Alias Grace

And I say, What do you mean, Sir?

I think he means do I dream of the future, do I have any plans for what I may do in my life, and I think it is a cruel question; seeing as I am in here until I die, I do not have many bright prospects to think about. Or perhaps he means do I daydream, do I have fancies about some man or other, like a young girl, and that notion is just as cruel if not more so; and I say, a little angry and reproachful, What would I be doing with dreams, it is not very kind of you to ask.

And he says, No, I see you mistake my meaning. What I am asking is, do you have dreams when you are asleep at night?

I say, a little tartly because it is more of his gentleman’s nonsense and also I am still angry, Everybody does, Sir, or I suppose they do.

Yes, Grace, but do you? he says. He has not noticed my tone or else he has chosen not to notice it. I can say anything to him and he would not be put out or shocked, or even very surprised, he would only write it down. I suppose he is interested in my dreams because a dream can mean something, or so it says in the Bible, such as Pharaoh and the fat kine and the lean kine, and Jacob with the angels going up and down the ladder. There is a quilt called after that, it is the Jacob’s Ladder. I do, Sir, I say.

He says, What did you dream last night?

I dreamt that I was standing at the door of the kitchen at Mr. Kinnear’s. It was the summer kitchen; I had just been scrubbing the floor, I know that because my skirts were still tucked up and my feet were bare and wet, and I had not yet put my clogs back on. A man was there, just outside on the step, he was a peddler of some sort, like Jeremiah the peddler who I once bought the buttons from, for my new dress, and McDermott bought the four shirts.

But this was not Jeremiah, it was a different man. He had his pack open and the things spread out on the ground, the ribbons and buttons and combs and pieces of cloth, very bright they were in the dream, silks and cashmere shawls and cotton prints gleaming in the sun, because it was broad daylight and full summer.

I felt he was someone I had once known, but he kept his face turned away so I could not see who it was. I could sense that he was looking down, looking at my bare legs, bare from the knee and none too clean from scrubbing the floor, but a leg is a leg, dirty or clean, and I did not pull down my skirts. I thought, Let him look, poor man, there’s nothing like that where he’s come from. He must have been a foreigner of some sort, he’d walked a long way, and he had a darkish and a starved look to him, or so I thought in the dream.

But then he wasn’t looking any more, he was trying to sell me something. He had a thing of mine and I needed it back, but I had no money so I could not buy it from him. We will trade then, he said, we will bargain. Come, what will you give me, he said in a teasing way.

What he had was one of my hands. I could see it now, it was white and shrivelled up, he was dangling it by its wrist like a glove. But then I looked down at my own hands, and I saw that there were two of them, on their wrists, coming out of the sleeves as usual, and I knew that this third hand must belong to some other woman. She was bound to come around looking for it, and if I had it in my possession she would say I had stolen it; but I did not want it any more, because it must have been cut off. And sure enough, there was the blood now, dripping and thick like syrup; but I was not horrified by it at all, as I would have been by real blood if awake; instead I was anxious about something else. Behind me I could hear the music of a flute, and this made me very nervous.

Go away, I said to the peddler man, you must go away right now. But he kept his head turned aside and would not move, and I suspected he might be laughing at me.

And what I thought was: It will get on the clean floor.

I say, I can’t remember, Sir. I can’t remember what I dreamt last night. It was something confusing. And he writes that down.

I have little enough of my own, no belongings, no possessions, no privacy to speak of, and I need to keep something for myself; and in any case, what use would he have for my dreams, after all?

Then he says, Well, there is more than one way to skin a cat.

I find that an odd choice of words, and I say, I am not a cat, Sir.

And he says, Oh I remember, nor are you a dog, and he smiles. He says, The question is, Grace, what are you? Fish or flesh or good red herring?

And I say, I beg your pardon, Sir?

I do not take well to being called a fish, I would leave the room except that I don’t dare to. And he says, Let us begin at the beginning.

And I say, The beginning of what, Sir?

And he says, The beginning of your life.

I was born, Sir, like anyone else, I say, still annoyed with him.

I have your Confession here, he says, let me read you what you said in it. That is not really my Confession, I say, it was only what the lawyer told me to say, and things made up by the men from the newspapers, you might as well believe the rubbishy broadsheet they were peddling about, as that. The first time I set eyes on a newspaper man I thought, Well then, does your mother know you’re out? He was almost as young as I was, he had no business writing for the papers as he was barely old enough to shave. They were all like that, wet behind the ears, and would not know the truth if they fell over it. They said I was eighteen or nineteen or not more than twenty, when I was only just turned sixteen, and they couldn’t even get the names right, they spelled Jamie Walsh’s name three different ways, Walsh, Welch, Walch, and McDermott’s too, with a Mc and a Mac, and one’t and two, and they wrote down Nancy’s name as Ann, she was never called that in her life, so how could you expect them to get anything else right? They will make up any old thing to suit themselves. Grace, he says then, who is Mary Whitney?

I give him a quick look. Mary Whitney, Sir? Now where would you get such a name as that? I say. It is written underneath your portrait, he says. At the front of your Confession. Grace Marks, Alias Mary Whitney.

Oh yes, I say. It is not a good likeness of me.

And Mary Whitney? he says.

Oh, that was just the name I gave, Sir, at the tavern in Lewiston when James McDermott was running away with me. He said I should not give my own name, in case they came looking for us. He was gripping my arm very tight at the time, as I recall. To make sure I would do as he told me. And did you give any name that came into your head? he says.

Oh no, Sir, I say. Mary Whitney was once a particular friend of mine. She was dead by that time, Sir, and I did not think she would mind it if I used her name. She sometimes lent me her clothing, too. I stop for a minute, thinking of the right way to explain it.

She was always kind to me, I say; and without her, it would have been a different story entirely.

Chapter 13

There is a little verse I remember from a child:

Needles and pins, needles and pins,

When a man marries his trouble begins.

It doesn’t say when a woman’s trouble begins. Perhaps mine began when I was born, for as they say, Sir, you cannot choose your own parents, and of my own free will I would not have chosen the ones God gave me.

What it says at the beginning of my Confession is true enough. I did indeed come from the North of Ireland; though I thought it very unjust when they wrote down that both of the accused were from Ireland by their own admission. That made it sound like a crime, and I don’t know that being from Ireland is a crime; although I have often seen it treated as such. But of course our family were Protestants, and that is different.

What I remember is a small rocky harbour by the sea, the land green and grey in colour, with not much in the way of trees; and for that reason I was quite frightened when I first saw large trees of the kind they have here, as I did not see how any tree could be that tall. I don’t recall the place very well, as I was a child when I left it; only in scraps, like a plate that’s been broken. There are always some pieces that would seem to belong to another plate altogether; and then there are the empty spaces, where you cannot fit anything in.

We lived in a cottage with a leaky roof and two small rooms, on the edge of a village near a town that I did not name for the newspapers, as my Aunt Pauline might still be living and I would not wish to bring disgrace upon her. She always thought well of me, although I heard her telling my mother what could be expected of me really, with so few prospects and with a father like that. She thought my mother had married beneath her; she said it was the way in our family, and she supposed I would end up the same; but to me she said that I should strive against it, and set a high price on myself, and not take up with the first Hail-fellow-well-met that should happen along, the way my mother had, without looking into his family or background, and that I should be wary of strangers. At the age of eight I did not have much idea of what she was talking about, although it was good advice all the same. My mother said Aunt Pauline meant kindly but had standards, which were all very well for those that could afford them. Aunt Pauline and her husband, who was my Uncle Roy, a slope-shouldered and outspoken man, kept a shop in the nearby town; along with general goods they sold dress materials and pieces of lace, and some linens from Belfast, and they did well enough. My mother was Aunt Pauline’s younger sister, and prettier than Aunt Pauline, who had a complexion like sandpaper and was all bone, with knuckles on her as big as chickens’ knees; but my mother had long auburn hair, it was her I got it from, and round blue eyes like a doll, and before her marriage she had lived with Aunt Pauline and Uncle Roy and helped them with the shop.

My mother and Aunt Pauline were a dead clergyman’s daughters — a Methodist, he was — and it was said their father had done something unexpected with the church money, and after that could not get a position; and when he died they were penniless, and were turned out to fend for themselves. But both had an education, and could embroider and play the piano; so that Aunt Pauline felt she too had married beneath her, as keeping a shop was not how a lady should live; but Uncle Roy was a well-meaning man although unpolished, and respected her, and that counted for something; and every time she looked into her linen closet, or counted over her two sets of dishes, one for everyday and one real china for best, she blessed her lucky stars and was thankful, because a woman could do worse; and what she meant was that my mother had.

I don’t think she said such things to hurt my mother’s feelings, although it had that effect, and she would cry afterwards. She’d begun life under Aunt Pauline’s thumb and continued the same way, only my father’s thumb was added to it. Aunt Pauline was always telling her to stand up to my father, and my father would tell her to stand up to Aunt Pauline, and between the two of them they squashed her flat. She was a timid creature, hesitating and weak and delicate, which used to anger me. I wanted her to be stronger, so I would not have to be so strong myself.

As for my father, he was not even Irish. He was an Englishman from the north of it, and why he had come to Ireland was never clear, as most who were inclined to travel went in the other direction. Aunt Pauline said he must have been in some trouble in England, and had come across to get himself out of the way in a hurry. Marks may not even have been his real name, she said; it should have been Mark, for the Mark of Cain, as he had a murderous look about him. But she only said that later, when things had gone so wrong.

At first, said my mother, he seemed a well-enough young man, and steady, and even Aunt Pauline had to admit that he was handsome, being tall and yellow-haired and having kept most of his teeth; and at the time they married, he had money in his pocket, as well as good prospects, for he was indeed a stone-mason, as the newspapers wrote down. Even so, Aunt Pauline said my mother would not have married him unless she’d had to, and it was covered up, although there was talk of my eldest sister Martha being very large for a seventh-month child; and that came from my mother’s being too obliging, and too many young women were caught in that fashion; and she was only telling me this so I would not do the same. She said my mother was very fortunate in that my father did agree to marry her, she would give him that, as most would have been on the next boat out of Belfast when they heard the news, leaving her high and dry on the shore, and what could Aunt Pauline have done for her then, as she had her own reputation and the shop to consider.

So my mother and my father each felt trapped by the other.

I do not believe my father was a bad man to begin with; but he was easily led astray, and circumstances were against him. Being an Englishman, he was none too welcome even among the Protestants, as they were not fond of outsiders. Also he claimed my uncle said he’d tricked my mother into marriage so he could have a fine time, living at ease and dipping into their money from the shop; which was true in part, as they could not refuse him because of my mother and the children.

I learnt all this at an early age. The doors in our house were none too thick, and I was a little pitcher with big ears, and my father’s voice was loud when drunk; and once he would get going, he did not notice who might be standing just around the corner or outside the window, as quiet as a mouse. One thing he said was that his children were too many in number, and would have been even for a richer man. As they wrote in the papers, there ended by being nine of us, nine living that is. They did not put in the dead ones, which were three, not counting the baby that was lost before being born, and never had a name. My mother and Aunt Pauline called it the lost baby, and when I was little I wondered where it had been lost, because I thought it was lost the way you would lose a penny; and if it had been lost, then perhaps it might someday be found.

The other three dead ones were buried in the churchyard. Although my mother prayed more and more, we went to church less and less, because she said she was not going to have her poor tattery children paraded in front of everyone like scarecrows, with no shoes. It was only a parish church but despite her feeble nature she had her pride, and being a clergyman’s daughter she knew what was decent in a church. She did so long to be decent again, and for us to be decent as well. But it is very hard, Sir, to be decent, without proper clothes.

I used to go to the churchyard though. The church was only the size of a cowshed, and the churchyard mostly overgrown. Our village was once larger, but many had moved away, to Belfast to the mills, or across the ocean; and often there was no one left from a family to tend the graves. The graveyard was one of the places I would take the younger children when my mother said I was to get them out of the house; so we would go and look at the three dead ones, and the other graves as well. Some were very old, and had gravestones with the heads of angels on them, though they looked more like flat cakes with two staring eyes, and a wing coming out on either side where the ears should have been. I did not see how a head could fly around without a body attached; and also I did not see how a person could be in Heaven, and in the churchyard too; but all agreed that it was so.

Our three dead children did not have stones but only wooden crosses. They must be all overgrown by now.

When I reached the age of nine, my older sister Martha left to go into service, and so all the work that Martha used to do around the house was now on me; and then two years after that, my brother Robert went to sea on a merchant ship, and was never heard from again; but as we ourselves moved away shortly thereafter, even if he had sent word it would not have reached us. Then there were five little ones and myself remaining at home, with another on the way. I cannot remember my mother when she wasn’t in what they call a delicate condition; although there is nothing delicate about it that I can see. They also call it an unhappy condition, and that is closer to the truth — an unhappy condition followed by a happy event, although the event is by no means always happy. Our father by this time was fed up with it. He would say, What are you bringing another brat into this world for, haven’t you had enough of that by now, but no you can’t stop, another mouth to feed, as if he himself had nothing to do with it at all. When I was quite young, six or seven, I put my hand on my mother’s belly, which was all round and tight, and I said What is in there, another mouth to feed, and my mother smiled sadly and said Yes I fear so, and I had a picture of an enormous mouth, on a head like the flying angel heads on the gravestones, but with teeth and all, eating away at my mother from the inside, and I began to cry because I thought it would kill her.

Our father used to go away, even as far as Belfast, to work for the builders that had hired him; and then when the job was over he would come home for a few days, and then be out seeking another piece of work. When he was home he would go to the tavern, to get away from the squalling. He said a man could not hear himself think in all that racket, and he had to look about him, with such a large family, and how he was to keep their bodies and souls together was beyond him. But most of the looking about he did was at the bottom of a glass, and there were always those willing to help him look; but when he was drunk he would become angry and begin cursing the Irish, and abusing them as a pack of low useless thieving scoundrels, and there would be a fight. But he had a strong arm, and soon not many friends left, as although they were happy enough to drink with him they did not want to be at the wrong end of his fist when the time came for it. And so he would drink by himself, more and more, and as the drink got stronger the nights got longer, and he began to miss jobs of work in the daytime. And so he got a reputation for not being reliable, and the jobs of work became few and far between. It was worse when he was home than when he was not, as by this time he was not confining his rages to the tavern. He would say he did not know why God had saddled him with such a litter, the world did not need any more of us, we should all have been drowned like kittens in a sack, and then the younger ones would be frightened. So I would take the four that were old enough to walk that far, and we would hold hands in a row, and go to the graveyard and pick weeds, or down to the harbour, and scramble among the rocks on the shore and poke at stranded jellyfish with sticks, or look in the tide pools for whatever we could find.

Or we would go out on the little dock where the fishing boats tied up. We were not supposed to go there because our mother feared we might slip over and drown, but I would lead the children there anyway, because the fishermen would sometimes give us a fish, a nice herring or a mackerel, and any sort of food was badly needed at home; sometimes we did not know what we were going to eat from one day to the next. We were forbidden by our mother to beg, and we would not, or not in so many words; but five ragged little children with hungry eyes is a hard sight to resist, or it was in our village then. And so we would get our fish more often than not, and go off home with it as proud as if we had caught it ourselves. I will confess to having a wicked thought, when I had the young ones all lined up on the dock, with their little bare legs dangling down. I thought, I might just push one or two of them over, and then there would not be so many to feed, nor so many clothes to wash. For by this time I was the one who had to do most of the washing. But it was only a thought, put into my head by the Devil, no doubt. Or more likely by my father, for at that age I was still trying to please him.

After a time he got into doubtful company, and was seen about with some Orangemen of bad reputation, and there was a house burnt down twenty miles away, of a Protestant gentleman that had taken the side of the Catholics, and another one found with his head bashed in. There were words about it between my mother and father, and he said how the Devil did she expect him to turn a penny, and the least she could do was to keep it a secret, not that you could ever trust a woman as far as you could throw her, as they’d betray any man as soon as look at him, and Hell was too good for the lot. And when I asked my mother what the secret was, she brought out the Bible, and said I must swear on it to keep the secret too, and that God would punish me if I broke such a sacred promise; which terrified me very much, as I was in danger of letting it out unawares, because I had no idea at all of what it was. And being punished by God must be a terrible thing, as he was so much larger than my father; and after that I was always very careful about keeping the secrets of others, no matter what they might be. For a time there was money, but things did not improve, and words came to blows, although my poor mother did little enough to provoke them; and when my Aunt Pauline came to visit, my mother would whisper to her, and show the bruises on her arms, and cry, and say He was not always this way; and Aunt Pauline would say, But look at him now, he’s nothing more than a boot with a hole in it, the more you pour in at the top, the more it runs out at the bottom, it’s a shame and a disgrace. My Uncle Roy came with her in their one-horse gig, bringing some eggs from their hens and a slab of bacon, for our own hens and pig were long gone; and they sat in the front room, which was hung about with drying clothes, because no sooner would you get your wash done and spread out on a sunny day in that climate, than it would cloud over and begin to drizzle; and Uncle Roy, who was a very plain-spoken man, said he didn’t know a man who could turn good money into horse piss faster than my father could. And Aunt Pauline made him say Pardon me, because of the language; though my mother had heard much worse than that, as when our father was drinking he had a mouth on him as foul as a running sewer. By now it was no longer the little money our father brought into the house that was keeping us alive. Instead it was my mother and her shirt sewing, at which I helped her, and my younger sister Katey too; and it was Aunt Pauline who got her the work, and brought it and took it away again, which must have been an expense to her because of the horse, and the extra time and trouble. But she would always bring some food with her, for although we had our little potato patch and our own cabbages, it was by no means enough; and she would bring leftover pieces of cloth from the shop, out of which our own clothes were made, such as they were.

Our father was long since past asking where such things came from. In those days, Sir, it was a matter of pride for a man to support his own family, whatever he might think of that family itself; and my mother, although weak-spirited, was too wise a woman to tell him anything about it. And the other person who did not know as much about it as there was to know was Uncle Roy, although he must have guessed it, and seen that certain items vanished from his own house, only to reappear in ours. But my Aunt Pauline was a strong-minded woman.

The new baby came, and there was more washing for me to do, as was always the case with a baby, and our mother was ill for a longer time than usual; and I had to get the dinners, as well as the breakfasts, which I had been doing already; and our father said we should just knock the new baby on the head and shove it into a hole in the cabbage patch, as it would be a good deal happier under the sod than above it. And then he said it made him hungry just to look at it, it would look very nice on a platter with roast potatoes all round and an apple in its mouth. And then he said why were we all staring at him. At this time a surprising thing happened. Aunt Pauline had despaired of ever having children, and so had regarded all of us as her own; but now there were signs that she was in the family way. And she was very happy about it, and my mother was happy for her. But Uncle Roy said to Aunt Pauline that there had to be a change, as he could not go on supporting our family now, with his own to think of, and some other plan would have to be made. Aunt Pauline said we could not be left to starve, no matter how bad my father might be, as her sister was her own flesh and blood and the children were innocent; and Uncle Roy said who ever said anything about starving, what he had in mind was emigration. Many were doing it, and there was free land to be had in the Canadas, and what my father needed was to wipe the slate clean. Stone-masons were in great demand over there because of all the building and works that were going forward, and he had it on good authority that soon there would be many railway stations to be constructed; and an industrious man could do well for himself.

Aunt Pauline said that was all very well, but who would pay for the passages? And Uncle Roy said he had some put by and would reach very deep into his pocket, and it would be enough to pay not only for our passages but for the food we would need on the journey; and he had his eye on a man who would arrange everything, for a fee. He had it all planned out before he brought it up for discussion, my Uncle Roy being a man who liked to have his ducks lined up in a row before shooting them. And so it was decided, and my Aunt Pauline came specially in her gig despite her condition, to repeat all of this to my mother, and my mother said she would have to talk to my father and obtain his agreement, but this was only for show. Beggars cannot be choosers, and they did not have any other road open to them; and as well, there had been some strange men about the village, talking about the house that was burnt and the man that was killed, and asking questions; and after that my father was in a hurry to get himself out of the way.

So he put a good front on it, and said it was a new start in life, and it was generous of my Uncle Roy, and he would regard the passage money as a loan and would pay it back as soon as he began to prosper; and Uncle Roy pretended to believe him. He had no wish to humiliate my father, only to see the last of him. As for his generosity, I suppose he thought it would be best to bite the bullet and pay out one large sum of money, rather than to be bled to death over the years penny by penny; and in his shoes I would have done the same.

And so all was set in motion. It was decided that we would sail at the end of April, as that way we would arrive in the Canadas at the beginning of summer, and have the warm weather while we got ourselves well settled. Much planning went on between Aunt Pauline and my mother, and a good deal of sorting and packing; and both tried to be cheerful, but both were downheartened. After all they were sisters, and had been through thick and thin, and they knew that once the ship set sail it was not likely they would ever see each other again in this life.

My Aunt Pauline brought a good linen sheet, only a little flawed, from the shop; and a thick warm shawl, as she’d heard it was cold on the other side of the ocean; and a little wicker hamper, and inside it, packed in straw, a china teapot, and two cups and saucers, with roses on them. And my mother thanked her very much, and said how good she had been to her always, and that she would treasure the teapot forever, in remembrance of her.

And there was a great deal of quiet weeping.

Chapter 14

We went up to Belfast in a cart hired by my uncle, which was a long journey and very jolting, but it did not rain much. Belfast was a large and stony city, the biggest place I had ever been in, and clattering with wagons and carriages. It had some grand buildings, but also many poor people, who worked in the linen mills day and night. The gas lamps were lit as we arrived in the evening, which were the first I ever saw; and they were just like moonlight, only greener in colour.

We slept at an inn which was so thick with fleas you would have thought it was a dog kennel; and we took all of the boxes into the room with us so as not to be robbed of our earthly goods. I didn’t have the chance to see much more, as in the morning we had to get on board the ship at once, and so I hustled the children along. They did not understand where we were going, and to tell you the truth, Sir, I don’t believe any of us did.

The ship was lying alongside the dock; it was a heavy hulking brute that had come across from Liverpool, and later I was told that it brought logs of wood eastward from the Canadas, and emigrants westward the other way, and both were viewed in much the same light, as cargo to be ferried. The people were already going aboard with all their bundles and boxes, and some of the women were wailing a good deal; but I did not do so, as I did not see the use of it, and our father was looking grim and in need of silence, and not in any mood to spare the back of his hand.

The ship was rocking to and for with the swell, and I did not trust it at all. The younger children were excited, the boys in particular, but my heart sank within me because I had never been on a ship, not even the small fishing boats in our harbour, and I knew we were to sail across the ocean, out of sight of land, and if we were to be in a shipwreck or fall overboard, not one of us could swim. I saw three crows sitting in a row on the crossbeam of the mast, and my mother saw them too, and she said it was bad luck, for three crows in a row meant a death. I was surprised at her saying this, as she was not a superstitious woman; but I suppose she was melancholy, for as I have noticed, those who are depressed in spirits are more likely to consider bad omens. But I was badly frightened by it, although I did not show it because of the young children: if they saw me taking on, they would do so as well, and there was enough noise and tumult already.

Our father put on a brave appearance and strode ahead up the gangplank, carrying the largest bundle of clothing and bedding, and gazing around him as if he knew all about it and was not afraid; but our mother came up very sadly, with her shawl drawn around her, shedding furtive tears, and she wrung her hands and said to me, Oh what has driven us to this, and as we stepped on board the ship she said, My foot will never touch land again. And I said, Mother, why do you say that? And she said, I feel it in my bones. And so it turned out.

Our father paid to have our larger boxes carried aboard and stowed away; it was a shame to waste the money but it was the only way to do it, as he could not carry all the things on by himself, as the porters were coarse and importunate, and would have hindered him. The deck was very crowded, with many comings and goings, and the men shouting to us to get out of their way. The boxes we would not need on board were taken to a special room, which was to be kept locked to prevent thievery, and the store of food which we had brought with us for the voyage had its own place too; but the blankets and sheets went below into our beds; and our mother insisted on keeping Aunt Pauline’s teapot with her, as she did not want to let it out of her sight; and she tied the wicker hamper to the upright post of the bed with a piece of twine.

Where we were to sleep was below the deck, down a greasy ladder into what they called the hold, which was built all through with beds. Hard rough wooden slabs they were, poorly nailed together and six feet long and six feet wide, with two persons to each, and three or four if children; and two layers of them, one on top of the other, with scarcely the room to squeeze in between. When you were in the bottom bed there was no space to sit up fully, as if you tried it you banged your head on the bed above; and if you were in the top one you stood more chance of tumbling out, and farther to fall if you did. It was everyone together, crammed in like herrings in a box, and no windows or any way of letting in the air, except the hatchways that led down. Already the air was close enough, but nothing like how it got later on. We had to snatch our beds and put our things on them at once, there was such a shove and scramble, and I did not want us to be separated, with the children alone and frightened in a strange place at night.

We set sail at noon, when all was stowed aboard. Once they had raised the gangplank and there was no way back to land, we were summoned by bell for an address from the Captain, who was leathery-skinned and a Scot from the south. He told us we must obey the rules of the ship, and that there must be no cooking fires made, as all our food would be cooked by the ship’s cook if brought promptly at the bell; and no smoking of pipes, especially below decks, as it could lead to fires, and those who could not do without tobacco could always chew and spit. And there was to be no washing of clothes, except on the days when the weather was right, and he would be the judge of that; for if it was too blustery we would lose our possessions overboard, and if it rained the hold would be full of wet steamy cloth at night, and he gave us his word for it that this was not a thing we would enjoy. Also there was to be no bringing of bedding up on deck to air it without permission, and all were to obey the orders of himself and the First Mate, and any of the other officers, as the ship’s safety depended on it; and in case of breach of discipline we would have to be locked up in a cubby-hole, so he hoped no one would be tempted to try his patience. Furthermore, he said, drunkenness would not be tolerated, as it led to falling down; we could get as drunk as a lord once ashore, but not on his ship; and for our own safety we were not allowed up on deck at night, as then we might be lost overboard. His sailors were not to be interfered with in their duties, nor bribed for favours; and he had eyes in the back of his head, and would know it immediately if attempted. As his men could testify, he ran a tight ship, and on the open seas the Captain’s word was law.

In case of illness there was a doctor on board, but most could expect to feel unwell until they got their sea legs, and the doctor was not to be pestered with trifles such as a little seasickness; and if all went well we would be on land again in six or eight weeks’ time. In conclusion, he wished to say that every ship afloat had a rat or two aboard, and this was a sign of luck because it was the rats who knew first when a ship was fated to sink, so he did not want to be bothered about it, should some well-bred lady happen to catch sight of one. He supposed none of us had ever seen a rat before — at this there was laughter —

but in case we were curious, he had one fresh killed, and very appetizing too should we be hungry. There was more laughter, as it was a joke he was telling, to set us more at ease. When the laughter had stopped he said that to sum it up, his ship was not Buckingham Palace, and we were not the Queen of France, and like everything else in this life you got what you paid for. And he wished us a pleasant voyage. Then he retired to his cabin, and left us to sort ourselves out as best we could. In his heart he most likely wished us all at the bottom of the sea, so long as he could keep the money for our transport. But at least he seemed to know what he was about, and that made me feel easier. I needn’t tell you that many of his instructions were not followed, especially as to the smoking and drinking; but those indulging had to be sly about it.

At first things did not go too badly. The clouds thinned and there was fitful sunlight, and I stayed on deck and watched them tacking the boat out of the harbour, and as long as we were in the shelter of the land I did not mind the motion. But as soon as we were out upon the Irish Sea and they ran up more of the sails, I began to feel strange and sick, and soon lost my breakfast into the scuppers, holding a little one by each hand who was doing the same. I was by no means alone, as many others were lined up like pigs at a trough. Our mother was prostrated, and our father was sicker than I was, so neither of them was any use with the children. It was fortunate we had eaten no dinner, or things would have been much worse with us. The sailors were ready for this, having seen it before, and they hauled up many buckets of salt water to wash all away.

After a while I was better; it may have been the fresh sea air, or that I was getting accustomed to the rolling and heaving of the ship, and also, if you’ll excuse me for putting it this way, Sir, there was nothing left to be sick with; and as long as I was above on the deck I did not feel so ill. There was no question of any supper for our family, as all were too indisposed; but a sailor told me that if we could drink some water and nibble on a piece of ship’s biscuit it would be better for us; and as we had laid in a supply of biscuit on my uncle’s instructions, we did this as best we could.

Thus things were a little improved until nightfall, and then we had to go below, when they became much worse. As I have said, all the passengers were stuffed in together, with no walls between, and most as sick as dogs; and so not only could you hear the retchings and groanings of your neighbours, which made you sick just to listen to them, but hardly any air got in, and so the hold became fouler and fouler and the stench was enough to turn your stomach inside out.

And if you’ll forgive me for mentioning this, Sir, there were no proper ways to relieve yourself. There were buckets provided, but in plain view of all, or they would have been if there had been any light; but as it was, there were gropings in the dark, and curses, and buckets being overturned by mistake, and even if the bucket remained upright, what didn’t go into it went onto the floor. Happily it was none too solid a floor, so at least some went below into the bilge. It did make me reflect, Sir, that there are times when women with their skirts are better off than men with their trousers, for at least we carry around with us a sort of natural tent, whereas the poor men had to stagger about with their trousers down around their ankles. But as I say, there was not much light.

What with the pitching and surging of the ship, and the creaking it made, and the sloshing of the waves, and the noise and the stink, and the rats running to and for as bold as lords and ladies, it was like being a suffering soul in Hell. I thought of Jonah in the belly of the whale, but at least he only had to stay there three days, and we had eight weeks of it ahead of us; and he was in the belly all by himself, and did not have to listen to the moaning and vomiting of others.

After several days it did improve, as the seasickness of many subsided; but the air was always foul at night, and there were always noises. Less retching, to be sure, but more coughing and snores; and also a good deal of crying and praying, which can be understood under the circumstances. But I did not mean to offend your sensibilities, Sir. The ship was after all only a sort of slum in motion, though without the gin shops; and I hear they have got better ships now. Perhaps you would like to open the window.

There was one good effect of all the suffering. The passengers were Catholic and Protestant mixed, with some English and Scots come over from Liverpool thrown into the bargain; and if in a state of health, they would have squabbled and fought, as there is no love lost. But there is nothing like a strong bout of seasickness to remove the desire for a scrap; and those who would cheerfully have cut each other’s throats on land, were often to be seen holding each other’s heads over the scuppers, like the tenderest of mothers; and I have sometimes noted the same thing in prison, as necessity does make strange bedfellows. A sea voyage and a prison may be God’s reminder to us that we are all flesh, and that all flesh is grass, and all flesh is weak. Or so I choose to believe.

After several days I had my sea legs, and so I could fetch and carry up and down the ladder to the deck, and see about the meals. Each family supplied its own food, which was brought to the ship’s cook and put into a net bag, and plunged into a cauldron of boiling water and boiled along with the meals of the others; and so you got not only your own dinner, but a taste of what the others were eating as well. Salt pork we had, and salt beef; we had some onions and potatoes, though not many of these because of the weight; and dried peas, and a cabbage which was soon gone, as I felt we should eat it before it wilted. The oatmeal we had could not be boiled in the main cauldron, but was mixed up with hot water and left to steep, and the tea as well. And we had biscuit, as I said before.

My Aunt Pauline had given my mother three lemons, worth their weight in gold, as she said it was well known they were good against the scurvy; and these I carefully preserved in case of need. All in all we had enough to keep strength in our bodies, which was more than some, who had spent their main money for the passage; and we had a little to spare, or so I felt, since our parents were not in a condition to eat their share of the food. So I gave several biscuits to our next neighbour, who was an elderly woman by the name of Mrs. Phelan, and she thanked me very much and said God bless you. She was a Catholic, and travelling with her daughter’s two children, who had been left behind when the family emigrated; and now she was taking them to Montreal, as her son-in-law had paid their passage; and I helped her with the children, and later I was glad I did so. Bread cast upon the waters comes back to you tenfold, as I am sure you have often heard, Sir.

And when we were told we might do a washing, as the weather was fair, with a good drying wind — it was much needed by then, because of all the sickness — I did a coverlet of hers as well as our own things. It was not much of a washing, as all we could use were the buckets of sea water provided, but at least it got off the worst of the mess, although the things smelled of salt after. A week and a half out we were overtaken by a ferocious gale, and the ship was tossed around like a cork in a tub, and the praying and shrieking became ferocious. There was no question of cooking anything, and at night it was impossible to sleep, as you would be rolled out of your bed unless you held on, and the Captain sent the First Mate to tell us to stay calm, as it was merely an ordinary gale and nothing to become worked up over, and also it was blowing us in the direction we wanted to go. But water was coming down the hatchways, and so they closed them; and we were all shut up in the pitch darkness with even less air than we had before, and I thought we would all be smothered. But the Captain must have known this, because the hatches were opened from time to time. Those near them became very wet, however; it was their turn to pay for the better supply of air they had enjoyed until then.

The gale blew itself out after two days, and there was a general thanksgiving service held for the Protestants, and there was a priest on board who said a Mass for the Catholics; and it was impossible to avoid attending both, in a manner of speaking, due to the cramped conditions; but nobody objected to it, for as I have said, the two sorts tolerated each other better than they did on land. I myself had become very friendly with old Mrs. Phelan; and she was brisker on her feet by this time than my own mother, who continued weak.

After the gale it grew colder. We began to meet fog, and then icebergs, which were said to be more numerous than usual for the season; and we went more slowly for fear of running into them; for the sailors said that the biggest part of them was under the water, and invisible, and it was lucky there was not a high wind, or we might be driven onto one, and the boat crushed; but I was never tired of looking at them. Great mountains of ice they were, with peaks and turrets, white and sparkling when the sun lit on them, with blue lights in the centres of them; and I thought, this must be what the walls of Heaven are made of, only not so cold.

But it was amongst the icebergs that our mother fell gravely ill. She had been in her bed most of the time because of the seasickness, and had not eaten anything except biscuit and water, and a little gruel made from oatmeal. Our father had not been much better, and if you had measured by the size of the groans, he was worse; and things were in a sorry state, as during the storm we had not been able to do any washing or airing of the bedding. So I did not notice at first what a bad turn my mother had taken. But she said she had such a violent headache she could scarcely see, and I brought wet cloths and laid them on her forehead; and I saw she had a fever. Then she began to complain that her stomach hurt very much, and I felt it. There was a hard swelling, and I thought it was another little mouth to feed, although I did not know how it could have come on so quickly.

So I told old Mrs. Phelan, who’d told me she’d delivered sixteen babies, nine of her own included; and she came at once, and felt the thing, poking and prodding, and my mother screamed; and Mrs. Phelan said I ought to send for the ship’s doctor. I did not like to, because the Captain said he should not be pestered over trifles; but Mrs. Phelan said this was no trifle, and no baby neither. I asked our father, but he said I should do whatever the Devil I liked, as he was too sick to have any thoughts about it; so at last I did send. But the doctor did not come, and my poor mother was getting worse by the hour. By this time she could scarcely speak, and what she did say made no sense at all. Mrs. Phelan said it was a shame, and they would treat a cow better, and she said the best way to get the doctor was to say it might be the typhus, or else the cholera, as there was nothing on earth they were more afraid of, on board a ship. And so I did say that, and the doctor came straight away. But he was of no more use — if you’ll excuse me, Sir — than tits on a rooster, as Mary Whitney liked to say, because after taking my mother’s pulse and feeling her forehead, and asking questions to which there were no answers, all he could tell us was that she did not have cholera, which I knew already, having made it up myself. As to what she did have, he couldn’t say; it was most likely a tumour, or a cyst, or else a burst appendix; and he would give her something for the pain. And he did do that; I think it was laudanum, and a great dose of it, because my mother soon became quiet, which was no doubt his object. He said we must just hope she would pull through the crisis; but there was no way of telling what it was, without cutting her open, and that would kill her for certain.

I asked if she might be carried up on deck, for the air, but he said it would be a mistake to move her. And then he went away as quickly as possible, while remarking to no one in particular that the air was so foul down here he was half choked. And that was another thing I knew already. My mother died that night. I wish I could tell you that she had visions of angels at the last, and made us a fine deathbed speech, as in books; but if she did have any visions she kept them to herself, for she did not say a word, about them or anything else. I fell asleep, though I had meant to wake and watch, and when I woke up in the morning she was dead as a mackerel, with her eyes open and fixed. And Mrs. Phelan put her arm around me, and folded me in her shawl, and gave me a drink from a little bottle of spirits she had by her for medicine; and said it would do me good to cry, and at least the poor thing was out of her sufferings, and in Heaven now with the blessed saints, even though she was a Protestant. Mrs. Phelan also said that we had not opened the window to let out the soul, as was the custom; but perhaps it would not be counted against my poor mother, as there were no windows in the bottom of the ship and therefore none to be opened. And I had never heard of a custom like that. I did not cry. I felt as if it was me and not my mother that had died; and I sat as if paralyzed, and did not know what to do next. But Mrs. Phelan said we could not leave her lying there, and did I have a white sheet for her to be buried in. And then I began to worry terribly, because all we had was the three sheets. There were two old ones that had been worn through and then cut in two and turned, and also the one new sheet given to us by Aunt Pauline; and I did not know which to use. It seemed like disrespect to use an old one, but if I used the new one it would go to waste as far as the living were concerned; and all my grief became concentrated, so to speak, on the matter of the sheets. And finally I asked myself what my mother would prefer, and since she’d always placed herself second best in life, I decided on the old one; and at least it was more or less clean.

The Captain having been notified, two sailors came to carry my mother up onto the deck; and Mrs. Phelan came up with me, and we arranged her, with her eyes closed and her pretty hair down, because Mrs. Phelan said a body should not be buried with the hair knotted. I left her in the same clothes she had on, except for the shoes. I kept back the shoes, and her shawl as well which she would have no need of. She looked pale and delicate, like a spring flower, and the children stood around crying; and I had each one of them kiss her on the forehead, which I wouldn’t have done if I thought she’d died of anything catching. And one of the sailors, who was an expert at such things, tucked the sheet around her very neatly, and sewed it up tight, with a length of old iron chain at the feet, to make her sink. I had forgotten to cut off a lock of her hair to keep, as I should have done; but I was too confused to remember it. As soon as the sheet was over her face I had the notion that it was not really my mother under there, it was some other woman; or that my mother had changed, and if I was to take away the sheet now, she would be someone else entirely. It must have been the shock of it that put such things into my head. Fortunately there was a clergyman on board, who was making the crossing in one of the cabins, the same that had done the thanksgiving service after the gale; and he read a short prayer, and my father managed to totter up the ladder from the hold, and he stood there with his head bowed, looking rumpled and unshaven, but at least he was there. And then with the icebergs floating around us and the fog rolling in, my poor mother was tipped into the sea. I hadn’t thought about where she was going until this moment, and there was something dreadful about it, to picture her floating down in a white sheet among all the staring fish. It was worse than being put into the earth, because if a person is in the earth at least you know where they are.

And then all was over, so quickly, and the next day went on as before, only without my mother. That night I took one of the lemons and cut it up, and made each of the children eat a piece of it, and I ate a piece of it myself. It was so sour that you felt it must be doing you good. It was the only thing I could think of, to do.

And now I have only one more thing to tell you about this voyage. When we were still becalmed, and in the thickest of the fog, the wicker basket with Aunt Pauline’s teapot fell off onto the floor, and the teapot broke. Now, that basket had stayed where it was all during the storm, through the tumbling and the pitching and tossing; and it had been tied to the bedpost.

Mrs. Phelan said that no doubt it had come untied when someone was trying to steal it, but they’d stopped when in danger of being seen, and it wouldn’t have been the first thing to change hands in that way. But this is not what I thought. I thought it was my mother’s spirit, trapped in the bottom of the ship because we could not open a window, and angry at me because of the second-best sheet. And now she would be caught in there for ever and ever, down below in the hold like a moth in a bottle, sailing back and forth across the hideous dark ocean, with the emigrants going one way and the logs of wood the other. And that made me very unhappy.

You see what queer ideas a person can get. But I was only a young girl at the time, and very ignorant.

Chapter 15

It was fortunate that we were not becalmed any longer, or else our food and water would have run out; but a wind sprang up and the fog cleared, and they said we had passed Newfoundland safely, although I never got a glimpse of it and was not sure whether it was a city or a country; and soon we were in the St. Lawrence River, although it was a good while before there was any land. And when we did see it, on the north side of the ship, it was all rocks and trees, and looked dark and forbidding, and not fit for human habitation at all; and there were clouds of birds that screamed like lost souls, and I hoped that we would not be compelled to live in such a place.

But after a time there were farms and houses visible on the shore, and the land had the appearance of being more placid, or tamer as you might say. We were required to stop at an island and to undergo an inspection for cholera, as many before us had brought it into the country on the ships; but as the dead people on our ship had died of other things — four besides my mother, two from consumption and one from apoplexy, and one jumped overboard — we were allowed to proceed. I did have the chance to give the children a good scrubbing-off in the river water, although it was very cold — at least their faces and arms, which they were very much in need of.

The next day we saw the city of Quebec, on a steep cliff overlooking the river. The houses were of stone, and there were peddlers and hawkers at the dock in the harbour, selling their wares, and I was able to buy some fresh onions from one of them. She spoke nothing but French, but we conducted the business with our fingers; and I believe she made me a better price because of the children and their thin little faces. We were so thirsty for these onions that we ate them raw, like apples, which gave us wind afterwards, but I have never known an onion to taste so good.

Some of the passengers got off the ship at Quebec, to take their chances there, but we continued on. I cannot think of anything else I need mention about the rest of the journey. It was more travelling and most of it uncomfortable, sometimes overland to avoid the rapids, and then in another ship on Lake Ontario, which was more like a sea than a lake. There were hordes of small biting flies, and mosquitoes as big as mice; and the children were in danger of scratching themselves to death. Our father was in a bleak and melancholy mood, and often said that he did not know how he would manage, with our mother dead. At these times it was best to say nothing.

At last we reached Toronto, which was where they said the free land could be obtained. The city was not in a good situation, being flat and damp; it was raining that day, and there were many wagons and men hurrying, and quantities of mud, except for the main streets which were paved. The rain was soft and warm, and the air had a thick and swampy feel to it, like oil clinging to the skin, which I was later to learn was usual for that season of the year, and productive of many fevers and summer illnesses. There was some gas lighting but not as grand as Belfast.

The people appeared to be very mixed as to the kinds of them, with many Scots and some Irish, and of course the English, and many Americans, and a few French; and Red Indians, although they had no feathers; and some Germans; with skins of all hues, which was very new to me; and you never could tell what sort of speech you were going to hear. There were many taverns, and much drunkenness around the harbour, because of the sailors, and altogether it was just like the Tower of Babel. But we did not see much of the town that first day, as we needed to get a roof over our heads with as little expense as possible. Our father had struck up acquaintance with a man from the ship, who was able to give us some information; and so he left us with a mug of cider amongst us, crammed with our boxes into one room of a tavern which was filthier than a pig wallow, and went off to make further enquiries. He came back in the morning and told us he had found lodgings, and so we went there. They were east of the harbour, off Lot Street, at the — back of a house which had seen better days. The landlady’s name was Mrs. Burt, a respectable widow of a seafaring man, or so she told us, and quite stout and red in the face, with a smell like that of a smoked eel; and some years older than my father. She lived in the front part of the house, which was badly in need of a coat of paint, and we lived in the two rooms in the back part, which was more like an outbuilding. There was no cellar under it, and I was glad it wasn’t winter, as the wind would have blown right through it. The floors were of wide boards, set too close to the ground, and beetles and other small creatures would make their way up through the cracks between them, worse after a rain, and one morning I found a live worm.

The rooms were not let furnished, but Mrs. Burt lent us two bedsteads with corn-shuck mattresses, until my father should get on his feet again, she said, after the sad blow he had suffered. For water we had a pump outside in the yard; as for cooking, we had the use of an iron stove that was in the passageway between the two parts of the house. It was not really a cookstove, it was meant for heating, but I did the best I could with it, and after a time of struggle I learnt its ways, and could force it to boil a kettle. It was the first iron stove I ever had to deal with, so as you may imagine there were some anxious moments, not to mention the smoke. But the fuel for it was plentiful, as the whole country was covered with trees, which they were doing their best to chop down and clear away. Also there were scraps of board left over from all the building which was being done, and you could have the board-ends from the workmen for a smile and the trouble of carrying them off.

But to tell you the truth, Sir, there was not much to cook, as our father said he needed to save the little money we had, so he could set himself up properly once he’d had a chance to look around him; and so at first we lived mostly on porridge. But Mrs. Burt had a goat in a shed at the back of her yard, and gave us fresh milk from it, and as it was now late June, some onions from her kitchen garden in return for having us hoe the weeds for her, and there were plenty of those; and when she was making bread she would make an extra loaf for us.

She said she was sorry for us because our mother had died. She had no children of her own, her only one having died of the cholera at the same time as her dear departed husband, and she missed the sound of little feet, or so she told our father. She would gaze at us wistfully and call us poor motherless lambs or little angels, though we were ragged enough and none too clean either. I believe she had the idea of making a match with my father; he was putting forth his best qualities, and taking some care with himself; and such a man, so recently bereaved and with so many children, must have seemed to Mrs. Burt like a fruit ready to fall from the tree.

She used to have him into the front part of the house to console him; she said that none knew better than a widow like herself, what it was to lose a spouse, it knocked a body down, and such were in need of a true and sympathizing friend, one who could share in his sorrows; and she let on that she was just the one for the job; and she may have been right about that, as there were no others applying for it. As for our father, he took the hint and played up, and went around like a man half-stunned, with a handkerchief always at the ready; and he said his heart had been torn alive out of his body, and whatever was he going to do without his beloved helpmeet by his side, now in Heaven, having been too good for this earth, and all these innocent little mouths to feed. I used to listen to him going on in Mrs. Burt’s parlour, the wall between the two parts of the house being none too thick, and if you put a tumbler to a wall and your ear against the other end of it, you can hear even better. We did have three tumblers, as Mrs. Burt had lent them to us, and I tried them all in turn, and soon picked out the best one for the purpose.

I’d found it hard enough when our mother died, but attempted to keep myself together through it all, and to put my shoulder to the wheel; and to hear my father snivelling away in that fashion was enough to turn the stomach. I believe it was only then that I truly began to hate him, especially considering how he had treated our mother in life, no better than if she had been a rag for cleaning his boots. And I knew —

although Mrs. Burt did not — that it was all put on, and that he was working on her feelings because he was behind in the rent, having taken the money for it to the nearest tavern; and then he sold my mother’s china cups with the roses, and although I begged for the broken teapot he sold that too, as he said it was a clean break and could be mended. And our mother’s shoes went the same way; and our best sheet; and I might as well have used it to bury my poor mother, as would have been right. He would go out of the house as jaunty as a rooster, pretending to look for work, but I knew where he was off to, I could tell by the smell of him when he came back. I would watch him swaggering down the lane and tucking his handkerchief back into his pocket; and soon enough Mrs. Burt gave up on her plan of consolation, and there were no more tea parties in the parlour; and she stopped the supply of milk and bread to us, and asked for her tumblers back, and for the rent to be paid, or she would have us all turned out, bag and baggage.

This was when our father began to tell me that I was almost a grown woman now and I was eating him out of house and home, it was time I went out into the world to earn my own bread, as my sister had done before me, although she had never sent enough of her wages back, the ungrateful slut. And when I asked who would look after the little ones, he said my next sister Katey would do it. She was nine years old, although halfway to ten. And I saw there was no help for it.

I did not have any notion about how to get a position, but I asked Mrs. Burt, she being the only person in the town that I knew. She now wanted to be rid of us, and who was to blame her; but she saw in me a hope of being repaid. She had a friend who knew the housekeeper at Mrs. Alderman Parkinson’s, and she’d heard that they were short a pair of hands; so she told me to tidy myself up, and lent me a clean cap of her own, and took me there herself, and presented me to the housekeeper. She said I was a very willing and hard worker of good character, and she would vouch for it herself. Then she told about my mother having died on board ship and being buried at sea, and the housekeeper agreed that it was a shame, and looked at me more closely. I have noticed there is nothing like a death to get your foot in the door.

The housekeeper was called Mrs. Honey, although she was sweet only in name, being a dried-up woman with a pointed nose like a candle snuffer. She looked as if she lived on stale crusts and cheese parings, which she most likely had done in her life, being an English gentlewoman in distress who was only a housekeeper through the death of her husband, and being stranded in this country, and having no money of her own. Mrs. Burt told her I was thirteen, and I did not contradict her — she’d warned me beforehand that it would be best that way, as I would stand a better chance of being hired; and it was not entirely a lie, as I would be thirteen indeed in under a month’s time. Mrs. Honey looked at me with a pinched mouth, and said I was very scrawny, and she hoped I was not ill with anything, and what had my mother died of; but Mrs. Burt said nothing catching, and I was just a trifle small for my age and hadn’t yet got my full growth, but I was very wiry, and she’d seen me carrying stacks of wood around just like a man.

Mrs. Honey took this for what it was worth, and sniffed, and asked if I was bad-tempered, as redheaded people frequently were; and Mrs. Burt said I had the sweetest temper in the world and had borne all my troubles with Christian resignation like a saint. This reminded Mrs. Honey to ask if I was a Catholic, as those from Ireland generally were; and if so she would have nothing to do with me, as the Catholics were superstitious and rebellious Papists who were ruining the country; but she was relieved to hear that I was not. And Mrs. Honey asked if I could sew, and Mrs. Burt said I could sew like the wind, and Mrs. Honey asked me directly if this was true; and I spoke up for myself, although nervous, and said I’d helped my mother make shirts from an early age, and could do the best buttonholes, and mend stockings, and I remembered to say Ma’am.

Then Mrs. Honey hesitated, as if adding up sums in her head; and then she asked to look at my hands. Perhaps she wished to see if they were the hands of a person who had been working hard; but she needn’t have bothered her head, as they were as red and rough as could be desired, and she appeared satisfied. You would have thought she was trading a horse; I was surprised she did not ask to look at my teeth, but I suppose if you pay out wages you want to get a good return on them. The upshot was that Mrs. Honey consulted with Mrs. Alderman Parkinson, and sent word the next day that I was to come. My wages were to be board and a dollar a month, which was the lowest she could in conscience pay; but Mrs. Burt said I could command more once I had some training and had grown older. And a dollar bought more at that time than it does now. As for me, I was delighted to be earning money of my own, and thought it a fortune.

My father had the idea that I would go back and forth between the two houses, and sleep at home, which was what he called our two rickety rooms, and continue to get up first thing every morning and light the brute of a stove, and boil the kettle, and then tidy up at the end of the day and wash the laundry into the bargain, what laundry we were able to do, there not being any sort of copper and it was useless asking my father to spend money on even the worst kind of soap. But at Mrs. Alderman Parkinson’s they wanted me to live in; and I was to come at the beginning of the week. And although I was sorry to part with my brothers and sisters, I was thankful that I had to go away, because if not, it would soon have come to bones broken between myself and my father. The older I became, the less I was able to please him, and I myself had lost all of a child’s natural faith in a parent, as he was drinking up the bread out of his own children’s mouths, and soon he would force us to begging or thieving, or worse. Also his rages had returned, stronger than before my mother died. Already my arms were black and blue, and then one night he threw me against the wall, as he’d sometimes done with my mother, shouting that I was a slut and a whore, and I fainted; and after that I feared that he might someday break my spine, and make a cripple out of me. But after these rages he would wake up in the morning and say he couldn’t remember a thing about it, and he hadn’t been himself, and he didn’t know what had got into him.

Although I was dog tired at the end of each day, I would lie awake at night brooding over it. It was the never knowing when he would go off his head like that and start rampaging about, and threaten to kill this or that person, including his own children, for no reason that anybody could see at all, apart from the drink.

I had begun to have thoughts about the iron cooking pot, and how heavy it was; and if it should happen to drop on him while he was asleep, it could smash his skull open, and kill him dead, and I would say it was an accident; and I did not want to be led into a grave sin of that kind, though I was afraid that the fiery red anger that was in my heart against him would drive me to it. So as I made ready to go to Mrs. Alderman Parkinson’s, I thanked God for taking me out of the path of temptation, and prayed that he would keep me out of it in the times ahead. Mrs. Burt kissed me goodbye, and wished me well, and despite her fat mottled face and her smell of smoked fish I was glad of it, because in this world you have to take your bits and ends of kindness where you can find them, as they do not grow on trees. The little ones cried as I went away, carrying my small bundle including my mother’s shawl, and I said I would come back and visit them; and at the time I meant it.

My father was not at home when I left. It was just as well, as I am sorry to say it would most likely have been curses both ways, although silent on my part. It is always a mistake to curse back openly at those who are stronger than you unless there is a fence between.

Chapter 16

From Dr. Simon Jordan, care of Major C. D. Humphrey, Lower Union Street, Kingston, Canada West; to Dr. Edward Murchie, Dorchester, Massachusetts, The United States of America. May 15th, 1859.

My dear Edward:

I am writing this by the light of the midnight oil, which we have so often burned together, in this damnably chilly house, which is fully equal to our London lodgings in that respect. But soon it will grow too hot, and the dank miasmas and summer diseases will be upon us, and I will complain about those in their turn.

I thank you for your letter, and for the welcome news it contains. So you have proposed yourself to the lovely Cornelia, and have been accepted! You will forgive an old friend for not expressing any great surprise, as the matter was writ large enough between the lines of your letters, and could easily be divined, without any great perspicacity on the reader’s part. Please accept my earnest congratulations. From what I know of Miss Rutherford, you are a lucky dog. At moments like this I envy those who have found a safe haven, in which to bestow their hearts; or perhaps I envy them for having a heart to bestow. I often feel that I myself am without one, and possess in its stead merely a heart-shaped stone; and am therefore doomed to “wander lonely as a cloud,”

as Wordsworth has put it.

The news of your engagement will no doubt invigorate my dear mother, and spur her on to even greater matrimonial efforts on my behalf; and I have no doubt but that you will be used against me, as a prime example of rectitude, and as a stick to beat me with, at every opportunity. Well, no doubt she is in the right. Sooner or later I must set aside my scruples and obey the Biblical command to “be fruitful and multiply.” I must give my stony heart into the keeping of some kindly damsel who will not mind too much that it is not a real heart of flesh, and who will also have the material means necessary to care for it; for hearts of stone are notoriously more demanding of their comforts than the other kind.

Despite this deficiency of mine, my dear mother continues her matrimonial scheming. She is currently singing the praises of Miss Faith Cartwright, whom you will remember encountering several years ago during one of your visits to us. She is supposed to have been much improved by a sojourn in Boston, which to my certain knowledge — and to yours too, my dear Edward, for you were with me as an undergraduate at Harvard — has never improved anyone else; but from the way my mother hymns the young lady’s moral virtues, I fear that the rectification of the deficiencies in her other charms has not been among the improvements. Alas, it is a type of maiden other than the worthy and spotless Faith, who would have the power to transform your cynical old friend into the semblance of a lover.

But enough of my grumblings and repinings. I am heartily glad for you, my dear fellow, and will dance at your wedding with the greatest goodwill in the world, provided that I am in your vicinity when the nuptials take place.

You have been kind enough — in the midst of your raptures — to enquire as to my progress with Grace Marks. I have as yet little to report, but as the methods I am employing are gradual and cumulative in their effects, I did not expect rapid results. My object is to wake the part of her mind that lies dormant — to probe down below the threshold of her consciousness, and to discover the memories that must perforce lie buried there. I approach her mind as if it is a locked box, to which I must find the right key; but so far, I must admit, I have not got very far with it. It would be helpful to me, if she were indeed mad, or at least a little madder than she appears to be; but thus far she has manifested a composure that a duchess might envy. I have never known any woman to be so thoroughly self-contained. Apart from the incident at the time of my arrival

— which I was unfortunately too late to witness — there have been no outbursts. Her voice is low and melodious, and more cultivated than is usual in a servant — a trick she has learned no doubt through her long service in the house of her social superiors; and she retains barely a trace of the Northern Irish accent with which she must have arrived, although that is not so remarkable, as she was only a child at the time and has now spent more than half her life on this continent. She “sits on a cushion and sews a fine seam,” cool as a cucumber and with her mouth primmed up like a governess’s, and I lean my elbows on the table across from her, cudgelling my brains, and trying in vain to open her up like an oyster. Although she converses in what seems a frank enough manner, she manages to tell me as little as possible, or as little as possible of what I want to learn; although I have managed to ascertain a good deal about her family situation as a child, and about her crossing of the Atlantic, as an emigrant; but none of it is very far out of the ordinary — only the usual poverty and hardships, etc. Those who believe in the hereditary nature of insanity might take some comfort in the fact that her father was an inebriate, and possibly an arsonist as well; but despite several theories to the contrary, I am far from being convinced that such tendencies are necessarily inherited.

As for myself, if it were not for the fascination her case affords, I might run mad myself, out of sheer boredom; there is little enough society here, and none who share my sentiments and interests, with the possible exception of one Dr. DuPont, who is a visitor here like myself; but he is a devotee of the Scottish crackpot Braid, and a queer duck himself. As for amusements and recreations, there are few to be had; and I have decided to ask my landlady if I may dig in her back garden — which has been let go sadly to waste — and plant a few cabbages and so forth, just for the distraction and the exercise. You see what I am driven to, who have scarcely lifted a spade before in my life!

But it is now past midnight, and I must close this letter to you, and go to my cold and lonely bed. I send you my best thoughts and wishes, and trust that you are living more profitably, and are less perplexed, than is,

Your old friend,

Simon.

Six - Secret Drawer

Chapter 17

Simon is dreaming of a corridor. It’s the attic passageway of his house, his old house, the house of his childhood; the big house they had before his father’s failure and death. The maids slept up here. It was a secret world, one as a boy he wasn’t supposed to explore, but did, creeping silent as a spy in his stocking feet. Listening at half-open doors. What did they talk about when they thought no one could hear?

When he was feeling very brave he would venture into their rooms, knowing they were downstairs. With a shiver of excitement he’d examine their things, their forbidden things; he’d slide open the drawers, touch the wooden comb with two broken teeth, the carefully rolled ribbon; he’d rummage in the corners, behind the door: the crumpled petticoat, the cotton stocking, only one. He’d touched it; it felt warm. In his dream the passageway is the same, only bigger. The walls are taller, and yellower: glowing, as if the sun itself is shining through them. But the doors are closed, and also locked. He tries door after door, lifting the latch, pushing gently, but nothing yields. There are people in there though, he can sense them. Women, the maids. Sitting on the edges of their narrow beds, in their white cotton shifts, their hair unbound and rippling down over their shoulders, their lips parted, their eyes gleaming. Waiting for him. The door at the end opens. Inside it is the sea. Before he can stop himself, down he goes, the water closing over his head, a stream of silvery bubbles rising from him. In his ears he hears a ringing, a faint and shivery laughter; then many hands caress him. It’s the maids; only they can swim. But now they are swimming away from him, abandoning him. He calls out to them, Help me, but they are gone. He’s clinging onto something: a broken chair. The waves are rising and falling. Despite this turbulence there is no wind, and the air is piercingly clear. Past him, just out of reach, various objects are floating: a silver tray; a pair of candlesticks; a mirror; an engraved snuffbox; a gold watch, which is making a chirping noise, like a cricket. Things that were his father’s once, but sold after his death. They’re rising up from the depths like bubbles, more and more of them; as they reach the surface they roll slowly over, like bloating fish. They aren’t hard, like metal, but soft; they have a scaly skin on them, like an eel’s. He watches in horror, because now they’re gathering, twining together, re-forming. Tentacles are growing. A dead hand. His father, in the sinuous process of coming back to life. He has an overwhelming sense of having transgressed.

He wakes, his heart is pounding; the sheets and comforter are tangled around him, the pillows are on the floor. He’s soaked with sweat. After he’s lain quietly for a time, reflecting, he thinks he understands the train of association that must have led to such a dream. It was Grace’s story, with its Atlantic crossing, its burial at sea, its catalogue of household objects; and the overbearing father, of course. One father leads to another.

He checks the time by his pocket-watch, which is on the small bedside table: for once, he’s slept in. Luckily his breakfast is late; but the surly Dora should be arriving at any moment, and he doesn’t want to be surprised by her in his nightshirt, caught out in sloth. He throws on his dressing-gown and seats himself quickly at his writing table, turning his back to the door.

He will record the dream he’s just had in the journal he keeps for such purposes. One school of French aliénistes recommend the recording of dreams as a diagnostic tool; their own dreams, as well as those of their patients, for the sake of comparison. They hold dreams, like somnambulism, to be a manifestation of the animal life that continues below consciousness, out of sight, beyond reach of the will. Perhaps the hooks — the hinges, as it were — in the chain of memory, are located there?

He must reread Thomas Brown’s work on association and suggestion, and Herbart’s theory of the threshold of consciousness — the line that divides those ideas that are apprehended in full daylight from those others that lurk forgotten in the shadows below. Moreau de Tours considers the dream to be the key to the knowledge of mental illness, and Maine de Biran held that conscious life was only a sort of island, floating upon a much vaster subconscious, and drawing thoughts up from it like fish. What is perceived as being known is only a small part of what may be stored in this dark repository. Lost memories lie down there like sunken treasure, to be retrieved piecemeal, if at all; and amnesia itself may be in effect a sort of dreaming in reverse; a drowning of recollection, a plunging under…. Behind his back the door opens: his breakfast is making its entrance. Assiduously he dips his pen. He waits for the thump of the tray, the clatter of earthenware on wood, but he does not hear it.

“Just set it on the table, will you?” he says, without turning.

There is a sound like air going out of a small bellows, followed by a shattering crash. Simon’s first thought is that Dora has hurled the tray at him — she has always suggested, to his mind, a barely repressed and potentially criminal violence. He shouts involuntarily, leaps up, and whirls around. Lying full-length upon the floor is his landlady, Mrs. Humphrey, in a shambles of broken crockery and ruined food. He hurries over to her, kneels, and takes her pulse. At least she is still alive. He rolls open an eyelid, sees the opaque white. Swiftly he undoes the none-too-clean bibbed apron which she is wearing, and which he recognizes as the one habitually worn by slovenly Dora; then he unbuttons the front of her dress, noticing as he does so that there is a button missing, with the threads still hanging in place. He rummages around inside the layers of cloth, and at last succeeds in cutting her stay-laces with his pocket-knife, releasing an odour of violet-water, autumn leaves, and humid flesh. There is more to her than he would have supposed, although she is far from plump.

He carries her into his bedroom — the settee in his sitting room is too small for the purpose — and extends her upon the bed, placing a pillow beneath her feet to cause the blood to run back into her head. He considers removing her boots — which haven’t been cleaned yet today — but decides that this would be an unwarranted familiarity.

Mrs. Humphrey has neat ankles, from which he averts his eyes; her hair is dishevelled from the fall. Seen this way she is younger than he’s thought; and, with her habitual expression of strained anxiety wiped away by unconsciousness, much more attractive. He sets his ear against her breast, listening: the heartbeat is regular. A simple case of fainting, then. He moistens a towel with water from the jug and applies it to her face and neck. Her eyelids twitch.

Simon pours half a glass of water from the bottle on his nightstand, adds twenty drops of sal volatile — a medication he always carries with him on his afternoon visits, in case of any similar flimsiness on the part of Grace Marks, who is said to be prone to fainting — and, supporting Mrs. Humphrey with one arm, holds the glass to her lips.

“Swallow this.”

She gulps awkwardly, then lifts a hand to her head. There is a red mark, he notices now, on the side of her face. Perhaps her scoundrel of a husband is a brute as well as a sot. Though this looks more like a hard slap, and surely such a man as the Major would employ a closed fist. Simon feels a wave of protective pity for her that he cannot really afford. The woman is only his landlady; apart from that she’s a complete stranger to him. He has no wish to alter this situation, despite an image that leaps into his mind, unbidden — aroused no doubt by the sight of a helpless woman extended upon his tumbled bed

— of Mrs. Humphrey, semi-conscious and with her hands fluttering helplessly in the air, minus her stays and with her chemise half torn off, her feet — curiously, still in their boots — kicking spasmodically, making faint mewing noises while being savaged by a hulking figure that bears no resemblance at all to himself; although — from above, and from the back, which is his point of view during this sordid scene

— the quilted dressing-gown looks identical.

He has always been curious about these manifestations of the imagination as he has been able to observe them in himself. Where do they come from? If they occur in him, they must occur as well in the majority of men. He is both sane and normal, and he has developed the rational faculties of his mind to a high degree; and yet he cannot always control such pictures. The difference between a civilized man and a barbarous fiend — a madman, say — lies, perhaps, merely in a thin veneer of willed self-restraint.

“You are quite safe,” he says to her kindly. “You have had a fall. You must rest quietly until you feel better.”

“But — I am on a bed.” She gazes around her.

“It is my bed, Mrs. Humphrey. I was forced to carry you to it in the absence of any other suitable place.”

The skin of her face is now flushed. She has noticed his dressing-gown. “I must leave at once.”

“I beg you to remember that I am a doctor, and, for the time being, you are my patient. If you were to attempt to get up now, there might be a recurrence.”

“Recurrence?”

“You collapsed, while carrying in” — it seems indelicate to mention it — “my breakfast tray. May I ask you — what has become of Dora?”

To his consternation, but not to his surprise, she begins to cry. “I could not pay her. I owed her three months’ back wages; I had succeeded in selling some — some items of a personal nature, but my husband took the money from me, two days ago. He has not been back since. I do not know where he has gone.” She makes a visible effort to control her tears.

“And this morning?”

“We had — words. She insisted on payment. I told her I could not, that it was not possible. She said in that case she would pay herself. She began to go through my bureau drawers, in search of jewellery, I suppose. Not finding any, she said she would have my wedding ring. It was gold, but very plain. I attempted to defend it from her. She said I was not honest. She…struck me. Then she took it, and said she would not be an unpaid slave to me any longer, and then she left the house. After that I prepared your breakfast myself, and carried it up. What else was I to do?”

So it was not the husband then, thinks Simon. It was that sow of a Dora. Mrs. Humphrey begins to cry again, gently, effortlessly, as if the sobs are a kind of birdsong.

“You must have some good woman friend you can go to. Or who can come to you.” Simon is anxious to transfer Mrs. Humphrey from his own shoulders to those of someone else. Women help each other; caring for the afflicted is their sphere. They make beef tea and jellies. They knit comforting shawls. They pat and soothe.

“I have no friends in this place. We have only recently come to this city, having suffered — having undergone some financial difficulties in our previous abode. My husband discouraged visits. He did not want me going out.”

A useful thought comes to Simon. “You must eat something. You will feel stronger.”

At this she smiles wanly at him. “There is nothing in the house to eat, Dr. Jordan. Your breakfast was the last of it. I have not eaten for two days, ever since my husband left. What little there was, Dora ate up herself. I have had nothing but water.”

And so Simon finds himself at the market, purchasing stores for the physical maintenance of his landlady, with his own money. He’d helped Mrs. Humphrey down the stairs to her own part of the house; she’d insisted on it, saying she could not afford to be found in the bedroom of her lodger in the event of her husband’s return. He wasn’t surprised to find that the rooms were essentially bare of furniture: a table and two chairs were all that remained in the parlour. But there was still a bed in the back bedroom, and onto it he had placed Mrs. Humphrey, in a state of nervous exhaustion. And starvation, too: no wonder she was so bony. He turned his mind away from the bed, and from the scenes of conjugal misery that must have been enacted upon it.

Then he went back upstairs to his own rooms, with a slop pail he’d located; the kitchen had been a shambles. He cleaned up the spilled breakfast and the broken dishes from his floor, noting that for once the now-ruined egg had been perfectly cooked.

He supposes he will have to give notice to Mrs. Humphrey, and change his lodgings, which will be an inconvenience; although preferable to the disruption of his life and work that would surely be the consequence if he were to stay. Disorder, chaos, the Bailiff’s men coming for the furniture in his own chambers, no doubt. But if he leaves, what will become of the wretched woman? He does not want her on his conscience, which is where she will be if she starves to death on a street corner. He buys some eggs, and some bacon and cheese, and some dirty-looking butter from an old farm woman at one of the stalls; and, at a shop, some tea twisted up in a paper. He would like bread, but there is none to be seen. He doesn’t really know how to go about this. He’s visited the market before, but only fleetingly, to obtain the vegetables with which he has been hoping to prod Grace’s memory. Now he’s on a different footing entirely. Where can he purchase milk? Why are there no apples? This is a universe he has never explored, having had no curiosity about where his food came from, as long as it did come. The other shoppers at the market are servants, their mistresses’ shopping baskets over their arms; or else women of the poorer classes, in limp bonnets and bedraggled shawls. He feels they are laughing at him behind his back.

When he returns, Mrs. Humphrey is up. She’s wrapped herself in a quilt and tidied her hair, and is sitting beside the stove, which is luckily alight — he himself would not know how to manage it — rubbing her hands together and shivering. He succeeds in making her some tea, and in frying some eggs and bacon, and in toasting a stale bun which he eventually found at the market. They eat these together, at the one remaining table. He wishes there were some marmalade.

“This is so good of you, Dr. Jordan.”

“Think nothing of it. I could not let you starve.” His voice is heartier than he intends, the voice of a jolly and insincere uncle who can scarcely wait to bestow the expected quarter-dollar on the grovelling poor-relation niece, pinch her cheek, and then make his getaway to the opera. Simon wonders what the bad Major Humphrey is doing right now, and curses him silently, and envies him. Whatever it may be, it is more enjoyable than this.

Mrs. Humphrey sighs. “I am afraid it will come to that. I am at the end of my resources.” She is now quite calm, and is looking at her situation objectively. “The rent of the house must be paid, and there is no money. Soon they will come like vultures to pick over the bones, and I will be turned out. Perhaps I will even be arrested for debt. I would rather die.”

“Surely there must be something you can do,” says Simon. “To earn a living.” She is clutching for her self-respect, and he admires her for it.

She gazes at him. Her eyes, in this light, are an odd shade of sea-green. “What do you suggest, Dr. Jordan? Fancy needlework? Women like me have few skills they can sell.” There’s a hint of malicious irony in her voice. Does she know what he was thinking as she lay unconscious on his unmade bed?

“I will advance you another two months’ rent,” he finds himself saying. He’s a fool, a soft-hearted idiot; if he had any sense he would be out of here as if the Devil himself were in pursuit. “That should be sufficient to hold the wolves at bay, at least until you’ve had time to consider your prospects.”

Her eyes fill with tears. Without a word, she lifts his hand from the table and presses it gently to her lips. The effect is only slightly dampened by the trace of butter that remains upon her mouth.

Chapter 18

Today Dr. Jordan looks more disarranged than usual, and as if he has something on his mind; he does not seem to know quite how to begin. So I continue with my sewing until he’s had time to gather himself together; and then he says, Is that a new quilt you are working on, Grace?

And I say, Yes it is, Sir, it is a Pandora’s Box for Miss Lydia.

This puts him in an instructive mood, and I can see he is going to teach me something, which gentlemen are fond of doing. Mr. Kinnear was like that as well. And he says, And do you know who Pandora was, Grace?

And I say, Yes, she was a Greek person from days of old, who looked into a box she had been told not to, and a lot of diseases came out, and wars, and other human ills; for I had learnt it a long time ago, at Mrs. Alderman Parkinson’s. Mary Whitney had a low opinion of the story, and said why did they leave such a box lying around, if they didn’t want it opened.

He is surprised to find I know that, and says, But do you know what was at the bottom of the box?

Yes Sir, I say, it was hope. And you could make a joke of it, and say that hope was what you got when you scraped the bottom of the barrel, as some do who have to marry at last out of desperation. Or you could say it was a hope chest. But in any case it is all just a fable; although a pretty quilt pattern. Well, I suppose we all need a little hope now and then, he says.

I am on the point of saying that I have been getting along without it for some time, but I refrain; and then I say, You do not look yourself today, Sir, I trust you are not ill.

And he smiles his one-sided smile, and says he isn’t ill, only preoccupied; but that if I would continue with my story, it would be a help to him, as it would distract him from his worries; but he does not say what these worries might be.

And so I go on.

Now, Sir, I say, I will come to a happier part of my story; and in this part I will tell you about Mary Whitney; and then you will understand why it was her name I borrowed, when I was in need of it; for she was never one to refuse a friend in need, and I hope I stood by her as well, when the time came for it. The house of my new employment was very grand, and was known as one of the finest houses in Toronto. It was situated on Front Street, overlooking the Lake, where there were many other big houses; and it had a curved portico with white pillars at the front. The dining room was oval in shape, as was the drawing room, and a marvel to behold, although drafty. And there was a library as big as a ballroom, with shelves up to the ceiling all stuffed full of books in leather covers, with more words in them than you would ever want to read in your life. And the bedchambers had high tester bedsteads with hangings, and also netting to keep out the flies in summer, and dressing tables with looking glasses, and mahogany commodes, and chests of drawers all complete. They were Church of England, as all the best people were in those days, and also those who wanted to be the best, as it was Established. The family consisted, first, of Mr. Alderman Parkinson, who was seldom visible, as he was much engaged in business and politics; he was the shape of an apple with two sticks stuck into it for legs. He had so many gold watch-chains and gold pins and gold snuffboxes and other trinkets, you could have got five necklaces out of him if he was melted down, with the earrings to match. Then there was Mrs. Alderman Parkinson, and Mary Whitney said she ought to have been the Alderman herself, as she was the better man. She was an imposing figure of a woman, and a very different shape out of her corsets than in them; but when she was firmly laced in, her bosom jutted out like a shelf, and she could have carried a whole tea service around on it and never spilt a drop. She came from the United States of America, and had been a well-to-do widow before being, as she said, swept off her feet by Mr. Alderman Parkinson; which must have been a sight to behold; and Mary Whitney said it was a wonder Mr. Alderman Parkinson had escaped with his life.

She had two grown sons who were away at college in the States; and also a spaniel dog named Bevelina, which I include as family because it was treated as such. I am fond of animals as a rule but this one took an effort.

Then there were the servants, which were many in number; and some left and others came while I was there, so I will not mention them all. There was Mrs. Alderman Parkinson’s lady’s maid, who claimed to be French although we had our doubts, and kept to herself; and Mrs. Honey the housekeeper, who had quite a large room at the back of the main floor, and so did the butler; and the cook and laundress lived next the kitchen. The gardener and stablemen lived in the outbuildings, as did the two kitchen maids, near the stable with the horses and three cows, where I went sometimes to help with the milking. I was put in the attic, at the very top of the back stairs, and shared a bed with Mary Whitney, who helped in the laundry. Our room was not large, and hot in summer and cold in winter, as it was next the roof and without a fireplace or stove; and in it was the bedstead, which had a pallet mattress filled with straw, and a small chest, and a plain washstand with a chipped basin, and a chamber pot; and also a straight-backed chair, painted a light green, where we folded our clothes at night. Down the passageway from us were Agnes and Effie, who were the chambermaids. Agnes was of a religious temperament, although kind-hearted and helpful. In her youth she had tried a preparation for taking the yellow off the teeth, but it took the white off as well, which may have been why she smiled so seldom, and took care to do it with her lips closed. Mary Whitney said she prayed so much because she was praying to God to get her white teeth back again, but so far no results. Effie had become very melancholic when her young man was transported to Australia for being in the Rebellion three years before; and when she got a letter saying he had died there, she attempted to hang herself by her apron strings; but they broke, and she was found on the floor half-choked and out of her mind, and had to be put away.

I knew nothing about the Rebellion, not having been in the country at the time, so Mary Whitney told me. It was against the gentry, who ran everything, and kept all the money and land for themselves; and it was led by Mr. William Lyon Mackenzie, who was a Radical, and after the Rebellion failed he escaped through ice and snow in women’s clothing, and over the Lake to the States, and he could have been betrayed many times over but was not, because he was a fine man who always stood up for the ordinary farmers; but many of the Radicals had been caught and transported or hanged, and had lost their property; or else had gone south; and most of those left here were Tories, or said they were; so it was best not to mention politics, except among friends.

I said I understood nothing about politics, so would not think of mentioning it in any case; and I asked Mary if she was a Radical. And she said I was not to tell the Parkinsons, who had heard a different story, but her own father had lost his farm that way, which he had cleared himself with much labour; and they had burnt the log house he’d built with his own two hands, while fighting off the bears and other wild animals; and then he’d lost his life too, through illness caused by hiding in the winter woods; and her mother had died of grief. But their time would come, they would be revenged; and she looked very fierce as she said this.

I was pleased to be with Mary Whitney, as I liked her at once. Next to me she was the youngest one there, being sixteen; and she was a pretty and cheerful girl, with a tidy figure and dark hair and sparkling black eyes, and rosy cheeks with dimples; and she smelled like nutmegs or carnations. She asked all about me, and I told her about the journey in the ship, and about my mother dying, and sinking down into the sea among the icebergs. And Mary said that was very sad. And then I told her about my father, although keeping back the worst parts, because it is not right to speak ill of a parent; and how I feared he would want all of my wages; and she said I should not give him my money as he had not worked for it, and it would not benefit my sisters and brothers, as he would spend all on himself and most likely on the drink. I said I was afraid of him, and she said he could not get at me here, and if he tried, she would speak to Jim in the stables, who was a large man with friends. And I began to feel easier. Mary said I might be very young, and as ignorant as an egg, but I was bright as a new penny, and the difference between stupid and ignorant was that ignorant could learn. And she said I looked like a good worker who would pull my weight, and we would get along fine together; and she’d had two other situations, and if you had to hire yourself out as a servant, it was as well at Parkinsons’ as anywhere, as they did not stint on the meals. And this was true, as I soon began to fill out and grow taller. Food was certainly easier to come by in the Canadas than on the other side of the ocean, and there was a greater variety of it; and even the servants ate meat every day, if only salt pork or bacon; and there was good bread, of wheat and also of Indian corn; and the house had its own three cows, and kitchen garden, and fruit trees, and strawberries, currants, and grapes; and flower beds as well. Mary Whitney was a fun-loving girl, and very mischievous and bold in her speech when we were alone. But towards her elders and betters her manner was respectful and demure; and because of that, and the brisk way she did her work, she was a general favourite. But behind their backs she made jokes about them, and imitated their faces and walks and ways. I was often astonished at the words that came out of her mouth, as many of them were quite coarse; it wasn’t that I’d never heard such language before, as there was a sufficient store of it at home when my father was drunk, and on the ship coming over, and down by the harbour near the taverns and inns; but I was surprised to hear it from a girl, and one so young and pretty, and so neatly and cleanly dressed. But I soon got used to it, and put it down to her being a native-born Canadian, as she did not have much respect for degree. And sometimes when I would be shocked at her, she would say that I would soon be singing mournful hymns like Agnes, and going around with a mouth pulled down all glum and saggy like an old maid’s backside; and I would protest, and we would end by laughing.

But it angered her that some people had so much and others so little, as she could not see any divine plan in it. She claimed that her grandmother had been a Red Indian, which was why her hair was so black; and that if she had half a chance she would run away to the woods, and go about with a bow and arrow, and not have to pin up her hair or wear stays; and I could come with her. And then we would fall to planning about how we would hide in the forest, and leap out upon travellers, and scalp them, which she had read about in books; and she said she would like to scalp Mrs. Alderman Parkinson, except it would not be worth the trouble as her hair was not her own, there were hanks and swatches of it kept in her dressing room; and she’d once seen the French maid brushing a heap of it, and thought it was the spaniel. But it was just our way of talking, and no harm was meant.

Mary took me under her wing from the very first. She soon guessed that I wasn’t as old as I said I was, and she swore not to tell; and then she looked over my clothes, and said most of them were too small for me, and fit only for the scrap bag, and that I would never make it through the winter with only my mother’s shawl, as the wind would go right through it like a sieve; and she would help me get the clothes I needed, as Mrs. Honey had told her I looked like a ragamuffin and I was to be made presentable, since Mrs. Alderman Parkinson had her name to keep up in the neighbourhood. But first I must be scrubbed like a potato, I was that filthy.

She said she would get the loan of Mrs. Honey’s hip bath; and I was alarmed, as I had never been in a bath of any sort, and also I was afraid of Mrs. Honey; but Mary said her bark was worse than her bite, and in any case you could always hear her coming, as she clanked like a wagonful of old kettles because of all her keys; and if there was any argument she would threaten to bathe me outside, stark naked, under the pump in the back courtyard. I was shocked by this, and said I would not allow it; and she said of course she would never do such a thing, but the mere mention of it would obtain Mrs. Honey’s consent. Back she came quite soon, and said we could have the hip bath as long as we scoured it well out afterwards; and we took it to the laundry room, and pumped the water, and took the chill off it on the stove, and poured it in. I made Mary stand at the door to prevent anyone from coming in, and with her back turned, as I had never taken off all my clothes at once before, though I kept my shift on out of modesty. The water was not very warm, and by the time I’d finished I was shivering, and it was a good thing it was summertime or I would have caught my death of cold. Mary said I had to wash my hair as well; and though it was true that washing it too much would take all the strength out of your body, and she had known a girl who had faded away and died from too much hair washing, still it needed to be done every three or four months; and she looked at my head, and said at least I did not have any lice, but if any appeared I would need sulphur and turpentine put on, and she had this done once and smelled like rotten eggs for days afterwards.

Mary lent me a nightdress until mine should be dry, because she’d washed all my clothes; and she wrapped me up in a sheet so I could go out of the laundry and climb up the back stairs; and she said I looked very comical, just like a madwoman.

Mary asked Mrs. Honey to give me an advance on my wages, for a decent dress; and we got leave to go into the town the very next day. Mrs. Honey preached us a sermon before we set off, and said we were to behave modestly, and go and come back straight away, and not speak to any strangers, especially men; and we promised to do as she said.

I am afraid however that we went the long way round, and looked at the flowers in the fenced gardens of the houses, and at the shops, which were not nearly so many or so grand as in Belfast, from what I had briefly seen there. Then Mary said would I like to see the street where the whores lived; and I was frightened, but she said there was no danger. I was indeed curious to see the women who made a living by selling their bodies, because I thought if worst came to worst and if starving, I would still have something to sell; and I wanted to see what they looked like. So we went to Lombard Street, but as it was the morning there was not much to be seen. Mary said that there were several bawdy-houses there, although you couldn’t tell them from the outside; but inside they were said to be very fancy, with Turkey carpets and crystal chandeliers and velvet curtains, and the whores lived in them with their own bedchambers, and with maids to bring them their breakfasts and clean their floors and make their beds and take out their slops, and all they had to do was put on their clothes and take them off again, and lie around on their backs, and it was easier work than a coal mine or a mill. The ones in these houses were the better class of whore, and the more expensive, and the men were gentlemen, or at least good paying customers. But the cheaper sort had to walk about outside, and make use of rooms rented by the hour; and many of them got diseases, and were old by the time they were twenty, and had to cover their faces with paint, so as to deceive the poor drunken sailors. And although they might look very elegant from a distance, with feathers and satins, up close you could see that their dresses were soiled and ill-fitting, as every stitch on their backs was rented by the day, and they scarcely had enough left over for their bread; and it was a dismal sort of life, and she wondered they did not throw themselves into the lake; which some did, and were often found floating about in the harbour. I wondered how Mary knew so much about it; but she laughed, and said that I would hear a lot if I would keep my ears open, especially in the kitchen; but also a girl she’d known from the country had gone to the bad, and she used to meet her on the street; but what had become of her since she didn’t know, and feared it was nothing good.

After that we went to King Street, to a dry-goods shop where ends of bales were sold cheaply; and there were silks and cottons and broadcloths and flannels, and satins and tartans, and everything you could desire; but we had to consider the price, and the use it was to be put to. In the end we bought a serviceable blue and white gingham, and Mary said she would help me make it up; though she was surprised, when the time came, to find I could sew so well and with such tiny stitches, and said I was wasted as a servant, and ought to set up as a dressmaker.

We bought the thread for the dress, and also the buttons, from a peddler who came round the next day, and was well known to all there. He was a great favourite with Cook, who made him a cup of tea and cut him a slice of cake while he opened up his pack and spread out his wares. His name was Jeremiah, and when he came up the drive to the back door he was followed by a band of five or six raggedy urchins, like a parade, and one was banging on a pot with a spoon; and all were singing, Jeremiah, blow the fire,

Puff, puff puff;

First you blow it gently,

Then you blow it rough!

The racket brought us all to the window; and when they’d reached the back door, he gave them a penny to spend, and they ran off; and when Cook asked him what all that was about, he said he would rather have them following under his command, than pelting him with clots of mud and horse dung, which was their habit with peddlers, who could not chase them away without abandoning their packs; which if they did, would swiftly be pillaged by the little ruffians; so he’d chosen the wiser course, and employed them, and taught them the song himself.

This Jeremiah was a deft and nimble man, with a long nose and legs and a skin all browned by the sun, and a curling black beard, and Mary said that although he looked like a Jew or a gypsy, as many peddlers were, he was a Yankee with an Italian father who’d come over to work in the mills, in Massachusetts; and his last name was Pontelli, but he was well liked. He spoke good English, yet with something foreign in his voice; and he had piercing black eyes and a wide and handsome smile, and flattered the women shamelessly.

He had a great many things I wanted to buy, but could not afford to, even though he said he would take half the money now and leave the rest until the next time he came; but I do not like being in debt. He had ribbons and laces, as well as the thread and buttons, which were metal or mother-of-pearl or wood or bone, and I chose the bone; and white cotton stockings, and collars and cuffs, and cravats and handkerchiefs; and several petticoats, and two pairs of stays, used, but well washed and almost as good as new; and summer gloves in pale shades, most beautifully made. And earrings, silver and gold in colour, although Mary said they would rub off; and a real silver snuffbox; and bottles of scent that smelled like roses, very strong. Cook bought some, and Jeremiah said she scarcely needed it, as she smelled like a princess already; and she blushed and giggled even though she was nearing fifty and not of a graceful figure, and she said Onions, more like; and he said she smelled good enough to eat, and the way to a man’s heart was through his stomach, and then he smiled with his large white teeth, which looked all the larger and whiter due to his dark beard, and gave Cook a hungry stare, and licked his lips, as if she herself was a delicious cake he longed to devour; at which she blushed even more. Then he asked us if we had anything to sell, for as we knew, he gave good prices; and Agnes sold her coral earrings that she had from an aunt, as being vanity, but we knew she needed the money for her sister, who was in difficulties; and Jim from the stables came in, and said he would trade a shirt he had, and also a large coloured handkerchief, for another and finer shirt he liked better; and with a wooden-handled pocket-knife thrown into the bargain, it was done.

While Jeremiah was in the kitchen it was like a party, and Mrs. Honey came to find out what was making all the commotion. And she said, Well Jeremiah, I see you are up to your old pranks, taking advantage of the women again. But she smiled while saying it, which was a rare sight. And he said yes, that was what he was doing, there were so many pretty ones he could not resist, but none so pretty as her; and she bought two lawn handkerchiefs from him, although she did say he had to be brisk about it, and not take all day, as the girls had their work to do. And then she clanked away out of the kitchen. Some wanted him to tell their fortunes by looking into their hands; but Agnes said it was meddling with the Devil, and that Mrs. Alderman Parkinson would not want word to get round of such gypsy doings in her kitchen. So he did not. But after much pleading, he did an imitation of a gentleman, with the voice and manners and all, at which we clapped our hands with joy, it was so lifelike; and he made a silver coin appear out of Cook’s ear, and showed us how he could swallow a fork, or appear to. He said these were conjuring tricks he had learnt in the days of his wicked youth, when he was a wild lad and worked at fairs, before he’d become an honest tradesman and had his pocket picked and his heart broken fifty times over by cruel and pretty girls such as we were; and all present laughed. But when he’d stowed everything away in his pack again, and had drunk his cup of tea and eaten his slice of cake, and said nobody made such good cakes as Cook did, and was going away, he motioned me over to him, and gave me an extra bone button, to go with the four I’d bought. He put it into my hand and folded my fingers over it, and his own fingers were hard and dry, like sand; but he peered into my hand swiftly first; and then he said, Five for luck; for people of that kind consider four an unlucky number, and odd numbers luckier than even ones. And he gave me a quick and intelligent look with his shining black eyes, and he said, quite low so that the others did not hear it, There are sharp rocks ahead. Which I suppose there always are, Sir, and there had certainly been enough of them behind, and I had survived them; so I was not too daunted by that.

But then he said the strangest thing of all to me. He said, You are one of us. And then he shouldered his pack and took up his staff, and walked away; and I was left wondering what he’d meant. But after I had mulled it over, I decided he meant that I too was homeless, and a wanderer, like the peddlers and those who worked at fairs; for I couldn’t imagine what else he might have had in mind.

We all felt a little stale and flat after he had gone; for it wasn’t often that those of us in the back rooms and offices were allowed a treat like that, and a good look at such pretty things, and a chance to laugh and fun in the middle of the day.

But the dress came out very well, and because there were five buttons and not four, we used three at the neck and one on each of the sleeve cuffs; and even Mrs. Honey said what a difference it made in my appearance, and how trim and respectable I looked, now that I was decently dressed.

Chapter 19

My father came round at the end of the first month, and wanted all my wages; but I could only give him a quarter, having spent the rest. And then he began to curse and swear, and seized me by the arm; but Mary set the stablehands onto him. And he came back at the end of the second month, and I gave him a quarter again, and Mary told him he wasn’t to come any more. And he called her hard names, and she called him worse, and whistled for the men; and so he was chased off. I was of two minds about this, as I felt sorry for the little ones; and I tried to send them some money afterwards, through Mrs. Burt; but I do not think they received it.

I was set to work at first as a scullery maid, scouring out the pots and pans, but it was soon observed that the iron cauldrons were too heavy for me; and then our laundress left for a new position, and another one came who was not so brisk, and Mrs. Honey said I was to assist Mary with the rinsing and the wringing out, and the hanging up and the folding and the mangling and mending, and we were both very pleased. Mary said she would teach me what I needed to know, and as I was bright enough I would learn it quickly.

When I would make a mistake and become anxious about it, Mary would comfort me and say I should not take things so seriously, and if you never made a mistake you would never learn; and when Mrs. Honey spoke sharply to me and I was on the verge of tears, Mary would say I should not mind her, as that was her way, it was because she had swallowed a bottle of vinegar and it came out on her tongue. And also I should remember that we were not slaves, and being a servant was not a thing we were born to, nor would we be forced to continue at it forever; it was just a job of work. She said it was the custom for young girls in this country to hire themselves out, in order to earn the money for their dowries; and then they would marry, and if their husbands prospered they would soon be hiring their own servants in their turn, at the very least a maid-of-all-work; and that one day I would be the mistress of a tidy farmhouse, and independent, and I would look back on my trials and tribulations at the hands of Mrs. Honey as a fine joke. And one person was as good as the next, and on this side of the ocean folks rose in the world by hard work, not by who their grandfather was, and that was the way it should be. She said that being a servant was like anything else, there was a knack to it which many never learnt, and it was all in the way of looking at it. For instance, we’d been told always to use the back stairs, in order to keep out of the way of the family, but in truth it was the other way around: the front stairs were there so that the family would keep out of our way. They could go traipsing up and down the front stairs in their fancy clothes and trinkets, while the real work of the place went on behind their backs, without them getting all snarled up in it, and interfering, and making a nuisance of themselves. They were feeble and ignorant creatures, although rich, and most of them could not light a fire if their toes were freezing off, because they didn’t know how, and it was a wonder they could blow their own noses or wipe their own backsides, they were by their nature as useless as a prick on a priest — if you’ll excuse me, Sir, but that was how she put it — and if they were to lose all their money tomorrow and be thrown out on the streets, they would not even be able to make a living by honest whoring, as they would not know which part was to go in where, and they would end up getting — I won’t say the word — in the ear; and most of them did not know their own arse from a hole in the ground. And she said something else about the women, which was so coarse I will not repeat it, Sir, but it made us laugh very much. She said that the trick to it was to have the work done without it ever being seen to be done; and if any of them was to surprise you at a task, you should simply remove yourself at once. In the end, she said, we had the better of them, because we washed their dirty linen and therefore we knew a good deal about them; but they did not wash ours, and knew nothing about us at all. There were few secrets they could keep from the servants; and if I was ever to be a chambermaid, I would have to learn to carry a bucket full of filth as if it was a bowl of roses, for the thing these people hated the most was to be reminded that they too had bodies, and their shit stank as much as anyone’s, if not worse. And then she would say a poem: When Adam delved and Eve span, Who was then the gentleman?

As I’ve said, Sir, Mary was an outspoken young woman, and did not mince words; and she had very democratic ideas, which it took me some getting used to.

At the very top of the house was a large attic, divided up; and if you climbed the stairs, and then went along past the room where we slept, and down some other stairs, you were in the drying room. It was strung with lines, and had several small windows that opened out under the eaves. And the chimney from the kitchen ran up through this room. It was used to dry the clothes in winter, and when it was raining outside.

As a rule we did not do a wash if the weather threatened; but especially in the summer, the day could start fair and then cloud over all of a sudden, and thunder and rain; and the thunderstorms were very violent, with loud cracks of thunder and fiery flashes of lightning, so much that you would think the end of the world was come. I was terrified the first time it happened, and got under a table and began to cry, and Mary said it was nothing, only a thunderstorm; but then she told me several stories of men who had been out in their fields or even in their barns, and were struck dead by lightning, and also a cow standing under a tree.

When we had a wash hanging out and the first drops began to fall, we would rush out with the baskets and gather all in as quickly as we could, and then haul it up the stairs and hang it out anew in the drying room, as it could not be allowed to sit in the baskets for long because of mildew. I did love the smell of a laundry dried outside, it was a good fresh smell; and the shirts and the nightgowns flapping in the breeze on a sunny day were like large white birds, or angels rejoicing, although without any heads. But when we hung the same things up inside, in the grey twilight of the drying room, they looked different, like pale ghosts of themselves hovering and shimmering there in the gloom; and the look of them, so silent and bodiless, made me afraid. And Mary, who was very quick in such matters, soon found this out, and would hide behind the sheets, and press up against them so there was the outline of her face, and give out a moaning sound; or she would get behind the nightshirts and make their arms move. Her object was to frighten me, and she would succeed, and I would shriek; and then we would chase up and down between the rows of washing, laughing and screaming, but trying not to laugh and scream too loud, and if I would catch her I would dart in and tickle her, for she was very ticklish; and sometimes we would try on Mrs. Alderman Parkinson’s corsets, over top of our clothes, and walk around with our chests sticking out and looking down our noses; and we would be so overcome that we would fall backwards into the baskets of linens, and lie there gasping like fish until we had recovered our straight faces again. These were just the high spirits of youth, which do not always take a very dignified form, as I am sure you have had cause to observe, Sir.

Mrs. Alderman Parkinson had more pieced quilts than I’d ever seen before in my life, as it was not so much the fashion on the other side of the ocean, and printed cottons were not so cheap and plentiful. Mary said that a girl did not consider herself ready for marriage here until she had three such quilts, made by her own hands; and the fanciest ones were the marriage quilts, such as the Tree of Paradise and the Flower Basket. Others, such as the Wild Goose Chase and the Pandora’s Box, had a good many pieces, and took skill; and those such as the Log Cabin and the Nine Patch were for everyday, and were much faster to make. Mary had not begun on her own marriage quilt yet, as she did not have the time, being a servant; but she’d already finished a Nine Patch.

On a fine day in mid-September, Mrs. Honey said that it was time to take out the winter quilts and blankets, and to air them, in preparation for the cold weather; and to mend the rents and tears; and she gave this task to Mary and myself. The quilts were stored in the attic, away from the drying room, to avoid the damp, in a cedar chest, with a sheet of muslin in between each one and enough camphor to kill a cat, and the smell of it made me quite light-headed. We were to carry them downstairs and hang them out on the lines, and brush them down and see if the moths had been at them; for sometimes, despite cedar chests and camphor, the moths will get in, and the winter quilts had wool batts inside them instead of the cotton ones in the summer quilts.

The winter quilts were of deeper colours than the summer ones, with reds and oranges and blues and purples; and some of them had silks and velvets and brocade pieces in them. Over the years in prison, when I have been by myself, as I am a good deal of the time, I have closed my eyes and turned my head towards the sun, and I have seen a red and an orange that were like the brightness of those quilts; and when we’d hung a half-dozen of them up on the line, all in a row, I thought that they looked like flags, hung out by an army as it goes to war.

And since that time I have thought, why is it that women have chosen to sew such flags, and then to lay them on the tops of beds? For they make the bed the most noticeable thing in a room. And then I have thought, it’s for a warning. Because you may think a bed is a peaceful thing, Sir, and to you it may mean rest and comfort and a good night’s sleep. But it isn’t so for everyone; and there are many dangerous things that may take place in a bed. It is where we are born, and that is our first peril in life; and it is where the women give birth, which is often their last. And it is where the act takes place between men and women that I will not mention to you, Sir, but I suppose you know what it is; and some call it love, and others despair, or else merely an indignity which they must suffer through. And finally beds are what we sleep in, and where we dream, and often where we die.

But I did not have these fancies about the quilts until after I was already in prison. It is a place where you have a lot of time to think, and no one to tell your thoughts to; and so you tell them to yourself. Here Dr. Jordan asks me to pause a little so he can catch up with his writing; for he says he is much interested in what I have just related. I am glad of this, as I have enjoyed telling about those days, and if I had my own wish I would stay in them as long as I could. So I wait, and watch his hand moving over the paper, and think it must be pleasant to have the knack of writing so quickly, which can only be done by practice, like playing the piano. And I wonder if he has a good singing voice, and sings duets with young ladies in the evenings, when I am shut up alone in my cell. Most likely he does, as he is a handsome enough and friendly, and unmarried.

And so, Grace, he says, looking up, you consider a bed to be a dangerous place?

There is a different note in his voice; perhaps he is laughing at me up his sleeve. I should not speak to him so freely, and decide I will not, if that is the tone he is going to take. Well of course not every time you get into it, Sir, I say, only on those occasions which I have mentioned. Then I keep silent, and continue to sew.

Have I offended you somehow, Grace? he says. I did not intend to.

I sew in silence for a few moments more. Then I say, I will believe you, Sir, and take you at your word; and hope such will be returned in future.

Of course, of course, he says warmly. Please do go on with your story. I should not have interrupted. Surely you do not want to hear about such ordinary things, and daily life, I say. I want to hear anything you may tell me, Grace, he says. The small details of life often hide a great significance.

I am not certain what he means by that, but I continue.

At last we had all of the quilts carried down and hung out in the sun, and brushed; and we took two of them inside again, to mend them. We stayed in the laundry, where there was no washing going forward, so it was cooler than the attic; and there was a large table where we could spread the quilts out. One of them was quite strange-looking; it had four grey urns with four green willow trees growing out of them, and a white dove in each corner, or I believe they were intended for doves, although they looked more like chickens; and in the middle was a woman’s name embroidered in black: Flora. And Mary said it was a Memorial Quilt, done by Mrs. Alderman Parkinson in the memory of a dear departed friend, as was then becoming the fashion.

And the other quilt was called Attic Windows; it had a great many pieces, and if you looked at it one way it was closed boxes, and when you looked at it another way the boxes were open, and I suppose the closed boxes were the attics and the open ones were the windows; and that is the same with all quilts, you can see them two different ways, by looking at the dark pieces, or else the light. But when Mary said the name I did not hear it right, and I thought she said Attic Widows, and I said, Attic Widows, that is a very odd name for a bed quilt. And then Mary told me what the right name was, and we had a fit of laughing, because we pictured an attic all full of widows, in their black dresses with their widow’s caps and the weepers hanging down, pulling mournful faces and wringing their hands, and writing letters on their black-bordered writing paper, and dabbing at their eyes with their black-bordered handkerchiefs. And Mary said, And the boxes and chests in the attic would be stuffed to the brim with their dear deceased husbands’ cut-off hair; and I said, And perhaps the dear deceased husbands are in the chests too.

And that set us off again. We could not stop laughing, even when we heard Mrs. Honey and her keys clanking along the hall. We buried our faces against the quilts, and by the time she’d opened the door Mary was composed again, but I was face down with my shoulders heaving, and Mrs. Honey said, What is the matter, girls, and Mary stood up and said, Please Mrs. Honey, it’s just that Grace is crying about her dead mother, and Mrs. Honey said Very well then, you may take her down to the kitchen for a cup of tea, but don’t be too long about it, and she said that young girls were often weepy but Mary must not indulge me and let it get out of control. And when she’d gone out we held onto each other, and laughed so much I thought we should die.

Now you may think it very thoughtless in us, Sir, to have made light of widows; and with the deaths in my own family, I should have known it was not a thing to joke over. And if there had been any widows nearby we would never have done it, as it is wrong to make fun of another’s suffering. But there were no widows to hear us, and all I can say, Sir, is that we were young girls, and young girls are often silly in that way; and it is better to laugh than to burst.

Then I thought about widows — about widow’s humps, and widow’s walks, and the widow’s mite in the Bible, which we servants were always being urged to give to the poor out of our wages; and also I thought about how the men would wink and nod when a young and rich widow was mentioned, and how a widow was a respectable thing to be if old and poor, but not otherwise; which is quite strange when you come to consider it.

In September the weather was beautiful, with days just like summer, and then in October many of the trees turned red and yellow and orange, as if they were on fire, and I could never stop looking at them. And one afternoon towards evening I was outside with Mary gathering in the sheets from the lines, and we heard a sound like many hoarse voices calling together, and Mary said, Look up, it’s the wild geese flying south for the winter. The sky above was dark with them, and Mary said, The hunters will be out tomorrow morning. And it was sad to think that these wild creatures were about to be shot. One night in late October a frightening thing happened to me. I would not tell you about this, Sir, except that you are a doctor and doctors know about it already, so you will not be shocked. I had been using the chamber pot, as I was already in my nightdress and ready to go to bed, so did not want to go outside to the privy in the dark; and when I happened to look down, there was blood, and some on my nightdress also. I was bleeding from between the legs, and I thought I was dying, and burst into tears. Mary coming into the room found me in this state, and said What has happened? and I said that I had a dreadful illness, and would surely die; and I had a pain in my stomach as well, which I’d ignored, thinking it was only from eating too much new bread, as it was a baking day. But now I remembered my mother, and how her death had begun with a stomach pain, and I cried harder.

Mary looked, and to do her credit she did not laugh at me; but explained all. You will wonder that I did not know this, considering how many children my mother had given birth to; but the fact is that I knew about babies and how they got out, and even how they got in, having seen dogs in the street; but not this other thing. I’d had no friends my own age, or I suppose I would have learnt it. And Mary said, You are a woman now, which made me cry again. But she put her arms around me, and comforted me, better than my own mother could have done, for she was always too busy or tired or ill. Then she lent me her red flannel petticoat until I should get one of my own, and showed me how to fold and pin the cloths, and said that some called it Eve’s curse but she thought that was stupid, and the real curse of Eve was having to put up with the nonsense of Adam, who as soon as there was any trouble, blamed it all on her. She also said that if the pain got too bad she would get me some willow bark to chew, and that would help; and she would heat a brick for me on the kitchen stove, and wrap it in a towel, for the ache. And I was very grateful to her, for she was indeed a good and kind friend. And then she sat me down and combed out my hair, which was gentle and soothing, and she said, Grace, you will be a beauty, soon you will turn the men’s heads. The worst ones are the gentlemen, who think they are entitled to anything they want; and when you go out to the privy at night, they’re drunk then, they lie in wait for you and then it is snatch and grab, there’s no reasoning with them, and if you must, you should give them a kick between the legs where they’ll feel it; and it is always better to lock your door, and to use the chamber pot. But any kind of man will try the same; and they’ll start promising things, they’ll say they will do whatever you want; but you must be very careful what you ask, and you must never do anything for them until they have performed what they promised; and if there’s a ring, there must be a parson to go with it.

I asked her innocently, Why was that, and she said it was because men were liars by nature, and would say anything to get what they wanted of you, and then they would think better of it and be off on the next boat. And now I saw that we were in the same story as the one Aunt Pauline used to tell about my mother, and I nodded wisely and said that she was right, although still not altogether certain what she meant. And she gave me a hug, and said I was a good girl.

On the night of October the 31st, which as you know, Sir, is All Hallows Eve, when they say the spirits of the dead come back from the grave, although it is only a superstition — on that night, Mary came to our room with something hidden in her apron, and she said, Look, I have got us four apples, I begged them from Cook. Apples were plentiful at that time of year and there were barrels of them already stored in the cellar. Oh, I said, are they for us to eat, and she said We will eat them after, but this is the night when you can find out who you will marry. She said she had got four, so that we would each have two chances at it.

She showed me a little knife she’d got from Cook also, or so she said. The truth is that she sometimes took things without asking, which made me nervous; though she said it was not stealing as long as you put the things back after. But sometimes she didn’t do that either. She’d taken a copy of The Lady of the Lake by Sir Walter Scott out of the library where they had five of them, and she was reading it out loud to me; and she had a store of candle-ends which she’d taken one by one from the dining room, and she kept them hidden under a loose floorboard; and if she’d had them by permission, she wouldn’t have done so. We were allowed our own candle, to undress by at night, but Mrs. Honey said we weren’t to burn it up in a profligate way, each candle was to last us a week, and that was less light than Mary wanted to have. She had some Lucifer matches which she also kept hidden, so that when our official candle was blown out to save it, she could light another whenever she wanted; and she lit two of her candle-ends now.

Here is the knife and the apple, she said, and you must take the peel off in one long piece; and then without looking behind you, you must throw it over your left shoulder. And it will spell out the initial of the man you will marry, and tonight you will dream about him.

I was too young to be thinking of husbands, but Mary talked about them a great deal. When she’d saved up enough of her wages, she was going to marry a nice young farmer whose land was already cleared and a good house built; and if she could not get one of those, she would settle for one with a log house, and they would build a better house later. She even knew what kind of hens and cow they would have

— she wanted white and red Leghorns, and a Jersey cow for the cream and cheese, which she said there was nothing better.

So I took the apple and pared it, and I got the peel off in one piece. Then I threw it behind me, and we looked at how it had fallen. There was no telling which way was up, but at last we decided that it was a J. And Mary began to tease, and to tell over the names of the men she knew whose names began with a J; and she said I would marry Jim from the stables, who had a squint, and stank horribly; or else Jeremiah the peddler, who was much handsomer, though I would have to tramp the country, and would have no house but the pack I carried on my back, like a snail. And she said I would cross water three times before it happened, and I said she was inventing it; and she smiled, because I’d guessed she was tricking me.

Then it was her turn, and she began to peel. But the peel on her first apple broke, and also on the second; and I gave her my extra one, but she was so nervous that she cut it in two almost as soon as she’d begun. And then she laughed, and said it was only a foolish old wives’ tale, and she ate the third apple, and set the other two on the window ledge to keep until the morning, and I ate my own apple; and we turned to making fun of Mrs. Alderman Parkinson’s corsets; but underneath all the funning she was upset.

And when we went to bed, I could tell that she hadn’t gone to sleep, but was lying on her back beside me, staring up at the ceiling; and when I did go to sleep myself, I did not dream of husbands at all. Instead I dreamt of my mother in her winding sheet, drifting down through the cold water, which was blue-green in colour; and the sheet began to come undone at the top, and it waved as if in the wind, and her hair floated out, rippling like seaweed; but the hair was over her face so I could not see it, and it was darker than my mother’s hair had been; and then I knew that this was not my mother at all, but some other woman, and she was not dead inside the sheet at all, but still alive. And I was afraid; and I woke up with my heart beating very fast, and the cold sweat on me. But Mary was asleep now, breathing deeply, and the grey and pink light of the dawn was beginning; and outside the cocks had begun to crow, and all was as usual. And so I felt better.

Chapter 20

And so things went on through November, when the leaves fell from the trees and it became dark early, and the weather was grim and grey, with a hard driving rain; and then December came, and the ground froze up solid as rock, and there were flurries of snow. Our attic room was now very cold, especially in the mornings, when we had to get up in the dark and put our bare feet on the icy floorboards; and Mary said that when she had a house of her own, she would have a braided rag rug beside every bed, and she herself would have a pair of warm felt slippers. We took our clothes into the bed with us, to warm them up before putting them on, and dressed underneath the bedclothes; and at night we would heat bricks on the stove and wrap them in flannel and put them in the bed, to keep our toes from turning to icicles. And the water in our basin was so cold that it would send the pain shooting up my arms when washing my hands; and I was glad we were two in a bed.

But Mary said this was nothing, as the real winter was not here and it would get much colder yet; and the only good of it was that they would have to build up the fires in the house, and burn them longer. And it was better to be a servant, in the daytime at least, because we could always warm ourselves in the kitchen, whereas the drawing room was as drafty as a barn and you could get no heat from the fireplace unless you stood right next to it, and Mrs. Alderman Parkinson lifted her skirts in front of it when alone in the room, to warm her backside; and last winter she’d set her petticoats alight, and Agnes the chambermaid heard the shouting, and rushed in and was frightened into hysterics, and Mrs. Alderman Parkinson had a blanket thrown over her, and was rolled on the floor like a barrel, by Jim from the stables. Luckily she was not burnt, but merely singed a little.

In the middle of December, my father sent my poor sister Katey to beg more of my wages; he would not come himself. I felt sorry for Katey, as the burden that had once been on me was now on her; and I brought her into the kitchen and warmed her by the stove, and asked a piece of bread from Cook, who said it was not her job to feed all of the starving orphans in the town, but gave it nevertheless; and Katey cried, and said she wished I was at home again. And I gave her a quarter of a dollar, and said she was to tell our father it was all I had, which I am sorry to say was a lie; but I had come to feel that the truth was not a thing I owed him. And I gave her ten cents for herself, and said she was to keep it safe in case of need, though she was in need enough already. Also I gave her a petticoat of mine, that was grown too small.

She said that our father had found no steady work, only odd jobs, but had the prospect of going north that winter, to cut trees; and had news of some free land further west, and would go there once the spring had come. Which he did, and suddenly too, for Mrs. Burt came around and said my father had gone off without paying anywhere near all he owed. At first she wanted me to make it good, but Mary told her she could not force a girl of thirteen to pay a debt incurred by a grown man; and Mrs. Burt was not a bad woman at heart, and at the end she said it was not my fault.

I do not know what became of my father and the children. I never had a letter, and also heard nothing from them at the time of the trial.

As Christmastime came around, spirits rose; and the fires were built up larger, and hampers were delivered from the grocer, and great wedges of beef, and the carcass of a pig from the butcher, which was to be roasted whole; and bustling preparations were made in the kitchen; and Mary and I were called away from the laundry, to give a hand, and we stirred and mixed for Cook, and peeled and sliced the apples, and picked through the raisins and currants, and grated the nutmegs, and beat up the eggs as required; and we liked this very much, as there was a chance for a taste here and a nibble there, and whenever we could we scraped off a little sugar for ourselves; and Cook did not notice or say anything, as she had a great deal on her mind.

It was Mary and me who made the bottom crusts for all of the mince pies, although Cook did the top ones, as she said there was an art to it which we were too young to know; and she cut out stars for them, and other fancy designs. And she let us unwrap the Christmas cakes from the layers of muslin round them, and pour on the brandy and whisky, and wrap them up again; and the smell of it was one of the best things I can remember.

There were many pies and cakes needed, as it was the season of visiting, and of dinners and parties and balls. The two sons of the household came home from school, at Harvard in Boston; their names were Mr. George and Mr. Richard, and both seemed pleasant enough and fairly tall. I did not pay much attention to them, as to my mind they only made for more washing, and a great many more shirts to be starched and ironed; but Mary was always peeping out the upstairs window into the yard, to see if she could catch a glimpse of them as they rode away on their horses, or else listening in the passageway, while they sang duets with the ladies invited; and what she liked especially was The Rose of Tralee, because her name was in it — where it says, Oh no, “twas the truth in her eye ever dawning, That made me love Mary, the Rose of Tralee. She had a good singing voice herself, too, and knew many of the songs off by heart; which the two of them would sometimes come into the kitchen and tease her to sing. And she called them young scamps, although both of them were some years older than she was. On Christmas Day itself, Mary gave me a pair of warm mittens which she’d knitted. I’d seen her doing it, but she had been very sly, and had told me they were for a young friend of hers; and I never thought that the young friend she meant was myself. They were a beautiful dark blue, with red flowers embroidered on them. And I gave her a needle-case I’d made from five squares of red flannel, sewn together along the top; and it tied shut with two bits of ribbon. And Mary thanked me, and gave me a hug and a kiss, and said it was the best needle-case in the world, you could never buy such a thing in a store, and she’d never seen one like it, and she would treasure it always.

The snow had fallen heavily that day, and the people were out in their sleighs, with bells on the horses, and it sounded very pretty. And after the family had eaten their Christmas dinner the servants ate theirs, and had their own turkey and mince pies, and we sang some carols together, and were glad. This was the happiest Christmas that I ever spent, either before or after. Mr. Richard went back to school after the holidays, but Mr. George stayed at home. He’d caught a chill which had gone to his lungs, and was coughing a great deal; and Mr. and Mrs. Alderman Parkinson went about with long faces, and the doctor came, which alarmed me. But it was said he did not have consumption, only a feverish cold, and the lumbago, and must be kept quiet, and given hot drinks; and these he had in plentiful supply, as he was a great favourite with the servants. And Mary heated an iron button on the stove, which she said was the best thing for the lumbago, if you put it on the spot; and she took it up to him.

By the time he was better it was the middle of February, and he’d missed so much of the college term he said he would stay away until the next one; and Mrs. Alderman Parkinson agreed, and said he needed to build up his strength. And so there he was, being fussed over by all, and with time on his hands and not much he needed to do, which is a bad situation for a young man full of spirits. And there was no shortage of parties to go to, and girls to dance with, and their mothers to plan his wedding for him without his knowledge. I am afraid he was very much indulged, not least by himself. For if the world treats you well, Sir, you come to believe you are deserving of it.

Mary had told the truth about the winter. The snow at Christmastime had been heavy, but it was like a blanket of feathers, and the air appeared warmer after it had fallen; and the stablehands joked, and threw snowballs; but as they were soft, they broke when they hit.

But soon the real winter set in, and the snow began to come down in earnest. This time it was not soft but hard, like tiny stinging pellets of ice; and it was driven along by a keen and bitter wind, and piled up in thick drifts; and I feared we would all be buried alive. Icicles grew on the roof, and you had to be careful when passing underneath, as they could fall off, and were sharp and pointed; and Mary had heard of a woman who’d been killed by one, that went right through her body like a skewer. One day there was sleet, which covered all the tree branches with a coating of ice, and the next day they sparkled in the sun like a thousand diamonds; but the trees were weighted down by it, and many branches broke. And the entire world was hard and white, and when the sun shone it was so blinding that you had to shield your eyes, and not look at it too long.

We kept indoors as much as possible, as there was a danger of frostbite, especially in the fingers and toes; and the men went about with scarves tied over their ears and noses, and their breath came out in clouds. The family had their fur rugs in the sleigh, and their wraps and cloaks, and went visiting; but we did not have such warm garments. At night Mary and I put our shawls on top of the bedcovers, and wore our stockings and an extra petticoat to bed; though even so we were not warm. By morning the fires had died down, and our hot bricks had cooled, and we were shivering like rabbits. On the last day of February the weather improved somewhat; and we ventured out on errands, having wrapped our feet up well in flannel cloths, inside the boots which we begged from the stablehands; and we wound ourselves in as many shawls as we could find or borrow, and walked down as far as the harbour. It was frozen solid, with great blocks and slices of ice piled against the shore; and there was a place cleared of snow, where the ladies and gentlemen were skating. It was a graceful motion, as if the ladies were running on wheels underneath their dresses, and I said to Mary that it must be delightful. Mr. George was there, gliding over the ice hand in hand with a young lady in a fur scarf, and he saw us, and gave us a cheerful wave. I asked Mary if she had ever skated, and she said no. About this time I began to notice a change in Mary. She was often late coming to bed; and when she did come, she no longer wanted to talk. She did not hear what I said to her, but appeared to be listening to something else; and she was constantly looking out through doorways, or windows, or over my shoulder. One night when she thought I was asleep, I saw her hiding something away in a handkerchief, under the floorboard where she kept her candle-ends and matches; and when I looked the next day, she being out of the room, I found that it was a gold ring. My first thought was that she had stolen it, which would be more than she’d ever stolen before, and very bad for her if she was caught; though there was no talk in the house of a missing ring.

But she did not laugh and fun as before, nor did she attend to her work in her usual brisk manner; and I became worried. But when I questioned her, and asked if there was some trouble, she would laugh, and say she did not know where I was getting such ideas. But her smell had changed, from nutmegs to salt fish.

The snow and ice began to melt, and a few birds returned, and they began to sing and call; so I knew it would soon be spring. And one day in late March, as we were carrying the clean wash up the back stairs in baskets, to hang it in the drying room, Mary said she was ill; and she ran downstairs and out into the back yard, behind the outbuildings. I set down my basket and followed her, just as I was, without my shawl; and I found her on her knees in the wet snow near the privy, which she had not had time to reach, as she had been overcome by a violent sickness.

I helped her up, and her forehead was damp and clammy, and I said she should be put to bed; but at that she became angry, and said it was something she’d eaten, it must have been yesterday’s mutton stew, and now she was rid of it. But I’d eaten the very same thing myself, and felt perfectly well. She made me promise not to speak of it, and I said I would not. But when the same thing happened a few days later, and then again the next morning, I was truly alarmed; for I had seen my own mother in that condition very often, and I knew the milky smell of it; and I was well aware of what was wrong with Mary. I thought it over, and turned it this way and that in my mind; and towards the end of April I taxed her with it, and swore very solemnly that if she would confide in me, I would not tell; for I believed she was in great need of confiding in someone, as she was restless at night, and had dark circles beneath her eyes, and was oppressed by the burden of her secret. Then she broke down and cried, and said my suspicions were all too true; and the man had promised to marry her, and had given her a ring, and for once in a way she’d believed him, as she’d thought he was not like other men; but he’d gone back on his promise, and now would not speak with her; and she was in despair and did not know what to do. I asked her who the man was, but she would not tell me; and she said that as soon as it was known what sort of trouble she was in, she would be turned away, as Mrs. Alderman Parkinson held very strict views; and then what would happen to her? Some girls in her place would have gone back to their families, but she had none; and now no decent man would marry her, and she would have to go on the streets, and become a sailors’ drab, as she would have no other way of feeding herself and the baby. And such a life would soon be the end of her.

I was very distressed on her behalf, and also on mine, for she was the truest and indeed the only friend I had in the world. I comforted her the best way I could, but I did not know what to say. Throughout the month of May, Mary and I frequently talked about what she should do. I said there must be a workhouse or something of the sort that would take her in, and she said she knew of none, but even so, if young girls went to any such place they always died, as they got fever as soon as they were delivered; and she believed the babies in such places were secretly smothered, so as not to be a charge on the public purse; and she would sooner take her chances of dying elsewhere. We talked about some way of delivering the baby ourselves, and keeping it quiet, and giving it away as an orphan; but she said her condition would soon begin to show; and Mrs. Honey had very sharp eyes, and had already remarked that Mary was putting on flesh, and she could not hope to go long undetected. I said she should try one last time to speak with the man in question, and appeal to his better nature. And she did so; but when she returned from the interview — which must have taken place nearby, as she was not gone long — she was angrier than she had ever been. She said he’d given her five dollars; and she’d said was that all his child was worth to him? And he said she would not catch him that way, and he doubted that it was even his own child, since she’d been so obliging with him, that he suspected she had been so for others; and if she threatened him with a scandal, or went to his family, he would deny it, and ruin whatever reputation she had left; and if she wanted a quick end to her troubles she could always drown herself.