He pressed his hand to his forehead, shaking his head. “I don’t know why I bother. There’s no point to any of this.”
Free traced a drawing on the floor with her finger. “My opinion? I think you bother because you’re not quite as bad a man as you make yourself out to be.”
“Yes, tell yourself that, Miss Marshall.” There was a mocking tone in his voice. “Tell yourself that I’m your knight in shining armor, here to save you from fires and foes. That’s a lie, but some people need lies to sleep at night. I’m here for my own reasons. I admire you. I like you.” His smile grew darker. “I’ll take you to bed, if you wish. But don’t ask me to pretend that this”—he waved his hand about —“that any of this matters a damn. It doesn’t.”
“You don’t really believe that.”
He moved an inch toward her. “You’re the loveliest woman ever to bash her head against a wall, but the wall you’re battering is higher and thicker than the Great Wall of China, and there’s only one of you. It’s not the stones that will give way to you, my dear.”
Free swallowed. “You’ve got it wrong.”
“Ah, the wall is made of paper, then, and you’ll burst through it at any second.” He laughed at her, and she could hear that ice in his voice. “Give yourself another ten years, and maybe you’ll understand what you’re facing. Until then, go ahead. Keep fighting.”
Free contemplated him in the darkness. “After tonight, do you still think that I’m naïve? That I don’t understand how the world works?”
“There’s no proof you do understand it. After everything you saw today, you still stayed up to send out your next issue. What do you imagine your little paper will change? Do you think that suddenly, Delacey will read one of your essays and say, ‘Good God, I’ve got it all wrong. Women deserve to be treated fairly after all’?”
“No,” Free looked away. “Of course I don’t think that. I’ll never convince him.”
“Or do you imagine that there is a group of men somewhere who haven’t yet made up their minds on the question of female suffrage? Men who are thinking, ‘Well, I suppose women might be actual human beings, just like men. Maybe I had better look out for them.’”
Free felt her face flush. “Don’t be ridiculous.”
“Because I can tell you what will happen,” Mr. Clark said in his dark, dangerous voice. “You women will squawk amongst yourselves about injustice and fairness. Maybe if you do it loudly enough, someday a handful of you will be allowed to vote, and it will be accounted a great victory. Maybe in fifty years, women will achieve a distinct minority in the professional classes. We might have a woman doctor, a woman barrister, and then five or ten of you might form an organization together and shake hands because something has been accomplished.”
Free let out a breath.
“Maybe in a hundred years of women voting, you might manage a single female Prime Minister.” He gave her a rough smile. “But just the one, and even so, people will never take her seriously. If she’s stern, they’ll blame her menstrual cycle. If she smiles, it will be proof that women are not strong enough to lead. That’s what you’re setting yourself up for, Miss Marshall. A lifetime of small wins, of victories that land like lead in your stomach. Your cause may be just. But you’re delusional if you think you can accomplish anything. You’re pitting yourself against an institution that is older than our country, Miss Marshall. It’s so old that we rarely even need speak of it. Rage all you want, Miss Marshall, but you’ll have more success emptying the Thames with a thimble.”
He touched a finger to his forehead in mock salute, as if tipping a hat. As if she’d just departed the land of reality, and he’d wished her a pleasant journey. His words didn’t match his actions, though. He came even closer to her as he spoke, leaning in with every sentence, until he seemed almost on the verge of kissing her.
“You’re right,” Free said, shutting her eyes.
He blinked and sat back, cocking his head. “What did you say?”
“I said you were right,” Free repeated. “You’re right about all of that. If history is any guide, it will take years—decades, perhaps—before women get the vote. As for the rest of it, I imagine that any woman who manages to stand out will be a target for abuse. She always is.”
His eyes crinkled in confusion.
“What I don’t understand is why you think you need to lecture me about this all. I run a newspaper for women. Do you imagine that nobody has ever written to me to explain precisely what you just said?”
He frowned. “Well.”
“Do you suppose I’ve never been told that I’m upset because I am menstruating? That I would calm down if only some man would put a child in my belly? Usually, the person writing offers to help out with that very task.” She swallowed bile in memory. “Shall I tell you what someone painted on my door one midnight? Or do you want to read the letters I receive?” Free wrapped her arms around herself. “I am here, on the floor of my press, because I told a man I wouldn’t bed him, and so he burned my house down. So, yes, Edward. I know the obstacles women face. I know them better than you ever will.”
He exhaled harshly. “God, Free.”
“Do you think I don’t know that the only tool I have is my thimble? I’m the one wielding it. I know. There are days I stare out at the Thames and wish I could stop bailing.” Her voice dropped. “My arms are tired, and there’s so much water that I’m afraid it’ll pull me under. But do you know why I keep going?”
He reached out and touched her chin. “That’s the one thing I can’t figure out. You don’t seem stupid; why do you persist?”
She lifted her face to his. “Because I’m not trying to empty the Thames.”
Silence met this.
“Look at the tasks you listed, the ones you think are impossible. You want men to give women the right to vote. You want men to think of women as equals, rather than as lesser animals who go around spewing illogic between our menstrual cycles.”
He still wasn’t saying anything.
“All your tasks are about men,” she told him. “And if you haven’t noticed, this is a newspaper for women.”
“But—if—”