The Autobiography of Mrs. Tom Thumb - Melanie Benjamin [135]
I gasped; it was as if all my clothing had just been torn from me and now I stood, naked and defenseless, beneath his perceptive gaze. Oh, how did he know? How did he always see straight to the heart of me?
“And Minnie—she’s different than you, no matter how much you try to convince yourself otherwise. She isn’t you, because she’s happy. And you’re not.”
“ ‘Happy’?” Finally, I found my tongue, and it felt strong and supple in my mouth, a weapon I could expertly use against him. “What do you know about happiness? You’re just as miserable as you think I am, marrying the wrong woman over and over!”
“By God, if you were a man—” He wheeled and strode away from me, reaching down to grab his walking stick, swinging it like a scythe as he lopped off the heads of dandelions and daffodils, both. “You are the most extraordinary female I’ve ever—I knew this day would come. We have usually been on the same side of an issue, but I always knew that there would be trouble between us if ever we were not.”
“Trouble? Is that all you think this is? My sister is dying and it’s my fault and your fault both, and you call it trouble? I can never forgive you for this!”
“If that is what you believe, then you are not the person I thought you were!” He turned. We stood like two warriors at the end of a battle; carnage lay at our feet, but it wasn’t bodies we had slain. It was our history.
“No, I’m not. I’m not the person I thought I was,” I said through a clenched jaw. “No, I’m not brave—not like Minnie. But then, neither are you. The only chance you ever take is with your bank account. The only chance I ever take is with a train schedule. Neither one of us has ever been brave enough to take a chance with his heart.”
“And back we come, to the crux of the matter. Because Minnie took risks. Minnie fell in love. Minnie didn’t need you, after all.”
I opened my mouth to deny it but could think of nothing more to say. He was right. But so was I—oh, none of it mattered. Not now, not with Minnie—
Suddenly, I began to shiver; I was aware of a creeping, numbing chill threatening to overcome me, confusing my thoughts. I realized that I hadn’t slept in days, that the back of my neck was gray with dirt and sweat, that my stomach was empty. And I ached all over, not just within my heart. A lifetime of looking up, of climbing stairs too steep for me, of using doorknobs and pens and brushes and utensils, even water glasses, that were too large for my hands—it was just this summer, this summer of dread, that it was beginning to take its toll on my once-elastic body. My right hip was cold and stiff in the mornings; my neck had a permanent kink to it, even while I lay down. The knuckles on my hands were beginning to knot up.
For the first time in a very long time, I felt small.
“I want you to leave now,” I said, recovering some remnant of rational thinking. “Although if you will allow Minnie to continue in the care of Dr. Feinway, I would appreciate it. But as for me, I would prefer not to be under any further obligation to you.”
“You don’t mean that,” Mr. Barnum said, and I could see, across the chasm between us, the flicker of hurt in his eyes even as he bravely set his mouth in that familiar crooked smile.
“I don’t? Why is that—because I’m only a dwarf? A ‘novelty,’ as you put it?”
His smile turned into a grimace. “Vinnie, I didn’t mean that—you’re too tired to know what you’re saying.”
“Then we’re agreed on something.” I shrugged. “I am tired. And I don’t have time for your showmanship anymore, Mr. Barnum. Now, if you’ll excuse me, my sister needs me.”
“Vinnie, wait—” He took a step in my direction, but I spun around and began to walk toward the house, to my sister. Away from him.
“Vinnie, don’t leave like this,” he called, and there was sadness in his voice now,