, gallantly.

‘For reasons I am not at liberty to divulge, I am trying to find a pamphlet with the title “Why Marry?”’ she said, almost breathless in her haste to say the words. ‘Tonight I heard you quote from it – are you the author?’

‘Oh, I have never written any pamphlet, only my little poems,’ he said.

‘Then you must have read it,’ she urged. ‘Perhaps you still have a copy. If so, I would like to purchase it.’

He smiled. ‘There should be no difficulty about that. There are so many pamphlets in my house and I often pick them up and read them. My dear wife, Flora, takes a great interest in the Women’s Suffrage Society and it is she who distributes its publications.’

‘When you say “distributes” – do you mean she gives them out to interested persons?’ asked Frances.

‘No, all the business is done by post,’ said Quayle. ‘The pamphlets are sent to us by the printers, and we keep them at the house. They are advertised in the newspapers, and Flora receives the funds, makes up the packets and sends them out.’

At that moment Sarah, who had been looking at the publications for sale in the hall, came up to the platform and shook her head.

‘Is Mrs Quayle here tonight?’ Frances asked, ‘I would very much like to speak to her.’

‘No, my dear Flora is devoted to our home and rarely strays forth,’ he said fondly. ‘She is a very timid girl. Why don’t I speak to her this evening and see if she has any copies left of the pamphlet you are looking for. If you could supply me with your address I will ensure that she sends one to you, and please accept it with our compliments.’

Whether this was an innocent or deliberate deflection Frances could not know. ‘That is very kind of you, but I must impose upon you further. I wish to see it tonight.’

For a moment he was taken aback by her boldness, then he recovered. ‘I see that Miss Gilbert has not underestimated you, Miss Doughty. Very well, I will secure a cab. I have a little house in Fulham.’

‘Thank you. There will be three of us to travel as my companion Miss Smith will accompany us.’

‘Oh!’ he exclaimed, as Sarah loomed into view, as if daring him to attempt even the smallest incorrectness. ‘Of course. That will be —,’ he laughed nervously, ‘most appropriate.’

The crowds were streaming from the hall, most of the audience in urgent search of refreshment. In the Grove, posters blazoned with the names of the Conservative candidates had, during the course of the meeting, appeared in the windows of nearby taverns and boys with bundles of leaflets were taking the opportunity of the sudden activity to hand out the election addresses of the Conservatives. There were no answering publications for the Liberals, who, it appeared, had been somewhat remiss in their arrangements. Frances quickly thanked the Misses Gilbert and John and assured them of her support for the Society before she and Sarah joined Mr Quayle in the cab.

Flora, said Quayle, who seemed inspired to heights of impassioned lyricism at the mere thought of his wife, was the most beautiful, delicate, shy and sweetly feminine girl in the whole world. They had met because her mother, Mrs Gribling, a good and respectable lady with an interest in literature, occasionally held small gatherings of poets who thereby had the opportunity to read their humble offerings aloud. Many a starving poet, he declared, would have expired for his art had it not been for Mrs Gribling’s bread and butter. Flora, who had kept house for her mother, had on those occasions only been seen when tea was to be served. This done she would retire quickly to another room, like a fragile flower afraid of withering in the sun. And yet, he thought, and yet – he uttered a sigh – perhaps there had been something in his poetry which had induced her to creep to the door of the parlour and listen. For his part, he had fallen in love with her on the very instant that he had seen her.

Quayle assured Frances that he believed strongly in the development of women’s intellect and would have been more than content if Flora had taken a leading part in the Women’s Suffrage Society. Had she desired to take the platform and make a speech, he would have been the first to applaud, but this, she had assured him, was not to her taste. She loved their little home and wanted nothing more than to make it agreeable for him. They had been married for less than a year, and for domestic bliss and comfort he could recommend nothing better. Feeling it necessary to explain that he did not earn a living from his poetry, something that Frances had already guessed, Quayle said that he had been fortunate in receiving a legacy from a generous aunt, this and his daily work as a clerk of accounts was more than enough for their small wants. Frances was largely silent as Quayle enthused about his little house as if it were a palace in miniature and his wife the queen of both his home and heart. Sarah said nothing, her face stonily impassive.

Quayle understood, however, that there were marriages which resulted in great unhappiness for both parties and did not disagree with the writer of the pamphlet that careful thought should be given before entering the married state. Want of money, the dissipation of unsuitable husbands, and contrasts of character were, in his opinion, the chief causes of marital misery.

The Quayles lived in a terraced property not far from the Fulham Road. There was no resident servant, only a woman who came in to do the heavy work, and of course a washerwoman, but everything else Flora liked to do for herself. As Quayle opened the front door, she peered around from the parlour into the hallway, like a bashful child. Her simple dress showed her delicate figure to advantage, and her face was very pale, with good features, and surrounded by a mass of lustrous golden hair. Unlike Selina Sandcourt, who knew she was beautiful, and that her beauty was her fortune, Flora Quayle seemed quite unaware of the advantages that nature had been kind enough to bestow upon her. She was for a moment alarmed at the appearance of two strangers on her doorstep, but her pleasure at seeing her husband was unmistakable.

‘Flora, my dear, here are Miss Doughty and Miss Smith who attended the meeting tonight and are most anxious to acquire one of your pamphlets. If you would be so kind as to provide some cocoa I will find what is needed.’ He hurried upstairs and Flora conducted Frances and Sarah into a small but well-kept parlour, so tidy and spotless that no army of assiduous maidservants could have left it better.

‘I hope we are not imposing upon you,’ said Frances, ‘but I was so moved by the speeches tonight that I simply had to know more, and there was something your husband said which was inspired by a pamphlet – I felt I had to obtain a copy without delay.’

‘Not at all,’ said Flora, ‘please be seated and I will bring the cocoa, it is already made, as I knew Jonathan would want a cup.’

They were soon settled, by which time Quayle had returned and Frances had to suppress her excitement as she saw he held a paper. ‘Ah, I remember this one, now,’ he said, ‘and it was a curious thing – it was not sent by the usual printer, and there seem to have been no orders. Perhaps they have failed to advertise it.’

‘May I see?’ asked Frances. Her cup rattled a little in the saucer as she set it down.

‘Oh,’ said Flora quietly, lowering her gaze to the tabletop. ‘Yes. I thought it strange, too.’

‘I have read several of the publications given to me by Miss Gilbert,’ said Frances, ‘and they were all on good quality paper and printed by Grant and Co. of Farringdon. This one is altogether thinner and by —,’ she looked at the back, which read only ‘Printed for the author by Soho Printworks Dean Street, W.’ ‘Not a firm I am acquainted with. Well, this is quite the mystery. And were they delivered here by hand, or did they come in the post?’

‘By hand, I believe,’ said Flora.

‘Is it a recent publication?’

‘I think so,’ said Quayle. ‘We received it in the last month.’

‘And what is your current stock?’

‘There are three dozen.’

Frances wrote her new address on a slip of paper and handed it to Quayle. ‘I would very much like to speak to the author. If you should learn anything, would you write to me?’

They both agreed, and Frances finished her cocoa with as much speed as was commensurate with politeness and not burning her mouth, and after attempting to pay for the pamphlet, an offer they refused to countenance, made her departure.

It was too dark to read in the cab home, but Frances, holding on to her prize, was content to wait. ‘I have to teach a chemistry class tomorrow,’ she told Sarah, ‘but I would like you to go to Dean Street and find out all you can about the person who ordered the copies of this pamphlet.’ Flora, she thought, had been very quiet at their meeting, but then that, according to her husband, was the nature of the girl. Even if Flora had not recognised Frances’ name from the newspapers – and Frances was unsure if her fame had spread as far as Fulham – she would soon be apprised by her husband of the nature of their visitor’s profession and the urgency with which she had demanded the pamphlet. She wondered if Flora had any more information to impart and if she might expect to receive a note requesting a private interview.

It was late when they returned, but not so late that Frances could not light a lamp and sit down to read.

Why Marry?

By

A Friend to Women

Do not think because I am a friend to women that I am thereby an enemy to men. There are many good, kind and worthy men, but there are also those who may appear to possess every manly virtue and yet time and circumstance will reveal them to harbour evil in their nature so terrible that it can hardly be named.

A young girl, still with the pallor of the schoolroom on her cheek, taught sufficient arithmetic only that she might understand a butcher’s account, and enough French to recite a little poetry, yet thoroughly educated in the art of decorative fans, and instilled with all the horrors that might befall her if she allows her shoulders to slump, is hardly qualified to judge the character of a suitor by outward appearance and manners. Her papa and mama have, with the best of intentions, selected him as worthy of their daughter’s respect and love, but they judge him only by his fortune, and whether he can provide the kind of establishment of which they hope she may be mistress. They, of course, do not have to live subservient to him, tend to his demands, and endure his faults. The disagreement of husband and wife is a great cause of unhappiness, but worse than this is neglect, cruelty and – painful as it is to relate – shameful and corrupt dissipation.

Do not, my young reader, dearer to me than a sister, be eager to rush into matrimony. Your relatives may tell you that it is the summit of every woman’s ambition, and it is true that a married woman may be a happy creature who expects all married women to be as happy as she, but if she is miserable then she wishes for nothing better than company in her misery. Before a woman agrees to marry she must first come to know and understand all the character of the man, but I fear that once she knows his character, she may decide not to marry.

You, who know nothing of the world and its wickedness, have been taught that it is the duty of Man to protect Woman, and that he has been placed in ascendancy over her by nature, custom and law, in order to carry out this duty. What woman would complain of this if all men were diligent and kind and selfless, but there are some who inhabit the world like monsters and consume and destroy all that is good and pure for their own pleasure. The authority placed in their undeserving hands will be abused, and lead to the ruin and despair of the innocent. What of the wife, so cruelly betrayed? How will she seem in society, except that she will conceal her suffering from the world and speak only to praise the husband who has broken her heart. His intemperance will be spoken of as an illness bravely borne, his uncontrolled appetites kept hidden behind a locked door suggesting only industry and application of the mind. How much better it would have been for his poor wife if she had never known him, how gladly now she would accept eternal spinsterhood rather than endure the torment of life with such a man as this.

Youth is full of optimism, and age may seem dry and bitter by comparison, but that is the fruit of knowledge. Gather your knowledge, let it ripen, use it well. Do not be led astray by fair words and fair faces until you know enough to judge what may lie beneath.

Frances laid the pamphlet aside, and for a time sat silently in thought. At last she retired to her bed, but sleep did not come to her until well into the night.

F
rances had read the pamphlet several times but the next morning, before she had even had her breakfast, she re-read it. The message was abundantly clear, and she now understood what had so terrified Mrs Venn and why the headmistress had ordered the destruction of every copy rather than risk having any member of the board of governors see it.

Frances was, on reflection, feeling a little embarrassed by the rapidity with which she had left the meeting the previous night and, concerned that she might have appeared impolite, wrote a letter to Miss Gilbert and Miss John, apologising for her sudden departure, which she said had arisen from unforeseen circumstances, thanking them for their kind invitation and asking to be advised of any future gatherings. She added that she was thinking of writing a pamphlet herself on the subject of professions for women, and needed a reliable and economical printer who would be able to make a few dozen copies. She had heard of the Soho Printworks in Dean Street and wondered if they knew of anyone who had used that company and could recommend it.