Again in yet more groups of numbers, the vocal spark sang on and on:
"Attention. If the Secret Service agent who has managed to get into Lord Clanronald's service as under-librarian at Gwyll Castle can secure complete copies--or better still, the originals--of the old Lord's plans for construction of the secret War-machine that hypocritical England has kept up her sleeve out of so-called humanity since the days of the British Regency--strike a deal with him at once. To the _menu_ that will presently be served to our enemies--beginning with Super-Explosive--explosive bullets, incendiary shells, lachrymatory shells serving as _entrees_--the bombardment of Dover from Calais--the destruction of London and the chief Naval Ports of Great Britain by our Zeppelin Fleet being the _piece de resistance_ of the banquet--the Clanronald Death-engine will be added as fifth course! Thou wilt pay the rogue who has dared to stickle for higher terms ten thousand pounds in English banknotes on account of the sum of twelve million marks he presumptuously demands of us. The balance will be paid him on personal application at the Wilhelmstrasse--you understand! Warn Prince Henry and von Moltke not to risk bringing the Secret Plans personally. Should the loss of the documents be discovered, suspicion would instantly attach to one of these two. Trust not the thief; he may be tempted to betray us. Send the plans by Undersea Boat 18 now on coast-observation duty in Area 88--fathoms 50--44, east of Spurn Head. Annulled. Forward by air. Squadron-Captain-Pilot von Herrnung of my 10th Field Flight will be detailed for this duty, being now in London investigating the value of a new stabiliser--rejected by the English War Office--which the French Chiefs of the Service Ae are anxious to secure. Tell him to obtain a personal flying-test from the inventor. I say no further! As the Hohenzollern were noble robber-knights, so also were von Herrnung's ancestors. Let the eagle fly home to his Imperial master with booty from across the sea. England may suppose him drowned. France also.... We shall know better.... A hearty welcome awaits the proud bird-knight alighting on our German soil."
*CHAPTER XXIV*
*DISILLUSION*
Rhona Helvellyn came stalking in, looked round, recognised Patrine, came over and dropped down beside her on the divan, full to the brim of the invariable subject, and suffering to talk.
Through the good offices of a legal pal she had got in to hear the Suffragette Trial at the Old Bailey that day. Fan Braid and Kitty Neek had been frightfully plucky. Full of grit and vim, in spite of the six weeks' hunger-strike. Began shrieking like Jimmy O! the moment they were brought into the dock by the warders and wardresses. On being rebuked by the Judge, Fan had bunked a bundle of pamphlets at the head of his lordship, catching the Clerk of the Court, who was seated immediately underneath the Bench, no end of a biff in the eye.
"And then?"
Patrine heard a strange voice from her own stiff lips asking the question.
"Then both of 'em were removed from the Dock. It was done--in time!" Rhona's light eyes danced with enjoyment. "Such a scrimmage! Such a rumpus! Took three men and a woman to tackle each of 'em. We could hear 'em giving tongue all the way down to the cells. Then they had to go on with the Trial without 'em." She chuckled. "You may guess there were a lot of us at the back of the Court waiting--just for that! Perfect wadge all together. Hell and trimmings when we started. They had to eject us before they could jog on with their gay old summing-up!"
"But in the end they got through?" The weary voice was so unlike Patrine's that she wondered why Rhona did not jump and stare at her. But Rhona was mounted on her hobby-horse, and unobservant of other things.
"Through right enough! And Fan and Kitty--" Rhona screwed up her lips into the shape of a whistle, and winked away a tear that hung on one of her fair eyelashes; "It's too brutal! Three months each, and poor little Kitty dying of lung-trouble. They only brought her back from Davos in May. That riles me!" She clenched her hands fiercely and went on, cautiously lowering her tone: "So far I've taken no active share in any Militant Demonstration. Partly because I'd be wiped off the Club books if I got spouting in public, or was mixed up in any police-court business, partly because I'm funky--there's the word! But at last I'm wound up! It was Kitty's little peaky-white face did it! ... She--she broke a blood-vessel as the warders were carrying her down to the cells."
A sob choked Rhona's voice, and a spasm of misery wrenched her. She controlled herself. She was deadly in earnest--wound up to go, as she had said. She went on, talking rapidly, in a tone that only reached the ear it had been meant for. How many such secret disclosures the Club divan had known.
"I've thought.... A regular swarm of Distinguished French and Belgian Big Pots and Little Pots--Mayors--Prefects and Deputies, Judges, Press Representatives and Inspectors-General--are engaged in Discovering England this week as ever is. It's an echo of the Entente Cordiale. Behind the badge of the International Advancement Association--I've got one!--I might drop in at one of their farewell speechifications, I believe the next's on Friday at Leamington--and heckle 'em like one o'clock! Ask 'em why women don't have the Vote in France and Belgium----"
"Don't they?"
"Nix a bit! Not for all the fuss they make about the sex. Or--to fix the scene of my maiden effort nearer home--there's a Banquet of Archbishops, Bishops and their wives at the Mansion House to-morrow night. Music just after the flesh-pots and before the speeches or after--a select company of Concert Artistes, the gemmen in boiled shirts and the usual accompaniments; the ladies in white with black sashes and black gloves. And that's where I shall come in--in white with black trimmings. Land of Hope and Glory!--when I get up and ask the Archbishop of Canterbury to plump for Female Suffrage!--or shall it be the Lord Mayor? ... Won't my Uncle Gustavus burst the buttons off his episcopal waistcoat. You've seen him. He's Bishop of Dorminster--and they fasten 'em at the back."
"Let the Bishop keep his buttons on!" said Patrine, suddenly and savagely. "What the--devil does it matter whether women get the Vote? Would we keep it if we got it, or throw it away--oh! idiots--idiots!--to gratify some vulgar vanity, or some beastly sensual whim?"
"Gee-whillikins!" Rhona whistled shrilly in astonishment. "Why, I thought you were one of Us. Not actively militant, but a sympathiser, no end. Didn't you get our Committee in touch with Mrs. Saxham, when we'd set our hearts on having her speak at the Monster Meeting of Women we're going to have in October at the Grand Imperial Hall? She's promised to address us on Suffrage and we're all over ourselves to hear her. That last article of hers in _The National Quarterly_--'The Burden of Tyre,' has collared the literary cake. People tell me who've read it that she doesn't care a hang about the Vote for Women in any other sense than that it'd open a gateway to legislation on the Sex Question of a much more drastic kind. She'd bring in a Bill to have moral offences against children dealt with by a Jury of Mothers--a lot they'd leave of the offender once they'd their claws on him!--and make it a Life Sentence every time, for the fellow who seduces a girl."
Patrine listened in stony silence. Rhona chattered on. "Of course the work she does amongst those unlucky wretches--young girls and women who've come to grief--is topping. But why waste herself rescuing prostitutes and street-walkers? Aren't any of us good enough--or bad enough to interest her? I'm going to ask her that when you introduce me--remember you've promised to!"
Patrine said in a voice jarred and harsh with anger:
"Since your declared intention is to be offensive to Mrs. Saxham, whose shoes neither you nor myself, nor any woman of our set is worthy to unlace, I take back the promise, if it was ever given!"
"What's up?" Rhona turned and stared. "I say!--but you look fearfully seedy! Worried about Margot, is that it?" She was off on another tack, carried by the light shifting breeze of her imagination. "Poor little Margot!--in spite of good advice and top-hole mascots--booked for the Nursery Handicap--and out of the running for a year!"
"Who told you--that?--about Margot?"
"Melts--the head housemaid here--had it from Kittum's maid Pauline, who dropped in to fetch away some stored luggage of her ladyship's.... They've furnished a house at Cadogan Place--Margot and her Franky-wanky. West End enough, and quite exquie inside, but not as convee as the dear old Club. But--I believe I'm boring you." Her nimble glance left Patrine's face, and darted in the direction of von Herrnung. "Who's the big, good-looking, carroty man, gobbling you up with his eyes while he's talking piffle to Cynthia and Trix? Now I remember--I _have_ heard some hints of your going over to the Common Enemy." Rhona's sharp light eyes sparkled like polished gold-stones. "Is that the reason why you've bleached your hair? What a putrid shame of you! And the Enemy's a foreigner--a German! Did he give you that gorgeous ring?"