The Palace Of Curiosities Part 14

'It will make your hair glossy,' he replied. 'Drink your gla.s.s of milk.' He checked the time once more and this time it satisfied him. 'Enough. We must make ready.'

'Dear husband, no-one has arrived.'

'You must be seated when they call.'

He placed me on the chair, angling it sideways to the window so that I could not gaze out upon the street. I faced the empty rows of seats.

'May I have a book to read until they are come?'

'Later. Indeed, that is a good idea. It will impress them.'

He took a step back and regarded me. I smiled.

'Raise your fan.'

I did as he asked.

'Better. Yes, that is better. Have you learned "Alice, Where Art Thou"?'

'Yes, I have it right.' I yawned.

'My dear Mrs Arroner, please be a little more ladylike.'

'I am sorry, dearest Josiah.' I giggled. 'Those eggs were very rich.'

'Yes, yes. And please call me Mr Arroner.'

'Dearest?'

'Before our guests. It is more seemly.'

The sun gushed through the gla.s.s and my armpits were threatening to trickle.

'Dearest Mr Arroner. It is very warm. Would you close the window shutters?'

My husband laughed. 'No-one has died! What notions you have.'

There was a thunderous knocking at the door, and he raced to answer it. I sat quietly, wondering how I might ease the growing cramp in my calves without getting up and skipping about on the rug. I simmered in the sunshine, stiff in my new whalebone.

A crowd of gentlemen walked in, looking about and making loud comments about the quality of our furnishings. My husband ducked like a coal-heaver, hand hovering halfway to tugging his hair in grat.i.tude. He showed our visitors into their seats, calling for tea, for coffee, and drawing attention to the little biscuits made from almonds, and how costly they were, to be sure. I smiled at his unaccustomed deference.

To begin with, our guests paid me no attention. They chattered like ravens on a roof-ridge about the best horse to wager upon, the best tailor for waistcoats, the best for trousers, all the while sipping noisily at their coffee. I felt like a bird of paradise, stuffed and mounted on a twig, a gla.s.s dome rammed down over my head.

However, they could not keep their eyes from me for long, and after a few minutes I spied them sneaking glances over the brims of their cups. I wondered when one of them might remember his good manners, step up, kiss my hand politely and ask me how I fared. I flapped my fan and grew stickier.

'Gentlemen!' my husband cried, and their clucking stopped. He stepped into the centre of the room and made a deep bow. 'I welcome you all to my humble abode.'

There was a fluttering of amus.e.m.e.nt and he bowed again.

'Permit me to make the correct and proper introductions, for which I know you are most keen. My wife,' he said and made a flourishing gesture towards me. 'My dear and most precious wife.'

I heard a few gasps and grinned, covering the smirk with my fan.

'Is it an automaton?' said one. 'I have seen the new French creations.'

'It is much larger.'

'These Frenchies are capable of anything.'

My husband coughed. 'She is no clockwork creature,' he said, p.r.o.nouncing the word 'she' with great emphasis, for which I was grateful.

'I am sure I spy a key!' laughed one wag. 'Let me wind it up and watch it dance!'

'No, there is no key.'

'Ha! I declare there is one hidden up its skirt! Let me show you.'

The fellow stood up, and my husband patted him on the shoulder so heartily he sat back down again. He laughed along with their laughter, complimenting them for being such 'brave fellows, oh yes, fine fellows, men of distinction and discrimination!' until by and by the thought of peering up my dress was forgotten.

'Oh! That I have been blessed with such a jewel for my wife!' he exclaimed.

The gentlemen cheered gleefully, whereupon my husband removed his hat and lowered his voice to a conspiratorial hiss.

'Ah, yes! This unusual creature you see before you was brought into London at great expense from the broad savannahs of Africa! From the establishment of a certain lady of such high position and royal connections that discretion does not permit me to elaborate further.'

He winked, prompting one man seated on the front row to whisper in the ear of his neighbour, who exclaimed, 'No!' in disbelief.

'Tut tut!' chided my husband. 'Such t.i.ttle-tattle, I never did!'

The company sn.i.g.g.e.red.

'Suffice it to say that said lady was startled by a ravening lion and was rescued from the jaws of death by her brave husband. Nine months later she brought forth the miraculous child you see before you.'

I ducked behind my fan at hearing such an exaggerated account of my beginnings. I felt no shame about my humble origins, and I wondered if he did, for it was such a mesh of lies he was spinning. I had no desire to be thought showy. But he was already speaking again.

'This gentlewoman entrusted her unusual babe into the care of others, who brought her to our fair isle to be educated in seclusion. For beneath her savage and terrifying appearance quivers the heart of a true Lady. Who can estimate the delicacy of emotion, the tenderness of expression which is concealed behind such a savage visage?'

He pointed at me. Their eyebrows climbed up their foreheads.

'Shall I prove she is a creature of flesh and blood, gentlemen?'

He walked to my side, leaned to my ear and hissed, 'Now, my dear.' I grasped the arms of the chair and raised myself slowly, closing my fan and resting it upon my breast.

'Gentlemen,' I said. Quietly, but each could hear me, for I declare a thick silence had fallen. 'I am delighted to meet you.'

'It speaks,' said one, in a small voice.

'Indeed, that is true,' I said. 'I speak. Shall I also sing for you, dear guests?'

Their heads nodded, stiff-necked. I had their attention now, however much they wished to dismiss me.

I began, and they held their tongues, and there were no more smart answers: 'The birds sleeping gently, Sweet Luna gleameth bright ...'

At the end they patted their hands together, which I thought kind, for my voice is not the most melodious.

'Ah! Is she not unique?' cried my husband, striding forwards. 'The best of her kind! Never seen before! How fortunate you are to be granted this rare opportunity to study such a sport of nature, and thereby to speculate on the mysterious Hand of G.o.d working through His creation!'

After a further selection of songs and a more detailed elaboration of my qualities, our visitors began to file out, pressing money into my husband's hand.

'Tell all your acquaintances!' he called after them. 'She is the only true and genuine Lion-Faced Woman. We are at home every day from two o'clock until six o'clock. Two shillings and one for children.'

After they had departed, he was smiling in a way I had never seen before.

'We are rich,' he grinned, bouncing from foot to foot.

'Are we, my dear? How so?' said I.

He waved a bag, and it clinked.

'Is this not wonderful?' he crowed, unable to help himself.

'It is wonderful, Mr Arroner. How did we come by such fortune?'

'You, my dear little wife! You are my fortune!' I must have looked confused, for he patted my head again. 'Ah! Such a sweet girl, I declare. Our visitors were rich, my dear, and have bestowed some of their wealth upon us. Simply for the pleasure they have experienced today, of meeting such a treasure as yourself.'

'That is very generous of them.'

'Indeed! It is capital,' he crooned, cradling his newborn wealth. 'I shall deny you nothing. Ask anything.'

I opened my mouth, but he filled the s.p.a.ce before I had a chance to speak.

'Anything. New dresses, new fans, new hats; ah yes, indeed new hats!'

With each afternoon my husband's description of me grew more and more outlandish until I was transformed into a creature I barely recognised: I became 'morally uplifting; the most prodigious creature ever examined by Europe's leading men of Science and Philosophy; offered to the general populace for the further edification and education of Mankind'.

Donkey-Skin remained my sole night-time companion.

See how they struggle with pity, horror and amus.e.m.e.nt, she said. How terrified they would be if they looked into the mirror and saw you instead of their own milky faces.

You are what they fear they might truly be. When they have snuffed the bedside candle, you are there. You are the darkness that swims over them, and drowns them.

'Oh hush,' I said to her. 'You are always so dramatic.'

I grew tired of listening to her poetic ramblings, so I resolved to go to my husband and discover what so occupied his nocturnal hours. Taking a candle, it was not difficult to find him in the room at the top of his house that he described as his Chamber of Retreat. The door was ajar; through it I saw, first, shelves lining the walls, stacked with yards of morocco-bound books stamped with bra.s.sy t.i.tles. I had never seen him read any of them. A narrow bed constructed of broad oak planks was shoved against the wall. In the centre of the room was a desk, over which bent my husband, lit by a bulb-stomached oil lamp. He was counting coins into neat piles. At the satisfactory completion of each heap he scribbled in an open ledger, the stub of his index finger keeping the place.

The word 'dearest' was less than one-half out of my mouth when his head spun in my direction; at the same moment he brought his arms around the coins and cradled them to his breast in a motherly gesture. It lasted less than two ticks of the wall clock; then he straightened up and began to adjust his cufflinks.

'Ah! Dear wife. So you find me at my labours.'

'It is late, Mr Arroner.'

'This is necessary toil.' He pointed at a small metal box, attached to the leg of the bed by a st.u.r.dy chain. 'Safer than the Bank of England,' he beamed, giving the chain a powerful tug. It responded with an obedient rattle. 'Guaranteed fire-proof. And I have the only key.'

'Are you not tired?' I asked hopefully.

'I am never tired when it comes to securing our financial future, Mrs Arroner.'

'Oh.'

He leaned towards me and planted a kiss on my forehead.

'Off with you, dearest heart. Take your rest and do not fret over your beloved. He will be thinking of you every minute.'

He turned away and resumed counting. I returned to my bed and stuffed my fingers into my ears so that I could not hear a word of Donkey-Skin's what did you expect?

The next day brought more callers, the day after more again, until I thought the walls would burst with the heap of them: the men bringing with them their women, who giggled and contrived ladylike fits of fainting, and their children, who yelped and hid their faces in their mothers' skirts to the greater amus.e.m.e.nt of the crowds.

I was made giddy with the ceaseless bustle, the endless coming and going of visitors. Each time I asked my husband to temper his exuberant descriptions of me, he brushed away my concerns, showering me with costly trinkets and new songs to learn. I grew so enervated that one day over luncheon, after we had been married for three months, I asked him to send the guests away just for one afternoon.

'It is not merely for my well-being,' I reasoned. 'They fatigue you also.'

'Not so!' he said. 'They give me the greatest satisfaction.'

'Dearest husband, we spend no time together.'

'We are always together. Every day. I do not leave you for one minute.'

'But we are always in the company of others.'

'Yes, dear Mrs Arroner. Is it not wonderful?'

I searched for words to say how I longed for his kisses, his body pressing against mine, but could find nothing that was not indelicate.

'Do you not like my friends? Is their company not to your taste?'

'It is not that, Mr Arroner.'

'Would you choose different friends for me?'

'Of course not, dear husband.'

'Then I declare myself confused.'

'I would be with you, that is all.'

'So, I do not pay you enough attention, is that it? Is it not enough that I shower you with every gift a woman could desire?'

He stood up, gripping the edge of the table, crumpling the cloth in his plump fingers.