The Autobiography of Mrs. Tom Thumb - Melanie Benjamin [162]
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CHARLES STRATTON, BETTER KNOWN AS GENERAL TOM THUMB, died of apoplexy, some said, the inevitable conclusion to a lifetime of cigars and rich foods. Others said he never recovered from the devastation of the Newhall House fire, of witnessing the tragedy of so many unfortunate souls.
They were all mistaken; I knew better. I knew he died of shame. He had played the hero, the leading man—the perfect man in miniature—onstage for as long, literally, as he could remember. The realization that he was not built to be a hero in life was too much for him to bear; he could never play that role again, and so he simply—stopped. Like a child’s windup toy, used too often, the spring finally broken.
We buried him in Bridgeport, Connecticut, the town of his birth. Years before he had done a benefit for a brand-new cemetery, and had arranged his own plot at the time; he had even posed for a statue he wanted placed upon his monument—a life-size statue.
Ten thousand people attended his funeral. He would have been so pleased—a packed house! I smiled, safely veiled in my widow’s weeds, thinking of how he would have shaken the hand of every man and kissed the cheek of every woman here. Charles did so love to meet people.
Two plumed Knights Templar stood at attention at the foot of his casket; upon the lid was his own small, plumed Knight Templar hat and miniature sword. Among those in attendance were Astors, Vanderbilts, and Bleekers; also the tattooed man he became quite fond of while touring with the circus, and many, many children, which would have touched him immeasurably. Queen Victoria sent a wreath, as did President Chester A. Arthur. The largest floral display of them all said, simply, “Friend”; it was given by Mr. P. T. Barnum, who sat several rows behind me in the church.
Minnie’s service had been so small, I remembered, watching the throngs file past Charles’s coffin, the reporters scribbling down every detail. Just in Mama and Papa’s parlor. How Charles had sobbed! As if she were his own sister, and truly, I knew he thought of her that way. Whatever my husband was or wasn’t, there was no denying he was genuinely giving of his love and affection. Charles had no enemies at all; he was the only person I knew of whom I could say that. No, Reader, I take that back. Minnie didn’t, either.
And there was genuine grief at his funeral, too; I saw it in the faces that passed me. I heard it in the sob coming from several pews back, the sob of an old friend, the man who had taken a five-year-old boy and turned him into a miniature adult—and together, they had conquered the world. There would have been no P.T. Barnum without Charles Stratton, and there would have been no General Tom Thumb without P. T. Barnum.
I longed to go back there and comfort him, for I alone knew of the genuine affection between the two. Others saw only a business partnership; I saw a friendship. Mr. Barnum’s sobs tore at my heart in a way that my own husband’s death did not; my tears would not fall, and so I appropriated his. He could cry over Charles, for the both of us, just as I had cried over Minnie.
But I did not go to him. I sat in my pew, upon a cushion so that I would be visible to all, and I adjusted my thick black veil so that it hung with dignity down my back. And I tried to remember the things I loved about Charles. For this day, of all days, I did not want to pretend; I did not want to feel as if my mourning dress was a costume, as my wedding dress had been. I closed my eyes, and I remembered Charles as he was with children: warm, open-hearted, all pretend dignity tossed aside, almost always on his knees, even though he—alone of all adults—did not have to bend down to be on their level.
I remembered Charles as he was with Minnie: the two of them co-conspirators, impish, playing pranks, sharing confidences, sharing a chair, the back turned to the rest of us, as they whispered together.
I remembered Charles as he was the last time I saw him: tear-stained, asking for my approval—because he had given up asking for my love. And I