Lady Rights a Wrong Page 6

  “Hear, hear!” the woman next to Cecilia cried, brandishing a placard high, and a cheer went around the hall. Cecilia nodded, thinking of her fierce grandmother, her restless mother, of her friend Maud Rainsley at Girton, of her own useless Season just past. What would she do, if she were free to choose? To follow her own dreams? She scarcely even knew, had never dared to think of it at all, because it was impossible.

  But now, as she listened to Mrs. Price and watched the mesmerizing gestures of her hands, the flash of a ruby ring on her finger, a tiny hope dared to bloom deep inside Cecilia’s secret self. Maybe things could be different. Maybe she could have choices. As she listened to Mrs. Price’s speech go on, that hope expanded.

  “. . . each individual deserves dignity, responsibility, personal attainment,” Mrs. Price finally concluded. “We must stand tall together, and change will come!”

  Thunderous applause swept through the hall, and the audience jumped to their feet. Cecilia picked up Jack so he wouldn’t be crushed and tucked him under her arm as she stood. She felt that bright, sunlit hope expand and grow as the crowd around her sang “Shoulder to Shoulder,” and Mrs. Price bowed.

  As the women on the dais filed out and the crowd began to thin, Cecilia sat down to wait for things to quiet a bit more before she found Miss Black and then went to fetch the cart. “That was quite stirring, wasn’t it, Jack?” she said.

  He squeezed his eyes, as if in agreement. Or perhaps he just thought they should stop by Mrs. Mabry’s grocery on the way home to ask for scraps.

  “Maybe Mrs. Price should take on feline rights next,” she said with a laugh, remembering Jack’s story, how he was rescued by Jane from the sinking ship carrying them both from America. “We can’t just sit around waiting for someone to save us, I suppose.”

  Jack just licked his paw.

  “Lady Cecilia,” someone called, and Cecilia glanced up to see Cora Black hurrying toward her. Her hair was even more tangled now, the tie at the neck of her shirtwaist askew, as if she had been rushing around the whole time. “I’m so glad you’re still here. Would you have a moment to meet Mrs. Price?”

  Meet Mrs. Price? Her? Cecilia felt her stomach lurch, and she patted at her hat. “Oh, I should like that very much indeed, Miss Black. But I must get home before I’m missed.”

  “Of course. Mrs. Price would not take up much of your time; she’s often very tired after a speech. We just so much appreciate your visit, and Mrs. Price was eager to say so herself.”

  Cecilia knew that it was not herself that warranted a private word but the earl’s daughter. Yet she still couldn’t help but feel excited and eager. “Then I would be honored.”

  She followed Cora to one of the smaller chambers just behind the dais, where once guild members had negotiated the price of wool. Tonight there were just a few ladies there, gathered around an urn of tea, chatting quietly. Cecilia recognized Harriet Palmer, the vice president, and Anne Price. Behind them sat Amelia Price, a cashmere shawl wrapped around her shoulders, a glass in her hand.

  “Mrs. Price, this is Lady Cecilia Bates, who I met before the speeches,” Cora said, tidying up a small table nearby as if she couldn’t quite keep still.

  “Lady Cecilia, how very charming.” Mrs. Price gave a radiant, though slightly tired, smile and held out her hand. That ruby ring and a wedding band shimmered. “Such a delight to meet you. I was very glad when Cora told me you attended tonight.”

  Cecilia shifted Jack under her arm and shook Mrs. Price’s hand. Her fingers were soft and slight. “Thank you, Mrs. Price. It was such a stirring speech.”

  “I was quite hoping to meet someone from Danby Hall while we’re here. I knew your father once.”

  “Really?” Cecilia couldn’t quite hide her surprise at the thought of her conventional, conservative father who was against suffrage being friends with Mrs. Price. He had said nothing of that.

  Mrs. Price laughed. “Oh, it was ages ago, before I even met Mr. Price. I was Miss Merriman then. Clifford was such a handsome devil! All of us debutantes were in agonies of love for him.” She gestured to the ladies close to her. “You have met Cora, of course, and this is my daughter Anne.”

  “How do you do, Lady Cecilia,” Anne Price said. Up close, she looked even more like her mother, tall and slim with dark hair, but her eyes were darker, more solemn, and she seemed slightly wary. “I remember you from the theater in London. How nice to see you again.”

  “And this is the vice president of our Union, my oldest friend, Mrs. Harriet Palmer,” said Mrs. Price.

  “Lovely to meet you,” the plump, partridge-like, but sharp-eyed Mrs. Palmer said before turning back to her tea.

  “I am sure you must get home before it grows too late, and I don’t want to keep you, but I hope you will visit us before we leave. Perhaps tomorrow?” Mrs. Price asked with another smile. “We are staying at Primrose Cottage.”

  “Thank you, I would enjoy that,” Cecilia answered, determined to pay that call, even if she had to sneak out again.

  “And do bring Sir Jack!” Cora added. “And any friends.”

  The Guildhall was quiet when Cecilia made her way out, but the night was not yet completely deserted. When she opened the door, she found herself facing a cluster of angry, red-faced men—led by Lord Elphin.

  “Go home to your babies!” one of them shouted. “What are you going to do, go to the pub and leave your husbands to change nappies?”

  Cecilia thought that sounded like a splendid idea, despite the cold touch of nervousness she felt deep inside as they pressed closer to her. Who wouldn’t prefer cider to baby nappies? Jack seemed to agree, as he hissed in her arms.

  “Women are irrational, emotional creatures who can’t make logical decisions at a ballot box,” Lord Elphin shouted. “Britain would be in chaos!”

  And Cecilia thought that was rich, coming from men waving torches and mucking around in the dark to whine about women going to the pub. She stepped forward to say how ridiculous they were, when she felt a gentle touch on her arm. She looked back to see Mrs. Price herself standing behind her, pale and perfect as a statue in the torchlight, a slight smile on her lips.

  “You cannot stop us—we are your equals whether you like it or not,” she said, in her musical, carrying voice. She smelled of roses and wine. “I pay my taxes, so I demand my say.” She waved her beringed hand at them. “Now begone to your beds. Maybe some beauty sleep would make you less cranky.” She glimpsed Lord Elphin, and her eyes widened for an instant, as if she recognized him. Maybe he had harassed the Union before.

  The men shouted incoherently and waved their torches, but Mrs. Price just ignored them and turned her smile to Cecilia. “Is that by any chance your friend over there, Lady Cecilia?”

  Cecilia was confused by the whole strange scene. She couldn’t be talking about anyone in the crowd of angry men. “My friend, Mrs. Price?”

  Mrs. Price gestured to the other side of the lane, along the edge of the village green. Cecilia saw that Jesse Fellows had just driven the cart around the corner, and he looked quite anxious.

  “Oh yes, that’s Jesse,” Cecilia said, in surprise and relief. Maybe a tiny bit of rescue from being a stowaway wasn’t so terrible.

  “Come along, then. You should not keep such a handsome lad waiting, my dear.” Mrs. Price took Cecilia’s arm and walked with her down the stone steps.

  “Mother!” Anne called from the doorway. “Where are you going?” Mrs. Price just waved her back, and even the angry men seemed to fall away a step as she marched serenely past them, as if they weren’t even there. Jack hissed at them.

  “Does this happen everywhere you go, Mrs. Price?” Cecilia whispered.

  Mrs. Price laughed. “There are certainly misguided people everywhere. Nothing to worry about. They will come to see the light of truth. And do call me Amelia.”

  One of the men suddenly
lunged forward to push Amelia, who stumbled against Cecilia. Jack howled and puffed out his orange-striped tail.

  “Hey!” Jesse shouted, and jumped down from the cart.

  Amelia glared at the man, who surprisingly retreated into the crowd of his mates. Lord Elphin himself had vanished. “You go on with your friend now, Lady Cecilia. And don’t forget to call on us at Primrose Cottage tomorrow! I do want to hear how your father is doing these days.”

  Still feeling a bit shaken, Cecilia just nodded and let Jesse lead her and Jack to the cart. She glanced back to see Amelia marching back into the Guildhall, the crowd dispersing into the night now that the excitement was over.

  “Are you all right, my lady?” Jesse asked tightly. He helped her up onto the narrow seat and carefully tucked the carriage blanket around her and Jack. “Some people have no manners.”

  “You are quite right about that, Jesse. But it was a fascinating evening. I quite enjoyed it before all that ruckus. And thank you for showing up like that,” she answered. “You didn’t need to come.”

  He smiled and jumped up beside her to gather the reins. “I wouldn’t have been able to sleep, thinking about you and Jack all alone in the night. But you and Mrs. Price seemed to have everything well in hand. That Elphin is a boor who should be put in his place more often.”

  “I certainly won’t disagree with that. Even my mother is hard-pressed to be polite to him when they meet, and she’s the perfect social actress. But Mrs. Price is rather extraordinary. I’m sure nothing much goads her.”

  “Joining up with the cause, then, my lady?”

  “I’m not sure about that. I doubt I have much to offer them. But Mrs. Price did invite me to call on her tomorrow, and I’m looking forward to talking to her more.” She hugged Jack close as they drove on through the night, still dizzy with all the sudden possibilities out there.

  Chapter Seven

  I’m so excited you could come with me today, Jane! You’ll like Mrs. Price; she is so charming,” Cecilia said as the two of them hurried down the lane toward the village. Collins had taken her father out in the car for the day, and Jesse was too busy with his duties to secretly hitch up the governess cart again, so walking it was. Cecilia thought that for the best, anyway, as the fewer people who knew about the suffrage meetings, the better. She had to gather her strategy before anyone could stop her from attending any further meetings.

  “Miss Clarke is working with your mother on that church bazaar again today,” Jane said, taking a small leap over a rut in the road. “It’s nice to be out for a while. Jack was rather put out about being kept back, though.”

  Cecilia laughed. “Poor Jack! He did seem quite interested in all the excitement last night, but he never likes walking on the lead.”

  “Was there really a commotion outside the Guildhall with that Lord Elphin and his stooges?”

  Cecilia frowned as she remembered their shouting and the shove someone gave Amelia. “It wasn’t much, really. Just a few men behaving badly, yelling about women and the pub. I’m sure Mrs. Price has faced much worse. She seemed very calm about it all.”

  “Weren’t you frightened, my lady?”

  “I was, a bit,” Cecilia admitted. She thought about life at Danby, how every day was just as expected and manners were everything. Maybe she had to get used to a different world if she wanted to be free. “We cannot let men like Lord Elphin stand in our way, not if we want to fulfill our potential in life.”

  Jane gave her a cheeky grin. “So you’re a full-fledged suffragette now?”

  Cecilia remembered the sash she had carefully tucked away in her dressing table drawer. “Of course not. I’m not sure how I could manage that, or be of help to them.” Yet.

  They turned at the end of the lane and hurried toward the village. A wagon clattered past, kicking up a small cloud of dust, but it was a warm, sunny, blue-sky day on the high street and the green. “How did you know there was a commotion?”

  “Mrs. Mabry’s delivery boy brought some crates for Mrs. Frazer this morning, and he told us about it. It sounds like nothing so exciting has happened in the village in ages!”

  “It hasn’t. Not since we won a Prettiest Village Green prize from the Yorkshire Garden Society a few years ago.”

  Jane gave her a strange, almost searching glance. “I also heard that Jesse Fellows helped you with the governess cart, my lady. And disappeared from the servants’ hall later.”

  Cecilia felt her cheeks turn warm at being found out. “He was being kind. He didn’t think I should be out alone at night. It was thoughtful.”

  “Thoughtful, yes. He’s handsome, too. I think Bridget and Pearl are half in love with him.”

  “Is he—is he in love with one of them, too?” Cecilia gasped.

  “Not a bit of it. He’s just polite to them, like he is to everyone. Bridget thinks he must have a sweetheart back wherever it was he lived before.”

  “Does she indeed?” Cecilia murmured.

  “It’s just gossip. Jesse is too closemouthed about everything personal to let something like that slip by. No one really knows much about him.” Jane frowned thoughtfully. “I have the feeling he is sweet on someone, though. Maybe a certain pretty lady with red-gold hair . . .”

  “You should write novels, Jane. You do seem so secretly romantic,” Cecilia said, wishing she was not “secretly romantic” herself. Jesse Fellows was handsome and considerate, yes, but he was also a footman. It would make their lives very difficult indeed. “Oh, here we are!”

  She was relieved to see Primrose Cottage just ahead. She did not like even thinking about her love life, and the fact that she had just had her second Season and would have to settle down somewhere suitable soon, let alone talking about such things. She took Jane’s arm and tugged her along to the garden gate.

  Primrose Cottage had once belonged to the widow of the last vicar, until she went to live in Brighton with her sister, and it was a charmingly old-fashioned, rambling house of old red brick with a wide veranda looking out to the garden that in summer would be a riot of color. Wavy, ancient glass windows peeked out from under the thatched roof. But a modern bicycle leaned against the garden wall, all shiny novelty. Cecilia pushed open the rickety garden gate and went to knock at the door, which was quickly opened by Cora Black.

  Like last night, Cora seemed a whirlwind of flying reddish curls and wide, bright eyes, a dark smudge on her shirtwaist sleeve, and account books balanced in her hands.

  “Lady Cecilia! I’m so glad you could come today. And you’ve brought a friend!”

  “This is Miss Jane Hughes,” Cecilia said as Cora ushered them into the dim, cool, flagstone-floored foyer. Coats, umbrellas, and hats were piled there haphazardly. “Jane, this is Cora Black, Mrs. Price’s secretary.”

  “It’s such a pleasure to meet you,” Jane said.

  “How do you do, Miss Hughes!” Cora said. “We’ve met so many fascinating people here in Danby. Mrs. Price has decided to stay on for a few days and hold another rally.”

  “What wonderful news,” Cecilia answered.

  “I’m sure Amelia will want to tell you all about it herself,” Cora said. “Do come in; everyone is in the sitting room. I am afraid we had a bit of a puzzling experience this morning.”

  “A puzzling experience?” Cecilia asked as she and Jane followed Cora along a narrow, cool corridor, with a flagstone floor and lined with old paintings of pastoral scenes. They stepped around a set of rickety, steep old stairs that no doubt led up to the bedchambers.

  “It seems as if there was a robbery in the early hours,” Cora said with a shiver. “Or rather an attempted robbery. It doesn’t look as if anything was taken.”

  “A robbery!” Cecilia cried. She exchanged glances with Jane, remembering the thief Guff, who had been collared on the green by Sergeant Duff. Had he been scoping out the village after all?

&nb
sp; “A window in the kitchen is broken and the latch messed about with is all,” Cora said. “These old houses are quite sturdier than they look. He got no farther.”

  “And no one heard anything?” Jane asked.

  “Not at all. Anne and I were in our rooms upstairs, and Mrs. Price took a small chamber just beyond the sitting room for her own parlor. She says she doesn’t like managing those rickety old stairs until bedtime.”

  “No one else stays in the house? Like Mrs. Palmer, maybe?” Cecilia asked.

  “No. Mrs. Palmer and the rest of the executive committee are at the Crown, and Nellie, Mrs. Price’s lady’s maid, doesn’t arrive until this afternoon.” Cora opened a door and ushered them into the sitting room.

  It was a round-shaped room, with a large, smoke-blackened fireplace at one end displayed with a portrait of the old queen on the mantel. Old-fashioned, heavy, darkly carved furniture was scattered on a faded red-and-blue carpet, and red velvet upholstered the seats. Embroidered cushions were scattered about. One desk, a modern, pale oak table, held folders and documents and books for serious work, along with unopened post and a letter ripped in half. Anne, Harriet, and Amelia examined the papers there, whispering among themselves.

  Another table, shoved into a corner, was quite different. Draped with a white cloth, it was scattered with a crystal ball and various tarot cards. Burned-down candles spilled wax onto the linen. Had the ladies been trying a bit of séance along with the business?

  Anne whispered something to her mother, and for an instant Amelia’s ivory-like face puckered in an angry frown. But that frown vanished as she looked to greet the newcomers with her usual serene smile. Yet Cecilia noticed that Anne Price still looked irritated as she gathered up the papers in short, rough gestures, and Harriet Palmer stared fixedly out the window.