Mrs. Warren's Daughter: A Story of the Woman's MovementJohnston, Harry
General
Mrs. Warren's Daughter: A Story of the Woman's Movement
Johnston, Harry
Feminism -- Fiction; Mothers and daughters -- Fiction; Women's rights -- Fiction
"Well, I should just send it to the Criminal Investigation
Department, New Scotland Yard, and tell them under what
circumstances it came into your possession. You needn't even give
your name or address. They'll soon know whether it's any use or
not." So Mrs. Rossiter took from her desk that scrap of partly burnt
paper with the typewritten words on it which she had picked out of
the grate two and a half years before, and posted it to the Criminal
Investigation Department, with the intimation that this fragment had
come into the possession of the sender some time ago, and seemed to
refer to a militant Suffragist who called herself "Vivie Warren" or
"David Williams," and perhaps it might be of some assistance to the
authorities in tracking down these dangerous women who now stuck at
nothing. She posted the letter with her own hands in the North West
district. Park Crescent, Portland Place, she always reflected, was
still in the _Western_ district, though it lay perilously near the
North West border line, beyond which Lady Jeune had once written, no
one in Society thought of living. This was a dictum that at one time
had occasioned Mrs. Rossiter considerable perturbation. It was
alarming to think that by crossing the Marylebone Road or migrating
to Cambridge Terrace you had passed out of Society.
It took the police a deuce of a time--two months--to make use
effectively of the information contained in Mrs. Rossiter's scrap of
burnt paper; though the statement of their anonymous correspondent
that Vivie Warren and David Williams were probably the same person
helped to locate Mr. Michaelis's office. It was soon ascertained
that Miss Vivien Warren, well known as a sort of Society speaker on
Suffrage, lived at the Lilacs in Victoria Road, Kensington. But when
a plain-clothes policeman called at Victoria Road he was only told
by the Suffragette caretaker (whose mother now usually lived with
her to console her for her mistress's frequent absences) that Miss
Warren was away just then, had recently been much away from home,
probably abroad where her mother lived. (Here the enquirer
registered a mental note: Miss Warren has a mother living abroad:
could it be _the_ Mrs. Warren?). Polite and respectful calls on Lady
Feenix, Lady Maud Parry, and Mrs. Armstrong--Vivie's known
associates--elicted no information, till on leaving the last-named
lady's house in Kensington Square the detective heard Colonel
Armstrong come in from the garden and call out "Ho-no-ria."
"'--ria," he said to himself, "'-ria kept the keys, and
now--' Honoria. What was her name before she married Colonel
Armstrong?--why--" He soon found out--"Fraser." "Wasn't there once a
firm, _Fraser and Warren_, which set up to be some new dodge for
establishing women in a city career?--Accountancy? Stockbroking?
Where did _Fraser and Warren_ have their office? Fifth floor of
Midland Insurance office in Chancery Lane. What was that building
now called? No. 88-90." Done.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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