Fanny (32 page)

But no sooner is my Back turn’d and it is clear that I am really going, than a Cry rises at my Back as if a Mob of Maenads had just glimps’d the Great God Pan himself!

To my Astonishment, ’tis the scrawny Nell who first runs forward, grabs me by the Skirts, and cries (as much to me as to Mother Coxtart): “If Fanny goes, then I go, too!” Whereupon the consumptive Roxana joins the Cry, and next the red-cheakt Molly! All three restrain me there without the Door, challenging Coxtart for the first Time in their Cow’ring Lives!

She is aghast, agog, amaz’d. She turns and looks at us, the Four Mutineers, and then back at the other Girls—Raven-hair’d Druscilla, the Creole Evelina—wond’ring, no doubt, how soon they, too, will rebel against the Divine Right of her Queenship. Like the Canny Politician that she is, she decides ’tis best to bargain now, whilst two Wenches yet remain in her Party, rather than waiting for the Mutiny, nay the Bloody Revolution, of all her Charges!

“Ladies, Ladies, Ladies,” says she, in a new, gentle Tone. “Pray sit ye down and let us talk of this more calmly. Anger ne’er solv’d the Woes of Humankind, and War is e’er a poor Alternative to Peace. Let us reason with each other then, like true Philosophers.”

I could scarce believe my Ears! Was it possible I’d won? Had my Brazenness accomplish’d what Submission ne’er could?

Slowly, with Dignity (and hiding my great Relief at being taken back again), I enter’d Mother Coxtart’s House once more, closing the Door behind me, whilst my loyal Confederates, Nell, Roxana, and Molly, walkt two Paces behind like Ladies in Waiting.

’Twas thus I learnt my first Great Lesson in the Conduct of Diplomacy. I had sought only to cover my own Fault in coming Home so late, and in my Brashness had spoken like the very Spirit of Lancelot Robinson himself—whose Notions of Fair Play and Camaraderie I had learnt during my Travels with the Merry Men. Little did I dream that Coxtart would truly propose a Counter-Scheme whereby each Wench earn’d a Share of the Profits of the House according to her Seniority and Industriousness! But now I saw that my Determination had frighten’d Coxtart, particularly when she saw all too clearly the Threat of her most valu’d Wenches all departing at once; and suddenly my bluffing Brazenness to acquit myself of Blame had turn’d me into the Heroine of all the House! ’Twas droll indeed! ’Twas perhaps a Lesson to me. For when I worried and fretted with Indecision, trembl’d lest I be turn’d out of Doors, no Good came of it—only more Worry and Fretting—but when I pretended to the Courage which I lackt, Coxtart herself capitulated and the other Wenches declar’d me reigning Queen!

All of ’em, that is, but Kate. For her part, she had been lockt in the Cellar upon my Account, and now nurs’d bitter Enmity ’gainst me. I tried to reason with her, to tell her that henceforth e’en she would have a Share in all she earn’d, but she was bitter with the Grudge of one who finds it hard to trust, then trusts a little, is betray’d, and now hates Humankind for good.

Friendship came hard to Kate. She had put out the first delicate Tendrils of that rare Plant; and when they were so unkindly lopp’d off by my Carelessness, Enmity took Root in their Stead.

“I knew I should ne’er have trusted ye,” she said bitterly, when we were alone together.

“But Kate, I sought to reach Golden Square by Eleven; ’twas impossible.”

“What kept ye, then?”

“I dare not say.”

“Filthy Swine,” she mutter’d. “Perhaps ye met the Scoundrel that put ye in the Family Way. I’ll tell Coxtart that, I will.”

“Tell her, then, tho’ I swear ’tis a Lye. Have you no Wits about you? Do you not understand that you, too, will profit from this new Scheme?”

(For tho’ Kate had been lockt in the Cellar during my great Mutiny ’gainst Coxtart, the other Wenches had related the Incident to her—nay, related it with as many Embellishments as a clever Comedian adds to the Words of the poor Poet who first penn’d his thund’ring Lines in a draughty Garret.)

“Who requires such Foolishness?” she said, with great Disdain. “I learnt to survive an’ prosper before ye arrived here, Madam Fanny. Ye think yerself the Saviour o’ the Girls—those simp’rin’ Strumpets that are in Bondage because they can do nought but
dream
o’ their Freedom! I’ve been savin’ Shillin’s these half a dozen Years an’ mean to have a Shop o’ me own thro’ me own hard Work and me own lovin’ Man. Poo—I care not a Fig fer yer fine Words to Coxtart an’ all yer fake Philosophy. Ye ne’er did it the hard Way as I did, ye Baggage!”

Thus I learnt, (for Kate continu’d to hate me passionately, despite all I did to make amends) that Gratitude is, for some Mortals, the most unwelcome of Emotions; that many Women who feel they have borne the Brunt of Woman’s Lot wish all their Sisters to be as unfortunate as they; that not only doth Misery love Company, but those who account themselves amongst the Miserable have a positive Hatred for those who would lure them amongst the Happy; and many Lessons of the like Nature—too num’rous to account for ’em all here, without unbearably delaying our Tale.

Now, I began to work like a very Devil, both to secure Lancelot Freedom of the Rules, and because, having won a Share of my own Earnings (tho’ admittedly a small one), I was more eager than e’er before to play the false Virgin—or any other mischievous Role Coxtart devis’d for me—so long as it would yield the most Guineas.

Of the many Times my Maidenhead was taken, the Great Figures of the Day who enter’d the Brothel (only to enter my Bow’r of Bliss), and of their curious Predilections and Practices betwixt the Bed-Clothes, I shall have to tell in a separate Chapter. ’Twill be useful, I trust, for any Woman who must at some Time in her hapless Life make her Bread and Board with her Body; and what Woman alive hath not at some Time been brought into that Predicament?

For, are not e’en Wives—especially Wives of Great Men—nought but Whores in bart’ring their Board (e’en if it include gilt Coaches and rich laced Clothes) for their Bed? And do not e’en our Poets and Philosophers show that a Woman who is a wily Merchant of her Maidenhead will make a better Match than one who spends it thriftlessly—as witness Mr. Richardson’s cloying Pamela Andrews, who ensnares her Squire, Lord B, by holding fast to her Maidenhead until the very Moment after Marriage and thereby receiving the very best Goods in Exchange for it?

Belinda, you well may ask whether I, who was e’er prone to Deliberation and Philosophical Debate within my own Soul, deliberated with myself about earning my Living as a Whore. To be sure, I did so. But when I first came to Mother Coxtart’s Brothel, ’twas not clear to me the House was a Brothel at all—so innocent and rustick was I. After that, I was restrain’d there under Lock and Key; and finally, knowing myself with Child and knowing now of Lancelot’s great Need of me, I remain’d in order to obtain pecuniary Benefits for myself in the only Way I thought open to me. But unlike wily Pamela Andrews, I was an Honest Whore and no Hypocrite! I sold my Body freely, but not my Mind! Whereas the Wives of Great Men, or those who aspire to be the Wives of Great Men, sell e’en their Minds and account themselves blest into the Bargain!

No, Belinda, I preserv’d the Independence of my Mind e’en tho’ I could not preserve the Independence of my Body. And so I account my Whoring more honest than the common State of Matrimony, wherein the Wife is sold to her Husband in exchange for Land to be added to her Father’s Holdings and reaps the Benefit of High Life from the Rental of her Flesh in the Merchant’s Shop of the Matrimonial Bed!

But now I come to a Subject far more unpleasant than e’en the one before, a Subject which makes my Quill tremble and my Eyes run with Tears—especially since these Pages are intended for my own Belinda. Would I were not sworn to Honesty above all! Would I were writing a Tale to pass the Time of Idle Ladies, or a Farce to be perform’d upon the London Stage! For now I must tell what I did upon the Ev’ning after my Mutiny ’gainst Coxtart and my Discussions with Kate in which I strove to make amends with her. I lockt myself in the Basement Privy (“The Stool of Repentance,” as Coxtart call’d it), and, with trembling Hand, I inserted the hellish black Suppository into the unwilling Mouth of my Womb.

’Twas no easy Thing; I bled profusely from my Nether Eye, and I also wept with those other Eyes which knew all too well the Import of my Act. ’Twas nothing short of Murder, in my View. I think there is no Woman in the World who murders her own Babe, Flesh of her own Flesh, without terrible Remorse and Pain; and yet my Desperation was so great that I knew I could not bear the Babe. Coxtart would throw me out upon the Street if she knew of my Condition, and not only would I surely starve, but Lancelot would starve and lose his Mind into the Bargain.

How can I explain this to you now, Belinda? How can I explain that you, the dearest Person in the World to me, the most precious Mortal on this spinning Globe, were once the Object of my murderous Wrath? Alas! Not Wrath, but Desperation! And yet, ’twas not, i’faith, you yourself! For a Mother in the first few Weeks of her new Condition, before she hath felt the Stirrings of Life within her, and before she hath borne a Child at all, cannot conceive with her Mind what her Body can so well conceive with its smallest Atoms and its coursing Blood!

So I inserted the horrid black Thing into my Womb, and bled, and waited; and before a half an Hour had pass’d, I was wrackt with Pain so terrible I had to stuff the whole Hem of my Petticoat into my Mouth to keep from Screaming. I doubl’d o’er with the Pain. I held my Vitals. My Legs began to shake and Sweat ran down my Brow. I dug my Nails into my Palms until they bled, whilst I pray’d silently to the Great Goddess, to Jesus Christ, our Lord, to any Deity at all who chanced to hear my Pray’r—e’en if it be the Foul Fiend Himself!—to grant me a Cessation of this Pain.

Pain was a great Red Ocean in which I swam, and I was a Shipwreckt Sailor. Pain was my Heaven, my Earth, my Native Element. I was near to fainting with the Pain, expiring there in the Reek of the House of Easement, with its fetid Odours rising and its Dampness like the Ante-Room to Hell itself—when, in a trice, my Womb cramp’d entirely in one horrid Convulsion, and the wretched black Thing (or what remain’d of it) came out.

I lost the Suppository with a fair Amount of Blood, yet I did not lose the Babe! That you know, since you yourself
are
that Babe (who held on with a Will of her own e’en before you had a Hand to grasp with, or a Rational Mind!). But at that Moment, I myself knew not whether I had loosed the Homunculus or no. I only knew I could not endure a Repetition of such Anguish e’er again, and I threw the other two ghastly black Things down the Hole of that stinking Privy, with scarce a Thought except to vent my Rage at being curst with Pain so unendurable!

In the Days that follow’d, I debated with myself as to whether I was still with Child. My Desire argu’d No; my Reason argu’d Yes; and, i’faith, I did not truly know until, well four Months later, ’twas unmistakable that my Belly had begun to grow.

But now I must go back again to that horrid Jakes and capture with my Quill the shaken, weeping seventeen-year-old Wench, who unlockt the Door, and with unsteady Tread, bloody Thighs, and bloody Linen, crept into her borrow’d brothel Bed to fall asleep and dream of the Home she had fore’er lost, whilst in her teeming Brain she could not ascertain—either by Logick or the wildest Guess—whether she would bear a Babe in nine Months’ Time or no; but she suspected the Truth and it terrified her.

At the Washstand in my Chamber, I cleans’d myself as well as I could, wishing truly for a proper Bath, but not daring to call the Maid to assist me at this Hour. I cast aside my smelly Newgate Clothes, my bloody Linen (which I swore to burn in the Grate come Morning), and crept into my Bed. For a Time, ’tis true, I slept and dreamt of Lymeworth; but ’twas not the Lymeworth I had known, but a strange House with many dank Cellars in which Tortures were carried out whilst Rats scuttl’d past the bare and bleeding Feet of Victims.

A hooded Man in black boil’d and stirr’d the Limbs of Traitors in Tar and Pitch, and I leant over the ghastly Cauldron only to see a fearful sever’d Head bubble to the Top—and lo! ’twas Lancelot’s Head, and it open’d its Lips to speak.

“Be there Honour amongst Thieves?” it cried. “Nay—fie on Humankind! They’ll sell yer Soul fer thirty Pieces o’ Silver! Beware the Captain o’ the
Hannibal
! Beware the Captain o’ yer Soul!” And then the Head submerged into the Pitch again.

I awaken’d with a sudden Cry. My limbs were shiv’ring and an icy Sweat stood in Drops upon my Brow. The Bed-Clothes were wet, as if with Rain. If my Dreams were to be so horrible, I’d best not sleep at all, I thought; whereupon I lit a Taper by my Bed, and sat up holding my Knees to my Belly like a Child.

My Thoughts roam’d back o’er the preceding Day and all the hellish Visions I had seen in Living London which had then fill’d my Dream of Death; I thought of Lancelot in Gaol, of Mrs. Skynner, of angry Kate, of my triumphant Mutiny and then my abject Misery, not long after. Rage fill’d my Heart where Sorrow once had been. How could my Body mutiny so against my Mind? I was just beginning to learn of Life; were all my Hopes of Pow’r o’er my Fate to be snatch’d from me so soon by this small Intruder in my Belly?

No sooner did I feel this Anger than I was stung by bitterest Remorse. I pitied the poor unform’d Creature to be so hated before ’twas e’en born! What a Monster I was! Had I no Pity upon the Small and Weak? And yet ’twas true, I felt the full Force of an Invasion. The Babe had enter’d quite against my Will—as if I were a Castle or a Fort, and some Imposter, in the Guise of Friend, had penetrated to my very Centre, and now sought nothing less than my Life!

Alas, Belinda, perhaps you will forgive me for these Thoughts when you, too, bear a Babe; for no State is as much akin to Madness upon the one Hand and Divinity upon the other, as being with Child. First, there is the Fear of Death, which no Woman who lyes down to bear a Babe can be sure she will escape; next, there is the Fear of Pain; finally, there is the Terror that she will prove an unloving Mother, wishing her Babe dead each Time it cries, instead of pitying its prodigious Need of her.