After the War Is Over: A Novel Page 2

  “Where on earth did those boys find a banana?” asked Miss Margaret.

  Norma had been working at a shipping office down by the docks for several years, and often came home with startling stories or unusual gifts from customers. Only last week she’d brought home an ancient bottle of Madeira, its stenciled label illegible under a hardened layer of decades-old dust. They’d polished off the bottle of dizzyingly strong fortified wine in an evening.

  “I’ve learned it’s best not to ask. They’d had an entire bunch, they said, and this was the last one. Shall we?”

  They all leaned forward, crowding close as Norma peeled away the skin and set the naked fruit on a clean dinner plate that Janie placed before her. And then, as precisely as a surgeon, she cut it into seven equal portions.

  Silence fell around the table as the women slowly ate the fruit, their faces a moving tableau of wonder and delight. Meg was the first to speak. “It’s . . . it’s just lovely. I’d forgotten . . .”

  “Me, too,” said Rosie. “My mum loved them. Would buy a bunch from the greengrocer whenever one of us had a birthday.”

  “Thank you, Norma,” said Miss Margaret. “Such a treat for us all.”

  “You’re very welcome. Now, if you don’t mind, I’ll excuse myself. I’m off to the pictures with one of the girls from work.”

  “What are you seeing?” asked Charlotte. It had been an age since she’d been to the cinema herself.

  “The Hope Chest. It’s Dorothy Gish’s newest. Doris has seen it already. Says it’s grand.”

  Soon Charlotte was the only one left at the table, and as she scraped her plate clean of bubble and squeak it occurred to her that she’d forgotten to check the table in the front hall for the day’s post.

  “Janie, did anything come in the post for me today?”

  “Oh, yes, Miss Brown. Shall I fetch it for you?”

  “No need. I’m done now. Thank you for supper. You always make everything taste delicious.”

  The letter was on the front hall table. As soon as she picked it up, she knew it was the letter, the one she’d been waiting for all week. Her heart racing, she tore open the envelope and began to read.

  16 March 1919

  Dear Miss Brown,

  Further to your inquiry of the 12th March, I am pleased to confirm that, as per the regulations of the Representation of the People Act of 1918, and as a graduate in good standing from Somerville College, you are indeed entitled to cast a vote in the forthcoming by-election for Oxford University. I therefore enclose a voting paper for you to return at your earliest convenience, together with instructions on its proper submission.

  I remain,

  Your obedient servant,

  Mr. C. M. R. Hopkins

  Office of the Vice Chancellor

  University of Oxford

  Chapter 3

  She set off for work not much past dawn the next morning, her voting paper tucked securely in her handbag. How odd, that a single piece of paper could instantly make her feel more present, more engaged, as if she were somehow part of a greater whole.

  Even the task she’d set herself for the morning, collating information on rents and prices from a whopping great pile of files, seemed appealing, and by the time her wristwatch read half past eight, before anyone other than Miss Rathbone had arrived, Charlotte had opened, read, and made notes from each and every file.

  She took the voting paper from her bag, unfolded it, and smoothed away its creases. It was time.

  She went to the door of Miss Rathbone’s office and knocked lightly.

  “Do come in!”

  “Miss Rathbone? Do you have a moment?”

  Charlotte’s employer looked up from the papers that cluttered her desk and exhaled a great plume of smoke from one of her ever-present Turkish cigarettes. “Of course, my dear. Is everything all right?”

  At least fifteen years Charlotte’s senior, Eleanor Rathbone had been middle-aged since the day she was born. Some of the younger women who worked in the constituency office were intimidated by her, for she took no pains to hide her formidable intellect, nor did she have much patience for those who were less sure in their convictions than she. A generation ago she would have been called a bluestocking and dismissed out of hand for her ridiculous notions about equality between the sexes and the inherent value of women’s work. Two decades into the twentieth century, Miss Rathbone was beginning to make her presence and politics felt on the national stage.

  Like Charlotte, she had attended Somerville College at Oxford, and after finishing her studies, Miss Rathbone had returned to Liverpool and had joined her father in his work chronicling the lives of the city’s working poor. She’d been elected as a city councilor for Granby Ward in 1909; two years after that Charlotte had begun work as one of her constituency assistants.

  But Miss Rathbone’s work as a ward councilor was only one of the many hats she wore. Elsewhere in Britain she had become known as a committed suffragist and defender of women’s rights beyond the voting booth. If a cause was worthy in her eyes, she threw her considerable weight behind it. Rest could wait for the hereafter, she often told her assistants. What counted, in this life, were good deeds and hard work.

  She was far from perfect, of course. She tended to bully her opponents into submission, smothering their arguments with the weighty superiority of her own convictions. She was high-minded to a fault, maddeningly humorless at times, and entirely lacking in vices apart from her addiction to tobacco.

  Charlotte worshiped her.

  “Yes, ma’am, quite all right. I’ve come about my vote.”

  “I don’t follow you,” Miss Rathbone said, stubbing out her cigarette and regarding Charlotte with an air of heightened interest.

  “I can’t remember if I told you I didn’t vote in the general election. I wanted to, but I had to apply to the registrar at Somerville for proof of my status as a graduate, and by the time—”

  “I understand. By the time you’d jumped through all their hoops, registration had closed.”

  “I was so disappointed. But they’ve since called a by-election for Oxford University, so I will be able to vote after all. I know it’s one of the university constituencies, and not a proper riding—”

  “A vote is a vote, my dear.”

  “As soon as the writ was issued, I applied for my voting paper, and it arrived yesterday.” Her voice faltered; until that moment, she hadn’t realized how much it had meant to her. “I was hoping, Miss Rathbone, that you would do me the honor of acting as my witness.”

  “The honor is entirely mine,” Miss Rathbone replied, her serious face transformed by a rare smile.

  Charlotte extracted her voting paper from its envelope and filled in the empty spaces where indicated.

  I, Charlotte Jocelin Brown (Somerville College, 1907), give my vote as indicated below:

  Professor Gilbert Murray, standing for the Liberal Party

  I declare that I have signed no other voting paper and have not voted in person at this election for the university constituency of Oxford.

  I also declare that I have not voted at this general election for any other university constituency.

  Signed

  Charlotte Jocelin Brown

  47 Huskisson Street

  Liverpool

  This day of 19 March 1919

  Her contribution complete, she handed the form across the desk to Miss Rathbone.

  I declare that this voting paper (the voting paper having been previously filled in), was signed in my presence by Miss Charlotte Jocelin Brown, who is personally known to me, on this day of 19 March 1919.

  Signed

  Eleanor Rathbone

  Greenbank House

  Mossley Hill, Liverpool

  Miss Rathbone set down her pen, lit another cigarette, and sighed with contentment. “Normally I would not presume to discuss your choice of candidate with you, but as it is staring me in the face, I will commend you for it.”

  “I fear
Professor Murray has no chance at all.”

  “None whatsoever,” Miss Rathbone agreed. “The university is Conservative to its foundation. But that, my dear, is not the point. Your name has been counted. You have been counted. How does it feel?”

  Charlotte had to think on it a moment. She’d been so intent on having her voting paper signed and witnessed that it hadn’t occurred to her to dwell on the moment itself, let alone contemplate its true significance.

  “Casting my vote felt familiar, oddly enough. As if it were something I’d done a hundred times before. If I think on it, I suppose I would say it felt right. As natural as breathing.”

  “An excellent point, for what could be more natural than an intelligent, able, and curious adult exercising her right to help determine the governance of her country? I feel this calls for a toast, in spite of the early hour.”

  Pushing back from her chair, Miss Rathbone went to a small drinks table at the far side of her office. She poured two modest measures of walnut-brown sherry and handed one of the tiny glasses to Charlotte.

  “To you, Charlotte, on the occasion of your first opportunity to exercise your franchise in a parliamentary election, and to those who fought so valiantly for the cause of universal suffrage, but were never able to cast their own vote.”

  They raised their glasses and then, seated again, sipped at their sherry. It was beautiful stuff, so dry it nearly evaporated on Charlotte’s tongue, and so potent that she set her glass down unfinished. It wouldn’t do to fall asleep at her desk.

  “I’ve been meaning to congratulate you on your election as president of the National Union,” she said.

  “Thank you. I’m afraid we have a long road ahead. With the government so obsessed with stabilizing the labor market, I worry most women in this country will soon find themselves out of work. It makes me wonder if we have all lost sight of what truly matters.”

  “Perhaps it’s simply that people want a respite from urgency,” Charlotte ventured. “They want to be, to live without anxiety, and if that means neglecting causes they once held dear . . .”

  It was clear, from the puzzled expression on Miss Rathbone’s face, that such sentiments were not only foreign to her, but also unthinkable.

  “Then we are all lost. No; we will have to find a way to wake this country up—and do so before we stand at the brink of disaster again. That reminds me . . .”

  “Yes, Miss Rathbone?”

  “Only an idea or two for my article on family allowances. Back to work we go, my dear. I need to finish off these memos I was writing for tomorrow’s meeting of the Personal Service Society. You’ll be there to take notes, won’t you?”

  “Of course I will. Thank you again, Miss Rathbone. It means a great deal to me that you witnessed my vote.”

  “You are most welcome. Now shut my door tight, and leave me to think.”

  WHEN SHE EMERGED from Miss Rathbone’s office, a little light-headed from the few sips of sherry she’d imbibed, her colleagues had all arrived and were fetching themselves cups of tea in the cloakroom.

  Her closest friend in the group, Mabel Petrie, was just taking off her coat. She and Charlotte were Miss Rathbone’s assistants, while the other women, six in total, worked as clerk typists. Like Charlotte, Mabel was the daughter of a vicar, and though she hadn’t been to university she had received a fine education at a ladies’ college in Newcastle, where she had grown up.

  “May I show you something, Miss Petrie?”

  It was a quirk of the office that she and Mabel were accorded the privilege of being referred to by their surnames, while the clerk typists were known by their Christian names alone. When she and Mabel went to lunch, or took a walk through Princes Park, they used each other’s Christian name; but at work they were Miss Brown and Miss Petrie.

  “Oh, do. That looks like something official,” Mabel answered.

  “It’s my vote,” Charlotte said, and instantly the cloakroom fell silent.

  “Your vote? How is that possible?”

  “I can’t vote here, as I don’t own any property or pay rates or anything like that. But I went to Oxford, and as a graduate of the university, I’m entitled to vote in their constituency.”

  “Doesn’t the city of Oxford have its own member of Parliament?” asked Margaret, one of the younger clerk typists.

  “It does, but for some reason the universities themselves have constituencies. Oxford and Cambridge both have one, and there’s a new constituency for all the other English universities.”

  “Seems an odd way of doing things.”

  “It is, rather. But it gives me the chance to vote, so I’m not going to complain.”

  The other women all crowded round, all eager for a look at Charlotte’s voting paper. All except Miss Margison.

  Though a clerk typist, Ann Margison insisted on being called by her surname, and as she had worked for Miss Rathbone for donkey’s years, no one thought to challenge her on it. She was capable enough, and was as devoted to their employer as the day was long, but she was such a disagreeable person, all hard edges and cutting gibes. If Miss Margison had ever had something nice to say about anyone or anything, Charlotte had yet to hear it.

  “Lucky you,” the woman said, and it was clear she was not offering her congratulations. “Lucky to be able to buy yourself a vote so easy.”

  Charlotte ignored her; what could she say that wouldn’t sound defensive or pandering? It was true, after a fashion, for her expensive education had set her apart, and had given her a vote when most other women were still excluded from the franchise.

  “You’ll all be filling out one of these before long,” she said. “You know Miss Rathbone won’t rest until it happens.”

  When the others had gone to their desks and begun their day, Charlotte returned to her little office and looked at her completed voting form until she was sure it was fixed in her memory. She folded it into the envelope she had prepared earlier, affixed a stamp, and then took it to the pillar-box around the corner. Pushing it through its slot, rather as she imagined one might insert a ballot in a voting box, was terribly satisfying, if a trifle anticlimactic.

  There were no brass bands to herald her victory, no crown of laurel or medal to mark her achievement. Only the sun, shining brightly in a pale spring sky, and the joyous music of birdsong high in the trees. But for now, for today, it was more than enough.

  Chapter 4

  The next morning Charlotte was once again knee-deep in files when there was a knock at her office door.

  “Miss Brown?” said the office’s reception clerk.

  “Yes, Gladys?”

  “Telegram just came for you. Here you are.”

  “Thank you.”

  Charlotte accepted the flimsy, nearly transparent envelope and took a steadying breath. Something had happened to one of her parents. That was the only explanation, really. Either Mother or Father was unwell, and the sooner she opened the wretched thing, the sooner she could pack and set off for Somerset.

  She tore open the envelope and extracted the single sheet, its message penciled out in neat block letters.

  DEAR CHARLOTTE. LORD CUMBERLAND DIED YESTERDAY MORNING. FUNERAL AND RECEPTION FRIDAY AFTERNOON. HOPEFUL YOU CAN COME. LILLY NEEDS A FRIENDLY FACE. EDWARD TOO. REGARDS ROBERT FRASER.

  Charlotte slumped a little in her chair, her heart pounding, and tried to quell the sense of relief she felt. Not bad news from home, but from London, from the fiancé of her dearest friend.

  Lord Cumberland hadn’t been much of a father to Lilly, nor had he been a particularly decent man. But her friend needed her, and for that reason alone she would go to London and endure what was sure to be a farce of a funeral. What could be said of a man who’d had so much and had given so little?

  Once, long ago, Charlotte had been a servant in the Cumberland household. Lilly’s governess, beloved by her charge but disdained by nearly everyone else in the family. Her friendship with Lilly had endured—had made every lowering mom
ent of those years worthwhile—but the prospect of seeing Lady Cumberland and her elder daughters was singularly unappealing.

  She wouldn’t think of how Lilly’s brother Edward was suffering, though it was a subject that had preyed on her mind ever since his near-miraculous return from the war. They had been friends, back in those years of war before his capture by the enemy. They had written to each other several times, and once, when he was home for Christmas, he had taken her and Lilly to lunch at the Savoy. As for what had occurred after lunch, she wouldn’t think of that, not now. Not ever.

  She had become very fond of him; perhaps too fond, given that he was engaged to another woman. Once or twice, she had even allowed herself to daydream of a future in which they were free to be more than friends.

  She went to Miss Rathbone’s office and knocked.

  “I’m terribly sorry to bother you, Miss Rathbone. The thing is . . . I’ve just had a telegram from London.”

  “Not bad news, I hope.”

  “It is, rather. Do you recall my friend Lilly? She and I lived together in London.”

  “The WAAC? Yes, I do. Is she—”

  “It’s her father. He died, quite unexpectedly, and she was hoping I might attend his funeral. It’s tomorrow afternoon. So I was hoping, with your permission, that I might have leave to go. I’ll make up the time, I promise.”

  “I have no fears on that account, not least because you’ve worked late almost every night since your return. Do go, and please convey my condolences to your friend.”

  “Thank you very much, Miss Rathbone. I promise I’ll leave everything in good order.”

  “I know you will, my dear.”

  “I was also wondering . . . may I use the telephone to ring London and let them know I’ll be there? I’ll ask the operator for the charges.”

  “Never mind about that. Do you wish to use my telephone?”

  “No, thank you, ma’am. I’ll use the one at the front desk. But thank you for offering all the same.”

  Charlotte hurried down the hall to the reception area at the front of the building. The main telephone for the constituency office sat at its own little desk, separate from that of the reception clerk, and for a change was not in use.