The Slave of Silence
By Fred M. White
There was no colour about the girl except for her hair’s warm, ripe tone and the deep, steadfast blue of her eyes. Though her face was cold and scornful, she would not have given the spectator the impression of coldness, only utter weariness and tiredness of life at the early age of twenty-two.
Behind her was a table laid out for a score of dinner guests. Everything was perfect and expensive, as appertained to everything at the Royal Palace Hotel, where the head waiter condescended to bow to nothing under a millionaire. The table decorations were red in tone, shades to the low electric lights, and masses of red carnations everywhere. No taste, and incidentally, no expense had been spared, for Beatrice Darryll was to be married on the morrow, and her father, Sir Charles, was giving this dinner in honour of the occasion. Only a wealthy man could afford a luxury like that.
“I think everything is complete, madame,” a waiter suggested softly. “If there is anything——”
Beatrice turned wearily from the window. She looked old and odd and drawn just for the moment. And yet that face could ripple with delighted smiles. The little red mouth was made for laughter. Beatrice’s eyes swept over the wealth of good taste and criminal extravagance.
“It will do very nicely,” the girl said. “It will do—anything will do. I mean, you have done your work splendidly. I am more than satisfied.”
The gratified, if slightly puzzled, waiter bowed himself out. The bitter scorn in Beatrice’s eyes deepened. What did all this reckless extravagance mean? Why was it justified? The man who might have answered the question strolled into the room. Sir Charles Darryll was A wonderfully well-preserved man with a boyish smile and an air of perennial youth unspotted by the world, unfitted to cope with life’s rugged grip and sordid side. Some said that he was a grasping, greedy, selfish old rascal who, under the guise of youthful integrity, concealed a harsh and cruel nature.
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Fred M. White
Fred Merrick White (1859–1935) wrote several novels and short stories under the name “Fred M. White”, including the six “Doom of London” science-fiction stories, in which various catastrophes beset London.
Biography.
These include The Four Days’ Night (1903), in which a massive killer smog besets London; The Dust of Death (1903), in which diphtheria infects the city, spreading from refuse tips and sewers; and The Four White Days (1903), in which a sudden and profound winter paralyzes the city under snow and ice. These six stories first appeared in Pearson’s Magazine and were illustrated by Warwick Goble. He was also a pioneer of the spy story, and in 2003, his series The Romance of the Secret Service Fund (written in 1899) was edited by Douglas G. Greene and published by Battered Silicon Dispatch Box.
Life
Fred Merrick White was born in 1859 in West Bromwich, a small town near Birmingham, England. The record of his birth indicates that he was born in the June quarter and that his first name was actually “Fred” — not, as is often assumed, “Frederick”. His second name, “Merrick”, was the maiden name of his mother, Helen, who married his father, Joseph, in West Bromwich in the September quarter of 1858.
During the 1861 census, Joseph and Helen White lived with their son at 18 Carters Green, West Bromwich. The census record describes Joseph as a “solicitor’s managing clerk.” Ten years later, the family lived in Hereford, a county town in West England.
Before becoming a full-time writer, White followed in his father’s footsteps, working as a solicitor’s clerk in Hereford. By the time of the 1881 census, Joseph White, Sr., was a fully-fledged solicitor and was now relatively prosperous. In 1891, White worked full-time as a journalist and author, presumably earning enough to support himself and his mother, Helen, who, in the census record for that year, figures as the head of the household in the Barton Road villa. In the June quarter of the following year, 1892, White married Clara Jane Smith. The wedding occurred at King’s Norton, Worcestershire, and the couple had two children.
In the 1911 census, Fred M. White, aged 52, and his wife Clara lived at Uckfield, a town in East Sussex. During the First World War, White’s sons served as junior officers in The Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers. In November 1915, the elder boy, Sydney Eric, was gazetted as a Second Lieutenant.
The First World War and his sons’ wartime experiences influenced White’s writing during and after this conflict. His novel ‘The Seed of Empire’ (1916) describes some of the early trench warfare in great detail and the places and events are historically accurate. Several novels published in the 1920s concern the social changes caused by the war and ex-soldiers difficulties in fitting back into everyday civilian life.
Fred and Clara spent their final years in Barnstaple in the County of Devon, which provided the backdrop for his novels The Mystery of Crocksands, The Riddle of the Rail, and The Shadow of the Dead Hand. White died in Barnstaple in December 1935, and his wife, Clara Jane, died in March 1940.
Fred M. White
