The Autobiography of Mrs. Tom Thumb Read Online Free PDF Page B

little closets. And often there were no closets at all, just primitive dark corners with buckets full of human waste slopping out with every rattle over a railroad tie.
    We changed trains so many times I lost count, always a chaotic affair. I had to submit to countless strangers lifting me up and down, for there was no way to manage the great difference between train and platform myself, and Colonel Wood was always gone somewhere, wrestling with our luggage or arguing with the ticket agent that I should cost him only half a fare because I took up only half a seat.
    These dispiriting experiences were all I remembered now; they had left my clothes filthy and stained, my skin covered in a gritty film of dirt, my toes pinched and blistered. My first pair of adult shoes, custom-ordered to fit, had proven to be very uncomfortable for feet used to the soft soles of children’s slippers.
    I also remembered, suddenly and overwhelmingly, how sad my parents and Minnie had looked when they said goodbye. I had waved at them for as long as I could as I drove away with Colonel Wood in his wagon, all my clothes and mementos and my beloved stair steps packed in a trunk borrowed from my married sister, Delia, as there had been no time to purchase one of my own. I remembered Mama’s tears, Minnie’s wails, Papa’s stoic face, his emotion betrayed only by the working of his Adam’s apple.
    The memories overwhelmed me, and I could not help it; as soon as the Colonel shut the door and I was left alone with the giantess, my tears could no longer be contained. I sat down on the floor, not caring about my dress, and I put my head in my hands and began to cry. Why, oh why, had I ever decided to leave home? My heart—too large for me all of a sudden, too full of pain and longing for family—felt as if it would break into pieces, so lost, so lonely, so dirty, and yes, so very
small
, did I feel.
    Mama had been right all along. The world was too big for me. I would get lost in it, swallowed up or trampled by this giantess—
    Who, without a word, without a sound, scooped me up in her arms and carried me to her bed. There she held me on her lap, rocking me as if I were a child, as I turned my head toward her vast, comforting bosom and sobbed my heart out.
    A MONTH EARLIER , C OLONEL J OHN W OOD HAD SHOWED UP AT our door. It was in March of 1858, during my first vacation from teaching. With a knock, a bow, a presentation of a card, he wasushered inside, where he brought with him the bracing air of a different world. He was dressed not in military clothing, as one might expect (I never did understand how he came by his title), but his costume was no less exciting. He wore a jacket made of red wool; I’d never seen such a thing on a man before! All the men in my life wore sober black, gray, or brown. Complementing his red jacket was an emerald-green vest, which was hung with a bright gold watch fob. His black hat, over graying curls, was shiny and tall, and he carried a polished ebony walking stick. He had a habit, I soon discovered, of pressing two fingers against his mustache—suspiciously black, considering how gray his curls were—whenever he desired to appear thoughtful.
    In short, he looked to be quite a man of the world to us Bumps, so insulated in our rural community. I would come to know many men of the world and recognize that the Colonel was not quite the dandy he thought himself to be, but at the time he certainly impressed Mama and me; Papa, however, merely sat and regarded him with a skeptical eye, puffing on his pipe distrustfully.
    “Sit down, sit down, and let us figure out our relation,” Mama exclaimed as she ushered Colonel Wood into our parlor; he had introduced himself as a cousin, which was all the calling card one needed in Middleborough, Massachusetts.
    “Don’t mind if I do,” Colonel Wood replied, taking the best chair before he was asked. While he addressed Mama, I felt his curious gaze still upon me, as it had been