The Autobiography of Mrs. Tom Thumb (39 page)

“Oh, it would be dreadful, impossible,”
I heard my mother’s stricken voice from across the ages.
“Don’t you remember the little
cow …”
Didn’t Minnie know? Didn’t she understand how dangerous it was for her to even consider having a child?

No, she didn’t. Because I had never thought to tell her—not even when she married Edward. For so long, my fears were her fears, her fears were mine, and I thought I could protect us both. But Minnie had changed, Minnie had grown—Minnie had become a real woman. Not simply a woman in miniature, like me.

“But, Vinnie, of course it’s a perfectly natural thing, and I know how sad you’ve always been that you couldn’t have a child. And just think of it—we won’t have to give it back! This will be
our
child—for, of course, she will be just as much yours as she will be mine, as I’m sure I will need your help. She! Isn’t that funny, Vinnie? I already think of it as a girl!” And Minnie laughed, all seriousness, all gravity gone from her eyes so that they were the impish—innocent—eyes of the sister I thought I knew.

“Minnie, listen to me.” I grabbed her hand again and held it tight; too tight, for she winced. “How far—how far along are you?”

“The doctor said nearly three months, he thought.”

“Three months.” I searched my memory, my vast storehouse of knowledge gleaned from a life so different from hers; the words
prevention powders
were recalled from some dusty, neglected corner of my brain. Carlotta—Carlotta, that poor girl from Colonel Wood’s boat—she had tried to give me those prior to my first private audience. What were they again? How did one use them?

“He also admitted it’s hard to tell,” Minnie continued, happily unaware of my thoughts. “Of course, Dr. Mills said the child will be tiny—as tiny as me!”

“But, Minnie, you—” I stopped. Minnie looked so unconcerned, so happy—so
well
. She did not appear to recall that she herself had not been a tiny baby, and neither had I. But the doctor? Surely he knew better?

“Yes, of course,” I told my sister, still holding her hand. I could not prevent myself from searching her, appraising her, top to bottom, as if she were a new broodmare Papa had decided to purchase; she was so very small, so delicate. As if made from wishes and dreams, not flesh and blood. Then I shut my eyes as a cold wave of terror washed over me:
She must not have this child. She must not
. For her, for me—giving life meant summoning death.

But I did not tell her this now; I simply sat and listened to her talk excitedly about the baby, how happy Charles would be, as he did love children so, how we all would love this child, we would all raise her together, she would be ours forever. And my heart twisted itself about in knots as guilt, recrimination, and fear all fought for possession of it. Neither one winning, but none leaving, either—each parked itself in my heart, setting up housekeeping. I knew they would never leave; I knew I would have to carry them all around forever.

She must not have this baby
—the phrase repeated itself over and over, wearing such a sharp groove in my mind, I had to grit my teeth from the pain of it. I needed to talk to someone, I needed to figure this out, for that was what I did—I figured things out. I took action. I made plans. I kept my sister safe. I was all mind, not heart—

And there was only one person who understood that. There was only one person I could turn to.

A
S THE TRAIN PULLED INTO
B
RIDGEPORT
, I
WONDERED HOW MANY
times I had taken this journey. It was hard to keep track, for I had taken so very many journeys by now. Since returning, triumphantly and in a blaze of headlines, from our world tour in 1872, the General Tom Thumb Company had gone back out to revisit this country, telling stories of our travels; this was when
Edward joined us. However, after that tour, Charles finally put his foot down; he was tired of mimicking people onstage and now wanted to mimic our Society friends by living a life of leisure.

So he bought a yacht, and a matching captain’s jacket and hat, recommended to him by Mr. Belmont; he bought horses—fast, expensive horses—and built fine stables for them; he bought me jewels, just as his friends Mr. Vanderbilt and Mr. Astor did for their wives; he ordered the finest cigars from Mr. Barnum’s man in New York. He built us our grand house in Middleborough, just across from Mama and Papa’s old homestead, and furnished it with the most exquisite furniture and carpets and draperies, much of it built specially for us. The stair steps were not steep, the windows were lower to the ground so that we might easily see out of them; there was even a special kitchen built with sinks and a stove only two feet off the ground.

It was all grand; it was all impressive. Middleborough twittered and preened whenever dear Caroline Astor came to visit, and even erected a sign at the town border proclaiming this the
Home of Mr. and Mrs. Charles Stratton, or General and Mrs. Tom Thumb
.

It was also less real to me than the flimsy scenery we carted around whenever we toured. I wasn’t the mimic that my husband was; while I could do a fair representation of a satisfied lady of the manor, I had yet to learn how to successfully impersonate a wife offstage. While my sister looked for ways to steal even more time with her husband, I made up excuses to spend less time with mine. A quick weekend up in New York, a jaunt over to Bridgeport; my blood always stirred with excitement even as my nerves relaxed in relief each time I boarded the train out of Middleborough.

Even today; even as I still felt—physically, as if I had been clubbed repeatedly—the blow of Minnie’s news. Yet I looked forward to traveling; even more did I look forward to seeing
Mr. Barnum. I reached inside my reticule and took out a piece of pink chamois, rubbing it all over my face to take the shine and dirt off, just as we pulled into the station in Bridgeport.

As I stood on the top of the stairs, my favorite porter beamed in recognition and bustled over to lift me down to the platform. “Good morning, Mrs. General! Here to see Mr. Barnum?”

“Yes.” I handed him a nickel.

“I thought so—he’s outside in his carriage, waiting for you.”

“He is?” Mr. Barnum never came to the station himself. How odd that he had done so today of all days—but then again, perhaps it wasn’t. Tears filled my eyes; I had not yet cried, so determined was I to fix Minnie’s “problem.” But the relief of being able to share this with someone who possessed sense and determination; the relief of being able to share my burden, period, with the one person I desired to share my burdens with—it was so unexpectedly sweet. I reached into my reticule again, this time removing a handkerchief; dabbing my eyes, I blinked away the rest of my tears.

Then I followed the porter outside to the curb, where Mr. Barnum’s enclosed carriage was waiting. He was standing next to it, bundled up in a heavy coat with a white fur collar that reached to the bottom of his ears even as his white curls brushed the tops, so that his face—pink as a baby’s in the cold—stood out vividly. He was heavier now, more wrinkled, a bit round-shouldered, with a tendency to lean more decidedly upon his walking stick. But his gray eyes were just as lively, just as perceptive, as ever.

“What’s wrong?” he barked as soon as he saw me. He threw his cigar upon the pavement, crushed it with his walking stick, and lifted me up into the carriage with such haste that I swallowed my words of greeting before they could reach my lips. And then we were inside, Mr. Barnum rapping his hand upon the outside of the carriage, signaling for the driver to go. “Take the long way,” he
shouted, sticking his head out the door before he shut it quickly against the cold. We lurched away, the horses soon settling into a smooth, slow trot that caused the carriage to sway gently, the lanterns—lit in the gloom of this depressing January day—to swing to and fro, casting ominous shadows upon us.

“It’s Minnie,” I said breathlessly, shivering, although there were heated bricks on the floor and hidden in the corners of the seat. Mr. Barnum leaned forward and tucked a buffalo robe about me; it was so heavy that I felt pinned to the seat, unable to move. But I was warm, anyway.

“What is it? Is there trouble with her husband? I always wondered about him; he seemed too darn polite, even for an Englishman.”

“No, not that. She’s—she’s with child.” I whispered this, feeling for the first time the indelicacy of the subject.

“She is? Why, that’s wonderful!” A great, crooked grin pushed across his face, and he clapped his gloved hands in delight. “How happy you all must be!”

“No!” I shouted it, frustrated that he did not immediately understand the situation. “No, it’s not wonderful. It’s terrible. Don’t you see? She’s—we must do something about it. Minnie was not—I was not—we were both normal-size babies. Mama always told us this, don’t you remember? I weighed six pounds when I was born. Do you know how much Minnie weighs now? Thirty pounds, at the most. Can you imagine—well, you were born on a farm, you must know! I remember Mama and Delia saying, long ago, how I must never—and now Minnie is, and she can’t, she can’t, it will kill her, and we must stop it!” Somehow I had flung that oppressive robe off me, kicking it to the floor, and now I was rocking back and forth, my arms clutching my shoulders. I knew I sounded wild, unhinged, but I did not care.

Comprehension dawned upon Mr. Barnum’s face; he paled,
then colored, then his eyes narrowed, as if he was squinting at some faraway point, and I took a big, crackling breath and wiped my face with the sleeve of my coat. He was thinking; the wheels in that great, perpetual-motion brain of his were turning, and I was weak with relief. I knew I could depend on him.

“Excuse me, Vinnie, for being so forward, but we must dispense with modesty. How far along is she?”

“She thinks almost three months, but the idiot doctor apparently can’t tell. He told her the baby would be tiny, like her—I don’t know if he’s totally ignorant, or if he told her that so she wouldn’t worry. I suspect the former.”

“Country doctors.” Mr. Barnum snorted. “I’ll find the finest New York doctor and send him to Middleborough.”

“Yes, that would be a relief.” I nodded, hesitating—but then I decided to plunge forward, as time was of the essence. “However, would he be willing to—I know there are things you can do, if the health of the mother is in question. It’s probably past the stage of any prevention powders, but—”

“What? Prevention powders?” Mr. Barnum stared at me, aghast; then he blushed. He actually blushed; I had never seen him do that, not even when the wild Circassian girl asked if she could dance bare-bodiced at the Museum. “What on earth do you know about such things?”

I met his gaze levelly. “When I was on the river. A girl—a dancer—once thought I might need something of the kind. She was quite mistaken, I’m glad to say. However, it was the first time I had heard of these things, and now I’m happy that I did, for I can think clearly about Minnie’s situation.”

“Vinnie, you never cease to amaze me,” Mr. Barnum said, grasping my hand. “You are the most remarkable woman I have ever met.”

I smiled at him, happy to hear this; it filled my soul with
gratitude and yearning and other unfamiliar emotions that I usually did not have time to miss—except when I was with him. But now was not the time to reflect upon such things.

“We need to consider the option of doing—something—so that Minnie does not carry the child to term.”

“But do you think there’s the possibility that the child might be tiny, as the doctor says?”

“I don’t know. All I know is that Minnie and I were not. Nor was Charles, remember? That’s three of us who were born normal-size that I know of—and that’s enough for me. I have no idea how we’ll be able to convince her, for she is over the moon with happiness—she said she’s doing this for me, too.” And now I was face-to-face with the hard, unpleasant truth of the matter, the factor I had tried my best to ignore but which would not go away. I looked at him and took a big breath. “All that baby business, back in the sixties. It broke her heart to say goodbye to those infants. She keeps saying how glad she’ll be not to have to say goodbye to her child, how happy Charles will be, how happy I must be. She thought I mourned those children just as she did, but I did not. She says she’s so glad she can do this for me! So it’s all my fault!”

“The one thing you cannot do is blame yourself.” Mr. Barnum shook his head. “Believe me, I know. When I lost Pauline last year, I couldn’t stop blaming myself, wondering if I could have seen the symptoms earlier.”

“But this is different! Pauline died of fever! I have pushed Minnie into making a decision that will cost her her life.”

“You don’t know that, Vinnie. You don’t know if she wouldn’t have done this anyway.”

“She never would have met Edward if it wasn’t for me!”

Mr. Barnum pressed his crooked lips together, as if trying to prevent himself from saying anything further. He did not; I think
he understood that I needed to say these things. Instead, he pushed himself off his seat and lurched over to my side of the carriage; he put his arm about me and gathered me close so that I could lean my head against his broad chest. He had never touched me in this way before; always he had been proper, respectful. A kiss upon the cheek in greeting, a fond handshake when embarking upon a new venture, a pat on the back in farewell.

But never had he held me; never had any man held me like this, so completely, as if he had a right to do so. Not even my husband, who would not have attempted to unless I first instructed him how. But I would never have done so; it was not in my nature, so accustomed was I to cringing from a man’s touch, fearing the intent behind it, fearing my own helplessness in the face of it. I had never before missed being held.

Until now.

I felt my limbs loosen; no longer did I feel responsible for holding them together within my skin, assembled correctly, upright and proper. At that moment, all my bones and muscles and tissue melted together, melted away, melted
into
someone else, someone strong and caring, someone just as capable as I. Someone who would keep my bones and muscles and tissue from draining away altogether, who would give them back to me, intact, when I needed them again.