Tattycoram (8 page)

The bells of St. James began to ring just as I rushed through the open door. “Mother! Mother! I'm home” (even in my excitement, being careful to set down my basket with its surprise). “Oh Mother! Mother! Mother!”

She turned to me with a look of such joy it set me weeping as we ran to one another. “I'm home,” I murmured, kissing the top of her head, “I'm home.”

Hand in hand we made our way to the church, with Father, for once, following close behind. I was re-introduced to the
Misses Bray, who were gracious and asked questions; the rector shook my hand, and the women of the village — many, on this special Sunday, with daughters home — gathered round to greet me.

I looked carefully at the other girls, a few of whom were already married with a baby in their shawls, but most of whom were domestic servants in the big houses in Shere, Gomshall, Peaslake and Albury. Although their manners might be rougher than mine, and their speech also (living with Mr. and Mrs. Dickens had done wonders for my speech), I envied them their nearness to their families.

I saw the grave of my dear grandfather and spent a few minutes with the little dead babies, especially Hannah, whose place I had taken.

Back home, my mother exclaimed over the simnel cake and declared she had never seen anything so beautiful — it looked too good to eat.

I laughed. “Father and I will eat it then.”

I gave her the new collar and cuffs, which of course looked “far too good for the likes of me,” and gave my father a twist of tobacco, for Mother had told me he'd taken up the habit after Grandfather's death.

Mother kept wiping her eyes with her apron and saying she was being silly, then wiping her eyes again. She was overjoyed to hear I could stay for two nights.

“This must seem very small to you,” Father said that evening, “this house, this village — after London.”

“No, oh no. This is where my heart is. This is home.”

In the spring of 1839, Mr. Dickens told me there was to be a grand concert at the Foundling to celebrate the one hundredth anniversary of the hospital. He and Mrs. Dickens and the Hogarths were taking tickets, and, he wondered, could he purchase a ticket for me?

“I know you sang in the chapel choir, Hattie, and Fred hears you singing in the nursery and in your room at night. I thought you might enjoy the concert; it will be selections from
Messiah
.”

I did not hesitate. “Thank you, sir, but no.”

“If you are worried about the children, Fred is not going, and since the concert is in the afternoon, he would be happy to keep an eye on them, I'm sure.”

“I would rather not, thank you, sir.”

I could see that he was not pleased with me, and I did not know how to explain without seeming ungrateful. My stomach churned just to think of going. It was not that I now thought of myself as above the children in the hospital — how could I? — but I tried not to dwell on my life there or why I had been admitted. Each time I reported to Mr. Brownlow at Whitsun and had to walk through those heavy gates, I was in such a state of agitation that I thought I would faint. It was ridiculous, I knew, for I was not really mistreated there and indeed had been a favourite of the sewing mistress. Perhaps I was afraid that once in, I would not get out again.

I felt so deeply about the place that still I always walked on the other side of the street on my way to Southampton Row. Sometimes I glanced across, briefly, at the statue of Thomas Coram, which towered over the entrance, and felt I owed him an apology for such revulsion. After all, I might have died in the workhouse if I had lived at all. So as much as I longed to hear the glorious music of
Messiah
, and to see my old choirmaster, I
could not bring myself to go, even at the risk of offending Mr. Dickens.

I stopped at home and listened instead to the rumble of carriages down Guildford Street, the sound of horses' hooves, and cursed myself for a fool. Mrs. Dickens told me later that the concert had raised thousands of pounds for the hospital and that the singing was superb.

“There were carriages all the way down Southampton Row. We were fortunate that we could walk.”

Miss Georgy had come back for tea. I heard her say something about the number of foundlings at the hospital, and how it never seemed to diminish, but she supposed there was some advantage to that, since it ensured a plentiful supply of servants, whatever it said about the stupidity of Woman.

“Ah, Georgy,” said Mr. Dickens, “I don't think fallen women are to be considered some sort of natural resource for the supplying of servants to the well-to-do. That is a horrible thought and quite beneath you.”

She was not used to being criticized by her brother-in-law and hastened to absolve herself.

“You are quite right; I was flippant. These women are more to be pitied than anything else, and the children must carry forever the mark of their mothers' shame.”

“And fathers', Georgy, and fathers'.”

“Oh, of course, and fathers'.”

And then, as though seeing me for the first time (I was gathering up the plates and cups and saucers), she raised her finger to her lips and with a slight tilt of her head in my direction, said, “Shh, poor Coram is listening. We don't want to hurt her feelings.”

(Two and twenty . . . two and twenty . . . two and twenty.)

Katie was born at the end of October. Once again, the delivery was hard and Mrs. Dickens recovered slowly. It was a fortnight before she came downstairs, and I could see that both her mother and Mr. Dickens were concerned about her. She had sudden fits of silent weeping and did not, for a while, express much interest in any of the children. I think Mamie sensed this and clung more and more to her father, when he was available. Charley, who was now rising three, did not seem to care much one way or the other. What he liked best was to ride his rock-inghorse on “adventures” or set up spirited battles with his box of lead soldiers. Occasionally Mr. Dickens would put him up on his own big horse and, with the groom on one side and himself on the other, walk him slowly up and down Doughty Mews. I was always commanded to come along and applaud. He had been promised a pony when he was old enough.

One day Mr. Dickens left his study door open and Charley ran in. I, of course, ran after him. I was amazed at the number of books on the shelves, and, forgetting that I was never to venture inside unless summoned, I was examining their titles when Mr. Dickens let out a roar behind me.

“What are you doing in here!”

“Charley ran in, sir, the door was open.”

“Nonsense. I never leave the door open.”

“Yes, sir.”

Charley kicked against me, wanting down.

“Was it really open, Harriet, or did you just want to see the lion's den?”

“No, sir. It was open.”

“Very well, I believe you.” He smiled. “I see you have been looking at my books.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Would you like a book to read? From the way you were gazing at my books, I assume you are passionate about reading. You can read, Hattie?”

“Yes, sir. All the children at the Foundling are taught to read.”

“How seditious. Will our servants remain content to do our drudgery if we teach them to read? What if they start to think for themselves?”

He smiled as he said this, so I knew it was a jest.

“I expect your taste runs to romance.”

“Taste, sir?”

“Yes. What sort of reading do you fancy? Adventure, tragedy, romance, drama? Ah. Here.” He handed me a book.

“Be very careful with this book. Keep it clean and out of the reach of this young man, who is a little too fierce with his own picture books, and never turn down the corners of the pages. When you finish that, come to me and perhaps I'll give you another.”

I was so fatigued at night that my habit had been, except on my half-day off, to do a bit of tatting, say my prayers and fall asleep immediately. Now, no matter how tired I might feel, I lit my candle, and with a shawl around my shoulders I stayed up
for an extra hour reading the wonderful book. It was
Robinson Crusoe
. I was amazed at how the hero contrived to exist on that hostile island, and so involved in the story was I that when Crusoe found the footprint in the sand, I actually cried out in terror and Fred came knocking on my door to see what was the matter.

When I finished that book, he gave me another and another and another. (But never, at that time, one he had written.)

One afternoon he said to me, as he handed me my latest book —
A Journal of the Plague Year
, also by Daniel Defoe — he said, “Hattie, how do you feel about children?”

“How do I feel about them, sir?”

“Yes. Do you like them?”

“I like them well enough. I'm particularly fond of the babies.”

“I, too. I'm particularly fond of the babies. What a pity they can't be shot and stuffed before the age of five.”

And once he said, “Do you think it odd, Harriet, the life I lead?”

“Odd, sir?”

“Yes, odd. While you are carrying cans of water up and down the stairs, dressing the children, managing the mangle, running errands, I sit shut up in my study, a man in his prime, making marks on slips of paper, or talking to myself, or pulling faces in the mirror. Do I appear to you as some sort of hermit, deliberately walled up here while life goes on outside?”

“No, sir.”

“No, sir, what?”

“You do not seem a hermit.” (I said nothing about “odd.”) “And you come out of your cell in the afternoons.”

“I come out of my cell in the afternoons! Oh Lor', that's wonderful. And then I greet real life head on, eh?”

“Yes, sir. And besides that . . .”

“Besides what?”

“Everyone knows you're a genius.”

He positively bellowed with laughter, but I was used to him now; he didn't frighten me.

“Everyone? Who is this everyone?”

“Mrs. Dickens, sir. Her new maid, Cook, William Topping — everyone.”

“Even the babies?”

“I'm not so sure about the babies.”

“No, I wouldn't be so sure about the babies; I wouldn't count on those babies for endorsements in the genius department. In the providing of toys and sweets department, maybe.”

After he dismissed me, I could hear him laughing and talking to himself. “I'm a genius. Everybody says so — Kate, the cook, the maid, the groom. But she's not sure about the babies. Oh wonderful, wonderful, wonderful.”

Childlike himself, in so many ways. On Guy Fawkes night, just after Katie was born, he disappeared down to Southampton Row and persuaded a group of boys to let him black his face and join them. He went up and down the streets with them crying, “A penny for the Old Guy, a penny for the Old Guy.”

“What larks,” he told us later, “what fun.”

He had had a leaning towards being a professional actor, he said, but on the day of his audition a sore throat had laid him low, and that was that. Now he entertained at dinner and convulsed everyone with laughter.

Such energy he brought to the house — he positively hummed with it, like a spinning top. Ran down the stairs, walked miles no matter what the weather, rode his horse, organized games at home or when we went down to Ramsgate for a holiday. (I did
not like the sea, the way the waves kept coming and coming and coming, but he plunged right in and carried the children in as well. He called us cowardy custards if we refused to follow his example.)

Perhaps sitting in solitude for hours made him restless and talkative when he emerged. He loved to entertain, to be surrounded by people once his work was done, although an evening with his relatives sometimes brought him down. Once he said, “You know, Harriet, it's not such a bad thing to lack a pile of relations always looking for a favour, usually of a monetary nature.”

Cook said he meant most particularly his father. “'Is father causes 'im a world of worry and trouble, 'e does.”

But I imagined Mr. Dickens would not really like to be without his family, however much they annoyed him, just as Cook, now that her husband had “passed over,” could refer to his drunkenness and bad habits with both scorn and affection.

The house on Doughty Street was now too small, so by Christmas of 1839 we were installed at Number One, Devonshire Terrace, near the York Gate entrance to Regent's Park. I, for one, was happy to move farther away from the shadow of the Foundling Hospital and the whispered taunts of the fat boy — “Orfink, orfink, oh yes, we know who
you
are!”

We had our first German tree that year, all lit up with tiny white candles; I don't think I have ever seen anything so lovely. The doors to the big parlour were kept closed until evening, the candles were lit, and then the entire household was ushered in. It was as though dozens of stars had descended on the big tree and nestled in its branches. And once the gas lamps were turned up, we could see little presents of toys and sweetmeats tied on the tree as well.

And the smell of the needles!

And the children's faces full of wonder and delight.

And Mr. Dickens, who had arranged the whole surprise, standing there grinning.

Mrs. Dickens seemed to regain some of her old cheerfulness with the move, and Cook said it was not just that she was feeling better “in 'er body” but that she was leaving the ghost of her dead sister behind.

“I saw 'em once,” she said, “the Master, with 'is face in poor Mary's clothes, weepin' like a little child. 'E were that fond of 'er. And she were a darling — as different from Miss Georgy as chalk from cheese. It were a tradegy when she died so sudden and so young. Everyone was haffected by hit. This 'ouse won't 'ave such melancholy memories.”

Mr. Dickens's close friend Mr. Macready lived just down the way, so there was much to-ing and fro-ing over the holidays, and on Twelfth Night, which was Charley's birthday, a huge party. A rich lady, who was Charley's godmother, sent over a splendid Twelfth Night cake.