The Crimson Rooms (12 page)

Peter Shaw and I had first exchanged friendly words when I visited Father’s office before the war. Decked out in picture hats and swishing skirts, Mother and I were supposed to dispense charm and encouragement to junior employees at bimonthly tea parties. Mother was an expert; I slouched in my upright chair and envied the young men their enthusiasm. But Peter always looked out for me and drew me into conversation if he could. His eyes were a melting brown and his gaze clung to mine and made a little rip in my composure. I lay awake at night, replaying snippets of conversation in search of inner meaning and dreaming him up an aura, toffee-brown like his eyes. After the Christmas party in 1914, which, as usual, took place in the drawing room at Clivedon Hall Gardens, with the carpets rolled up, furniture pushed back, candlelight, sherry, music (one of the senior partners had a limited repertoire on the violin), we stepped outside together into the smoky, late-afternoon air and ran away, panting and giggling, I in my party dress and thin shoes, until we came to the shelter of a canal bridge, where he kissed me until my mind popped with shock and fear and delight.

But what a wasted opportunity that kiss had been. I couldn’t concentrate for wondering: Yes, but do I really love Peter Shaw, or is it just that he’s available at this moment and going away in the new year? If I’d known that his might be the only kiss that would ever be granted me, I’d have drawn him into the darkness, abandoned my Clivedon Hall Gardens principles altogether, and let him make love to me à la Ethel M. Dell. Because as soon as he went away, even before he got himself shot or shelled or whatever it was that provoked the word
missing
on the telegram home, in my imagination he became taller, bolder, more beautiful, an ideal boy, in fact, with Byronic hair and features, full of wit.

So the music was an opportunity to lose myself again to his touch, to snatch more forbidden moments in the shadow of the bridge, to remember his three letters, each of which closed with the phrase
You have been on my mind
(into which I read a restrained but passionate yearning), to smell his alien young male scent, to feel his fingertip play secretly along the veins on the underside of my wrist as we sat side by side at the Clivedon Hall Gardens dining table on the night before he went away.

The second affair, nearly four years later, when I was twenty-five, had been more tortured still. It was enough to recall a bowl of red glass cupped in the hand of a uniformed man to feel my blood shudder with the anticipated shock of lovemaking.

The music ended and I opened my dazed eyes to find that I was being scrutinized from across the room by a man I recognized but couldn’t at first place. Then I remembered that he was the barrister who had caught hold of me in the foyer of Shoreditch Magistrates’ Court after the humiliation of Leah Marchant’s bail proceedings and advised me not to interrupt a magistrate. Not wishing to be reminded of that morning, I looked hastily for Carrie but, seeing no sign of her, headed for the door.

“Miss Gifford.”

Surely I had been mistaken; he would not bother to follow me into Commercial Road and was hardly likely to have remembered my name. But though I didn’t pause, he called again and actually came abreast of me. “Miss Gifford.”

I shielded my eyes from the sun to look into his face as he offered his hand. “Nicholas Thorne,” he said. “Last time we met, I’m afraid there was no time for introductions—do you remember—Marlborough Street Police Court or some other godforsaken hole?”

You don’t deceive me, I thought as I withdrew my hand from his clasp, you remember exactly where we met. I walked on, wondering what on earth he wanted with me.

“Did you enjoy the concert, Miss Gifford?” he asked, falling into step beside me.

“Very much.”

“Although I think you missed all but the last piece. I saw you come in toward the end. Such a shame. We had Gluck, and Handel’s G Minor sonata. Do you know that particular work? It happens to be one of my favorites. I’ve not seen you at the Toynbee concerts—is this a first for you? It’s like old times for me, quite a nostalgia trip because I was here just after the war offering a bit of legal advice and a spot of lecturing in psychology and French. Sanest thing I’d done for years, it seemed to me.”

There were many reasons for my reluctance to be drawn into conversation with him, the foremost being that I could see no reason why he would wish to talk other than to bait me. I had encountered plenty of embryonic barristers at Cambridge and recognized the educated drawl, disarming smile, and acute memory. Yet he was such a gentleman in the way he maneuvered to ensure that he was on the outside of the sidewalk, and his smile was so engaging—barely a muscle was disturbed in his lip or cheek but his eyes were warm—that I could not be completely immune. He was a beautiful, intact, youngish man and therefore a rarity indeed. And of course I was still in the grip of the wretched music.

At last I said: “I used to go to Toynbee Hall last year. I worked on the poor man’s law scheme too.”

“Actually I assumed you once used to frequent Toynbee.”

“Why?”

“You work for Breen. Everybody knows the work Breen did at Toynbee. There was bound to be a connection. Did you enjoy your work there, Miss Gifford?”

“It gave me a degree of purpose. Unlike you, I suspect, I worked there not out of altruism but of necessity. Nobody else would take me. It was the only way I could gain any experience in the law at all.”

“Has it been a very rough ride for you, Miss Gifford? Do you know, I’m absolutely fascinated. A couple of ladies have recently been called to the bar, possibly you’re acquainted with them, Williams and Normanton. Such stalwarts. So fierce and determined. One has to admire them, one really does. Look I’m absolutely parched, I know of a cracking little tea shop near here, would you mind, could you bear to take tea with me? You probably won’t believe this but I have been hoping to run into you these past couple of days.”

I was so startled I actually stopped dead. “I’m afraid I have to get back to the office.”

He threw back his head and laughed. “Tea, Miss Gifford, is all I’m suggesting. Ten minutes of your time. Don’t look so horrified.”

But I had grown hotter still, this time with anger. I knew his game all right—Let’s charm the frightful bluestocking Miss Gifford into pouring out her little would-be legal heart and then cut her down to size:
I’ve often wondered, Miss Gifford, perhaps you’d give me your opinion—do you think that tokenism is better than nothing at all? How does it feel to be
a token
, Miss Gifford?

A cart had slipped a sack of coal and the smell of dust was stifling. Before I knew it, Thorne had seized my case. “You are absolutely white as a sheet. It is rotten of me to have kept you in this broiling sun. I think you’ll find the place I have in mind is rather cool and it will barely take you a step out of your way.”

He strode along, swinging my case, and short of wrenching it out of his hand what could I do but trot beside him as he scattered remarks like a bird-feeder dispensing corn? “. . . Extraordinary friendships forged at Toynbee . . . missed your Breen by a couple of years but knew of him by reputation . . . opportunity to share one’s education with those who . . .” We reached the café, where the door stood open and inside the edges of checked tablecloths were ruffled by an electric ceiling fan. He chose a corner table and took my jacket, held back a chair for me, and folded himself into another—his long legs would not fit under the table. “The truth is I was very impressed when I saw you in court the other day. Less impressed by the magistrate, I might add, who I thought treated you appallingly. For the first time, when I heard you pleading for your client, I saw the case for women in court. I realized there might be sympathy between women in trouble and a woman lawyer.”

An urn hissed behind the counter while an offhand woman in a flowered overall came forward to take the order. I gathered my wits. “No,” I said firmly.

“Miss Gifford?”

“That’s not why I trained, to help just women. No, I wish to serve all people. I don’t want to become part of some lesser branch of the law, as I think has happened to some extent with women in medicine.”

“I didn’t mean
lesser
.”

“I think you probably did. I have heard the argument before, numerous times. Would you consider yourself to be an effective barrister if you were only allowed to practice with one half of the population?”

“You have a point, Miss Gifford, but you must allow me to take one step at a time. Before I met you I had an entirely different viewpoint; I didn’t see the need for lady lawyers at all.” He paused to bestow a smile on the waitress as she set out the cups, ran his fingers through his damp hair to slick it back from his forehead, and rested his arm along the table. “I couldn’t imagine doing battle with a lady across the floor of a courtroom. It would be like sparring with my mother or fiancée, something that as a well-brought-up young man I simply couldn’t do.”

“Forgive me, but I believe that to be a wholly unconvincing argument. Are you suggesting that gentlemen politicians will find themselves unable to argue with female members of Parliament and councilors? Are you telling me you never argued with your sister? What you mean, I believe, is that women aren’t worth arguing with because they’ll never be able to withstand your mental and verbal dexterity.”

His laugh had the most perverse effect on me, like a finger drawn across my breastbone. “I don’t have a sister, Miss Gifford, so I can’t answer the first part of your argument. And later I’ll examine my conscience and judge whether you have in fact found me out with the second.”

Everything about him was leisurely, as if there was a lag between thought and deed, so that his smile dawned at the back of his eye and at last, after the lapse of a second or so, reached the corner of his lip. It was the same with his gestures. When at one point he hitched up his trouser leg, the movement was a slow lifting of first hand, then knee. He removed the teapot lid, stirred, took the strainer, and poured the tea expertly. As he handed me a cup, he glanced into my face and must have seen my absorption, because he raised an eyebrow: “Do you not approve of my method, Miss Gifford? I have a Lancashire grandmother who taught us to put the milk in last.”

“I’m sure it will be very good tea.”

“Thing is, I’d better come clean. It was a stroke of luck meeting you. I’d been due to pay a visit to Breen and Balcombe on behalf of a client of mine who happens to employ a client of yours, Stephen Wheeler. I’ve been asked to keep a friendly eye on the case, see if there was anything we could do to help out. So when I saw you today . . .”

“Stephen Wheeler is Mr. Breen’s client, not mine.”

“But Mr. Breen wasn’t in Toynbee Hall and you were, so I thought I’d have a word. Fact is, Miss Gifford, my client, Sir David Hardynge, is concerned for the reputation of his company. It’s all over the press that Wheeler killed his wife for the insurance payout, which we find hard to believe.”

“You can hardly expect me to . . .”

“Of course, you can’t discuss the case, but I wanted to offer my assistance, should it be required. Obviously I can’t represent Wheeler, due to a conflict of interest. I am very closely connected to Hardynge, served with his son—friends since boyhood, in fact—engaged to his daughter, actually, but if I can advise . . .”

“Thank you. I shall tell Mr. Breen about this conversation. And now, if you’ll excuse me . . .” I pushed my cup aside.

“You seem taken aback. Perhaps I’ve handled this badly. I’m simply speaking on behalf of a concerned employer. Hardynge cares for all his men, particularly those who served in the war, to whom he shows almost paternal indulgence. He telephoned me on the afternoon of Wheeler’s arrest, asked me what could be done. All in all I’d say he’s a most enlightened employer, would do anything for Wheeler.”

“I don’t doubt Sir David Hardynge’s good intentions and I’m sure Mr. Breen will be most grateful.” I signaled to the waitress to bring my jacket, then, without pausing to fasten the buttons or adjust my hat, picked up my case and held out my hand. “Thank you for the tea, Mr. Thorne.”

“I’ll give you my card.”

“Thank you. As I’ve said, any correspondence should be with Mr. Breen.”

“Miss Gifford . . .” Instead of releasing my hand, he held it within his own. “You look upset. What is it? Please don’t dash away.”

“I must, I’m afraid. As I’ve said, I feel it’s quite inappropriate to discuss the Wheeler case further.”

“Then we’ll talk of other things.”

“Really, no, thank you.”

I left him at the table, one hand in his pocket as he reached for change, a bemused smile on his face but otherwise unruffled.

I, on the other hand, walked away at a great speed, muttering to myself: What were you thinking of? You made an utter fool of yourself. Why else would he want to buy you tea except to gain information? Engaged to Sir David Hardynge’s daughter. Fool. Fool. And you thought he was impressed, attracted to you, even. Yes you did, that’s why you’re upset. You thought he’d singled you out.