“Well, that’s just it.”Her voice became even lower.“They’re making plans.”
There was a flash of suffragette colours outside.The woman with the sign was being forced towards the window in order to maintain her distance from a man who was shouting at her.
Penny stuffed the letters into her bag and left payment on the table.She crammed the crumpet into her mouth and darted out of the tea shop just as another man appeared and took advantage of the woman’s divided attention to wrest the sign from her.
“Go home!”a passing woman tossed over her shoulder at the embattled suffragist.“Go home to your husband and your children!”
“Go home yourself!”Penny retorted, though the bit of crumpet still in her mouth spoiled the effect a bit.
Slinging her bag strap over her body, she executed a brief display of martial movements with the aid of her umbrella, finishing with the sharpened tip of it hovering an inch from the gulping throat of the shouting man—who was no longer shouting.
“Would you care to spar with me, sir?”she offered.
“Well, if you have to resort to violence instead of rational debate, I’ve nothing more to say,” he said loudly, for the benefit of the few people nearby.“I should call a policeman, really.”
“Please do!”said Penny.“My brother works for the police.He doesn’t like people who threaten helpless young ladies.”
While he sputtered and someone behind him laughed, the suffragist put her hand on Penny’s arm in a gesture of caution.
“No, let’s not,” the woman said, glancing at her watch.“We have an urgent appointment to keep.Don’t we?”
Penny nodded.
The other man still had his arms round the sign in a bulldoggish sort of way.
“Thank you so much for your support of the cause, it’s men like you that will get us the vote,” Penny said sincerely as they passed, saddling him with the sign.
As the two young women walked down the street together at a brisk clip, Penny glanced at her new friend.She appeared to be approaching thirty, with a lightly golden complexion and hair that was black and glossy where it puffed out under her hat.
“You’re wanted by the police?”Penny asked quietly.“Do you need—somewhere to wait?”
“Thanks, but no,” she said.They paused at a shop window.“I’m not a fugitive.It’s just—it doesn’t usually go very well with my sort when a policeman is called.They assume I’m a floozy at an opium den.”She took off her glasses, revealing a pair of almond-shaped dark eyes.“Mae Wu, and I’m pleased to meet you.”
“Oh,” breathed Penny with a laugh.“I’m Penny Fairweather.Fancy me bounding up to rescueyouwith jiu-jitsu, of all people!”
“Not at all,” Miss Wu said a trifle acidly, putting a stop to Penny’s laughter.“Jiu-jitsu comes from Japan.My father’s family is from Shanghai.I owe you,” she added, cracking a smile, which relieved Penny, who was beginning to worry that she’d offended the woman somehow.Her voice had a soft tang of Cockney, though all her h’s were correctly positioned.“I didn’t like my odds back there at all.Don’t hesitate to call on me if there is ever anything I can do for you in return.My dad has a shop, out Limehouse way.”
“Of course,” said Penny politely, although she could not imagine how a Wu of Limehouse could ever assist a Fairweather of Bloomsbury.
As Miss Wu turned to go, an idea struck Penny.
She caught her by the arm.“Have you ever heard the phrase ‘England for the English’?”
Miss Wu looked at her oddly.“If want to argue that with me, Penny Fairweather, I might point out to you that your ancestors were likely about as English as mine.”
Penny laughed.“No, no, that’s not what I meant.And you’re quite right—Norman French and Scottish.It’s just, I write for theDaily Mail,and I think I’ve sensed an important story.About a secret society that uses that motto.I believe they call themselves the Brotherhood, or something like it?Have they caused any trouble?For your people?”
Miss Wu’s eyes grew sharp.“They might have.But you’d have to come and see for yourself.Most of the people who write about our part of London can’t be bothered to go there.”
“I’m ready to go now,” Penny said, buttoning the top button of her jacket.
“Not worried about white slavers?”Miss Wu said, looking at her a little sideways.
“Well, you said you owe me a favour,” Penny said.“I assume that extends to protecting me from abduction.”
Miss Wu laughed.“Indeed it does!Shall we catch a tram?”
As they headed to the nearest tram depot, Penny’s skin prickled with anticipation.She was about to visit the fabled Chinese district in the East End, immortalised in sensationalist literature, and she was visiting it as the fearless lady reporter oftheDaily Mail.
