Break of Dawn

If there had been any doubt in Sadie’s mind as to whether she was on the right track, it was dispelled when Sophy didn’t answer but, walking to the door, said coldly, in a tone she had never used before, ‘I shall need an early breakfast in the morning. A cab is calling at nine o’clock,’ and left the kitchen without another word.

Well, well, well. Sadie smiled to herself but then almost in the same breath, her face straightened. What was to be done? She knew Sophy, and for all her good traits she could be stubbornness itself. She sighed, lifting herself out of her comfy chair by the range. Her dear old father used to say that even the most stubborn donkey could be moved by a red-hot poker up its backside, but what was the particular poker that would move Sophy? She’d have to put her thinking cap on. And in the meantime, when the opportunity arose, she’d give Mr Gregory the nod, but discreetly like, that she was on his side.



Ten thousand women, dressed in white, had gathered at the Embankment to walk in a two-mile-long procession to the Albert Hall when Sophy joined them the next morning. The sky was cloudless and the sun already beating down; it was going to be a baking hot day.

The AFL were playing a prominent part in the demonstration in support of the Bill. Sophy took her place with the other actresses, all dressed in fashionable white gowns and elegant, wide-brimmed white hats, behind the huge banner embroidered with the linked comedy and tragedy masks. Although everyone was in mourning for the King, for this event white dresses and hats had been called for, and as they walked in the dust and heat of the roadway, Sophy had to admit it was a stroke of genuis. Most onlookers were dressed in black or the darkest clothes they possessed, and the contrast was striking.

Like an orderly and well-drilled army and carrying banners and flags of the different societies represented, the women walked to the Albert Hall.

‘Look at them two.’ Gertie Price, an actress Sophy had worked with on a number of occasions, nudged her as they passed a group of well-dressed men standing outside a gentleman’s club. Two of the men, ridicule in their eyes and smiles of superiority on their sneering lips, had got hold of a parasol from somewhere and were imitiating the women’s walk in an exaggerated manner, calling forth guffaws from the crowd. Gertie, a rough and ready Manchester lass, left the procession and spoke briefly to the two men, and when she joined Sophy again the men were no longer laughing.

‘What did you say to them?’ Sophy asked curiously.

Gertie grinned. ‘I told them they looked a mite too natural with that walk, and if they weren’t careful they might get offers from the Oscar Wilde set to shove that parasol where the sun don’t shine.’

‘Gertie, you didn’t!’ Sophy had to laugh, although she didn’t doubt Emmeline Pankhurst would have been horrified at such behaviour.

Sophy was feeling exhausted by the time the procession began to disperse later in the day. The last six months had been gruelling, the journey home the day before tiring, and she hadn’t slept well. Kane had written to her several times while she had been away, as had Patience. She had replied to Patience’s letters by return. Kane’s she had left for some days and then written brief businesslike notes as befitted a client to her agent. His letters had remained warm and friendly, and at least twice he had said he missed her.

She sat down on a bench in the sunshine a short distance from the Albert Hall, watching women walk past her in their twos and threes and small groups, mostly talking about the success of the procession. She knew she had reached a crossroads in her life which would determine her future, and now she was home again she couldn’t put it off much longer. She was fond of Kane. She bit her lip, refusing to acknowledge more than fondness. And if his feelings for her were more than that of a friend – and she didn’t know that for sure, nothing had been said – then sooner or later he would ask her to make a decision. That was only fair.

Could she join her life to that of a man’s again? Make that huge step of trust, of faith? Did she want to? However well she thought she knew him, it was a step into the unknown. If he loved her – she closed her eyes for a second as her heart thudded at the thought – it might be all right, but how did she know what he was really like? People only showed you what they wanted you to see, and she was as guilty of that as the next person.

Rita Bradshaw's books