The Autobiography of Mrs. Tom Thumb (33 page)

After what seemed an interminable amount of time walking the perimeter of the stage with this fussing child in my arms, holding it up, laying my cheek against it, while the audience oohed and
ahhed
, I very gratefully handed it off to Minnie, who was standing in the wings with her arms greedily outstretched. Then Charles joined me onstage and together we danced around to the strains of “The Tom Thumb Polka,” one of the many songs that had been written in honor of our marriage.

Finally, the curtain came down; we repeated this at least three times a day.

Our notices were rapturous; we were the
“crème de la crème.”
Soon there were dolls, songs, greeting cards featuring “M. et Mme. Tom Pouce” all over the city.

Mr. Barnum sent us huge bouquets and cabled us his congratulations—ending with what almost seemed an afterthought. Queen Victoria had asked, once we returned to London, he wrote, if we would come to tea. The Queen was quite fond of babies, of course; would we mind bringing our precious daughter with us, so that Her Majesty could see her and give her a gift?

I stared at the telegram, paralyzed. When I had agreed to this humbug, it was onstage only—or posing for photographs. I had never imagined that I might have to play the part of mother up close, where others could see how ill equipped, how terrified, I was.

“Minnie! Oh, Minnie, you must help me!” I ran to find my sister; Charles said she was in the child’s bedroom while the nursemaid was having her dinner. Then I had to ask him where the child’s bedroom was; he pointed down the hall, and I burst into the room. “Minnie, I need your—oh!”

Minnie, who was kneeling on the floor next to the cradle, rocking it gently with a beautiful smile upon her face, looked up. “What is it, Vinnie? What’s wrong?”

“I didn’t know—why, it’s so pretty in here! Who did all this?”

For this room, unlike the other stuffy rooms in our suite, was utterly lovely. Scattered around were dolls—several that I recognized as Minnie’s—and watercolors of animals and cherubs. Pastel scarves were draped over the lamps, softening the light. Simple vases of posies graced the tables and mantel, and a stuffed white lamb perched on a rocking chair. The whole effect was one of peace and security—exactly how a nursery should feel. It had never once occurred to me to make sure that the infant had appropriate surroundings; it had never occurred to me to buy any toys for it, or to check to make sure the nurse wasn’t harming it in some way.

“I did,” replied Minnie. “I hope you don’t mind, Vinnie, but Mrs. Bleeker took me shopping one afternoon when you were out, and I picked everything out for Cosette. That’s what we named her—Cosette—because the poor thing didn’t have a real name. And everyone deserves a name, don’t you think?”

Minnie looked at me so anxiously, wanting to be right. And, of course, she was. Everyone deserves a name.

Even a foundling child who was beginning life as a stage prop.

“Yes, darling, of course. And Cosette is a beautiful name. Now, could you help me, please, dear? I need to—that is, I want to—learn how to hold her better, how to care for her, just a little, just enough to pretend—I think it would be good for me to learn, don’t you?”

“Oh, yes, Vinnie! You do hold her awfully strangely. You never did play with dolls when you were little, did you?”

“No,” I admitted ruefully, gathering up my hoopskirt and joining Minnie on the floor. The fire in the hearth, just behind us, crackled and popped. The room was scented with lavender and powder. The child in the cradle was sleeping peacefully, her little eyes scrunched up; she had long black eyelashes and black curling hair. She could have easily passed for Minnie’s child, so identically sweet and untroubled were their countenances.

But that was absurd, of course. My baby sister could not have a baby. I suppressed a laugh at the very idea.

“Now, watch what I do,” Minnie instructed me, and then I did have to smile. She had never instructed me in anything before; it was such an odd reversal of roles. I led, she followed; that was the way it had always been. Since when had she become such a serious little grown-up?

Minnie reached into the cradle, placing one tiny hand—much tinier than mine; Minnie was so petite and delicate, her hoop-skirts often threatened to swallow her whole—beneath the child’s head, the other beneath her back. Then she gently scooped it—her—
Cosette
—up from the cradle, and clasped her, reverently, to her chest. The motion was so fluid, so instinctive, that it looked like part of a dance. The child, small as she was, really was too big for Minnie, but my sister did not appear to notice; she simply rocked the child, easily, naturally, against her chest. As if the weight of the child in her arms had triggered some hidden switch,
Minnie began to sing softly, to murmur words and phrases that I could not completely understand, but they were soothing and melodious, like the echoing fragments of songs long after they were finished.

“How do you do that?” I whispered, truly in awe; it was almost as if I was in church, with a real life Madonna and child before me. Minnie’s face, with her halo of tangled curls, was lit up from behind by the glow of the fire, so that the only thing you could see was her cameo profile as she bent her head toward Cosette’s.

“I don’t know, I just do. I don’t even think about it. Oh, Vinnie, can’t we keep her? Can’t we?” Despite her passion, Minnie’s voice never rose above a whisper as she continued to rock the infant.

“Minnie, I just don’t see how. I would love to, truly, but arrangements are arrangements, and it’s for the best. This is no life for a baby.”

“It could be. I’d help, you know! I’d do everything; I wouldn’t mind a bit. I don’t need to be before the public like you. I’d much prefer to stay behind stage and take care of Cosette—you wouldn’t even have to pay the nursemaid!”

“Oh, Minnie.” It was not in my nature to deny my sister anything, and I struggled against it, trying to sort out the thorny details. The child had no papers, not with our name on them. But would an actual child of ours? I didn’t even know. I supposed there would be a baptismal record at least; I knew that Mama kept all of ours in her family Bible. So that would have to be created, somehow. If we actually adopted it, would someone find that out? Or could Mr. Barnum cover it up? But what about later—when the child grew big? We couldn’t use her in the act then, could we? I couldn’t imagine how. But then, that wasn’t the point; Minnie was talking about real life: raising a child, caring for her, kissing her scraped knees, soothing her cries at night, worrying about her
schooling, her future—all the things my own parents had done so well.

I couldn’t imagine it. Minnie couldn’t do it all by herself; I would have to be involved somehow, and I did not wish to be. That was it, pure and simple; my life was onstage, next to my husband, either reenacting a pretend wedding ceremony or holding a pretend infant.

I had no room for big love, big decisions, big messes, big happiness; not in this miniature life, spent under the magnifying glare of so many eyes, that I had made for myself.

“See how sweetly she’s sleeping, Vinnie?” Minnie whispered, bending closer to me; she leaned in to hand me the child, careful not to wake her up.

“No,” I said, recoiling, as if the child was a hex or a bad omen—something I did not want to touch for fear of how it might affect my future. Hastily I scrambled up from the floor, hiding my trembling hands behind my skirts. “No, no, I’m sorry but we’ll just have to take very good care of Cosette now.” I avoided Minnie’s surprised, hurt gaze. “And when the time comes, we must return her and trust that she will find a good family who will love her just as much.”

Minnie didn’t speak at first; she merely bent her head down to Cosette and kissed her on the tip of her snub nose. Then she looked up at me, so that I could not help but see the single tear rolling down her cheek; it continued to fall until it landed upon Cosette’s smooth, untroubled brow. “I don’t see how,” Minnie whispered, careful not to wake the child. “I don’t see how anyone can love her just as much as me. I don’t see how I can ever love any other baby just as much as Cosette.”

I turned away. I detested this whole charade. But I could see no way of ending it without exposing it—and Mr. Barnum, not to mention myself. I left the room with a bitter taste in my mouth
and a bitterer stain on my soul, knowing that Minnie felt, in her sweet, susceptible heart, that what she had said was true; she could never love another baby as much as she loved Cosette.

I also knew that she would say the same thing again, in a few weeks, when we went to England. Only instead of Cosette, it would be Isabel. Or Alice, or Beatrice—or whatever she decided to name the next one. My sister’s heart was endlessly elastic, but I had to wonder, even then, how long she could go on mourning baby after baby after baby.

I also had to wonder why I, the mother in this particular play written by Mr. P. T. Barnum, never did. I never shed one tear over any of those infants—not until much, much later in my life.

INTERMISSION
 

From
The New York Times
, December 26, 1865

G
ENERAL
N
EWS

The Commissioner of Agriculture has received from the American Legation at Jeddo, Japan, several hundred varieties of fruit and flower seeds indigenous to that country, many of which, the consul believes, may be cultivated to advantage in this country.

One thousand four hundred men are now employed on the Reno, Oil Creek and Pit Hole Railroad. In about two weeks the railroad will be open.

Quite a number of plantations near Augusta, Ga., have changed hands; lately the purchasers are mostly from the North.

Frederick Douglass has written a letter accepting the position of delegate in Washington of the colored men of New York.

From
The Blairsville Press
, Blairsville, Pennsylvania, April 19, 1869

General Sheridan received a few days since the following report from Maj. General Schofield, at Ft. Leavenworth: “General Custer reports from the headwaters of the Washita, March 21st, the successful termination of his expedition. He has rescued the captive white women, Mrs. Morgan and Miss White; made the Indians submit to the Government, and holds three Cheyenne chiefs as security for the fulfillment of his promise. The troops are in good health.”

[ FOURTEEN ]
 
Thrills and Chills Guaranteed to Tingle the Spine!
 (or, Trains, Indians, Runaway Wagons, and Mormons
)

O
UR DAUGHTER DIED IN
S
EPTEMBER
1866. M
R
. B
ARNUM
put out the press release:
“The Infant Daughter of General and Mrs. Tom Thumb Dead of Brain Inflammation.”
Even in death, she remained nameless.

I killed her; I demanded her death. But I did not mourn her; that was Minnie’s duty, one that she begged to be allowed to perform.

“Let me reply to these letters, Sister. It will give me some pleasure.”

“Oh, Minnie, no, darling. You don’t have to do that—Mr. Barnum’s secretaries will send out a card.”