Half of the Human Race Read online

  ‘Hullo,’ said Connie, a not quite friendly note of puzzlement in her greeting. Her mother gaily supplied the explanation.

  ‘Mr Maitland called by with those flowers, darling – did you see them?’

  ‘And your mother very kindly allowed me to barge in on lunch,’ added Will, clearly embarrassed to have surprised her.

  ‘Oh, please! We’re delighted to have you. Constance, we’ve kept a place for you there,’ continued Mrs Callaway. ‘Fred, help Constance to the fish, will you?’

  Connie sat down next to Fred, who scooped a portion of cold poached trout onto her plate. He nodded over at their guest. ‘Mr Maitland’s been telling us about your visit to the Priory in May. Three hundred-odd runs in a day!’

  She looked to Will, who would not, she knew, have volunteered that information himself. On the subject of his own batting feats he maintained a modest reticence. Olivia, who had no interest in cricket, was nevertheless directing a look of open curiosity at Will.

  ‘You live in London, then, Mr Maitland?’ she asked him.

  ‘Yes, part of the time,’ Will admitted. ‘During the season I tend to stay at my mother’s place.’

  ‘Constance told us what a beautiful house it is,’ Mrs Callaway chimed in.

  ‘We’re – very fond of it,’ he said, with a meek glance to see if Connie’s face registered any favourable memory of her visit, but she was bent over her plate, not catching his eye. He felt once again the liberty he had taken in pitching up, unannounced. ‘Will you be holidaying on the south coast this summer?’

  ‘We might have a run down there,’ said Olivia grandly, ‘though there’s so much to do before the wedding.’

  Lionel squinted at Will, as though he had recalled something. ‘I say, Maitland – that name … you’re not one of the wine and spirits people, by any chance?’

  ‘I am. The company was started by my grandfather.’

  ‘Doing pretty well, I dare say,’ Lionel speculated further, at which Will nodded politely. For an awful moment Connie thought that Lionel might be about to ask him for ‘a deal’ on the wine for his wedding. She could sense around the table a concerted enthusiasm for Will, whose gift of flowers only she knew had been brought in contrition rather than courtship. His show of interest in the forthcoming nuptials was making Olivia almost purr with approval, and even their mother seemed strangely coquettish in his presence. Will himself, aware that Connie had hardly said a word to him since sitting down, had taken to charming the family instead. Mrs Callaway had perhaps noticed, too, for she now addressed her directly.

  ‘How was it at work, darling?’ It secretly annoyed Connie that her mother would never refer to it as ‘the shop’. It was always ‘at work’.

  ‘Fine,’ said Connie, picking a tiny bone out of the fish.

  Mrs Callaway turned to Will. ‘Constance always loved to be around books,’ she said, as if she were offering a courtroom testimonial.

  ‘She used to write them, too,’ added Fred. ‘D’you remember, Con?’ Sniggering laughter followed from Olivia and her mother as they heard the door to a favourite family story creak open. Connie sighed long-sufferingly at the imminent prospect of being teased. Will had leaned forward, head cocked in interest.

  ‘Did you really?’

  Before she had time to answer, Olivia had jumped in. ‘Oh yes! She got through huge heaps of paper. And when she finished one of these great loose-leafed tomes she would make Fred sit down and listen to her read it out. The poor boy was only about five!’

  ‘I remember rather enjoying them,’ Fred said with loyal promptness. ‘Though I did used to wonder whether dragons really had the power of reason. Or indeed of speech.’

  Even Connie couldn’t help smiling at that. She thought now of Fred as a boy, his darkly serious eyes staring into the distance as he listened – or seemed to listen – to her youthful epics of storytelling. It was some years after that, when Connie was about fifteen, that Fred had repaid the gift and told her something she didn’t know. Her curiosity, inflamed by whispered schoolgirl conversations about where babies came from, had prompted her to supplement her small store of physiological facts from close reading of the Bible, Keats and Adam Bede, but it was Fred, home from school, who one afternoon during a walk down Upper Street had bluntly recited to her the precise details of the sexual act. It seemed to her that his eagerness to impart the information came not of an instinct to shock but of an excessive wonderment: he wanted to know if Connie could possibly believe it either. She concealed her own surprise at the time, though months, perhaps years, elapsed before she deduced that the procedure Fred had described could be more conveniently practised while lying down.

  Lunch was being cleared. Will was talking with Lionel in the warily appraising way that men tend to do on brief acquaintance. Connie carried the remains of the ravaged trout off to the kitchen, where her mother and Mrs Etherington, the cook, were stacking the plates.

  ‘Darling,’ said Connie’s mother over her shoulder, ‘a little parcel arrived for you this morning. I left it on the seat by the telephone.’

  Connie went out to the hall and picked up the slim package, but she hadn’t started to open it before Olivia came hurrying in after her, her expression lit with conspiratorial excitement. ‘What a charmer!’ she said, keeping her voice low. ‘Nicer than I remembered. And he’s absolutely spoony about you!’

  ‘You think so?’ said Connie unconcernedly.

  Olivia’s brow darkened. ‘Yes – so please tell, why are you being so stand-offish with him?’

  ‘I wasn’t aware of it.’

  ‘He’s always looking at you, and you’ve barely said a word to the poor man. Just buck up!’ She gave Connie’s arm a schoolmarmish tap. ‘Lionel thinks he’s a capital fellow, too.’ Nothing could have been less likely to endear a man to Connie than Lionel’s approbation, but she held her tongue: like it or not, he would soon be a member of the family. Baffled by this continuing cool, Olivia dipped her head towards Connie’s ear. ‘You do realise how much he’s worth?’

  So there it was, thought Connie. The eager, almost fawning attention Olivia and her mother had paid Will, Lionel’s impudent enquiry as to the Maitland fortune, and now these whispered exhortations: it all came down to money. Will had it, and Connie, as far as she could tell, was being encouraged to pursue it. But unlike her sister, she revolted at such calculation. If she were to marry at all it would not be for the sake of financial security. She would find a man she loved and who loved her, and once established, at a time of her own choosing, she might consent to marry him. Not before. To explain this, however, would effectively cast Olivia’s own rationale in a very poor light; it wouldn’t do to impute mercenary motives to her sister, no matter how obvious they appeared.

  ‘I’d rather not discuss this,’ said Connie quietly.

  Olivia pursed her lips, then said, decidedly, ‘I’ve an idea. I think it would be a friendly thing if you invited Mr Maitland – William – to our wedding.’

  Connie blinked in surprise. ‘Why? You hardly know him.’

  ‘But you know him. And wouldn’t it be agreeable to have a man walk you in?’

  ‘Not especially.’

  Olivia gave an irritable sigh. ‘Just ask him.’

  ‘No,’ said Connie, turning away and making for the stairs. She heard Olivia’s footsteps tick irritably over the parquet back towards the garden. Once in her bedroom she took out her sewing scissors and cut through the string on her package, revealing a slim white box embossed with the Garrard’s marque and the royal warrant. It was itself secured with purple and green ribbons. Intrigued, she untied them and raised the lid: as the light gleamed on it, her instant reaction was delight that someone had given her silver. Only when she plucked it from its cushioned bed of purple velvet did she realise that it wasn’t a paperknife, as she first thought. It was a silver brooch in the shape of an arrow, with ‘Votes for Women’ minutely engraved upon its flight. An ivory-coloured envelope, creamy to the touch, ha
d been inserted with the package, and she read the note inside.

  18 Sumner Place, Kensington, SW.

  Friday, 19 July 1912

  Dear Constance,

  News has reached us of your ‘sharing a drink’ with Mr Foulkes the other night. I need hardly tell you it has roused feelings of admiration and even envy among certain Union members – such a forceful and public rebuke was long overdue. To speak personally, your boldness has been a source of considerable pride to me, for I recall your misgivings as to the efficacy of militant action. But you have splendidly upheld our old motto: audere est facere. As a token of my warm regard please accept the enclosed gift, and may it encourage you to higher degrees of daring in this great cause of ours.

  Believe me, very affectionately yours,

  Marianne Garnett

  A postscript appended the address of a hotel in Belgravia, and a date in September on which a deputation of the WSPU were planning to assemble. It did not require any great intuition on Connie’s part that another campaign was about to be launched. She looked at the date again: three days after Olivia’s wedding. As she gazed at the slim shaft of silver, she considered Marianne’s letter. On the one hand, she felt a pleasurable glow in having won the respect of a woman whom she personally revered; this heroine of independent womanhood had taken the time to write, warmly, affectionately – to her. On the other, she detected the sly hand of opportunism steering her, somewhat against her will. Connie did undeed have ‘misgivings’, not just over the efficacy of militant tactics but over the morality, and, if she were being honest with herself, they had not been resolved. Marianne’s blandishments hid an agenda: her expressed delight in Connie’s boldness subtly implied that the Union had won a new recruit, one who would moreover be moved to ‘higher degrees of daring’. Tipping a glass of wine over an MP was a beginning; now she would have to take a step up to breaking windows and risking imprisonment. But was she ready to do that?

  Below she heard laughter and the clink of china in the garden. She went to her window and looked down, where Olivia was just depositing a pot of coffee on the lunch table, while the men yarned on among themselves. Fred, she noticed, had a cigar in blast. She watched as Olivia seated herself next to Will, his body weight shifting around towards her in an accommodating effort of politeness. There was something so appealing about good manners, she thought, particularly in men, from whom she expected very little. Her father, while not ill-mannered, had been domineering, and was apt to put people on the spot – a consequence, she supposed, of the frantic pace of business in the City. Fred, less worldly than his father, was sometimes thoughtless, but he had an unaffected geniality that was more cherishable than social forms. There was about him an air of wanting nothing more than to enjoy the company of whomever he was with. As for Will, he did have beautiful manners, she had to concede; it was the reason he had been a hit this afternoon. She didn’t wonder that Olivia and her mother suddenly had her matrimonial eligibility in view. More fluttery laughter drifted up from below. She could only imagine their commotion on discovering what had prompted the gift of the brooch she now weighed in her hand, and the identity of the sender.

  Her mother was calling her. Hiding the box and its gift in a drawer, she descended the stairs and walked through to the garden. As she approached the table she saw Olivia vacate the chair next to Will, thus obliging Connie to take it. Had he noticed that they were being forced together? In fact, all that bothered Will was not being able to talk privately with Connie. He would have endured another half-hour of Lionel’s droning monologues if she would only favour him with a look of – what? Forgiveness, he supposed. Yet his mood consisted in more than simple penitence. Smarting from her furious outburst at the Beaufort, he had tried to convince himself in the following days that she was half mad, unstable, absolutely to be avoided. And then he had woken one morning to a palpitating sense of alarm that he might never see her again. This in turn compelled him to acknowledge the possibility that he was – it seemed preposterous – growing attached to her.

  Connie, stirring cream into her coffee, glanced surreptitiously at her watch. It was nearly three, too late for a trip to the Gentlemen vs Players match. The letter from Marianne was making her feel skittish. She had to get out and walk.

  ‘I have an errand to run,’ she said to her mother.

  ‘Oh … can it not wait?’

  ‘No. I promised to call on Lily this afternoon.’

  She heard Olivia click her tongue in exasperation, but didn’t say anything.

  ‘Your friend – lives nearby?’ asked Will.

  Connie nodded. ‘A ten-minute walk.’

  ‘I wonder if you’d allow me to accompany you – some of the way?’

  Softened by the meekness of his request, she said, ‘As you wish.’

  ‘I can come too, if you like,’ said Fred innocently. Connie caught Olivia’s flint-eyed look of warning at their brother, who took the hint. ‘Or not …’ he shrugged.

  A few minutes later Connie was coming down the stairs from her room, where she had retrieved her navy cloche and gloves, and saw Olivia and her mother almost simpering over Will in anticipation of his departure.

  ‘So nice to meet you again,’ trilled Mrs Callaway, ‘and thank you for those beautiful flowers!’

  She then overheard Olivia say, ‘I look forward to seeing you at the wedding.’

  ‘That’s very kind of you,’ said Will, with a nervous glance at Connie – he could tell that the invitation was not at her prompting.

  Out on the street they walked for about a minute in awkward silence. Connie looked straight ahead, satisfied that the conversational onus rested upon Will for imposing his company on her. He cleared his throat at last.

  ‘I hope you liked the flowers. They were meant as an apology.’

  ‘I did. Thank you for them.’

  ‘So may I venture to hope that I am … forgiven?’

  Connie kept walking. After some moments’ delay, she said, ‘In truth, I’m quite surprised by the question. When we last met you took so very decided a view of my behaviour. First you were indignant against me, then you condescended to make excuses for me. Which of these two do you wish to apologise for?’

  Will compressed his lips, then said, ‘Both. I was wrong on both counts. And that’s why I called, to ask your pardon.’ Connie stopped, and turned to look at him. Her gaze was so disarmingly candid that he bowed his head.

  ‘Well, if you mean it …’ she said. They were standing by a row of shops on Roman Road, and over his shoulder Connie saw a little bakery she occasionally visited for treats. She knew that Lily would love a cake. ‘Would you mind waiting here a moment?’

  As she hurried over to the shop Will followed her at a distance. Coming to a halt on the pavement where he could see her through the window, he was rewarded when she turned her head and, spotting him there on the other side, proffered a smile. At last! He continued to watch as she handed her money over the counter, picked up her purchase and walked back out, swinging two neat striped boxes on a string. ‘For you,’ she said, handing one of them to Will with an arching of her eyebrows. Will peeked inside the box: it was a jam tart. ‘They didn’t have any humble pie, I’m afraid,’ she added. Now it was his turn to smile.

  ‘Much obliged,’ he said with a little bow. They walked on, listening to the leaves of drooping sycamores shiver beneath the light breeze. Connie, with a sidelong look, said, ‘So … you’ve been invited to the wedding.’

  Will did not hear enthusiasm in her tone. ‘I wasn’t angling for an invitation, I assure you,’ he said. ‘Your sister rather took me by surprise.’

  Connie nodded slowly. ‘Well … you’ve probably earned it, what with having to listen to Lionel the whole lunch.’

  These last words, delivered in an eerily accurate imitation of Lionel’s nasal drawl, caused Will almost to yelp with laughter. ‘I take it you aren’t thrilled by the prospect of your brother-in-law.’

  ‘Do you blame me? I’ve ne
ver known a man so enchanted by the sound of his own voice. Olivia is only –’ She stopped herself. However much she believed it, it would be indiscreet, not to say grossly disloyal, to put it about that her sister was marrying for money. Nobody would emerge from such gossip looking well, including the gossip-monger. Will sensed something withheld, but didn’t press her.

  ‘The heart has its reasons,’ he shrugged, attempting a note of airy indulgence. ‘And I’m sure you’ll be happy for your sister on the day.’

  ‘Of course,’ said Connie. ‘Don’t worry, I’ll be all sweetness and light.’

  By now they had turned into Arundel Square. A carriage drawn by two horses rattled past them as they walked, prompting Connie to muse aloud.

  ‘D’you ever wonder what they’ll do with all the horses? I mean, with so many motor buses and cars nowadays, one sees fewer and fewer of them on the street. Will they simply be – retired?’

  Will hadn’t really considered the equine life after obsolescence, but now that he did, he envisaged a somewhat darker fate than retirement awaiting them. He said, ‘I’m not sure. Perhaps they’ll find something useful for them to do. In the country?’

  Connie half smiled at his vagueness, though she felt sad about the horses’ gradual disappearance; it was hard to imagine the roads without the castanet rhythm of hooves any more. The advent of something useful always seemed to entail the loss of something cherished. Her steps had slowed as they approached the Vaughan residence. Will, experiencing a lurch of regret at their imminent parting, felt moved to keep her a few moments longer, but couldn’t think of a suitable diversion.

  ‘This is Lil’s house,’ she said with a valedictory air.