A Monstrous Regiment of Women - Laurie R. King [13]
“Ronnie, look, I’ll see what I can do. I know a man at Scotland Yard”—this was a slight exaggeration—“who might be able to suggest something.”
“You’re right, Mary.” She fumbled with her sodden handkerchief. “I know you’re right; it’s just that it’s so damnable, feeling completely hopeless while Miles is destroying himself. He’s—he was—such a good man.” She sighed, then sat back, her hands on her lap. We sat together as if at a wake.
Suddenly, she looked up at the clock on her wall, and a curious look of shy animation crept onto her face.
“Mary, are you free tonight? I don’t know what you had planned, but there’s someone you might be interested in meeting.”
“Yes, I told you I’m free. I had thought to go up to Oxford for a couple of days, but it’s nothing that couldn’t wait.”
“Oh, good. I really do think you’d like to hear her, and I could introduce you to her after the meeting.”
“Meeting?” I said dubiously. She laughed, her face alive again and the signs of the storm fading fast.
“That’s what she calls it. It’s a bit like a church service, but tons more fun, and she gives a talk—her name is Margery Childe. Have you heard of her?”
“I have, somewhere.” The name brought with it an impression of disdain overlying unease, as if the teller (writer? in a newspaper?) had been uncomfortable with the woman and taken refuge in cynicism. Also a photograph—yes, definitely in a newspaper, a blonde woman shaking hands with a beribboned official who towered over her.
“She’s an amazing person, very sensible and yet, well”— she gave an embarrassed little laugh—“holy somehow. I go to the meetings sometimes, if I’m free. They always make me feel good—refreshed, and strong. Margery’s been very helpful,” she added unnecessarily.
“I’d be happy to go, Ronnie, but I don’t have any clothes other than that suit.”
“There’ll be some stuff downstairs in the jumble box that’ll fit you, if you’re not too particular.”
Thus it was that scarcely half an hour later I, wearing an odd assortment of ill-fitting garments, followed Veronica Beaconsfield out of the taxi and across the wet pavement, under the sign that read NEW TEMPLE IN GOD, and into the remarkable presence of Margery Childe.
* * *
THREE
Monday, 27 December
Women should keep silence in church; for they are not permitted to speak, but should be subordinate, as the law says. … It is shameful for a woman to speak in church.
I Corinthians 14:34-35
« ^ »
The service was well under way when we arrived and found two seats in the back. To my surprise, my first impression was more of a hall filled with eager operagoers than a gathering of pious evening worshippers. The room was a hall, rather than a church or temple, had tiered seating, and was larger than it had appeared from the street. On the raised stage before us stood a small woman, a diminutive blonde figure on the nearly bare boards; she was wearing a long, simple dress—a robe—of some slightly peach-tinted white material, heavy silk perhaps, that shimmered and caught the light in golden highlights as she moved. She was speaking, but if it was a sermon, it did not resemble any I’d heard before. Her voice was low, almost throaty, but it reached easily into all corners and gave one the eerie impression of being alone with a friend and overhearing her private musings.
“It was shortly after that,” she was saying, “that I went to church one lovely Sunday morning and heard the preacher, who was a large man with a thundering voice, speaking on the text from First Corinthians, ‘Let your women keep silence in the churches.’ ” She paused and gathered all eyes to her in anticipation, then her mouth twitched in mischief. “I was, as you might imagine, not amused.”
The gust of appreciative laughter that swept through the hall confirmed her audience’s—congregation’s?—endorsement