Page 108 of Rivals at Ashmore Castle

Decius said, ‘I think there’s going to be quite a backlash over those sentences, sir. They’re respectable ladies. And Mrs Cobden Sanderson is the daughter of Richard Cobden, who got the Corn Laws repealed. She’s like royalty to the Liberals.’

‘What are you saying?’

‘I think a lot of people are going to be asking the home secretary to intervene, and I think he’s going to want to, and I think perhaps the first person to ask him is the one who will get the credit.’

‘Oh, you think that, do you?’ He was silent, drumming his fingers on the table in thought. Nina opened her mouth and Decius shot her a look that closed it again. ‘You could be right,’ Wigston said at last. ‘And I can’t bear to think of that sweet, gentle creature shut up in some filthy cell with God knows who.’ He drummed again. ‘I’ll go and see Gladstone tomorrow. If I got to the prime minister he’d likely just throw me off onto him anyway. But mark me,’ he wagged a finger between them, ‘if I manage to get her off, that’s to be the end of it. No more of this suffragette nonsense for Lady Clemmie. If she wants to be treated like a lady, she’s to act like a lady.’

Lord Wigston was by no means the first person to speak to the home secretary. It was difficult to get to see him, he was so busy. The newspapers the next day were full of commentary, the telephones fizzing with disquiet, letters of protest arriving in numbers. In the lobbies of Westminster Members were clustered, heads together, buzzing like so many hives of bees, and press reporters were lurking in the Yard, Downing Street, and all points in between.

By lunch time the clubs were full of unhappy gentlemen talking about the government’s ‘embarrassment’, and by the time Wigston found himself face to face with Gladstone, he was aware the job was already done.

‘I can’t spare you more than a moment,’ Gladstone said distractedly, on his feet and already heading for the door. ‘If it’s about this women question—’

‘Lady Clemmie Leacock, personal friend and a very fine lady, sir,’ Wigston said quickly, to get the words out while he could. ‘General opinion, it’s an unduly harsh sentence. If you could see your way—’

‘Yes, yes, I’ve heard all the arguments. Damned nuisance, these suffragists, but you’re right, it does look bad. At all events, I’ve already written the letter. They’ll be put in the first division, and that’s all I can do.’

‘Thank you, sir, but if I may—’

‘No, I’m sorry, Wigston, but you mayn’t. And if there are any more of you planning to ask me the same thing, you might put ’em off, there’s a good chap. I’ve done what I can, and I can’t spend any more time on it.’

And he was gone.

Rumblings of discontent continued in polite society, letters continued to be published in the newspapers, and Nina heard from Lepida who heard from Mary Martin that several large donations had been sent to WSPU headquarters. And it turned out that there was a little more that could be done: none of the women served the full two months. They were let out quietly, at different times, and early.

Clemmie was the first to be released, on the 31st of October, having become very ill with a cold that turned to influenza. On her release she was taken into the house of one of the other WSPU ladies to be nursed back to health. Nina didn’t see her again until mid-November.

CHAPTER NINETEEN

St Leonard’s, Ashmore Carr, was a simple Norman church, flint-knapped, red-tiled, with a tiny bell tower with a pointed wooden roof like a witch’s hat. Inside, it was like an upturned boat, with a wooden ceiling between the ribs that would once have been painted in bright colours. A rather lovely rounded stone arch between the nave and the chancel probably dated from an earlier Saxon building. Ashmore Carr was where the canons of Canons Ashmore had had their fishponds, but there had probably been a settlement on the site long before that, using the river for fishing and transport, with a tiny Saxon church to serve its spiritual needs.

Moss had looked all this up in local history books, feeling that he should be as prepared as possible before the wedding, and having nothing else, really, to prepare for.

Ada’s mother and brother Harold had paid a visit to the Castle, invited to tea by Mrs Webster, and had shyly shaken Moss’s hand, peeping up at him as though he were the King meeting the peasantry. Harold was a big, knuckly man in large boots and an ill-fitting suit, evidently his Sunday best, worn over a thick, home-knitted jumper that made the buttons strain. His work-worn hands were like planks of wood. Ada’s mother, Mrs Bell, was tiny, less than five feet, with a worn-out version of Ada’s colouring – golden hair gone grey and blue eyes gone pale like a shirt too often washed. She looked too slight to have borne seven children, of whom three survived: Harold, the eldest, Ada, the youngest, and an in-between daughter, married and ‘gone abroad’ to live with her husband in Peterborough.

They were plainly overawed by the Castle, bewildered by the size of the servants’ hall, the length of the table, the number of people coming and going, perhaps even the splendour of the tea. Mrs Terry had done Ada proud with potted-meat sandwiches, freshly made buns and a cake with marzipan on it, to augment the usual bread and jam.

Moss tried to converse with Ada’s kin, but he was hampered by his impressive figure and long-cultivated stateliness, which turned big Harold and tiny Mrs Bell into terrified field-mice. When he tried to be jolly and put them at their ease, he only became more inexplicable to them.

George was brought in to share the occasion, and arrived scrubbed to shining redness and with his hair still wet from the yard pump, but the Bells knew George and the atmosphere eased when he took his place opposite them. Before long, Harold’s big booming laugh was heard, and Mrs Bell thawed enough actually to eat the slice of cake Mrs Webster had placed gently before her.

When chairs were scraped back and departures were taken, George came confidently to shake Moss’s hand and say he was right grateful to him for all he’d done for Ada. ‘I know she looks up to you, Mr Moss, and rightly so. We couldn’t be more honoured that you’re going to give her away.’

A very nice thing to say, was the general opinion: George Soper knew how to conduct himself all right.

Too much of what the cat cleans her paws with, was Moss’s private verdict.

And now, here he was at the church in his best Sunday suit, which Mrs Webster had had sponged and pressed. His shirt had been laundered by expert hands and his shoes polished to a mirror gleam by Frederick. Afton had trimmed his hair for him. Moss had the uncomfortable feeling that Afton knew what was going on in his mind. There was a sort of painful sympathy in the way he looked at him…

And here was Ada, slipping her hand under his arm. He could feel her trembling. He put his other hand over hers to reassure her and found it cold as a stone. The music struck up and he said, ‘Here we go,’ and walked forward, with a tiny tug of resistance from her before her feet unglued from the floor and she came along like a led pony beside a great carthorse.

Between packed pews he processed – fellow servants from the Castle on the bride’s side, unfamiliar faces on the groom’s: Soper’s numerous family and friends from the Carr. And here they were at the altar rails, and he had to unlatch her tiny cold fingers from his sleeve and hand them to George Soper, groom in both his personae; had to give her to him and step back a pace; and when the parson had asked ‘who giveth?’ his part was over. He was done.

The rest of the wedding passed in a dream, with the world at arm’s length, seen and heard through a veil. The company retired to the Dog and Gun, Ashmore Carr’s public house. They had done their best for Ada and George, with greenery and favours on the walls, while family and neighbours had provided a feast and a firkin of beer, after which it was pay for your own. The Dog and Gun had no large rooms, but no-one seemed to mind being crushed together, and the unseasonably mild weather allowed the overspill to make merry outside.

Moss never got near the happy couple, but he was tall and spotted them from time to time, Ada’s golden head and George’s brown curly one close together. He was guest of honour and someone was always pushing a glass of beer into his hand. As it grew hot in the cramped space and he grew thirsty he drank more than he was used to, which only added to the feeling of unreality.

At some point someone started playing a squeeze-box, and the company contrived to dance, winding in and out of the different rooms, bursting outside by one door and back in by another. Moss found himself dancing with Ada’s diminutive mother. Squinting down at her, he had the odd feeling that he was looking into the future and seeing Ada as she would be at the wedding of her own daughter.