The story might have been
written for Jack’s wife, Sarah. Like the
Irishman she refused to bow down to the dangers of the streets; and as Jack was
sitting to a Society table Sarah was preparing to walk to Whitechapel. The walk would take Sarah from the relative
comfort of Victoria Park to a district of London known for its squalor and
crime; her preparation was to dress in plain, if expensive clothes, a high
collar, straight jacket and long skirt that all but erased the evidence of her
sex.
Such
behaviour was typical of the doctor, a woman of principle and social
conscience; and having dressed, she checked the time and hurried down to the
kitchen to give some final instructions.
The young German maid she employed there was a protégé, an ambitious project
in self-worth. Porsche was a reluctant
learner, however, she had other ideas; and not expecting to be seen again that
evening, Porsche had begun her preparations for her own outing. She turned away as Sarah entered, trying to
hide her face.
“Are
you wearing make-up, Porsche?” Sarah challenged.
“With
permission, Dr Knightley,” Porsche lied; “they are holding a meeting of women
at my church.”
“And
do the women usually wear make-up to such meetings?”
“No,
Dr Knightley.”
“Then
you had best remove it.”
The
maid’s blush showed through the light-brown tinge as she turned to this
instruction. Sarah felt no guilt, hers
was a tough love; and the model of femininity she practised was physical in a
mainly functional sense. She held the
maid’s sheepish gaze with a prudish stare then, Porsche’s youthful deceit
something to be corrected.
Porsche responded accordingly,
her married lover a secret. She offered
a submissive curtsey, noting its effect.
The submission, as usual, was sufficient to move Sarah onto more
practical matters; this time it was supper.
“You
will be home before nine,” Sarah said; “Mr Knightley will expect supper when he
returns, and you will need to prepare it.”
“Of
course, Dr Knightley.”
“Now;
I must be off. Wash your face before you
go to church. You don’t want to give the
wrong impression.”
Sarah
closed the door with this final, gentler reminder. Porsche had already determined what food to
leave out before she left for London Bridge; but Sarah could not even guess at
this deception. Hers was a busy life,
medicine and politics; and as Sarah thought of suffrage Porsche was preparing
to run away to Paris. The maid pictured
a new life there, a fantasy of romance; the excitement justified her behaviour,
and she made swift work of her final chores.
Then she dressed in the glamour of silk, a woman of importance ready to leave.
Sarah
meanwhile had moved on, a different protégé.
Jessica Clarke, a nurse at the University Hospital, lived in a street
off Whitechapel Road, behind Baker’s Row.
Sarah had recognised the potential at once, a native, if ill-formed
intelligence; the woman spoke thus to Sarah’s ambitions, and Sarah had
committed a good deal of time, inspiring in Jessica a sense of her own
political worth. As she did so, a bonus
of education, Sarah too had learned; and this learning, the innate beauty of
Jessica’s class, carried her out from Victoria Park that evening, turning right
and right again onto Mile End Road.
She walked, though a woman
alone, with her head upright, a hungry intelligence taking in the sights all
about. It was an evening of bitter cold,
an icy damp that leaked beneath her coat and her broad-rimmed hat. There were few people about on such an
evening; and those that were, mostly men, gathered beneath street-lamps, or
around braziers. Sarah noticed herself
observed by several such groups, some calling out. She did not react, however crude their jests;
she chose rather to assume a look of indifference, as though she was above
anything so vulgar.
This defence carried her the
few miles towards Whitechapel Station.
She recognised it from a distance, the red and blue lit against the dark
of early evening. About her the sights,
sounds and smells had grown more threatening, unpleasant; but Sarah was a woman
steeled against unpleasantness. Her
thoughts thus were on spotting the Pavillion Theatre, Jessica’s home was in the
streets opposite. Having reached the
theatre Sarah crossed the road, remembering the instructions she had been
given, and escaping from a chill wind into a maze of narrow, cramped and poorly
lit lanes.
Despite the greater number of
people, clustered in doorways or on street corners, Sarah was even more visible
now that she had left the main road.
Nobody approached at first, but all eyes seemed to follow her; and as
she advanced further, the smokey dark appearing to press its seal behind, she
could tell from whispers, gestures and the occasional shout, that she was generating
a lot of interest.
She treated this with the same
determined resolve; her head was forward now, straight, avoiding any contact of
eyes; and she distracted her fear by counting the turns on her right. By the time she reached Baker’s Row, however,
the calls could not be ignored. Sarah
paused at the approach of some women; they were made up for their trade. The prostitutes looked old, worn with life;
and Sarah pitied them their work, even as they stopped, raised their skirts and
mimed the movements with which they would serve their customers.
The laughter and jests this
invited, placing prices on Sarah’s sex, were echoing loudly as Jessica
appeared. Jessica was both embarrassed
and angered by this reception.
“Shut up the lot of yeh,” she
called; “or I’ll set my Billy on yeh.”
Sarah’s lesson was brought duly
to an end, though the women moved slowly, a few resentful glances, still
laughing among themselves. Sarah watched
on, doctor and researcher, the excitements of her danger passing. She was still doing so when Jessica spoke
again.
“I told yeh, yeh shouldn’t
have walked,” Jessica complained.
