CHAPTER XVI

BRUSSELS AND THE WAR:  1914

The Lilacs in Victoria Road had been disposed of—­through Honoria—­as soon as possible, after the sentence of Three years’ imprisonment had been pronounced on Vivie; and the faithful Suffragette maid had passed into Honoria’s employ at Petworth, a fact that was not fully understood by Colonel Armstrong until he had become General Armstrong and perfectly indifferent to the Suffrage agitation which had by that time attained its end.  So when Vivie had come out of prison and had promised to write to all the wardresses and to meet them some day on non-professional ground; had found Rossiter waiting for her in his motor and Honoria in hers; had thanked them both for their never-to-be-forgotten kindness, and had insisted on walking away in her rather creased and rumpled clothes of the previous year with Bertie Adams; she sought the hospitality of Praddy at Hans Place.  The parlour-maid received her sumptuously, and Praddy’s eyes watered with senile tears.

But Vivie would have no melancholy.  “Oh Praddy!  If you only knew.  It’s worth going to prison to know the joy of coming out of it!  I’m so happy at thinking this is my last day in England for ever so long.  When the War is over, I think I shall settle in Switzerland with mother—­or perhaps all three of us—­you with us, I mean—­in Italy.  We’ll only come back here when the Women have got the Vote.  Now to-night you shall take me to the theatre—­or rather I’ll take you.  I’ve thought it all out beforehand, and Bertie Adams has secured the seats.  It’s The Chocolate Soldier at the Adelphi, the only war piece they had ready; there are two stalls for us and Bertie and his wife are going to the Dress Circle.  My Cook’s ticket is taken for Brussels and I leave to-morrow by the Ostende route.”

“To-morrow” was the 12th of August, and Dora was not yet in being to interpose every possible obstacle in the way of the civilian traveller.  Down to the Battle of the Marne in September, 1914, very little difficulty was made about crossing the Channel, especially off the main Dover-Calais route.

So in the radiant noon of that August day Vivie looked her last on the brown-white promontories, cliffs and grey castle of Dover, scarcely troubling about any anticipations one way or the other, and certainly having no prevision she would not recross the Channel for four years and four months, and not see Dover again for five or six years.

British war vessels were off the port and inside it.  But there was not much excitement or crowding on the Ostende steamer or any of those sensational precautions against being torpedoed or mined, which soon afterwards oppressed the spirits of cross-Channel passengers.  Vessels arriving from Belgium were full of passengers of the superior refugee class, American and British tourists, or wealthy people who though they preferred living abroad had begun to think that the Continent just now was not very healthy and England the securest refuge for those who wished to be comfortable.