Another policeman arrived, his whistle piercing the discord.
“Madam, please let us by!” the deep voice roared over the growing clamor. I turned my head just enough to witness the tall man behind Eloise try gently to move her aside. She tightened her grip on my arm in response, her fingers digging painfully into my flesh.
“As will I do my duty and save you from the depths of degradation with which you are so intent upon besmirching yourself!” She pulled me toward her.
I clutched the fence in desperation.
“Votes for women! Votes for women!” chanted the suffragettes.
More constables arrived, their whistles shrill over the calls of the crowd.
“. . . sinful and degraded. . . .”
“We wish to pass, blast you!”
“This is ridiculous—please go away!” I yelled at Eloise. “Leave me be!”
“…willful and proud…”
“This is a public street, madam! I insist you allow us to pass!”
Snarling to myself in aggravation, I used both hands to grip the fence.
“. . . nothing but grief, always thinking of yourself and never of your poor mother. . . .”
The bystanders were frenzied now, keyed up by the arrival of several policemen on horseback. To the left, a small cluster of partygoers was backed up, still blocked by Eloise, loudly expressing their desire to move by us. To the right, the demonstrators, all successfully chained to the fence save me, chanted and sang in unison.
“I will not let you ruin my demonstration!” I shouted over the noise to Eloise, just as she heaved her ample bulk and succeeded in prying me off the fence. At the same moment, the man behind her gave her a shove forward, sending me hurtling towards him, rather than her.
The force of my not-insubstantial weight thrown off balance and directly onto him resulted in our crashing to the pavement in an awkward display of petticoats, umbrellas, chain, and limbs.
Chapter Two
I lay stunned for a moment, staring stupidly down into the diamond studs in his shirt. Before I could think to move, hands lifted me to my feet.
“Good heavens,” I gasped as soon as I could gather my breath, “I do apologize! Eloise—my mother’s friend—she was much stronger than I imagined. Are you injured?”
The man swore into his chest as he bent down to assess the damage. He was muddied and wet down the left side, and, I feared, extremely damp on the back. His top hat had been ruined, and his white gloves were black with mud. Although my coat was button-less, its heavy material, and the fact that I fell on top of the gentleman, left me relatively unaffected by the mishap.
“Just you wait and see, Cassandra Whitney!” Eloise screeched as she was carried forward by the momentum of the crowd. “You’ll come to a bad end!”
Two ladies and a short, bald gentleman had stopped near us, inquiring anxiously as to the muddied man’s state. The pale woman handed me a jeweled comb that had flown from my hair.
“Please forgive me,” I stammered, ignoring the man’s frown to dab at him ineffectually with my handkerchief. “I am mortified. Eloise is clearly a danger to the public. Let me help clean you off. I am very capable in the removal of mud, having lived in the country all my life. If we just wipe it off carefully like so—”
I patted a spot of dirt, but pulled away my handkerchief only to find I had left a long diagonal smear of mud across the snowy white expanse of his shirt front.
“Oh, dear.”
He looked at his chest in disbelief.
The bald man in formal apparel leaned forward and muttered to my unfortunate victim, then turned to me and said in a loud, piercing voice, “Young woman, you have done quite enough damage for the night with your savage excuse for manners. Kindly stand away from my brother and allow us to pass.”
A sudden swelling of enthusiastic noise washed over us. The short man’s eyes widened at the vocal output of the protesters.
“Good Gad!” he barked. “Why aren’t the police arresting those anarchists? What has this country come to when such displays are tolerated? Those harlots should be horsewhipped!”
“This is very embarrassing,” I murmured as I gazed at the mud on the tall man’s chest. “I don’t make it a habit of flinging myself on gentlemen, I can assure you, and am mortified despite the fact...erm...never mind.”
“Despite what?” he asked.
“It’s not important. I do apologize.”
“I accept your apology. What is not important?”
He had amber eyes, very disconcerting amber eyes. So disconcerting, I spoke without thinking. “It’s just that I should take such things as falling on a strange man in stride. Naturally, common good manners make me regret the damage to your clothing, but for the rest...well, I am a New Woman, you see. Falling on men is nothing to us. In fact, I am shortly to take a lover, and smoke cigarettes.”
His lips twitched. “At the same time?”
“Of course not. That would be unhygienic.” I paused, considering what he suggested. “I don’t believe it would be possible, either, but that really is neither here nor there.”
“No, it isn’t. Are you all right?”
As I nodded, a thin woman in a dress that was a bilious shade of green brushed his arm and said, “Come, Griffin, we’re late. You can repair the damage this creature did to you inside.” She paused to toss a hateful stare at me before taking the arm of the sputtering bald man, the pair of them moving down the sidewalk with stately arrogance.
The tall man named Griffin muttered a few words to the other woman, who quickly followed the first pair.
“Despite my New Womanhood, I feel terrible. I wish I could make Eloise apologize as well, but as you may have noticed, she’s quite deranged.”
He gazed at me for a moment then unexpectedly tipped his head back and laughed. “Don’t look so distressed. I didn’t particularly wish to attend this ball. In fact, I’m grateful to you for offering me an excuse to avoid it, although,” he looked at his shirt front ruefully, “I wish you could have managed it in some other fashion.”
I dabbed unhappily at the mud on his arm, removing a wet leaf from his lapel. “I fear your companions are less understanding. I can’t blame them for being angry at the unfortunate accident.”
He turned and waved at someone behind him. “My brother and his wife find these functions enjoyable; I do not.”
“But the lady with you, surely—” I indicated the distant figures of his party and covertly picked off a small snail making its way up his shoulder when he glanced the other way.
“My sister. She will have no difficulty enjoying herself without me.”
He handed me the bag and umbrella that had been knocked from my hands earlier. Looking at it rather curiously, he picked up the chain in his ungloved hand. As I reached out to take it, a fawn-colored motor car pulled up alongside him. The driver leaped out and opened the door.
“Will you be going inside,” Griffin nodded toward the ball, “or can I offer you a ride somewhere else?”
I looked right to where street children, passing citizens, partygoers, and now a sizable number of constables surrounded the women protestors. The noise was almost deafening. My heart sank as I nodded at the nearest suffragette. “I am with them. At least, I was supposed to be with them. I have a defective chain, however.”
His eyebrows rose.
“Why does everyone act like it’s impossible for a chain to cease working?” I told his eyebrows. “I defy you to bind yourself to the rail using that chain.”
The eyebrows lowered again, and once more, the corners of his mouth twitched. It had the unfortunate result of making me stare at his mouth, an act that had me thinking of the animals in the field, and my determination to take a lover.
“I see. If it’s defective, then you won’t be wanting it back.” He held up the chain, making no move to return it to me.
“Not particularly. I will admit that at this moment, I feel nothing but animosity for the horrid thing.” Why was his mouth holding such fascination for me? Was he married? Did he like tall women of overly abundant upper quarters, and red hair?
“A just feeling, I suspect.” A frown creased his forehead as he considered me, his eyes narrowing into two amber slits as they raked me from head to foot. “Why would a woman like yourself want to be a part of such a spectacle?”
A sudden jarring note interrupted the pleasant contemplation of what his bare derriere might look like. I frowned in turn. “Spectacle?”
“Spectacle,” he said firmly. “A display of bad behavior.”
“I know what the word means!”
“Surely a woman like you should be inside waltzing with a suitor rather than chaining yourself to a fence in a manner that does nothing but amuse the general population.”
Those fascinating amber eyes flashed in the night, but they were no match for mine. My tendency to plumpness I inherited from my mother, my temper from my father. Anger and my chin rose in response to his arrogant and condescending attitude. “You are very opinionated on the subject for someone who does not have a uterus!”
Surprise flickered in his eyes. “What the hell does that have to do with anything?”
“You are a man,” I pointed out, waving toward his groin. I had the worst urge to walk around behind him to see if his wet trousers were plastered to his rear parts, but managed to squelch that desire and focus on what was important. “You do not understand at all what it is to be a woman.”
“I assure you, madam, that one does not need a uterus to think,” he retorted.
“No, but it helps,” I answered, smiling a little to myself as the barb drove home. “As for your accusation, I do not consider the pursuit of emancipation a spectacle. Quite the contrary! I consider it my Christian duty to chain myself to this fence in order to strike a blow for the rights of women everywhere. And I would do so if I wasn’t cursed with a chain that was clearly forged in hell.”
He eyed my low décolletage speculatively. “You certainly are dressed for the event.”
“Why is everyone obsessed with my gown? I had a dinner engagement! I could hardly dress in something more suited for gardening!” I clutched my button-less coat tight across my bosom.
“Dinner with one of your lovers?”
“I don’t have any yet, not that it is any of your business. My dinner engagement was with a man I was considering for the position, but he dribbled soup, and one cannot have a lover who dribbles soup.”
He stared at my breasts, now hidden beneath my coat. “Give the amount of cleavage you were showing, I’m surprised soup is all he dribbled.”
“My dress is the very latest fashion!” I snapped. “And it is not any concern of yours.”
“Except when I find it lying on top of me in the mud,” he said quickly, suddenly grinning.
My legs felt suddenly wobbly under the influence of that grin. I stiffened them. “I have apologized for the unfortunate accident. If you are not gracious enough to accept that apology, perhaps you will allow me to get on with my business.”
“By all means. Would you like me to round up a few men so you might consider them for the position?”
“I do not need your help to find a lover!”
Given the cacophony of sound generated by the demonstration to my right, I had felt it necessary to raise my voice to a volume at which I could be heard without undue strain, but once again, a strange hush fell over the crowd, creating the perfect setting for my words to echo off the buildings that lined the street. For the third time that night, heads swiveled in unison to look in my direction.
Griffin
leaned back against his motor and folded his arms across his chest. “Temper, Cassandra Whitney. First swearing and now bellowing like a stevedore—you wouldn’t want people to think that your disposition is as fiery as your hair.”
Momentarily confused by his use of my name, I remembered Eloise’s mean, and regrettably public, comments earlier. I was in the middle of formulating an exceedingly clever and biting retort when a great cheer from the crowd distracted me. Several police vans had arrived with reinforcements. A large number of constables emerged and swarmed along the protest line, arguing with the bound women and trying to forcibly remove the chains. “Bloody hell!”
“I
beg
your pardon?”
I glared at the irritating man opposite me. He was laughing at me, his eyes all but mocking me. “My first demonstration for the rights of women, and I am going to miss everything!”
“And what a tragedy that would be.”
“You who do not have uteruses…uteri…collectively more than one uterus may think so, but I assure you that we brave New Women will win out the day!” I snatched the chain from his hand and ran back to the fence, muttering under my breath that I would not allow myself to be distracted by such an infuriating, if incredibly charismatic, and very well built man.
“Do you need help with your defective chain?” his bemused voice followed me. “I would be happy to assist if you find you can’t manage such a highly technical feat by yourself.”
A visit to the dentist was going to be in order if I continued to grind my teeth as I had wont to do several times that evening. “I do not need your help. I think you will find that women can do most anything without the assistance of a man.”
“Surely not everything,” he drawled. “Else you would have no need for a lover.”
I struggled for a few minutes with the uncooperative chain, then flung it down in a pique. Biting back an oath, I glared again at Griffin. Still smiling, he politely tipped his muddied hat, and got into the motor car.