Jenny and Barnum (7 page)

“
I have my reward,” the little bird said. “Your tears, the first time I sang for you. Let me come and sing for you again, of good things and bad, joy and suffering. Because a little bird flies everywhere, I see many things in your empire. Let me advise your heart with my songs. Keep this your secret, and it will serve you better.
”

In the morning the Emperor's courtiers found him dressed in his imperial clothes and holding his imperial saber; more eager than ever to bring peace and justice to his Empire
.

Jenny
hated
the story. Did Andersen think she was stupid or uneducated? She hated everything about the story, every level, down to the central vision of its author.

How
dare
he? The title identified her with the story—she had been called “The Swedish Nightingale” for more than two years now. Was she to be seen by the world as a plain, gray little bird, despicably called a “he” who found the meaning of his art only in the eyes of his audience? The story violated her privacy, was utterly contemptuous, and held her up to ridicule. Andersen had trafficked in their acquaintanceship, gratuitously hinting an intimacy that was not there. The thought that anyone would believe there was some private relationship between them simply made her shudder.

What was the story supposed to mean anyway? With the word “nightingale” so closely linked to her, what was the meaning of making the bird a male besides insulting her? Was the story about her art or her plainness? Was he comparing her to more beautiful, less talented women by showing the Emperor pining away under the stultifying effects of the bejeweled mechanical bird's one song? He was sitting in judgment of her on every level. Emperor, indeed! Andersen had abused her with his presumption; she felt scalded, trespassed upon, so shocked and hurt with his stupid incomprehension that she thought it would make her ill. His stories were gently Christian? Something about this tale told her that the man's mind was a rank, stinking sewer. She had to put “The Nightingale” out of her mind.

But long after her emotion had subsided, she could not stop thinking of the shallowness of Andersen's intellect and his narrow concept of art itself. To think that once she had respected him and sought out his opinion! Andersen was saying that art had no reason for being without an audience. Was he also saying the song was somehow less because only the singer had heard it? Who understood the art of song better than the singer? To suggest the opposite as the opinion of a character identified with Jenny Lind was to libel her. Andersen was not content to insult her womanhood and her appearance by comparing her to a plain, gray, male bird; by suggesting that she sang only for the reward of her audience's reaction did not just belittle her accomplishments, it denied the effort she had put into them. Her art took effort, intelligence, and sacrifice as well as God-given talent. If Hans Andersen, upon self-examination, found art to be a trivial, mewling attempt to curry the gratitude of ignorant strangers, that was his business; for her part, Jenny Lind felt degraded for having been, all unknowing, in the presence of such views.

But Jenny was incapable of sustaining that sort of wrath for long. Less than a year later, again in Copenhagen, she received a note from Andersen asking permission to call upon her. At the time, her serious attention was elsewhere; she wanted to regard “The Nightingale” episode as an insignificant annoyance, finished and in the past. By messenger she let Andersen know that she was willing to see him for an hour late Sunday afternoon.

He arrived early, homely and unkempt as ever, obviously overwrought and patting his brow with a threadbare handkerchief. It took her only a few moments to realize she had made a mistake in seeing him.

“I have felt an emptiness every day since our last meeting,” Andersen whispered breathlessly. “You are everything I have ever aspired to be.”

“Nonsense, Mr. Andersen. You have done very well in your own right.” She wanted to divert him. “I had hoped that you were bringing me the best of Copenhagen's gossip, all the delicious secrets, and hints of unspeakable scandal. Come now, tell me what you know.”

“What I know is that, because of you, I am Copenhagen's biggest scandal, no secret, and the cause of most of the gossip.”

“I do not want to hear of it,” Jenny said.

“I'm afraid it will not fail to reach your ears.”

“Respect my wishes, please.”

“I want to please you—that is
my
wish,” Andersen said.

And so it went, Andersen maddeningly turning her every phrase toward his childish lovesickness. Why could he not account for her feelings and wishes in the matter? Could he not see that he was being as thick-headed and self-centered as his silly Emperor? He wanted to possess her without giving a thought to who and what she was. Finally he was on his knees in front of her, almost crazed, his eyes wild, whimpering still another proposal of his idea of “marriage.” He was within an inch of clutching at her skirt, and her terror awakened the rage he had made her feel in the past.

“I beg you, please, be my wife—”

“
Wife?
You imbecilic giraffe, I do not want to be
wife
to anybody, least of all you!” Now she was the one who was out of control. She seized a hand mirror from the side table and thrust it toward his face, nearly hitting him with it. “Look at this, Andersen! Now do you understand my position?”

He recoiled, stumbled to his feet, muttered something, turned abruptly, and walked out, his back straight and his fists clenched.

She never saw him again.

Her cruelty to him that day haunted her for years afterward. In interviews he still spoke of her glowingly, but apparently only when asked. She didn't believe his statements anyway. In disgracing himself with her, he had exposed the most desperate feelings of an ugly, lonely man; in defending herself against his hapless attempt to overwhelm her, she had wounded him mortally. She remembered the clenched fists. Whether he knew it or not, some small part of him hated her. It was in him forever, like a cancer, like death.

A letter from Jenny Lind was waiting for Tom Thumb at the desk of his Vienna hotel when he came downstairs alone in the darkness at six-thirty the next morning. The quickness of her response and deviation from her own plan involving Judge Munthe meant the best or the worst, in Tom Thumb's experience—acceptance of Barnum's offer as tendered, or rejection out-of-hand—the latter devoutly to be wished, from the little General's point of view. He had awakened this morning more convinced than ever that Barnum's scheme would fail. All concerned would be better served if contact could be broken off. This morning Tom Thumb had had a new thought: even if America did respond to glum and prissy Jenny Lind, then Jenny Lind would positively
loathe
America. This Europe was too tame and orderly, too
civilized
, for Tom Thumb and his colleagues. Wouldn't she react in the opposite way to America? Hadn't she suggested as much, with her questions about slavery? And her assumption that Barnum exhibited human beings in cages? Of course she had. Her projected tour of America already contained all the elements of disaster.

Tom Thumb put the letter in his pocket to read after breakfast. He was up and about so early because he wanted to be sure that all the baggage and equipment (from Anna Swan's carriage already on a flat car down at the station, to his own dining room seat cushions, not yet packed) were properly collected and assembled before they were packed off to the railroad station. Traveling in Europe really was no better than in America. Matters such as people's clothing and costumes could not be left to the near-morons normally put in charge of them. Tom Thumb and Barnum had learned the lesson in America on their very first tour, only to have to learn it all over again on their way to be presented to Queen Victoria when their trunks were lost somewhere between the docks of Liverpool and the hotel in London.

These days in America Barnum hired men he elegantly called traveling secretaries to look after the baggage, pay the bills, confirm the next reservations, and so forth—in all, a terrible load of work. But it was Barnum's nature to be capriciously and often insultingly tightfisted and before this European tour he'd cried poverty and asked Tom Thumb “to look after that end—you know, the way we used to do for ourselves. I'll pay you for it, of course.”

In fact, Barnum only wanted to save the round-trip passage, hotel charges, and meals another employee would incur. Tom Thumb knew that to be true because he worked it out, knowing for a week before sailing the dollars and cents involved, during which time Barnum never mentioned actually
how much
he planned to pay his little partner for what was, unarguably, a hellishly difficult job even for someone with nothing else to do.

Tom Thumb waited until the morning the
Great Western
was ready to sail before confronting the big humbug. The
Great Western
's tall stack was billowing smoke thick enough to darken the blue Hudson, and the hissing of steam smothered the gabble of voices from the crowd on the pier, the gangplanks, and the majestic ship itself. Sailors and stevedores were carrying aboard the last barrels of wine, shouldering them through the crowd with hearty shouts, not even the dank river breeze able to carry off the odors of wine-soaked wood and workingmen's sweat. It was a grand moment, with Tom Thumb in his Napoleon getup standing on a hatch, even with Barnum's chest, an expectant crowd gaping and hanging on every high-pitched, faint little word.

“See here, Barnum, I want to know what you're going to pay me for looking after the troupe.”

The crowd guffawed; people thought it was part of the show. Barnum eyed them slowly and then took hold of his coat lapels, like a politician. “Why, I thought I'd pay you the regular rate.” He didn't know what Tom Thumb had on his mind. If the little General wanted to play it as a comic turn, Barnum, as always, was willing to go along.

“Well, I suppose I should be grateful,” Tom Thumb said loudly, playing to the audience. “Given my size, I thought you were going to offer me
half
the regular wages.”

Barnum waited for the laughter to subside. “If that's the way you want it, General, it certainly can be arranged.”

“No, sir! Knowing what a cheapskate you are, that's what I was
afraid
of. No, if I'm going to do the job of a full-sized man, I'm going to have to work
twice
as hard as he would—and I think you ought to pay me accordingly, and I make that to be
double!
”

The crowd cheered, whistled, and hooted. Tom Thumb stepped back and performed a sweeping bow.

“Pay him!” they shouted. “Pay his price!”

“I thought we were partners, you little field mouse,” Barnum growled through his teeth.

“We
are
partners,” Tom Thumb said for everyone to hear, “and this minority partner votes to pay the little fellow what he demands.”

“Pay, Barnum!” the crowd shouted. “Pay!”

People started to clap rhythmically, and Barnum raised his hands. “I give up. For once, boys, I've been outsmarted!” They cheered, and hats were thrown in the air. Barnum leaned close to Tom Thumb. “As for you, you human canapé, your next appearances will be before the Apache and Comanche Indians.”

“Don't kid me, you fat tub,” Tom Thumb whispered. “Paying me double wages will save you twice as much as you would have spent on a traveling secretary's expenses.”

“The Jenny Lind proposition is going to put me in a bad way!”

“Stop your bellyaching. The only reason you take such chances is to avoid an honest day's work.”

Barnum smiled. Tom Thumb smiled. They shook hands and the crowd cheered again. It was a grand time, and everybody thought it was part of the show. The cheering went on, spreading down the gangplanks to the pier, where people cheered, too, although not knowing why. But they cheered all the same.

Whatever the contents of Jenny Lind's letter in his pocket, Tom Thumb felt in a similarly expansive mood this morning. Last night had been good—the show had been good, Emperor Franz-what's-his-name had greeted them warmly. Best of all, Tom Thumb had had Lavinia to himself, Joe Gallagher ducking out of the reception early, once again seeing that the star of the show, wherever in the world it played, was the smallest man in the world, Tom Thumb.

The little General had his other suspicions about Joe Gallagher, his activities, and what his sudden departures actually meant. So far there was no proof, but if Gallagher was debauching himself in brothels all over Europe as Tom Thumb suspected, then he was a menace to the reputations of them all and a candidate for a one-way ticket back to San Francisco. No matter. Last night Tom Thumb and Lavinia Warren had been together—alone—for hours. Like any other successful lover, Tom Thumb felt on top of the world—drained by the process, naturally, and a little guilty, but happy to the point of giggling nevertheless.

He was dressed for travel, in black walking shoes, white spats, pearl gray trousers, a gray Chesterfield, and a black silk top hat—taken together, a tiny fraction of the custom wardrobe that cost many thousands of dollars every year to maintain. The hotel dining room was open but still empty, the gaslights on as if prepared for dinner instead of breakfast. The Barnum troupe had its own specially prepared large table in the corner, the General's chair built up with his own custom designed, firm, square cushions. Hotel dining room people all over Europe were now so accustomed to the troupe that they could handle all its unusual requirements with aplomb. Such professionalism, when it appeared, was one of Tom Thumb's few comforts when he was touring Europe.

The captain steadied Tom Thumb's chair as the tiny man climbed up. “Coffee at once, sir?”

For a moment Tom Thumb forgot where he was, and thought the man meant American coffee. But no. Tom Thumb nodded. “Let me have half a scrambled egg, half a slice of toast, and one slice of bacon, too.”