THE SIXTH SCHOOL

WAR à OUTRANCE

"Ridgeon: I have a curious aching; I dont know where; I cant localise it. Sometimes I think it's my heart; sometimes I suspect my spine. It doesn't exactly hurt me, but it unsettles me completely. I feel that something is going to happen....

Sir Patrick: You are sure there are no voices?

Ridgeon: Quite sure.

Sir Patrick: Then it's only foolishness.

Ridgeon: Have you ever met anything like it before in your practice?

Sir Patrick: Oh yes. Often. It's very common between the ages of seventeen and twenty-two. It sometimes comes on again at forty or thereabouts. You're a bachelor, you see. It's not serious-if you're careful.

Ridgeon: About my food?

Sir Patrick: No; about your behaviour.... Youre not going to die; but you may be going to make a fool of yourself."

Bernard Shaw: "The Doctor's Dilemma."

I was a few minutes late for dinner, as a guest should be. Aintree had quite properly arrived before me, and was standing in the lounge of the Ritz talking to two slim, fair-haired women, with very white skin and very blue eyes. I have spent so much of my time in the East and South that this light colouring has almost faded from my memory. I associated it exclusively with England, and in time began to fancy it must be an imagination of my boyhood. The English blondes you meet returning from India by P & O are usually so bleached and dried by the sun that you find yourself doubting whether the truly golden hair and forget-me-not eyes of your dreams are ever discoverable in real life. But the fascination endures even when you suspect you are cherishing an illusion.

I had been wondering, as I drove down, whether any trace survived of the two dare-devil, fearless, riotous children I had seen by flashlight glimpses, when an invitation from old Jasper Davenant brought me to participate in one of his amazing Cumberland shoots. I was twenty or twenty-one at the time; Elsie must have been seven, and Joyce five. Mrs. Davenant was alive in those days, and Dick still unborn. My memory of the two children is a misty confusion of cut hands, broken knees, torn clothes, and daily whippings. Jasper wanted to make fine animals of his children, and set them to swim as soon as they could walk, and to hunt as soon as their fingers were large enough to hold a rein.

When I was climbing with him in Trans-Caucasia, I asked how the young draft was shaping. That was ten years later, and I gathered that Elsie was beginning to be afraid of being described as a tomboy. On such a subject Joyce was quite indifferent. She attended her first hunt ball at twelve, against orders and under threat of castigation; half the hunt broke their backs in bending down to dance with her, as soon as they had got over the surprise of seeing a short-frocked, golden-haired fairy marching into the ball-room and defying her father to send her home. "You know the consequences?" he had said with pathetic endeavour to preserve parental authority. "I think it's worth it," was her answer. That night the Master interceded with old Jasper to save Joyce her whipping, and the next morning saw an attempt to establish order without recourse to the civil hand. "I'll let you off this time," Jasper had said, "if you'll promise not to disobey me again." "Not good enough," was Joyce's comment with grave deliberate shake of the head. "Then I shall have to flog you." "I think you'd better. You said you would, and you'd make me feel mean if you didn't. I've had my fun."

The words might be taken for the Davenant motto, in substitution of the present "Vita brevis." Gay and gallant, half savage, half moss-rider, lawless and light-hearted, they would stick at nothing to compass the whim of the moment, and come up for judgment with uncomplaining faces on the day of inevitable retribution. Joyce had run away from two schools because the Christmas term clashed with the hunting. I never heard the reason why she was expelled from a third; but I have no doubt it was adequate. She would ride anything that had a back, drive anything that had a bit or steering-wheel, thrash a poacher with her own hand, and take or offer a bet at any hour of the day or night. That was the character her father gave her. I had seen and heard little of the family since his death, Elsie's marriage and Joyce's abrupt, marauding descent on Oxford, where she worked twelve hours a day for three years, secured two firsts, and brought her name before the public as a writer of political pamphlets, and a pioneer in the suffrage agitation.

"We really oughtn't to need introduction," said Mrs. Wylton, as Aintree brought me up to be presented. "I remember you quite well. I shouldn't think you've altered a bit. How long is it?"

"Twenty years," I said. "You have-grown, rather."

She had grown staider and sadder, as well as older; but the bright golden hair, white skin, and blue eyes were the same as I remembered in Cumberland. A black dress clung closely to her slim, tall figure, and a rope of pearls was her only adornment.

I turned and shook hands with Joyce, marvelling at the likeness between the two sisters. There was no rope of pearls, only a thin band of black velvet round the neck. Joyce was dressed in white silk, and wore malmaisons at her waist. Those, you would say, were the only differences-until time granted you a closer scrutiny, and you saw that Elsie was a Joyce who had passed through the fire. Something of her courage had been scorched and withered in the ordeal; my pity went out to her as we met. Joyce demanded another quality than pity. I hardly know what to call it-homage, allegiance, devotion. She impressed me, as not half a dozen people have impressed me in this life-Rhodes, Chamberlain, and one or two more-with the feeling that I was under the dominion of one who had always had her way, and would always have it; one who came armed with a plan and a purpose among straying sheep who awaited her lead.... And with it all she was twenty-eight, and looked less; smiling, soft and childlike; so slim and fragile that you might snap her across your knee like a lath rod.

Aintree and Mrs. Wylton led the way into the dining-room.

"I can't honestly say I remember you," Joyce remarked as we prepared to follow. "I was too young when you went away. I suppose we did meet?"

"The last time I heard of you...." I began.

"Oh, don't!" she interrupted with a laugh. "You must have heard some pretty bad things. You know, people won't meet me now. I'm a.... Wait a bit-'A disgrace to my family,' 'a traitor to my class,' 'a reproach to my upbringing!' I've 'drilled incendiary lawlessness into a compact, organised force,' I'm 'an example of acute militant hysteria.' Heaven knows what else! D'you still feel equal to dining at the same table? It's brave of you; that boy in front-he's too good for this world-he's the only non-political friend I've got. I'm afraid you'll find me dreadfully changed-that is, if we ever did meet."

"As I was saying...."

"Yes, and I interrupted! I'm so sorry. You drop into the habit of interrupting if you're a militant. As you were saying, the last time we met...."

"The last time we met, strictly speaking we didn't meet at all. I came to say good-bye, but you'd just discovered that a pony was necessary to your happiness. It was an idée fixe, you were a fanatic, you broke half a Crown Derby dinner-service when you couldn't get it. When I came to say good-bye, you were locked in the nursery with an insufficient allowance of bread and water."

Joyce shook her head sadly.

"I was an awful child."

"Was?"

She looked up with reproach in her blue eyes.

"Haven't I improved?"

"You were a wonderfully pretty child."

"Oh, never mind looks!"

"But I do. They're the only things worth having."

"They're not enough."

"Leave that to be said by the women who haven't any."

"In any case they don't last."

"And while they do, you slight them."

"I? They're far too useful!" She paused at the door of the dining-room to survey her reflection in the mirror; then turned to me with a slow, childlike smile. "I think I'm looking rather nice to-night."

"You looked nice twenty years ago. Not content with that, you broke a dinner-service to get a pony."

"Fancy your remembering that all these years!"

"I was reminded of it the moment I saw you. Plus ?a change, plus c'est la même chose. You are still not content with looking extremely nice, you must break a dinner-service now and again."

Joyce raised her eyebrows, and patiently stated a self-evident proposition.

"I must have a thing if I think I've a right to it," she pouted.

"You were condemned to bread and water twenty years ago to convince you of your error."

"I get condemned to that now."

"Dull eating, isn't it?"

"I don't know. I've never tried."

"You did then?"

"I threw it out of the window, plate and all."

We threaded our way through to a table at the far side of the room.

"Indeed you've not changed," I said. "You might still be that wilful child of five that I remember so well."

"You've forgotten one thing about me," she answered.

"What's that?"

"I got the pony," she replied with a mischievous laugh.

How far the others enjoyed that dinner, I cannot say. Aintree was an admirable host, and made a point of seeing that every one had too much to eat and drink; to the conversation he contributed as little as Mrs. Wylton. I did not know then how near the date of the divorce was approaching. Both sat silent and reflective, one overshadowed by the Past, the other by the Future: on the opposite side of the table, living and absorbed in the Present, typifying it and luxuriating in its every moment, was Joyce Davenant. I, too, contrive to live in the present, if by that you mean squeezing the last drop of enjoyment out of each sunny day's pleasure and troubling my head as little about the future as the past....

I made Joyce tell me her version of the suffrage war; it was like dipping into the memoirs of a prescribed Girondist. She had written and spoken, debated and petitioned. When an obdurate Parliament told her there was no real demand for the vote among women themselves, she had organised great peaceful demonstrations and "marches past": when sceptics belittled her processions and said you could persuade any one to sign any petition in favour of anything, she had massed a determined army in Parliament Square, raided the House and broken into the Prime Minister's private room.

The raid was followed by short terms of imprisonment for the ringleaders. Joyce came out of Holloway, blithe and unrepentant, and hurried from a congratulatory luncheon to an afternoon meeting at the Albert Hall, and from that to the first round of the heckling campaign. For six months no Minister could address a meeting without the certainty of persistent interruption, and no sooner had it been decided first to admit only such women as were armed with tickets, and then no women at all, than the country was flung into the throes of a General Election, and the Militants sought out every uncertain Ministerial constituency and threw the weight of their influence into the scale of the Opposition candidate.

Joyce told me of the papers they had founded and the bills they had promoted. The heckling of Ministers at unsuspected moments was reduced to a fine art: the whole sphere of their activities seemed governed by an almost diabolical ingenuity and resourcefulness. I heard of fresh terms of imprisonment, growing longer as the public temper warmed; the institution of the Hunger Strike, the counter move of Forcible Feeding, a short deadlock, and at last the promulgation of the "Cat and Mouse" Bill.

I was not surprised to hear some of the hardest fighting had been against over-zealous, misdirected allies. It cannot be said too often that Joyce herself would stick at nothing-fire, flood or dynamite-to secure what she conceived to be her rights. But if vitriol had to be thrown, she would see that it fell into the eyes of the right, responsible person: in her view it was worse than useless to attempt pressure on A by breaking B's windows. She had stood severely aloof from the latter developments of militancy, and refused to lend her countenance to the idly exasperating policy of injuring treasures of art, interrupting public races, breaking non-combatants' windows and burning down unique, priceless houses.

"Where do you stand now?" I asked as dinner drew to a close. "I renewed my acquaintance with Arthur Roden to-day, and he invited me down to the House to assist at the final obsequies of the Militant movement."

Joyce shook her head dispassionately over the ingrained stupidity of mankind.

"I think it's silly to talk like that before the battle's over. Don't you?"

"He seemed quite certain of the result."

"Napoleon was so certain that he was going to invade England that he had medals struck to commemorate the capture of London. I've got one at home. I'd rather like to send it him, only it 'ud look flippant."

I reminded her that she had not answered my question.

"Roden says that the 'Cat and Mouse' Act has killed the law-breakers," I told her, "and to-night's division is going to kill the constitutionalists. What are you going to do?"

Joyce turned to me with profound solemnity, sat for a moment with her head on one side, and then allowed a smile to press its way through the serious mask. As I watched the eyes softening and the cheeks breaking into dimples, I appreciated the hopelessness of trying to be serious with a fanatic who only made fun of her enemies.

"What would you do?" she asked.

"Give it up," I answered. "Yield to force majeure. I've lived long enough in the East to feel the beauty and usefulness of resignation."

"But if we won't give it up?"

I shrugged my shoulders.

"What can you do?"

"I'm inviting suggestions. You're a man, so I thought you'd be sure to be helpful. Of course we've got our own plan, and when the Amendment's rejected to-night, you'll be able to buy a copy of the first number of a new paper to-morrow morning. It's called the New Militant, only a penny, and really worth reading. I've written most of it myself. And then we're going to start a fresh militant campaign, rather ingenious, and directed against the real obstructionists. No more window-breaking or house-burning, but real serious fighting, just where it will hurt them most. Something must come of it," she concluded. "I hope it may not be blood."

Aintree roused himself from his attitude of listless indifference.

"You'll gain nothing by militancy," he pronounced. "I've no axe to grind, you may have the vote or go without it. You may take mine away, or give me two. But your cause has gone back steadily, ever since you adopted militant tactics."

"The Weary Seraph cares for none of these things," Joyce remarked. I requested a moment's silence to ponder the exquisite fitness of the name. Had I thought for a year I could not have found a better description for the shy boy with the alert face and large frightened eyes. "Every one calls him that," Joyce went on. "And he doesn't like it. I should love to be called seraphic, but no one will; I'm too full of original sin. Well, Seraph, you may disapprove of militancy if you like, but you must suggest something to put in its place."

"I don't know that I can."

Joyce turned to her sister.

"These men-things aren't helpful, are they, Elsie?"

"I'm a good destructive critic," I said in self-justification.

"There are so many without you," Joyce answered, laying her hand on my arm. "Listen, Mr. Merivale. You've probably noticed there's very little argument about the suffrage; everything that can be said on either side has already been said a thousand times. You're going to refuse us the vote. Good. I should do the same in your place. There are more of us than there are of you, and we shall swamp you if we all get the vote. You can't give it to some of us and not others, because the brain is not yet born that can think of a perfect partial franchise. Will you give it to property and leave out the factory workers? Will you give it to spinsters and leave out the women who bear children to the nation? Will you give it to married women and leave out the unprotected spinsters? It's all or none: I say all, you say none. You say I'm not fit for a vote, I say I am. We reach an impasse, and might argue till daybreak without getting an inch further forward. We're fighting to swamp you, you're fighting to keep your head above water. We're reduced to a trial of strength."

She leant back in her chair, and I presented her with a dish of salted almonds, partly as a reward, partly because I never eat them myself.

"I admire your summary of the situation," I said. "You've only omitted one point. In a trial of strength between man and woman, man is still the stronger."

"And woman the more resourceful."

"Perhaps."

"She's certainly the more ruthless," Joyce answered, as she finished her coffee and drew on her gloves.

"War à outrance," I commented as we left the dining-room. "And what after the war?"

"When we've got the vote...." she began.

"Napoleon and the capture of London," I murmured.

"Oh well, you don't think I go in for a thing unless I'm going to win, do you? When we get the vote, we shall work to secure as large a share of public life as men enjoy, and we shall put women on an equality with men in things like divorce," she added between closed teeth.

"Suppose for the sake of argument you're beaten? I imagine even Joyce Davenant occasionally meets with little checks?"

"Oh yes. When Joyce was seven, she wanted to go skating, and her father said the ice wouldn't bear and she mustn't go. Joyce went, and fell in and nearly got drowned. And when she got home, her father was very angry and whipped her with a crop."

"Well?"

"That's all. Only-he said afterwards that she took it rather well, there was no crying."

I wondered then, as I have always wondered, whether she in any way appreciated the seriousness of the warfare she was waging on society.

"A month in the second division at Holloway is one thing...." I began.

"It'll be seven years' penal servitude if I'm beaten," she interrupted. Her tone was innocent alike of flippancy and bravado.

"Forty votes aren't worth that. I've got three, so I ought to know."

Joyce's eyes turned in the direction of her sister who was coming out of the dining-room with Aintree.

"She's worth some sacrifice."

"You couldn't make her lot easier if you had every vote in creation. She's up against the existing divorce law, and that's buttressed by every Church, and every dull married woman in the country. You're starting conversation at the wrong end, Joyce."

Her little arched eyebrows raised themselves at the name.

"Joyce?" she repeated.