Another woman came in, tall this time, also wearing the gray uniform, and jangling her keys in a most irritating manner.
“H-fifteen, second division,” Troll said to her. “Another un’s already there.”
The wardress nodded and gestured for Mr. Coleman and Maude to follow-which they did, neither of them giving me even a backward glance.
Well. When they were gone, Troll grinned at me from behind her table. I was surprised to see she had a full set of teeth-I would have expected them to be black and falling out. I ignored her and sat very quietly, like a little mouse. For I was rather terrified.
The thing about a little mouse, though, is that it can’t help but look around for some crumbs to munch on. There was not much to see in the room just the table and a few benches, all empty-and I found myself studying Troll. She was sitting behind the table, writing something in the ledger. She really was quite repulsive, even worse than something Dickens would have thought up. Her mole positively gleamed on her lip. I wondered if there were hairs growing out of it. The thought made me giggle. f didn’t think she could see me spying on her-I was looking at her through my lashes while pretending to study my fingernails-but she growled, “What you laughing at, gal?”
“My own little joke,” I said bravely. “It’s nothing to do with you. And really, you had better call me Miss Waterhouse.”
She had the impudence to laugh, so I felt obliged to explain that I was almost certain we were related to the painter J. W. Waterhouse, even though Papa thinks not, and that I had written to him to discover the connection. (I didn’t tell her that Mr. Waterhouse never responded to my letter.) Of course I was assuming far too much of a prison gatekeeper with a mole on her lip, even if she can write-she clearly had never heard of J.W W, not even when I described his painting of the Lady of Shalott that hangs in the Tate. She hadn’t even heard of her! Next she would be asking who was Tennyson.
Fortunately this fruitless conversation was interrupted by the arrival back of yet another wardress. Troll said she was glad the other had come because I could “talk the ear off an elephant, an’ all of it rubbish too.”
I was very tempted to stick out my tongue at her-the longer I sat there the less terrified I was. But then a bell rang, and she went off to answer the door. The other wardress just stood there and stared at me as if I were a piece in a museum exhibition. I glared at her but it didn’t seem to put her off. I expect they don’t often see girls like me sitting on that bench-no wonder that she stared.
Troll came back with a man in tow, dressed in a dark suit and bowler hat. He stood at the table while Troll looked in her ledger and said, “She’s already got her visitors for today. Popular lady. Did you write ahead to arrange it?”
“No,” the man said.
“You have to write ahead for permission,” Troll said gleefully. She did delight in others’ misfortunes. “And then it’s up to her to say she’ll see you.”
“I see.” The man turned to leave.
Well. I was rather beyond surprise by that time. So when he glanced over at me and started like a skittish horse, I simply smiled my sweetest smile and said, “Hello, Mr. Jackson.”
Luckily he left before Maude and her father returned or there would have been an awkward scene. For once Troll held her tongue rather than make everyone’s misery worse, and I kept quiet as well. It was very odd indeed that Mr. Jackson should want to visit Maude’s mother.
It was such a trying day that when I got home I had to have a long nap and a bowl of bread-and-butter pudding to comfort me, as if I were ill. All the while there were thoughts racing around my head that kept trying to fit themselves together. They were to do with Maude’s mother and Mr. Jackson. I tried very hard not to let them fit together, however, and I think I succeeded.
Maude Coleman
Daddy and I followed the wardress down a corridor and into a large internal courtyard. From the ground we could see all the way up to the roof. The walls were lined with tier after tier of doors. Outside the rows of doors were gangways of black ironwork, along which other wardresses dressed in gray were walking.
Our wardress led us up two flights of stairs and out along one of the gangways. From the iron railing at my side to the other across the courtyard a wire net had been stretched over the empty space. There were strange things caught in it-a wooden spoon, a white cap, a cracked leather shoe.
In the center of each cell door hung a leather flap. As I passed one I had an overwhelming urge to lift it. I slowed down so that Daddy and the wardress were several paces ahead, then quickly lifted the flap and put my eye up to the peephole.
The cell was very small-perhaps five feet by seven, not much larger than our scullery. I could see very little-a plank of wood leaning against a wall, a towel hanging from a nail, and a woman sitting on a stool in the corner. She had dark brown hair piled on her head, olive skin, and a strong jaw and mouth set in the manner of a soldier as he marches in a parade. She held herself very straight, as Grandmother is always nagging me to do. She wore a dark green dress with white arrows sewn on it-the badge of a prisoner-a checked apron, and a white cap like the one caught in the net outside the cells. A ball of wool and knitting needles sat in her lap.
I wanted her to look at me. When at last she met my eye, I knew exactly who she was. I had never seen Mrs. Pankhurst before-the remarkable Emmeline Pankhurst, leader of the suffragettes. Mummy always hoped she would come to an At Home, but she never did. I heard Caroline Black once describe her leader’s eyes as “deep blue and so penetrating that you would do anything for them-take a spade to Mount Snowdon if she said it ruined her view.”
Mrs. Pankhurst smiled at me.
“Maude!”
I jumped back from the peephole. Daddy was staring at me in horror. The wardress was still rushing forward but stopped when she heard Daddy’s shout.
I ran to him.
“What in hell’s name were you doing?” he whispered, grabbing my arm.
“Sorry,” I whispered.
The wardress grunted. “Look sharp, keep up with me, or you won’t see ‘er at all.”
Farther along the gangway two women were standing at a cell door-one a wardress, the other Caroline Black. Under her gray coat she was wearing a brilliant white dress with several rows of lace trim across her chest, and a hat trimmed with wilting primroses. She looked as if she should be strolling in Hyde Park. My own plain blue coat and old straw hat were very drab in comparison.
As we approached she was saying into the cell, “The colors are to be purple for dignity, white for purity, and green for hope. Isn’t it a splendid idea? I would’ve worn them myself today except I wanted to wear primroses for you. Think how striking it will look in public gatherings to see everyone dressed in the same colors!” She glanced at us, smiled, and announced, “More visitors!”
“Who has come?” I heard from inside the cell.
“Mummy!” I cried. I darted forward, but then stopped-although the door was open, there were still bars across the doorway. I wanted to cry.
Mummy’s cell was identical to Mrs. Pankhurst‘s, down to the ball of gray wool sitting on the stool, a gray sock with red stripes at the top almost finished between the knitting needles. Mummy stood against the back wall. “Hello, Maude,” she said. “Come to see your old mother locked away, then?” Like Mrs. Pankhurst, she, too, was dressed in dark green serge dotted with white arrows. The dress was too big for her-it covered her feet and hid her waist. Big as it was, I could see from her pinched face that she had lost weight. She had dark circles under her eyes and her skin was blotchy and yellow. Her eyes were bright as if she had a fever.