STAVE 8
When the mist parted again it was upon the Cratchit household in Camden Town; the last great holiday we would spend there; New Year's Eve 1843. I had never liked this holiday. I thought it was frivolous for a change of calendar and somewhat depressing that we were ushering out such a magical month of December to return to the everyday. But I did enjoy the morning mass I spent with my family, I thought the hymns were beautiful, the last Christmas hymns of the season. Tim was in the choir.
We all put on our best dress and bonnets to attend. Mum would always yell about being late but we never were, yet we might have found it bad luck if we did not hear her voice bellow through the house. The world might have come to a stop, or for that year…Mr. Scrooge might have gone back on his word. "Come along Cratchits, come along! We are going to be late! Lord alive, the lot of you knows how I hate to be tardy for anything! I think you do it to spite me!"… all was well.
Belinda and I laughed, and so did Lucy who I held on my lap. "Shall we wait until the last second to come out from our room to ruffle her feathers?" asked Belinda wickedly.
"Of course!" I conspired. "It is a Cratchit girl tradition to make mother irate before church! The clergy would not know what to do if they saw her any other way!" we all laughed again.
"How will the tradition continue once we are married off and separated?" questioned Belinda. I thought a moment and rested my chin upon the top of Lucy's head and smiled. "If we are parted… we must simply make our poor bridegrooms irate instead." I giggled. "Think of it, the three most simmering men in church will be unmistakably, undeniably married to Cratchit girls! Oh we will have to make it up to them later to be sure!"
Mum stormed in then to clap her hands and shuttle us along in her fretful but adoring way. I smiled when I took father's left arm and kissed him good morning as Peter addressed the issue of how good it had been to have him home for one full week. Yes, Mr. Scrooge had given him the week off as another long overdue kindness. Dad said there would be a surprise for us after church and indeed there was; only, I was made privy to the surprise during one of the hymns by mum.
It was a good church; old, but warm and beautiful all the same. The clergy was completely holy and upheld the word of God credibly and patiently. Belinda thought that sometimes the sermons droned on and on; and so did I but the choir was worth it. Ida had protested the idea of church all together. Ida thought that one should simply do God's work and not just ramble idly with hands clasped. There was truth in this, we did and do make our own fate… but church was so peaceful…. I saw a great moving point in going, especially when the choir and congregation rose its voice in one singular meeting.
" Silent night, holy night, all is calm, all is bright
Round yon virgin Mother and Child, holy
Infant so tender and mild,
Sleep in heavenly peace,
Sleep in heavenly peace."
In the midst of this grandeur, mum lifted up her side of the song book we were holding to hide her lips and leant into me. "Mr. Scrooge has come to see your brother sing and meet him straight afterwards." She said to me. My eyes darted to the front doors where heavenly light was streaming in and there he was leaning against the wood respectfully, his eyes trained upon Tiny Tim even as my eyes were trained upon him. My lips parted in surprise. He too was singing the hymn or he was at least mouthing the words. Humility and humanity looked well on him.
His face was still set with hints of lines that would emphasize sternness or disapproval but with the new light in his eyes these unpleasant lines softened into distinguish charm, there were brushes of silver that glinted when met with light in his hair and sideburns. Dressed to his finest, pale skinned and blue eyed. A very handsome man when he was mild, a very handsome man indeed.
My mother half slapped my arm. How long I had been looking I did not know. "Don't look back at him." She jeered. "Lest you want people to think you are leering, disrespectful to the lord and lusting after him!" it was such an extreme for merely satisfying a curiosity, I was appalled at the implication.
"You're the one that interrupted me in song to tell me he was here!" I whisper. "My first design is to look when something specific is pointed out to me. What would you have me do? Not look and disrespect you that way?" I question. She leans into me again.
"Just shut your trap and keep your eyes forward or it will be a proper wallop for you after church, I don't care how old you are!"
"Yes mum." I submit with a fleeting moment of annoyance before I resume loving her patiently and singing again but yet; no, not obeying completely for I kept him in the corner of my eye.
After the sermon and the final Amen was uttered, the people begun to dispatch and started filing out one by one to resume their New Year's Eve plans of parties and grand dinners. I myself was planning to go to the hospital that morning and visit with whoever would receive me until midafternoon…
Upon exiting my father was surprised to see Mr. Scrooge which tipped me off that the confidentiality must have been between my mum and Mr. Scrooge during a passing moment in town. "What ho! Mr. Scrooge!" Dad laughed then directing his offspring accordingly. "Line up children, line up! Good and proper and in order so I can introduce you! Look lively now, look lively! That's it!"
And so we were in a line, I first as should be in order of birth and Tim last. Dad clasped his employers shoulder and led him down the line. "My eldest, Martha."
I curtsy and he nods and moves on.
"Peter, my second." They shake hands. "A pleasure master Peter."
"Belinda, our third." Another gentlemanly nod. "Ms. Belinda, how do you do?"
"Mathew and Lucy." With a smile he kneels down and shakes both of their hands and takes the time to listen to both of them as if they were equals, and then resumes.
"And our youngest, Tim." The moment of truth…. He knelt down again and removed his hat and sat it next to him. He smiles patiently and says very softly. "Hello young Mr. Cratchit, I have been waiting ever so eagerly to meet you."
Tim only wavers for a moment and then smiles, and then as they both laugh with the joy of meeting each other as if it had been their destiny to do so all along, they embrace. "Bless you my boy. We will get you well again and if permitted, love you like a son!" He was sincere, it touched me, touched all of us as mist was in all of our eyes. "Am I permitted? Am I?"
Mum clasped her hands and bellowed. "You are!" dad agreed and so did Tim. With this, Mr. Scrooge in a single motion lifted Tim upon his left shoulder and walked with him there as if he weighed no more than a feather as Mathew, Lucy, dad and mum all fought for the honor of conversing with him.
Peter, Belinda and I stayed at a distance to talk among ourselves. "I think he's bananas and that mum and dad are following him blindly." Peter stated; blunt in his skepticism.
"Do not be so cynical." Said Belinda. "If he was going to swindle us, he wouldn't have waited this long." She then turned to me inquisitively. "Martha?"
She waited for my verdict, if anyone was a sceptic or cynic in the family it was me and with good reason and keen sense of my fellow man I usually was right. I took into account everything, the tone of his voice, the warmth in his smile, the way he had looked at Tim as dad used to look at me when I was young, how he had met us all as equals and the past. I spoke. "I…I think he is in earnest." I took in a breath. "I do believe with all my heart that he is in earnest."
And with that I joined the others and took my place at my father's side. "Normally we just have dinner and go to bed." Said he to Mr. Scrooge.
"Oh that's nonsense." Replied the banker with a smile. "You must join me at Fred's New Years Eve party, I insist all of you must!"
All of the younger children begun to beg and even Belinda when she joined brightened at the notion. "Of course we will come!" Answered mum in a flustered breath before a second could pass. Mr. Scrooge put Tim down and smiled. "Excellent!" he beamed. "I shall see you all when the bell tolls eight, you know the place Bob. Mrs. Cratchit." And with a tip of his hat he walked in the other direction.
"Our first party mother!" Lucy cheered.
Mum rounded all of us up with a sense of nothing short of a chief in command. "Now listen up children, I want you all to go from neighbor to neighbor and see if you can recruit the best outfits you can find to borrow."
"Emily!" Dad gasped.
"Bob!" was her curt reply. And no more was said.
"Will it affect my time at the hospital?" I asked of father as everyone else set forth on their mission to somehow become presentable. Mum overheard and smirked. "Not you, less you expect to stay their till half past seven. I ave your gown already. You get your dowry tonight love!"
My dowry? Did I have such a thing? Had dad not have been there to give me a reassuring nod I might have retired her to Bedlam. But ah no. She too was in earnest. She in all of her struggles and tribulations had indeed saved a trifle for her first born. Had I ever doubted her love (which I most certainly had) those doubts were put to rest by her wedding gown.
It was a beautiful, white, delicate thing that would have fetched a pretty penny at any given time. It fit me seamlessly, we had been the same size. My lips parted as I beheld myself in it in the mirror. My hair was pinned up with tendrils cascading down and I had the lightest dusting of rouge upon my cheeks and as I have said the gown fitted me well. The mirror showed to me a creature that halfway resembled what a woman should be; soft and gentle on the eyes. I was half inclined to look up what Merriam Webster would define this creature that had swallowed Martha Cratchit whole as.…I would have come up with this…
Beauty; the qualities in a person or a thing that give pleasure to the senses or the mind.
It seemed almost blasphemous to associate outer beauty with the eldest Cratchit, a phenomenon really. More of a thing that belonged in a circus rather than a party.
"If we put a colored shawl with it no one will know it was a wedding dress." Mum declared flittering about as the other girls came in with what they had procured. Bits and pieces from neighbors and even some costumes from Mad Sal's to make the illusion of presentable party dresses.
My sisters were tended to one by one and I watched, thinking. I had invited Tom to join us but he said he would not go. I told him that I would be lonely if he did not go and he didn't understand how I could with my whole family and a crowd. He did not know me. In crowds were when I felt loneliest. He did not know me and yet we were engaged and had been for seven years. That was how aristocratic, arranged marriages worked, no one really knew who they were marrying….Tom and I were not aristocrats. Ida had arranged it. Ida knew me… what was I going to do at this party?
"Martha put on your shoes dear. Now everyone don't forget what happens at midnight!"
Midnight. Shoes. A less than grand woman at a grand ball. Where had I heard this before? I had read it somewhere. My head was racing! Something told me that after this party change was going to be on the horizon and everyone was going to be racing towards it full-speed-ahead and that it was every man for himself. The younger Cratchits of course would have etiquette lessons and learn French, the art of silence, debut balls and learn how to be desired in society. Belinda had not missed that mark and nor had Peter, they were young yet and mum and dad had time to teach them. But I was near twenty-five, an old dog for new tricks. Where did or would that leave me? Abandon, again.
The shoes were uncomfortable.
Dad ushered us out.
We were off.
To describe what the party was like when we arrived through the eyes of my younger self would be nothing short of an understatement and sense Fan and I had arrived at this year and I was only a year younger than I am now, I found it hard to separate that self from this self, which is why I hardly reference us as separate beings. My heart, body and soul was fully in it now, as if I were living it for the first time.
The skirts of the ball gowns seemed to bloom like spring flowers upon the dancefloor. Everybody moved so intricately and in time. And those who were not on the floor engaged in a low but satisfying drone of conversations flowing as elegantly as the dances.
The candles danced too. As bright and as star like as the very star that brought The Three Wise-men to a humble manger on a cold but fateful night. The furnishing was pristine and lavish and beautiful. Fred and Joan Milark our host and hostess were also this way. The Cratchits were humbled. We were welcomed with opened arms.
Despite my protest father pulled me into a polka after mum was settled with a group of ladies and a glass. He wanted a proper dance with his eldest girl. He was truly happy, which made me all the happier to oblige. I felt like the only child again and he felt it too. In his soft brown eyes he still saw me as that fat-faced little thing that he would dance around the parlor, as if no years of poverty or hardships had passed between that girl and this. I saw mother press a hand to her chest lovingly and tilt her head and Belinda unconsciously did the same.
"This was the kind of life I had meant for you to have." He said taking a tighter grip on my hand warmly, but his eyes did not betray his hints of feeling failure.
"I have had a great life Papa." I assure him as we dance at arm's length, I had not called him that in years. But, with everyone else twirling with seamless fluidity; and me never having danced in a restricting corset before, all the motion got to me. "Can I go sit down?" I say softly. "I feel dizzy." My first downfall as a society woman.
Dad looked at me with a smile that bespoke drowning love and pride, and coming forward kissed my brow. I could do no wrong in his eyes. "What a little woman you have become." He whispers and his fatherly love makes me melt inside and I shared his melancholy smile.
As I went out Belinda took him and they melded into the masses. They were born for it! I watched with bittersweet happiness.
I went to go sit down upon a bench were there was a vacant fan and watched the scene unfold with a grateful but pained laugh, as I begun fanning away pressing a hand to my side and trying to regain myself. It was only when I heard giggling and whispers that I realized that there were two other girls present, younger than I.
It took me a moment to turn to them and offer up a friendly smile due to the boning in the dress. "What?" I asked. They cowered a little at the sound of my voice, heaven knows why…
The braver of the two spoke up with a blush. "It is just that no one knows what you are trying to say." I looked at them stupidly. "With your fan."
I looked at the instrument in my hand and then back up at them. The two young ladies then explained to me with counterfeit patients that one could not simply fan oneself to get cool; heaven forbid, there was an art to it. Certain openness and certain waves meant certain things. Married, come hither, go away and so on…. It all got very convoluted in my mind. I had been sending mixed signals trying to cool down. I felt a fool. "Right."
I rose and nodded to them, and left the fan where I had found it. I bit my lip as I walked away as they talked in heated, blustering whispers and snorts. I went to the bowl of punch and took one of the flutes in my hand and scanned the room. Everyone was making merry, that was a good thing. The Cratchit boys looked a little out of sorts in the presence of young ladies, which made me laugh. "Go on." I encouraged as Tim and Mathew looked at me questioningly. "Do not be afraid." If only I could take my own advice.
A young man suddenly stood next to me and also observed. The orchestra swelled sweetly and I decided to comment. "What a lovely event!" I sighed. The response I got was a look of not quite distain but something close to it, and he walked away. I was puzzled.
"Don't mind Topper. Cheers!" Fred Milark came from the side and toasted me, clinging his glass against mine and then gave a further explanation. "He tends to take the rules of introduction too seriously."
"Rules of introduction?"
"Yes, two people of different classes must be introduced properly before a conversation can take place. I'm the host so luckily I have the advantage to talk with whomever I like. Where is your escort Ms. Cratchit?"
"if you don't mind me saying I think that everyone should have that advantage. Where I come from, they do and cant afford not to. " I say but felt foolish again and saw that mum and dad each had taken on role of escort and introducer for Mathew and Belinda from across the room. Had I wandered off to soon? It mattered little, the damage had been done and with how Mr. Topper and the young ladies were whispering and pointing it would be round the room soon. Oh I was humiliated, but refuse to let it show.
"I think she is over there." I said. "Excuse me." I set my glass down and started toward the garden. Once outside, I stepped out of the shoes and left them under a bench and sighed in my release of them. Folding my arms and looking up at the sky. I let the cool air whisk past me and was grateful for the breeze. Being outside, I was at a good vantage point to watch and listen without making another brutal social mistake. I was glad of that too. Ida would be laughing about now, I just knew it. Sometimes I think she can see from the stars, sometimes I feel that she still watches out for me in her way and sends me exactly what I need.
"Ms. Cratchit?" a voice called me away from my musing and I looked away from the star I had dedicated as Ida towards the garden door as Mr. Scrooge joined me outside. I wasn't expecting to see him, I had seen him making his rounds but I did not expect him to go out of his way for me exclusively. "You are not having a good time?" he pressed.
I shook my head and gave a half smile as the curls danced against my neck. "No, I am having a lovely time. The best time I have had in ages!" I admit.
He cocks an eyebrow. "Yet you do not join in?"
I laughed a little at his expression. "I like to watch people and see how they behave, I find it very interesting!"
"A queer little habit indeed." He notes with a laugh of his own.
"I'll not deny it sir, truly!" I reply. "Also, I am afraid I do not know the social graces as I should. I made rather a dolt of myself earlier when I went to get some punch. I started chattering away like a monkey to a group round the bowl not knowing I needed to be introduced! And did you know that there was an entire etiquette to fanning oneself?" after I stopped giggling at my former embarrassment I sighed and leant back on my bare heels mildly. "I am sorry! There I go chattering away again…" I look away with another sigh. "This world is very different to me than the world I was brought up in, very different… my parents must be very proud of me making such a spectacle of myself." I say sarcastically hoping that he would not trace the hints of sadness that I had felt moments ago.
He steps forward with an almost sly grin. "Ah but a spectacle in a very pretty dress." He says, hands clasped behind his back and tilting his head forward.
I do not know what girlish urge possessed me but I held out my arms and span in it for him. "Do you like it?"
"Very much."
"You are kind sir… Tis my one and only dowry. Not a penny to our name and yet mum saved her wedding dress for me." I stopped spinning and met his gaze again with a bittersweet glance. "Now I wear it as a ball gown at a New Years Eve party. I feel as if it is ill used for sure." I can almost trace pity in his eyes and it touches me.
"You are truly lovely, regardless." My heart skips, it is the first time I am sincerely addressed with an endearment. I involuntarily shiver as a blush comes to my cheeks. "Thank you."
He looks back inside as the dancers begin to congregate once more, he looks back at me. "Will you come inside and dance with me?" he questions.
"Oh no." I say. "That is, no thank you. I tried dancing with my father earlier and got frightfully dizzy, I would be quite useless to you."
He sighed, almost looking relieved and came further outside and looked out at the sky too. "Thank God." He said mildly and then sat down. "To tell the truth, I do not know it either. The social graces I mean. Not well anyway. Since the whole ordeal I find myself quite a baby to the land of the living."
I halfway laughed in surprise. "You? I should think you would know everything, being of that world and all." I did not mean for the remark to come out haughtily, but somehow the way he looked up from the ground and into my face told me that it did. I touched my lips as apposed to biting them.
"And I would think as a woman the manor would be instilled in you naturally." Was his curt reply, it put me back but in the best way. "I was born a poor boy even as you are poor now and then retreated into myself before any social knowledge was bestowed upon me. Do not generalize Emma, it doesn't suit you, not at all. You are more of a lady than that." He spoke to me directly, personally. His tone softens. "We are as even as the ground you and I. sit you down next to me. Amuse me as only you can Pixie."
I take the seat next to him gratefully. We were silent but for the first time I felt at ease. I spoke first. "Are you glad not to dance?" I ask cocking my head to the side to look at him, he returns the glance. "Only you looked relieved when I declined."
He sighs. "Because of the expectation you so bluntly pointed out, of me being expected to know how to behave, I have been dancing since Christmas, thinking it the proper thing to do and have not stopped. And while joining the world again is exhilarating, it is also exhausting. Yes, I am glad of the seat."
"What made you decide to change?" I ask. He threw his head back and chuckled throatily. "Ah yes, that is the question isn't it? Asked to me again and again, what unmisered the miser?" You already think me mad. I know that for a fact, you said it outright in the shop. And to tell you may confirm that you are right." His head came back front and center but his eyes met mine and the proximity of our faces was very close. He stole away some hair from my eyes. "And we mustn't have you be right all the time, must we?" his voice was a low loll that had me hypnotized. "No." I say softly as not to disturb the moment. "We mustn't."
He pauses and I saw consideration dance and light in his eyes. "But maybe I will tell you. Maybe I do need confidence in someone. Maybe that was my greatest mistake last time. Stay Ms. Cratchit, maybe I will tell you, in time.."
I looked at him in earnest and spoke true, and soft. My fingers met his wrist as it came back down to join his side. "When you are ready to tell, I will be here to listen." And I meant it.
He didn't tell me of his revelation, at least not that night. We found that there were too many other undiscovered subjects to explore, and like wine we tried eagerly to taste upon them all. The conversation flowed from me to him easily. He went back in of course at an inquiring eyebrow from his nephew and fulfilled a required social duty of one sort or another; a dance, a conversation. And with some blatant ques from mum I did the same. But somehow we always found a way to resume our conversation, a way back to each other. I was uneasy at first with just how eagerly I wanted to talk to him. But I was so joyous in my family and in him that by midnight when all departed I had forgotten everything…literally everything.
The mist of the scene swallowed itself and Fan was taking me on again. This time we were at the hospital near Camden Town, my younger self was volunteering as a nurse, but she was different, she was smiling, glowing as if the rouge and the ball had never left her as she relayed the story to a few patients. Her hair was torn down and was in a cascading fall of curls but other than that there was no difference. She was happy. She was among her own kind.
