House of Orphans

by Helen Dunmore

  His mother had walked around the birch grove for hours on that June morning, and then she lay down on the wooden bench, in the pine-scented dimness of the sauna, and gave birth to him. Thomas’s nurse, who was there, told him the story His mother gave birth with no trouble at all; she was made for having babies. But God only gave her that one chance. No doubt He had his reasons.

  His mother must have given scandal; certainly she’d raised some eyebrows by behaving ‘like one of us’, as his nurse said. But she’d been right. And she’d stood up with Thomas in her arms that same evening, when he was only a few hours old, and had walked back to the house. It was as if she’d known by instinct that she would only conceive once, and that she must do everything she could to ensure that baby’s survival.

  They had something, that generation, he thought. They didn’t doubt themselves. They knew what life was, and where they belonged in it. Not like us.

  Matti knocked at the back door while Eeva was pouring a kettle of boiling water over soda crystals in the sink, to clean out the pipes.

  ‘The doctor’s had his sauna,’ Matti observed. He wouldn’t come in, because he’d been digging and his boots were claggy.

  ‘Does he want something?’

  ‘No, he’s gone back up to the house,’ said Matti, as if they weren’t in the house themselves. ‘He’ll be settling himself down for a drink. That’s his way.’

  ‘Does he drink, then?’ asked Eeva, surprised.

  ‘Drink? No, not to say drink, he doesn’t. But he likes his glass of vodka after the sauna, like anyone. But what I mean to say is, the sauna’s heated.’

  ‘Oh. Would he mind?’

  ‘He’s not going to know, is he?’ said Matti. ‘And I’ll be out of your way. I’m heading home now. That was good coffee bread you gave me this morning, Eeva. You’re a fine cook, you are.’

  ‘Thank you, Matti,’ she said, and smiled. Matti was easy. He never pressed himself on you. If you gave him cake, he was glad. If you didn’t, he wasn’t bothered. He worked like a horse, that one, but never got flurried.

  ‘We’ll be getting some real spring weather now,’ he said, looking up. ‘You’ll be glad to be out of the town, with summer coming.’

  ‘You’ve never been to Helsinki, have you, Matti?’

  ‘Me? No. Never been anywhere.’

  She couldn’t tell from his tone if he was glad of it, or sorry.

  When Matti was gone, she walked out into the yard. Yes, he was right, the sky had a clear green tint to it, like the flesh of an unripe apple. Good weather was coming. You could feel the spring.

  She wasn’t sure that she wanted to feel it. She wanted the clatter and dust of Helsinki. She wanted their apartment, full of smoke and talk. Even in Mika’s house it was the same familiar atmosphere. Pamphlets, meetings, reading, bashing out arguments like steak on a wooden plank, friends from Petersburg appearing and then disappearing again, bringing ideas and leaving them behind to grow or just shrivel away into nothing. Eeva hadn’t come across an idea since she left Helsinki. They didn’t have ideas in the House of Orphans; there’d have been trouble if they had.

  She loved Helsinki in summer, when all the rich people had gone to their summer houses, and the city belonged to them, the workers. Never again those late-evening summer walks after her father got home from work. That was before he got ill. She would trot alongside him, sometimes holding his hand, sometimes darting away to explore. He would let her run, kicking up dust from the strong little boots he soled and heeled himself. Along the magnificent cobbled spaces of the harbour they’d go, past the big ships, looking out over the water which was silky with evening and filled with yellow light. He liked to pick a handful of birch twigs, to smell their sap. He held them to her nose. ‘Breathe in deep, Eevi, it’s good for you.’ They would wander farther than they meant, and he would carry her home on his shoulders. He was strong then, solid, with his hair springing under his cap. Her father was a short man, but he seemed tall to her.

  He ought to have been taller. He told her that once. ‘Look at the people you see in the streets, Eevi. The well-dressed ones, the ones with money, they’re taller than us. Even their children are taller. Do you know why that is?’

  She’d shaken her head.

  ‘They eat better,’ he said. ‘Their children have butter and meat and milk whenever they want, and so they grow taller. Never forget that, Eevi. Two winters when I was a boy, we were boiling up a dry ham bone over and over. You don’t grow tall on that. Look at them, Eevi, when they go into the big shops or when they wait for their carriages. Look close. And remember it.’

  She did remember it. She was growing, since she’d come to the doctor’s house, where there was proper food. The ham bones in her soup had meat on them. She’d had to let down her skirt hem. Her bodice was tight.

  Yes, she’d go to the sauna. Why shouldn’t she? The sauna wasn’t just for the master. Matti had as good as said so. She was tired, and she ached all over. She would fetch the clean underwear Mrs Eriksson had given her in a bundle, along with a blue striped skirt and blouse. They were only a little worn. Much better than the things Eeva had brought with her. After the sauna, she’d put on all her clean things.

  She’d stay as long as she wanted in the steam. When the orphans were taken to the public sauna, once a week, they were always rushed because there were so many of them. Yes, she’d bathe in the steam as long as she wanted, this time, and no one was going to stop her.

  9

  No, the second cigarette was never as good as the first. The taste had gone. But look – he’d smoked six. There was the ashtray, brimming with cigarette ends. The room was thick with smoke. His glass was empty, too.

  Thomas lifted the bottle. But how full had it been in the first place? He couldn’t remember.

  What he would do was, he would go outside in the fresh air. The sun was low, but there would be light for a while yet. He’d go for a walk and he’d feel better.

  He wouldn’t drink any more. He didn’t really drink, never had. Only very occasionally, to defy Johanna, to get away into a place where she couldn’t follow him. He could count the number of times he’d been drunk on the fingers of his left hand.

  His sense of relaxation after the sauna had drained away. He was back in the itch of everyday frustrations. No, that last cigarette hadn’t tasted good, nor had the last glass of vodka. If only he could begin again. If he walked outside, in the fresh air down in the birch grove, maybe he’d recapture that warm relaxed feeling. He had got to turn away from these bitter thoughts that tore at him like claws. He wasn’t so old, surely it wasn’t time to say that the struggle of life was over and he had failed. He was only forty-seven.

  I might live another twenty years, he thought. He was standing, pressing hard with the heels of both hands on the leather top of his desk. And why? Why am I living? To do good, is that it? Is that what I imagine I’m doing?

  He looked down at his hands. They were still strong and flexible. Doctor’s hands. There were skills built into his fingers which it had taken a lifetime to learn. He had good hands for diagnosis.

  She hadn’t wanted them, he thought, crisping his fingers. She didn’t want my hands on her. Never, never. It was always I who reached out to her, towards the scent of her skin. It’s all gone now, all of it. No use thinking of it. She’s dead, she’s under the earth.

  But it was impossible that Johanna was under the earth, part of it. Surely her distinct self wouldn’t let itself dissolve like that. She stepped out so firmly and decisively. If she came across something she couldn’t control she simply turned away. He’d always been too eager, that was what had put her off. And now he was old and dry and tired and none of it mattered.

  He turned his head to look out of the window. There they were, his beautiful trees. The birches were full of spring sap, rising through the chalky pink flesh of the tree. His mother used to bind a handful of twigs for him.

  My mother is dead, he thought. My mother is dead, and J
ohanna is dead. Even old Katariina is dead. This is the way it happens when you’re middle-aged. The people who remembered you as a child have gone. You know more and more faces among the dead. Once you’d known only a handful of dead people – a grandfather and a couple of old servants – but now you had as many friends among the dead as among the living. And then, one by one, you realized that the dead outnumbered the living. They were all around you, possessive and strong.

  Children were what held you firm in the land of the living. But Minna… No, he wasn’t going to think about Minna. And he wasn’t going to think about Johanna any more either. That bunch of birch twigs his mother had bound for him one June morning was as real as anything. Hold on to that.

  He stepped out into the clean air. How quiet the house was behind him, settling into itself for the night. She’d be lighting her candle soon, to read where she thought nobody would see her. Johanna’s plates were shining behind the glass doors. Johanna would never see them again, but Lotta still distinguished them. ‘Johanna’s plates’, she said, and ‘your mother’s plates’. The history of possessions was like a religion to Lotta. Those plates had outlived both women, breakable though they were. They’d outlive him too. Those smirking, gesticulating painted figures. He’d never liked them. Minna ought to have them now, in her house. Next time she came, he would ask her to take them away.

  Minna’s next visit wouldn’t be soon, he realized that, but it would be soon enough not to cause gossip about neglect of her widowed father. Minna had her mother’s respect for convention. and her mother’s strength. She could be iron when she wanted.

  You are becoming morbid, he told himself. You must not give way to self-pity, or you’ll be of no use to anyone. Why blame Minna? None of it was her fault.

  It was lighter outside than he’d thought. The air was soft and wet and sweet. He snuffed it greedily. There was a faint scent of celery: yes, he was treading on herb robert. He walked slowly, bathing in the freshness of evening. Everything he smelled or saw or heard was piercingly sharp, but distant. He’d drunk too much vodka, that was it. He was wearing a coat of vodka. A nice feeling again, now that he was outdoors.

  Lucky that Lotta wasn’t here to see him. It was hard work living up to Lotta. The Thomas who was Lotta’s friend was a stranger to Thomas, and he wasn’t sure he’d care to meet him. Responsible, even distinguished, devoted to his profession and to his patients, dignified in bereavement – no, surely Lotta couldn’t really believe in that Thomas either?

  ‘Or if she does, the more fool her,’ he muttered, tripping over a root.

  The knees of his trousers were covered in mud. What did it matter? It would brush off. And if it didn’t, there were more. Plenty more trousers, pair after pair of them hanging in that monumental wardrobe that smelled of camphor and close-packed wool. But his heart was thudding. He stood still, regaining himself.

  And there, through the slender birch boles, he saw the sauna door open. He nearly yelled out, ‘Hey! You there! What d’you think you’re doing?’ But he stopped himself, seeing who it was. It was the girl. She pushed the door wide and stepped out into the clearing. She stood still for a moment, looking up. Her skin was flushed all over from the sauna, her damp hair clung to her neck and shoulders. He could not stop looking at her.

  He’d thought of her as a child. Or maybe he’d pretended to himself that she was a child. But she was not. She was too thin still: she should grow fuller. But her naked body was a woman’s. He was close enough to see her nipples grow hard as the cool air touched them.

  She stood still for a moment and then she walked away through the trees, to the stream. As soon as she entered the trees her white flesh was camouflaged by shadows.

  She was gone. There was a bright fuzz of leaves on the underbrush, where she’d disappeared. He strained to see her, hear her. Maybe that was the sound of her splashing into the water. No cry of shock at the cold, no cry of pleasure. He pictured her where she was, where he’d been only an hour or so before. Crouched on her haunches in the shallow pool, scooping up water in her cupped hands and throwing it over herself. Bathing herself in the fast, brown, icy water, just as he’d done. He felt as if that water were prickling his own thighs, as sharp as thorns.

  He wanted to move forward. He could move quietly. He wouldn’t disturb her or frighten her. He must see more. He must see her.

  No. He held himself back. If she caught sight of him, that would be the end. She would run back to the house in a panic, up to her attic bedroom. She’d throw her possessions into a bundle and leave tomorrow. She would tell Anna-Liisa what had happened, and Anna-Liisa would find another place for her. Anna-Liisa wouldn’t say anything, because after all it would only be the girl’s word against the doctor’s. But she would believe the girl. She had enough experience for that.

  He held himself back, pressed against the trunk of a cherry tree. The bark was dirty. It would come off on his clothes. Dusk was creeping through the trees now, thick and blue. Soon it would be dark. Surely she wouldn’t stay long? He could hear nothing but the purling of the stream. Maybe something had happened to her. She’d slipped on the wet stones, and fallen. She’d struck her head. Her face lay in the water. He should help her – after all, he was a doctor…

  No, you fool, he told himself. His coat of vodka was wearing thin. It wasn’t keeping him warm any more. He hadn’t realized how much he had sweated. The sweat was cold now, and his shirt clung to him. Had he really seen the girl, or not? The image of her slipping into the trees seemed barely real. Had it all been just vodka and a trick of the light?

  How rough and dirty the cherry-tree bark was. Who would believe that such white flowers could grow from it, or such round glistening fruit? He had cut down his cherry trees, because of Johanna. But not all of them. Even Johanna couldn’t pretend that this stand of cherries threatened her view. She’d never liked this wild part of their grounds, but it was what he loved best. The boggy patches down by the stream, the smell of water peppermint, the little yellow irises that flowered there in late spring, the wild mallow and stray forget-me-nots and croaking frogs with their slippery billows of spawn. He would bend down and peer at the threads of life wriggling in the spawn, as tadpoles began to develop.

  And in summer, the tall rods of rosebay willowherb. He’d rolled in the bog as a child, over and over, crushing the vegetation, soaking himself in mud and slime. He had picked wild strawberries in the sunny clearing. He had chewed leaves of water peppermint, he had blown away the seeds of rosebay willowherb and spent hours watching the frogs. He had never known Johanna half as well as he knew the touch and smell and contour of this stream and its bogland, these cherry and birch trees.

  Maybe she likes it here too, he thought. Eeva. Maybe that’s why she stays so long. He pictured her squatting in the stream, head up, alert as a deer, and then dipping her hands again into the water.

  Just when he’d given her up, she came. A blackbird broke through the bushes ahead of her, its wings flapping the leaves, protesting at the disturbance. The girl ran quickly across the clearing. Her arms were wrapped tight around her shivering body, hiding her belly and breasts. She pulled open the door of the sauna, and disappeared inside. She hadn’t spotted him. She’d never known he was there.

  Eeva was going to bathe in the sauna again. She didn’t care that it was getting dark. He wouldn’t care, if he were her. The dry, resinous heat of the sauna would be folding around her already, warming her cold flesh. She would sigh, and lean back on the bench, and let the heat enter her. No doubt she would go to the stream again later, when she was flushed and sweating from the sauna. Her feet would pick their way over grass and damp earth. There would be streaks of mud on the pale sides of her feet.

  The sauna door was closed. It was so ordinary and so familiar, a sauna like a thousand others. But she was in there. It wasn’t his sauna any more, but a mysterious, hidden space that belonged to Eeva. Even though the door was closed and she couldn’t possibly see him, he stayed in the
shelter of the cherry, doubly hidden by the growing dark. He would not frighten her.

  He’d been born there, in that sauna which seemed to be Eeva’s now. His mother had wrenched open the door in the last stage of her labour, and clambered onto the bench to give birth to him. Old Katariina had followed her inside, and closed the door on his father. He’d first opened his eyes there, to see that knotted pine wood and his mother’s face, flushed with birth, the whites of her eyes stained with tiny broken blood vessels. Katariina’s stories had been so real that they’d become his own memories.

  ‘And then you slipped out, just like a fish. You didn’t give your mother any trouble. She couldn’t wait until you were swaddled to hold you. No, she had to have you right away, all naked.’

  How embarrassed he’d been, at eight, when Katariina said ‘all naked’. He’d been afraid she’d go and tell the story in front of other people. But he’d been glad, too.

  At eight he’d had no idea what birth was. After years of attending childbirth he knew more. The baby would have been bloodstained and greasy with vernix. Its bluish colour would have flushed red as it took its first breaths. Probably it would have urinated in its first spasm of crying. But his mother, his firm, contained mother with her tight waist and long dragging skirts, she had not been able to wait for him. She’d grabbed hold of that wet, slippery, bloodstreaked little creature and put him naked to her breast.

  But he couldn’t go into the sauna now. He must stay outside.

  10

  If she could read, she could also write. He would test her, Thomas thought.

  ‘Eeva, I was thinking that you may have friends. That you may want to communicate with them.’

  She stood perfectly still, a bowl of dried peas in her hands. Slowly, she lowered it to the kitchen table. She said nothing.

  ‘I mean that you may wish to write a letter.’