House of Orphans

by Helen Dunmore

  The girl’s eyes were on her. Green eyes: what a colour. No, you’re not a rabbit at all, you’re a cunning little vixen. But not quite cunning enough. I’m on to you.

  But, annoyingly, the girl didn’t look worried. Her face was calm, even stern. Minna stopped, and let go of the skirts she’d been holding close to stop the branches tearing them. They were no distance from the house, but already they were in the forest. Its smell was in her nostrils. A sourish smell of earth that never got the sun, resin from the pines, a mushroomy smell of decay. Minna didn’t like that smell, never had done.

  ‘What are you doing here?’ she asked sharply, to recover herself.

  The girl showed the colander. There was green stuff in the bottom of it.

  ‘I’m gathering nettles,’ she said. But the girl’s hands were bare; really, thought Minna with derision, it was so easy to catch her out.

  ‘You’d be stung, if they were nettles,’ Minna pointed out. ‘Why aren’t you wearing gloves?’

  ‘I only need the tips,’ said Eeva. ‘If you pinch them off sharp, like this, see, they don’t sting.’

  Minna hadn’t noticed the clump of nettles, just where the trees thinned and sun came through. They were growing strongly, into a thick, rank patch. She would like to roll the girl in them, she thought.

  ‘See,’ said Eeva, like this,’ and she bent down, pinched the growing tip of a nettle hard between thumb and forefinger, and plucked it. ‘If you do it like that, it won’t sting you. Have a try.’

  ‘I’ve no desire to pick nettles,’ said Minna coldly. The performance reminded her of her father. He was always on at her to come mushroom-picking, or berry-picking, years after she’d grown out of it. ‘And I can’t imagine what you think you’re doing here, when you ought to be at work.’

  ‘I am at work,’ said Eeva. ‘The doctor asked me to pick nettle tips. It’s for a tonic. He takes it to his patients.’

  Wasn’t that exactly typical of her father? Just the kind of thing he would ask the girl to do. Medicine wasn’t enough for him, he always had to be asking a toothless old woman who couldn’t even sign her own name about some remedy or other she’d been using since time immemorial. Imagine what people must think of him. Here’s the doctor, with his bottle of nettle tonic. The doctor, subscribing to a pack of folk stories and superstitions. No wonder he’d never got on. No wonder he hadn’t wanted to leave this place and move into town – not enough nettles there.

  It used to infuriate her mother, and no wonder. He was determined to walk everywhere, while the horses ate their heads off in the stable. If a doctor makes himself look poor, people lose confidence in him. And even though he took the latest medical journals, and she knew for sure that he read them, how were his patients to guess it? He recommended that they drink cranberry juice for a chill on the kidneys, instead of giving them proper medicine. Birch sap, the first of a mare’s milk after she’d given birth (Yes! How vividly Minna remembered that one!), poultices of mouldy bread, juniper beer, all kinds of concoctions and decoctions of herbs and berries, head massage, spinal massage, cupping…

  As long as the remedy came from some wrinkled old peasant who looked exactly like a Karelian shaman, it was worth trying, first on himself and then on anybody else who was mug enough. Really, her father was maddening. Why refuse to go forward, into the modern world? Why bury yourself in the forest, when the future lay in the city? Why make yourself look like a failure?

  Minna took a deep breath to steady herself. She must stop this: her mind was pulsing with years of anger. None of it mattered. What her father did in his profession couldn’t hurt her now. She was free. She had her own life and he was no part of it. Her friends never saw him, and knew nothing about him.

  It was the woods that were upsetting her. Too many memories. It would have been far better for this interview to take place in the kitchen, with the girl standing in front of her, her hands folded submissively against her apron. But never mind that. Nothing was going to stop Minna from saying what she’d travelled all the way from Åbo to say.

  ‘Have you ever thought, Eeva, that you might be better off in another place?’ she began. Eeva didn’t reply at once. She waited, warily, but Minna wasn’t having any of that. This girl wasn’t going to force her hand with silence, or make Minna say more than she meant to. Minna was in charge.

  ‘Well?’

  ‘I’ve never been in another place. I came straight here from the orphanage.’

  ‘I know you did.’ Minna paused, softened her voice. And maybe that’s the root of the trouble: your inexperience. You’re very young. Dr Eklund is a generous man, he wanted to give you a chance, but he didn’t realize quite how difficult it would be for you.’

  ‘Why are you saying this to me?’ said Eeva quietly.

  This was too much. Minna felt her hair crisp with rage, and she took a step towards the girl.

  ‘I am saying this to you because you are a servant in my father’s house. I am saying this to you because you are not – because your work is not giving satisfaction.’

  But it sounded limp, lame. It was not at all what she wanted to say. She wanted to slam words against the girl so that they knocked her into the patch of nettles. And then she’d find out whether nettles sting or not.

  She wanted to spit out the most insulting words she could think of – words she’d never said aloud, words she hadn’t even let herself know that she knew. Words her mother had never said in all those years.

  ‘You needn’t think I don’t know what you’re up to,’ she said. ‘You think I’m soft, and that you can make a fool of me, just as you’ve tried to make a fool of my father. But I’m not soft. Do you imagine that you’re in the kitchen, up to your elbows in grease all day, because you know so much more than I do? You’ve got a lot to learn, my girl, and you can start by taking that look off your face when you talk to me.’

  Colour had rushed into the girl’s cheeks.

  ‘It’s only you that’s saying this,’ she said. ‘He hasn’t said anything.’

  ‘No, and you thought he wouldn’t, didn’t you? You counted on that. You thought nobody would stop your little game of making a fool out of a man who’s alone, who’s been widowed, who isn’t quite himself. It’s easy enough to make a fool out of any man from eighteen to eighty, God knows there’s nothing clever about it.’ Where were these words coming from? What part of her? ‘You don’t think he cares tuppence for you, do you? No, it’s just because you’re here. You’re convenient. He loved my mother, and his life is over now that she’s dead –’

  Yes, that was it. The right words were tumbling out of her mouth now. It felt good, rich. She was panting with anger, not exertion. She had the power to say anything, do anything. If she had to drag this girl back to the house by her hair, she would do it. There was strength in her now, to move mountains.

  ‘All you are, as far as he’s concerned, is a little trollop who’s handy and makes it clear she’s available.’

  Trollop, that was it. That was telling her.

  The girl was pale now. She was clasping the colander against her stomach and staring at Minna.

  It’s no good pretending, my girl, thought Minna. You’re no innocent. You’ve heard it all before. Do you think I don’t know where you come from, and the way you’ve been dragged up?

  The bare sight of the girl made her sick.

  ‘You needn’t worry,’ said the girl. ‘I’m not staying.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘That’s it. I’m not staying. I’m going somewhere else.’

  ‘You’ve got another place?’

  ‘Yes. I’ve got another place.’

  ‘You can’t do that. You haven’t given notice. Mrs Eriksson doesn’t know you’ve got another place. Do they know at the orphanage?’

  ‘You wanted me to go. I’m telling you that I’m going.’

  She was sly, that’s what she was. Calculating. She’d been thinking ahead, planning her next move, because she knew it woul
d all come out sooner or later, what she’d been up to here.

  ‘They will do,’ added the girl.

  ‘They will do what?’

  ‘They’ll know, at the orphanage. When I’ve gone. They always get told when someone leaves a place.’

  For sheer brass neck she took some beating.

  ‘So you’ve got yourself another place,’ said Minna slowly, to give herself time, ‘and without so much as telling anyone. What did you do, answer an advertisement? They’ll want a reference, you know. Have you thought of that?’

  ‘Why are you so angry? I thought you wanted me to leave.’

  Minna couldn’t help herself. She stepped forward, right up to the girl, and knocked the colander out of her hand. It thudded on the earth, and the green stuff scattered. Minna ground it with the heel of her boot, ground it until the green was mashed into earth and pine needles.

  ‘You think you can do exactly as you like, don’t you?’ she hissed through her teeth. The girl was lucky. She didn’t know how lucky she was. I don’t often lose my temper, said Minna to herself, but when I do…

  The girl crouched down to examine the mess of nettle and earth. Minna looked at the thin, pale nape of her neck. It had down on it, and tendrils which had crept out of the knot of hair. Minna had never had such thoughts before. Violent, cruel thoughts. If she’d had an axe she could have chopped that neck like a rotten branch. Get up, you fool, she thought, and, as if the girl had heard her, she stood up again with her empty colander, pushed back a stray lock of hair and faced Minna.

  ‘There’re plenty more nettles,’ she said, ‘I’ll find a better clump. I know what you think. You think because I come from an orphange, my life belongs to Mrs Eriksson, and to the orphanage. But you’re wrong. My life belongs to me.’

  The two young women faced each other. Minna had never been so angry in her life, she told herself. Anger licked inside her, hot and almost lovable. She wanted to be angry. My God, she thought, I could kill her and grind her into the earth just like those leaves. Her hands had gone to her hips, her elbows were braced, she balanced on the balls of her feet, ready to spring.

  And then they both heard whistling. Beautiful, melodious whistling. Not a bird, they knew that at once.

  ‘It’s Matti,’ said Eeva. ‘That’s him whistling.’

  Of course it was. How the sound took Minna back. She couldn’t help it, she was five again, grubbing in the soil of the kitchen garden, digging up the radishes she’d planted to see how they were growing, while Matti worked in one of the beds near by, and whistled songs she knew well.

  I’ll tramp the roads as far as I wish

  And I’ll love the one I choose.

  Yes, he would whistle a couple of lines, and then sing the song so beautifully that she would sit back on her heels in the dry dusty earth and do nothing but listen.

  They were always Finnish songs. By rights she wouldn’t have been able to understand a word of them, living as she did almost entirely in the Swedish-speaking world. But her father was determined that Minna should speak Finnish as well as Swedish, right from the start, so that the language would sit easily on her tongue. He had taught her himself, and encouraged her to talk in Finnish with Matti and with old Beata who came to do the washing in those days. Her mother had only Swedish-speaking servants in the house, and in those days the tongues of other mothers clicked when they heard Minna chattering in Finnish. But she didn’t care, not then. Her father had explained his reasons to her.

  Yes, in those days she’d been glad and proud to be taught by him. Quite puffed up with her own success, when she realized that she was more fluent than her mother. But her mother had soon pricked that bubble.

  When you’ve learned a language as soon as you can talk, you can’t get it out of your head, even if you want to. Matti had taught her all his Finnish songs, and she’d sung the verses after him, following him line by line. Funny how she’d nearly forgotten all that. But it came back: she could hear the words now.

  But she didn’t recognize the song Matti was whistling.

  ‘What’s he whistling?’ she asked aloud, not even thinking that it was Eeva who would answer the question. Without realizing it, she dropped into Finnish. Eeva stared.

  ‘What’s he whistling? Do you know it?’ repeated Minna.

  Eeva listened. ‘I don’t know it,’ she answered, speaking in Finnish too. Her own tongue. Who would have thought this stuck-up city bitch could have spoken like that? ‘He’ll sing the words in a moment,’ Eeva went on. ‘That’s what he does, whistles a verse, then sings it.’

  ‘I know.’

  They stood there listening until Matti opened his mouth and sang the words:

  And if you still refuse to love me

  I’ll bathe myself in bitter memory,

  I’ll go and feed on wild honey,

  I’ll go and feed on golden berries.

  Yes, thought Minna. He whistles and then he sings the words. That’s what he does. For a moment she was torn with longing. How had it all happened? She’d been that little girl squatting in the dust, not knowing anything about what lay ahead of her, and afraid of nothing. She could even remember the feeling of the love she’d had for Matti, as if she were rubbing her fingers on the fabric of a dress she’d worn long ago. Yes, she used to leave special little patterns of different-coloured stones around the garden, for him to find. It all seemed so close still that she could shut her eyes and feel the silkiness of dust between her fingers. And the bitter taste of those radishes that weren’t ready to eat. But it was all gone. She could never go back there.

  But she had her life. She was married, and she had her own tall house with new dove-grey paper in the morning room where she sat to write letters. The thought of that dove-grey paper was like a warm spot inside her. She’d barely looked at it yet, because the room had only just been finished when she’d had to come away. Soon she’d be sitting there again, writing letters beginning ‘My dear father –’ and signing them ‘your affectionate daughter, Minna’.

  No, it wasn’t a tragedy that you couldn’t go back. It was all very well listening to Matti whistle, but if she went to talk to him now it would just be embarrassing. She had nothing to say to him.

  Life changes, and we change with it, thought Minna, and the words comforted her. Matti was still singing.

  In the bitter smoke of memory

  You will be with me for ever.

  How feelingly he sang, even though he was an old man now. But it was all the greatest possible rubbish. People weren’t like that. They soon forgot each other.

  Her anger was cold now. All she felt was weariness; yes, weariness, that was what she felt, because she was always afraid now, she was hedged about with fear of this and fear of that. She did not dare even to think about having children. And the more afraid she felt, the more sure she had to seem. And there was no one she loved enough to leave little patterns of pebbles in the dust for them to find.

  She would do her duty. She did not love her father. And this girl was nothing. She was in the way, that was all. She had to be got rid of, in a civilized way, so that Minna and her father could go back to being as they were, not loving each other or upsetting each other.

  It wasn’t possible that she, Minna, had thought of beating the girl to the earth.

  No, she wasn’t going to stand here ‘bathing herself in bitter memory’ like any hopeless peasant. That wasn’t her way, any more than it had been her mother’s way. Johanna had squared her shoulders and carried on. Bitter memory! Let him have that. It had been a mistake to come back here, but she had her duty. And fortunately, as it turned out, she didn’t need to dismiss the girl. It had all been done for her. Minna was quite sensible enough to realize that the pleasure of telling the girl to go would be balanced by the inconvenience of telling her father that she had done so.

  The girl would go of her own choice: good. She would not be missed. Even Lotta didn’t need to know the detail. Let her think what she wanted to think. T
he girl would be gone, and that would be enough. And if she was lying and she didn’t have a place to go to, then so much the worse for her. It wasn’t Minna’s responsibility. Yes, let her go as soon as possible, and let everything be calm again. Her father would be grateful. Not immediately, that was too much to hope for, but in time. Yes, in time, when he’d been able to reflect, and realized that Minna had done this for him. All Minna wanted was to keep him from his own weakness, and in the end he would appreciate that her motives were good.

  And when the golden berries fall

  And the honeycomb is empty

  And we sleep in the heart of winter,

  I will still call for you.

  The girl had turned away from Minna to listen, as if Minna were not there. Her lips were parted. Suddenly Minna’s satisfaction was tinged with pity. Yes, she thought, that’s what’s going to happen to you. No more golden berries, no more honey. That’s it for you, my girl, so listen while you can.

  Very upright, drawing her skirts close, Minna made her way out of the wood.

  18

  There was something going on behind his back. He knew it from Minna’s smooth face at dinner, and from the satisfied way she tapped her glass down on the table and announced that she’d be going home tomorrow. It always seemed to him that she took a special, hurtful pleasure in saying the word ‘home’ to him, when she did not mean the house where she was born and brought up, the home where her family had lived for generations…

  But of course Åbo was her home now; Minna was a married woman with her own household to run, her own preoccupations and plans for the future.

  All through dinner she’d been telling him about the redecoration of her morning room, and the English water-colours she’d bought at auction. She was like her mother in this love of things Anglo-Saxon. He could imagine her in a circle of young matrons like herself, each of them talking about her own drawing room or the improvements she’d made to the kitchen, and how her cook had said the new range had quite transformed her life. The young matrons would take turns, allowing one another just so much time, and turning their bright pleased faces from one speaker to the next.