The Autobiography of Mrs. Tom Thumb (51 page)

“Yes, yes, I am,” I said briskly—coldly. “I’m quite mad at you, if you want to know the truth.”

Then I turned to go, before I could see the effect my words had on him. I didn’t want to be late for my train.

T
HE TELEGRAM ARRIVED AT
M
R
. B
LEEKER’S HOUSE THE NEXT
morning. We were having breakfast in his niece’s narrow dining room; it was odd, just the two of us. I wasn’t sure we had ever taken a meal alone together before.

Mr. Bleeker’s sad face was even sadder; it was only now, with his wife gone, that it was obvious how much warmth and light she had given him. But he was not like Charles; he did not live in
the past. He was doing his best to enjoy life with his niece, who had two small sons, and for the first time, I wondered why he and Mrs. Bleeker had never had children of their own.

“Julia couldn’t,” he said frankly, over toast and eggs. “I think that’s why she enjoyed traveling with you all, even though she did long for that farm. But you and Minnie, especially—you were like daughters to her. You were our family.”

“Odd, isn’t it?” I sipped my coffee—the cup was large for me, so I had to use two hands.

“What is?”

“We all pretended to have children we didn’t, in a way. Except for Minnie. She wasn’t like us; she wasn’t content just to pretend.”

“Yes, except for Minnie. She would have been a wonderful mother.”

“I know. It’s been five years,” I said softly, wonderingly. “Almost exactly—it was July, I remember it so well. Five years, too, since I last spoke—well, five years.”

“Vinnie, what happened between you and Barnum?” Mr. Bleeker asked, and I was reminded that no matter how sad his face was, his eyes were ever sharp, ever perceptive. “I’ve always wondered. Goodness knows plenty of people have fallen out with him over the years, but I never thought you would.”

“I—that is, it’s hard to put into words. We both said things that hurt, and—that whole baby business.” I shook my head. “It was the one thing my parents warned me about when I first met him. They warned me not to get caught up in one of his humbugs. Well, I did, and I brought Minnie along with me, and see what happened? Minnie’s gone. I can’t forget that.”

“Just like I can’t stop thinking that I was responsible for Julia,” Mr. Bleeker whispered. “How do we live with that? How have you gone on?”

“By being so angry with Mr. Barnum, I sometimes forget to be angry with myself,” I replied, smiling ruefully. “But ever since the fire …” I stirred my coffee and shrugged.

Ever since the fire, I had not stopped thinking about him.

That horrible moment when I thought I was about to take my last breath and form my last thought—it had been of him. I knew I wanted to see him one more time. I knew I wanted to tell him things—just what, I couldn’t say. But inside my soul, in addition to the great burden of guilt I carried with me about Minnie, was a greater burden of things unsaid.

“Ever since the fire?” Mr. Bleeker prompted.

“I’ve been thinking it would be good to see him again.”

“He is in Bridgeport now, I understand,” said Mr. Bleeker, ever the organizer, ever the manager.

“I was hoping he was,” I replied, wondering if I should wire him that I was going to stop on my way back. Or should I simply surprise him? He always did like surprises. Maybe I could stop into a shop and buy a stuffed elephant to bring him—he would like that; he would laugh, throwing back his head, and then motion for me to pull up a chair and sit with him.

Or maybe I should wire, after all. What was the best way to end a rift like ours? I smiled, thinking that if it were left to him, he probably would take out an ad in
The New York Times
proclaiming his apology and selling tickets to our reunion for twenty-five cents each.

And so it was that I was thinking about someone else, his moods, his quirks; wondering how I might reach out to him again over the morass of all the years, memories, and misunderstandings—

When the telegram arrived informing me of the death of the man whom I constantly had to remind myself to think about. The man whose name I eagerly took but whose heart I had never wanted, in the first place.

*   *   *

C
HARLES
S
TRATTON, BETTER KNOWN AS
G
ENERAL
T
OM
T
HUMB
, died of apoplexy, some said, the inevitable conclusion to a lifetime of cigars and rich foods. Others said he never recovered from the devastation of the Newhall House fire, of witnessing the tragedy of so many unfortunate souls.

They were all mistaken; I knew better. I knew he died of shame. He had played the hero, the leading man—the perfect man in miniature—onstage for as long, literally, as he could remember. The realization that he was not built to be a hero in life was too much for him to bear; he could never play that role again, and so he simply—stopped. Like a child’s windup toy, used too often, the spring finally broken.

We buried him in Bridgeport, Connecticut, the town of his birth. Years before he had done a benefit for a brand-new cemetery, and had arranged his own plot at the time; he had even posed for a statue he wanted placed upon his monument—a life-size statue.

Ten thousand people attended his funeral. He would have been so pleased—a packed house! I smiled, safely veiled in my widow’s weeds, thinking of how he would have shaken the hand of every man and kissed the cheek of every woman here. Charles did so love to meet people.

Two plumed Knights Templar stood at attention at the foot of his casket; upon the lid was his own small, plumed Knight Templar hat and miniature sword. Among those in attendance were Astors, Vanderbilts, and Bleekers; also the tattooed man he became quite fond of while touring with the circus, and many, many children, which would have touched him immeasurably. Queen Victoria sent a wreath, as did President Chester A. Arthur. The largest floral display of them all said, simply, “Friend”; it was given
by Mr. P. T. Barnum, who sat several rows behind me in the church.

Minnie’s service had been so small, I remembered, watching the throngs file past Charles’s coffin, the reporters scribbling down every detail. Just in Mama and Papa’s parlor. How Charles had sobbed! As if she were his own sister, and truly, I knew he thought of her that way. Whatever my husband was or wasn’t, there was no denying he was genuinely giving of his love and affection. Charles had no enemies at all; he was the only person I knew of whom I could say that. No, Reader, I take that back. Minnie didn’t, either.

And there was genuine grief at his funeral, too; I saw it in the faces that passed me. I heard it in the sob coming from several pews back, the sob of an old friend, the man who had taken a five-year-old boy and turned him into a miniature adult—and together, they had conquered the world. There would have been no P.T. Barnum without Charles Stratton, and there would have been no General Tom Thumb without P. T. Barnum.

I longed to go back there and comfort him, for I alone knew of the genuine affection between the two. Others saw only a business partnership; I saw a friendship. Mr. Barnum’s sobs tore at my heart in a way that my own husband’s death did not; my tears would not fall, and so I appropriated his. He could cry over Charles, for the both of us, just as I had cried over Minnie.

But I did not go to him. I sat in my pew, upon a cushion so that I would be visible to all, and I adjusted my thick black veil so that it hung with dignity down my back. And I tried to remember the things I loved about Charles. For this day, of all days, I did not want to pretend; I did not want to feel as if my mourning dress was a costume, as my wedding dress had been. I closed my eyes, and I remembered Charles as he was with children: warm, open-hearted, all pretend dignity tossed aside, almost always on his
knees, even though he—alone of all adults—did not have to bend down to be on their level.

I remembered Charles as he was with Minnie: the two of them co-conspirators, impish, playing pranks, sharing confidences, sharing a chair, the back turned to the rest of us, as they whispered together.

I remembered Charles as he was the last time I saw him: tear-stained, asking for my approval—because he had given up asking for my love. And I had refused him. It seemed to me I spent our entire married life refusing him, he who asked for so little of me. He had died alone, in our bed; even if I had been there with him, he would have died alone. For I had never allowed love to join us there, and without it, the two of us could not begin to fill up all the empty spaces between us.

His coffin looked so small in this great church, the stained-glass windows looming over it, those tall Knights Templar dwarfing his tiny plumed hat, perched so jauntily upon the top. I thought I should go and stand by him, so he wouldn’t be so lonely, as he had always stood by me—

And that’s when I realized what I would most miss about him. For I had lost the person who shared my view of the world, the person who had stood by me as I traveled continents, met Queens, shook hands with Presidents. I hadn’t stood alone in over twenty years; always I had someone by my side whose eyes saw the world as I did. Through a maze of legs, of wheels, of barriers large and barriers small.

Barriers of hearts, and barriers of minds.

I bowed my head, tears finally trickling down my cheeks. And I found a way to mourn for my husband.

INTERMISSION
 

From
The Humbugs of the World
, by P. T. Barnum

And whenever the time shall come when men are kind and just and honest; when they only want what is fair and right, judge only on real and true evidence, and take nothing for granted, then there will be no place left for any humbugs, either harmless or hurtful.

[ TWENTY ]
 
One Last Encore

A
FTER THE FUNERAL
, I
WENT BACK TO
M
IDDLEBOROUGH—
back to my family. It was unspoken, but I knew they assumed that I would finally settle down, once and for all, within their bosom. Henceforth, I would be “Aunt Vinnie” to my various nieces and nephews, so numerous I honestly could not remember all their names.

“Aunt Vinnie, who used to be in show business”—I could just imagine how it would be. On Sundays the children would be forced to come into my parlor and visit with me, giving me a dutiful peck on the cheek while I rocked in my widow’s weeds and told them stories they would not believe until they were older. It would only be after I was gone that they would believe me, after someone inherited a trunk full of scrapbooks and costumes and handbills—probably intended to be thrown out, but for some reason, someone thought to open it first. Then, imagine the surprise!
Aunt Vinnie had told the truth; she wasn’t just a dotty old lady after all. Who would have believed it?

Oh, this was but one of many elaborate scenarios I envisioned for myself as I sat, brooding, in the house of my childhood. Sometimes the trunk was opened by an eager niece who wanted to go into the theater herself; she had always believed me, even though her brothers taunted her. Sometimes the trunk was sold, unopened, only to be discovered at an estate sale a year or two later.

And sometimes the trunk was simply thrown out. And no one remembered me at all, until I died and my will was read, stipulating I was to be buried next to my husband. That little man, that General Something-or-other; hadn’t he been famous first?

Yes, he had. And now, without him, with only his name, who was I, anyway? Who would want to come see the widow of General Tom Thumb, all alone? What could she do on her own, other than tell stories that nobody believed anymore? Stories of Kings and Queens and Mormons and old Civil War generals? Who would pay money for that?
I wouldn’t
, I thought to myself as I tried, unsuccessfully, to fall asleep in the room I had shared with Minnie as a girl.

Only I was all alone now; Minnie was gone, and even though at times my chest still ached with the memory of her head nestled against it, it had been five years since I had rocked her, finally, to sleep.

And Charles—I had never imagined that I would miss my husband as much as I did. I even missed his solid warmth in bed next to me, even though we never touched. But still, his snoring, his movement in the night, for he was a restless sleeper—I missed it now as I lie, once and for all, alone. Alone in my little bed, the one I used as a girl. The elaborate carved bed I had shared with Charles was gone; I put it in storage, for I could not bear the reminder of my failure as a wife.