Elephant Man (34 page)

As she finished she turned toward the royal box, but as very little could be seen in it the applause was modest at first. The crowd craned their necks to get a glimpse, and one or two who caught sight of him whispered hurriedly to their companions. A muted buzz began to run over the audience.

“Stand up, John,” said Treves. “Let them see you.”

Merrick turned apprehensive eyes on him. “Oh no—I couldn’t.”

“It’s for you, John. It’s all for you. Go ahead, let them see you.”

He held out his hand and Merrick took it trustingly, allowing himself to be drawn forward to the front of the box. The ladies all drew back to allow him to pass, and when he had reached the edge of the box Princess Alexandra came and stood beside him, smiling at him. Her gesture left the audience in no doubt that he was under her special protection, and their shock at the first sight of Merrick quickly passed into cheering.

Merrick stood rigid at the front of the box, overcome by what was happening to him, tears pouring down his face, his hand tightly grasping Treves’ hand. When he spoke it was almost to himself, and the words only just reached Treves standing beside him.

“I feel as if I’ve traveled my whole life just to stand here.”

Treves put Merrick to bed himself that night. It would have damaged the illusion if either Nora or Mothershead had helped. But both women saw him to his door and thanked him for their night out, before rustling away, their elegant taffeta gowns looking strangely fine in the severely prosaic hospital corridor.

Merrick spoke very little as Treves helped him on with his nightshirt, but the doctor could sense a difference
in him, as though a light were sinning outward from within. He had wondered if Merrick would want to talk about the night, the new sights he had seen, his treatment as an honored guest. But the Elephant Man seemed to want to hold it all within himself, as though it would all escape him and vanish if it were put into words.

“You’d better go straight to bed now,” Treves said. “You’ve had a long night.”

Once Merrick would have taken this as a command to be obeyed, but now he sat down at the table where his new cardboard cathedral looked, to Treves’ eyes, complete.

“No,” he said. “I’ve just a little more I want to do here. I’d like to work a bit tonight.” He began to add minute dots with a pencil while Treves gathered up his things ready to go. “I wonder if that poor man will ever get out of the dungeon.”

Treves was about to ask, What man? when he realized that Merrick was still pondering the fate of the “people” he had seen that night. To him the ogre was still confined in that dungeon.

He laid down his pencil and leaned forward to examine something more closely. The movement tilted his head forward heavily, and he had to jerk it back, struggling to control it. Even in the few weeks he had been back, his head had grown again. Treves watched him.

“Will the cathedral be finished soon, John?” he said quietly.

“Yes, very soon.”

“Splendid. It’s truly a masterpiece. Well, I suppose I’ll be on my way now. I hope you enjoyed yourself this evening.”

“Oh yes! It was a wonderful evening.”

“I’m glad, John. Good night.”

“Mr. Treves …” Merrick’s voice stopped him.

“Yes, John?” Treves returned to the table.

“Mr. Treves, tell me … tell me truly. Is it all right? Did I make any mistakes that you can see?”

Treves bent and studied the cathedral. It was better than the last one, although no more perfect that would be expected from a man with only one good hand. But it had been made with care and love by someone who could only express his sense of beauty in this one way.

“No, John,” said Treves. “No mistakes that I can see.”

“Then I shouldn’t change anything?”

“No, no. I wouldn’t change a thing.”

He met Merrick’s silent gaze, hoping his own eyes did not betray him.

“I’ll walk you to the door,” Merrick said at last. He rose and for the three yards to the door performed his duties as host admirably.

“Good night, John. Sleep well.”

“You too, my friend. Good night.”

He waited until Treves was halfway down the hall before he closed the door. He could still hear the sound of his friend’s retreating footsteps as he went back to the table and studied his cathedral from different angles. He picked up a fine brush and made a few final delicate strokes, then stood back to look.

“It is finished,” he said softly.

He had one final touch to add. With infinite care he used the brush to sign his name at the base of the spire.

“John—Merrick.” He repeated the words to himself incredulously. He had the oddest sensation that the man John Merrick had only come into being at this very moment, when he had completed one thing of perfect goodness and beauty. Out of the ugliness that covered him he had brought forth something that was lovely.

“John Merrick—” he repeated, as though introducing himself to this man who had created such a little masterpiece of detail and shading.

Now, tonight, he could savor fully the feeling that had been growing in him ever since he returned, and he knew it to be a feeling of triumph. As the anguish of those weeks in Belgium faded only one thing remained,
and that was the realization that he had made a long journey, over land and sea—alone. True, he had started with the assistance of some of the best friends a man ever had. But for their courage, and their generosity, he could never have even begun the journey. But having once begun it he had completed it alone. Alone he had left the train at Ostende and bought his ticket for the boat, alone he had boarded and endured the journey, alone he had disembarked on the other side and found the right train for London. He had done all this, just as any other man would. He was a traveler, a man with the experience of journeying on land and sea. He savored the thought. It was sweet.

He sat down where he could look through the window and see the moonlight on the spire of St. Philip’s, and his mind went back over everything that had happened since his return, starting with Mothershead’s heartfelt welcome, which had made him leave the safety of Treves’ arms and fall into hers.

How different it had all been from his first arrival in the hospital. Then there had been suspicion, hostility, attempts to drive him out. Now he was welcomed as a long-lost friend returned from a dangerous journey. Carr-Gomm had come to see him and rejoice in his return, Anne Treves had visited him, Nora had arrived bearing a fresh pile of materials for his cathedral.

Treves and Mothershead had spent long hours with him. From them he had heard of Renshaw’s dismissal, and the story of how Mothershead had knocked him to the ground with a single blow would have made him laugh, if he had been able to.

His ladies were all waiting for him on the mantelpiece, their laughing eyes seeming to welcome him back. The picture of his mother was soon replaced in a new frame, brought by Anne Treves. It gazed on him now and he inclined his head toward it.

The movement brought pain, and a renewed sense of how his pain had been growing recently. Mostly
he managed to put it out of his mind. He tried to now, choosing instead to remember the day Mrs. Kendal had come in and welcomed him home, bringing with her the incredible news that he was to go to the theater. The scene slid easily into that very night—his first visit to the theater—the kindness of the Princess—an evening of glittering color for him who had once known only drabness and squalor.

There would be other visits, he knew that. Tonight was only the start of the new life that opened to him. He knew now that the difference between himself and others was not so very great. People had been frightened before, but they grew used to him. His skills were growing; he became more like other men every day.

The thought reminded him of the one thing in which he was still not like others. He still slept with his head forward on his knees, propped up by pillows. It had always been an uncomfortable posture, but more so now that pain shivered over his body and stretching his back was more difficult. Increasingly he turned his eyes toward the picture of the child sleeping that hung on his wall, and he yearned to be like that child.

He wondered how he slept when he was little. He could no longer remember now. But surely, when he was a baby, he had lain backward while his mother cradled him in her arms. He was sure that he had done so, for she had rocked him gently and sung to him. It seemed to him that the time could not be long before she returned for him, for surely now she must hear of how like other men he was becoming—perhaps she would even hear about tonight—and then she would know how hard he had tried to be a good son, and she would come back. If he could just manage this last hurdle…

Slowly he removed the pillows from the bed and began to lay them on the floor, taking care to place them neatly. The window was slightly open, and a breeze billowed the curtains inward, causing them to
touch his face gently. He wondered if her fingers would feel like that when she caressed his face for the first time.

He was ready now. He placed her picture where he could see it and eased himself into bed. As his head went down it lolled frighteningly, but he managed to catch it in his left hand and steady it until he was lying down. He was on his side now, his head resting on the single pillow that he had left. He thought he could have slept like this, but for the increased pain that came from the pressure on the growths on that side. He tried to relax, and to take his mind off his pain he began to repeat to himself the words of the poem he had read with Treves on that day when he had asked the doctor if he could be cured. He had returned to that poem a dozen times since, until now he could say it by heart.

“When will the stream be aweary of flowing under my eye,” he whispered. “When will the wind be aweary of blowing over the sky?”

His eyes were fixed on his mother’s picture. In the darkness he could just make out the faint smile on her lips.

“When will the clouds be aweary of fleeting?”

The pain was growing now. Any moment he knew he must roll over onto his back, where he hoped it would be easier.

“When will the heart be aweary of beating—and nature die?”

He began to ease himself over onto his back. His head seemed to pull strongly on his neck and he sucked frantically for breath. From this position he could no longer see his mother’s picture, but somehow her face was still there, just before him, her eyes looking into his with a calm smile, and it was her voice that was saying to him, “Never, oh never. Nothing will die …”

The tightness was growing ominously in his throat, but he would not move and take his eyes off her. Her smile was telling him that all would be well.
“The stream flows,” she said in a voice that echoed in his head. “The wind blows, the cloud fleets, the heart beats …”

She was no longer in darkness, but surrounded now by a light that was so brilliant it blinded him. When he opened his eyes she was still there, smiling, reaching out her hand.

“Nothing will die,” she promised.

She had come for him at last.

John Merrick was found dead in his bed one morning in April 1890. Frederick Treves described the discovery in these words:

“He was lying on his back as if asleep and had evidently died without a struggle, since not even the coverlet of the bed was disturbed.”

The exact cause of his death has never been entirely explained, but Treves was always convinced that Merrick had tried to lie down and sleep like other people, and so choked himself.

The Elephant Man was suffering from a disorder known as neurofibromatosis, about which almost nothing was known in his day. It is doubtful whether Treves himself ever used the term or even managed to make a complete diagnosis. The condition caused tumors to grow over almost every part of Merrick’s body—around his nerves, under his skin, and in his bones, until the whole body was dreadfully distorted.

Neurofibromatosis occurs in about one in 3,000 people, but the degree of severity varies greatly, and there are very few other cases recorded in which the disfigurement was anything like Merrick’s.

After his death a postmortem was conducted and plaster casts of his limbs were made, so that it is still possible to see how he must have looked. His skeleton, some of the bones horribly swollen and twisted, still stands in the Medical School attached to the London Hospital.

Treves himself received the fame he had always longed for. In 1900 he was appointed Surgeon-Extraordinary
to Queen Victoria. But his true moment of glory came in January 1902, when King Edward VII collapsed with appendicitis a few days before his coronation. Treves, as the leading authority on the illness, was called in and insisted on an immediate operation. A battle ensued between the man who was King of his country and the man who was king in his own sphere. Treves was not afraid to stand up to monarchs, and when Edward insisted that he must go through with his coronation the doctor told him, “In that case you will go to the Abbey as a corpse.”

Realizing he had met his match, Edward gave way and Treves performed an emergency operation. It was a success, and he was named a baronet.

By that time he already had a practice that was successful beyond his wildest dreams. The wealthy, the aristocratic—they all flocked to his consulting rooms on Wimpole Street until the house overflowed with them, and Anne declared that the bedroom was the only room she could call her own. But Sir Frederick Treves, who regularly commanded the highest prices and numbered royalty among his friends, would give up Sundays, his only free day, to return to the hospital to see the poor patients in the wards.

In 1908 he retired from active surgical practice and set off on his travels. He and Anne went to Palestine, Uganda, the West Indies, and many other places, and it was then that he began his second career as a writer of travel books. He was still writing in 1920 when failing health forced him to live quietly in Switzerland.

His last years were darkened by the tragedy of his younger daughter’s death, ironically from an attack of appendicitis, the very illness on which he was the supreme authority. He died in 1923, having lived just long enough to see his last book published to excellent reviews. It was called
The Elephant Man and Other Reminiscences
.