Tattycoram (11 page)

“I won't leave, Father, you do know that? I won't ever leave you.”

He leaned across to my chair and grasped my hand.

“I must tell you something, Hattie, that I never told her, never let on to anyone. When she first started this fostering business — she'd heard about it from a cousin over to Farnham — I didn't like the idea, I didn't like it at all. But when her first two babies died, and she was so low, I thought I should reconcile myself to the idea. Then Sam came, but she was used to it by then, and I got used to it as well — sometimes she had two babies at once! — and so she kept on. Just as well, because her own babies kept dying, poor things. But I never really liked those babies the way she did. Until you. Mebbe it was because of Jonnie, because he lived, even though the little girl died, but suddenly it all made sense, that she wanted to help raise a strange woman's child, that she would put it to the breast. And you were such a lively little thing and so fond of us all . . . well, I just wanted you to know all this. I was as fond of you myself as if you were my own. And now — look at the blessing you have been. There are many natural daughters who would not have done as much as you. God works in mysterious ways, He truly does.”

I could say nothing in reply, just hold onto his hand and sob.

And later, when I came across a small packet of letters from the hospital, I found in one a lock of my hair, “as requested.” So it hadn't been for my first mother after all.

In the summer of 1843 the Misses Bray came to see me. They wished to set up a proper school in the village; would I be interested in teaching there?

“But I have never taught anyone.”

“Harriet, you can read, and you write a good hand, as we saw in the note you sent us after your mother's funeral. The rector vouches for you, and the need for education in this village is great. You are as yet unmarried and without the encumbrance of children at home. All that we would require is basic reading and writing, simple arithmetic, handicrafts for the girls and some religious instruction.”

“I would have to ask my father.”

“Lass,” he said, “it's a good thing. It would provide you with a bit of money and keep you by me at the same time.”

“I've told you, Father, I won't leave you, money or no money.”

“Do you not think of returning to London some day?”

“Not really. I like it here with you.”

This was not strictly true. I did like it in the village and I would never leave my father, but I sometimes felt very lonely. Most of the women my age were long married and had children. They greeted me warmly, but I could see that they didn't feel we had much in common. Even my accent was different. I missed
my walks through the busy streets — so much to look at and listen to. I felt old before my time, and although I loved my father, I knew that some day he would be gone and I would be all alone, with no one to cook for or care for. It was almost comical: on the one hand, I was a bastard, some unknown couple's child and, in the world's eyes, a nothing, a naught; on the other, my life in the Dickens household, where both my speech and manners had been polished and my love of reading encouraged — these things set me apart from the villagers in quite the opposite way.

The new curate came to call, a limp young man who fancied himself, and although I gave him tea and he praised my scones, I made no effort to attract his interest. I was sure someone appropriate would soon snatch him up, perhaps one of the young ladies from the big houses in the parish. As for myself, I could never be happy with such an earnest, joyless creature. I had a feeling his face might break if he laughed, and he constantly patted his lips with a white handkerchief.

What were my prospects if I stayed? Nursery maid to one of the rich families? Maybe even parlour maid, with ribbons in my cap? A word from Mr. and Mrs. Charles Dickens would assure me of good employment in that line. I decided being a teacher was vastly preferable to that, and so I told the Misses Bray I would be pleased to try it, and try it I did.

For four years I taught at that little school, and I did become quite good at it, expanding the syllabus to include geography, because I was interested in that subject. The Misses Bray bought a large map of the world, with all the Empire marked in pink. It hung on the wall behind my desk, next to a picture of the Queen and Prince Albert in their best clothes. It amazed the children to think that there could be such places as Africa or
South America. They knew about Australia, if only to hear of, because that's where the convicts went.

They wrote on their slates:

The North Wind doth blow
And we shall have Snow
And what will the Robin do then
Poor thing?

The size of my class depended on the season, for at sowing time and harvest time the older children disappeared to work in the fields alongside their parents. And if a new baby was born, an older sister might have to stop at home for a few weeks.

We burned peat in an iron stove, and I shall forever associate that sweet, acrid, eye-watering smell with the squeak of chalk on slates and the sound of children's voices, more or less in unison, reciting the four times table.

And now, for the first time, I felt part of the community. I was “the schoolmistress”; I was “the teacher”; I had a clearly defined role. I went to church with Father every Sunday, never failing to say a prayer in the churchyard, where Mother lay beside her parents and her children. I helped at the village fetes, where my tatting and fancywork were very much admired by the gentry. My pies were applauded at the harvest dinners.

In the years since my return, I had continued my habit of long walks; sometimes Father went with me, but from spring until past harvest time he was usually too busy and seldom came home before dusk. I often thought of the day I left the Foundling, when Mr. Dickens had said to me, “Do you like to walk, Harriet?” and my pert reply. I'm surprised he didn't turn me around right then and march me back inside.

I continued my rambles and brought back things for the
children to examine: an abandoned robin's nest, the shed skin of a grass snake, a razor-sharp fungus from the Hurtwood. One day a boy brought in a dead crow, and we admired the glossy blackness of its feathers and the lightness of its bones.

“Why can't we fly, Miss?”

“Because we are too heavy, and besides, we have no wings.”

“Angels have wings, Miss. We'll all have wings one day.”

No one called me “orfink” or “fondling.” It was “Good morning, Miss Coram,” “Good afternoon, Miss Coram,” “Yes, Miss,” “No, Miss,” “Please, Miss, I know the answer, Miss.”

The curate married a pale girl from Albury; she had very little chin and seemed almost as limp as he was. In time, I thought, they will produce a string of pale, boneless children — and told myself not to be so nasty.

Then my father died, suddenly, just keeled over while he was walking behind a plough. No time to make our farewells, no time for me to tell him once again how much I loved him.

There was his pipe on the mantel, his clean smock-frock drying on the line. I had never been so alone before and could not adjust to it. The little cottage was full of ghosts, and although I tried to tire myself out with teaching and walking, I slept badly and had terrible dreams. Sometimes I was back at the Foundling and had been thrust into a ring of fine ladies, all pointing their fingers and chanting “base-born! base-born!” or a stern voice was commanding, “Hold out your hands!” Sometimes I was on a London street in the fog and night creatures were clutching at my skirts. I went down street after street, trying to find my way home. Street after street, turning this way and that, but nothing looked familiar. Once I dreamed I was being walled up like the anchorite and woke up screaming.
There were several nights after his passing when, sleepless, I sat downstairs, wrapped in an old shawl of my mother's, and never went up to my bedroom at all.

And there were practical things to worry about. We did not own the cottage of course (somehow I had forgotten that when imagining my future), and I knew I would have to leave, perhaps right away. Would I end up a domestic servant after all? I seemed sunk in a bog of grief and worry; it was all I could do to drag myself to school each morning. When I helped to arrange the flowers in the church, I looked towards the place where Christine, the anchorite, had had herself walled up. Twice! She came out and then she went back in. How could anyone do that? Was she allowed to speak to the person who delivered her daily bread and water, or had she taken a vow of silence as well? There were stories in the village, passed down from generation to generation, that after she died and her body was brought out, her fingers were worn down past the first joint, that there were gouges in the wall where she had tried to remove some bricks. If that were so, then there was more to the story than we thought. What if she had not gone willingly? What if it were punishment, not devotion, that placed her there? Was she one of the unwise virgins perhaps? Was she taken in adultery?

Whatever was to become of me, even if it meant cleaning out grates at dawn and carrying cans of water up and down stairs, even if it meant encountering another Miss Georgina (and I had heard that some of the farmers' daughters were just as high-handed with their servants), I would never be walled up again for any reason; I would never give up on life. I had had enough of walls and silence at the Foundling.

Once again, my benefactors came to my rescue. The Misses Bray had decided to buy our cottage from the farmer who owned it, but he balked at this, said it was a labourer's cottage and a labourer's cottage it would remain. However, if they were willing to pay the rents, I could remain until the next Lady Day.

“And before that,” said Miss Amelia, “we shall have built a teacherage.”

“We need a teacherage anyway,” said Miss Louisa.

“You must let me pay the rents.”

“Nonsense, my dear. Your stipend is so low, we couldn't allow it.”

“Is there no way I can repay you for your kindness?”

Miss Amelia smiled. “The daughter of a young cousin is getting married. We have seen examples of your embroidery and tatting, and we wondered, if we brought over a set of linen — sheets and pillowcases — if you could embroider something on them and do a pretty edge?”

“I would be pleased to do that.”

That night I thought of something my father had said when I was reading to him from
Robinson Crusoe
: “Wonderful, the way he got on. No lyin' down and given' up for that one, Hattie, none o' that.”

Here I had been bemoaning my lot like some spoiled, incompetent girl. I did not deserve the Misses Bray. There were no Misses Bray to haul Robinson Crusoe out of his despair, no Misses Bray to say, “We'll build you a house, my dear.”

The teaching continued; the children came and went. Thanks to the rector, I was able to get some music sent out from London and I even began part-singing with them. I thought we might give a little concert on May Day.

Now is the month of May-ing
With lads and lasses play-ing
Fa la la la la, fa la la la la
Fa la la la la — lah.

I adopted a little black kitten — or the kitten adopted me — and I found myself confiding in him as though he could understand. I let him sleep in my bed, and his small contented hum seemed to take the edge off my loneliness at night. Soon he began to present me with gifts of mice and voles, and I decided to name him Orion after the mighty hunter in the sky, Ori for short.

And then, one morning, a “Whoa!” and a great clatter of hooves outside the schoolroom door. The children dropped everything and jostled for space at the windows to see who had come to visit us. I thought it might be the bishop and looked anxiously around to see if everything was in order.

It was Mr. Dickens, dismounting from a big black horse.

“Give them a half-holiday,” he commanded. “I must talk to you.”

“I can't do that, sir.”

“Of course you can. You're in charge here, aren't you?”

“We are in the midst of a lesson.”

“Yes, well, lessons can wait. What are you in the midst of?”

“Simple fractions, sir.”

“Well, one-half plus one-third is still going to make five-sixths tomorrow, isn't it? That's not going to change.”

He turned to a boy named Noel.

“You, boy. What's one-half of sixteen?”

“Eight, sir.”

“Very good. Here's a sixpence.”

Then such a show of hands! “Try me, sir! Try me!”

He smiled at me in his old pleased-with-myself way, but I was not pleased.

“I can meet you at the end of school, sir, and not before.”

“And what am I to do while I'm waiting?”

“There's an excellent inn here, the White Horse, on the west side of Shere Lane. Just carry on past the stream towards the square, and you will come to it.”

“Is there a stable in the village?”

“Of course.”

“Very well, although why I should give in to you I don't know. I've half a mind to go away again and not tell you why I've come.”

“As you wish, sir.”

“Heighty-teighty. But all right, I shall meet you outside the White Horse at — at what time?”

“At half past two.”

He mounted his horse and clattered away down the lane.

“Who was that, Miss?”

“Was that your sweetheart, Miss?”

“Was that your long-lost brother?”

Great envy fell upon Noel and his sixpence, which I feared might be taken from him before the day was out. Several boys were much bigger than he was.

“That,” I said, “is the greatest writer in England, and if you are very good and finish this lesson, perhaps I shall read you a story.”

They were good and did reasonably well at their lessons, and
so after dinner I took out
Oliver Twist
. I did not begin at the beginning, but commenced at Chapter Two: “For the next eight or ten months, Oliver was the victim of a systematic course of treachery and deception — he was brought up by hand.”