The Wild Girl

by Kate Forsyth

‘A blood sausage and a liver sausage had been friends for some time, and the blood sausage invited the liver sausage for a meal at her home. At dinner time the liver sausage merrily set out for the blood sausage’s house. But when she walked through the doorway, she saw all kinds of strange things. There were many steps, and on each one of them she found something different. There were a broom and shovel fighting with each other, a monkey with a big wound on his head, and more such things.’

  Malchen spoke at breakneck speed, barely pausing for breath, and Wilhelm’s quill scratched as he did his best to keep up.

  ‘The liver sausage was very frightened and upset by this. Nevertheless, she took heart, entered the room and was welcomed in a friendly way by the blood sausage. The liver sausage began to enquire about the strange things on the stairs, but the blood sausage said it was nothing and shifted the topic to something else.’

  Wilhelm held up his spare hand for her to pause; Malchen waited reluctantly, bouncing up and down in her impatience. When he nodded at her to continue, she again launched herself at the tale at full speed.

  ‘Then the blood sausage said she had to leave the room to go into the kitchen. She wanted to check that everything was in order and nothing had fallen into the ashes. The liver sausage began walking back and forth in the room and kept wondering about the strange things until someone appeared – I don’t know who it was – and said, “Let me warn you, liver sausage, you’re in a bloody murderous trap. You’d better get out of here quickly if you value your life.”’

  Malchen spoke the words with immense relish, and her brother laughed. Charlotte and Julia Ramus pretended to be shocked at the word ‘bloody’.

  ‘The liver sausage did not have to think twice about this. She ran out the door as fast as she could. When she looked back, she saw the blood sausage standing high up in the attic window with a long, long knife, which was gleaming as though it had just been sharpened. The blood sausage cried out, “If I had caught you, I would have had you!”’

  Frau Ramus looked shocked and said, ‘Dear me, Malchen, what a bloodthirsty story.’

  Louis laughed, and repeated, ‘If I had caught you, I would have had you!’

  Wilhelm waved his writing hand up and down, then made his hand into a fist and released it, while gently blowing on the page to quicken the drying of the ink.

  Then Marie offered to tell a story. Jakob took Wilhelm’s place at the table, picking up a freshly sharpened quill.

  The story Marie told was one of the strangest and most beautiful that Dortchen had ever heard.

  ‘A king and queen had no children at all,’ she said. ‘One day the queen was bathing, and a crab told her that she would soon have a daughter. And so it happened, and the king in his joy held a great celebration. But, because he had only twelve golden plates, he did not invite one of the thirteen fairies in the land. She cursed the baby princess, saying that on her fifteenth birthday she would prick herself on a spindle and die. The other fairies wanted to avert this curse, but the best they could do was make the princess fall asleep for a hundred years instead of dying.’

  Jakob wrote steadily, his eyes on his page, his handwriting neat, firm and precise, as Marie told him that the king ordered all the spindles in the land to be burnt, but his daughter was pricked by a spindle on her fifteenth birthday and fell asleep.

  ‘And this sleep spread throughout the entire castle,’ Marie said. ‘Even the flies on the wall fell asleep.’

  Nobody stirred or spoke as Marie told her tale. It was as if she had cast a spell on them. She was so delicate and pretty, heavy dark ringlets falling down on either side of her face, and finely marked dark brows over black eyes that seemed full of sombre mystery.

  ‘Roundabout the castle a thorn hedge began to grow, till it finally covered the entire castle. A legend circulated throughout the land about the beautiful sleeping Dornröschen, for so the princess was called.’

  Little Thorn-Rose. Such a beautiful name, Dortchen thought. It almost sounds like mine.

  She looked at Wilhelm, and saw his eyes were fixed on Marie. Jealousy stabbed her, as sharp as one of the thorns in the hedge. It was all she could do to keep still. Dortchen twisted her handkerchief in her hands, keeping her head bowed so no one could see her face.

  ‘After a long, long time, a king’s son came into the land,’ Marie said. ‘He heard the tale and went riding up to the thorn hedge. All the thorns parted before him and seemed to be flowers, and behind him they turned into thorns again. He kissed the sleeping princess and everything awoke from its sleep, and the two were married. And if they are not dead, they are still living.’

  Marie had finished her tale. She smiled, her eyes downturned, while everyone congratulated her.

  ‘It is a beautiful story,’ Jakob said, wiping his quill on a rag. ‘But it’s French. We cannot include it in our collection.’

  ‘Oh, no,’ Marie cried out, distressed. ‘But it’s my favourite story. It’s not French – my mother told it to me.’

  ‘It’s from Monsieur Perrault’s collection,’ Jakob said. ‘Wilhelm, you must’ve read it – “La Belle au Bois Dormant”.’

  ‘Well, yes,’ Wilhelm agreed. ‘But there are significant differences too. In Monsieur Perrault’s version, there are only eight fairies, not thirteen. And the princess bears him two children and the prince’s mother tries to eat them. Surely Marie’s tale has as many echoes of Brynhild and the Völsunga epic as it does of Perrault’s story?’

  ‘The maiden asleep in a remote castle, you mean?’ Jakob said.

  ‘Yes, until the right man comes just at the right time to awaken her. And surely the wall of thorns in Little Thorn-Rose’s story is analogous to the wall of fire in Brynhild’s story?’

  ‘Perhaps,’ Jakob said. ‘I’ll need to think on it.’

  ‘It’s too beautiful not to include,’ Wilhelm said to Marie.

  ‘Oh, I am glad,’ she said, clasping her hands together and smiling up at him.

  Dortchen stood up. ‘It’s time for us to go. Come on, Mia.’

  As she gathered up her reticule, she was aware of Jakob’s thoughtful gaze on her face. She made her farewells as politely as she could manage, drowning Mia’s protests ruthlessly. As they went out into the hot, dusty street, Mia said, ‘But why? What’s wrong, Dortchen?’

  ‘Nothing,’ she answered, knowing that she lied.

  I must stop loving him, she told herself. But how?

  COMMON RUE

  September 1810

  One morning, in early September, Hanne leant over and vomited her morning coffee all over the floor.

  Pandemonium erupted. Frau Wild wept and wrung her hands, Herr Wild shouted and stamped about and shook Hanne till she almost fainted, while Rudolf was disgusted. The three younger sisters all huddled together, frightened and alarmed.

  ‘Why is everyone so angry?’ Mia asked. ‘It’s not Hanne’s fault if she’s eaten something bad.’

  Dortchen put her arm about Mia’s shoulders. ‘They think Hanne may be with child.’

  ‘With child? You mean …’

  Dortchen nodded.

  ‘She has become a transgressor,’ Röse said with dark satisfaction.

  ‘Who is he?’ Herr Wild yelled. ‘I’ll kill him!’

  ‘I shan’t tell you,’ Hanne said, and he slapped her.

  Hanne stumbled back, her hand covering her cheek. Herr Wild raised his hand again and Frau Wild tried to seize it. He smacked her instead, saying, ‘What else could I expect, with a fool for a wife?’

  He went out of the room, slamming the door behind him. Dortchen helped her mother and sister to the drawing room, then brought cool lavender water, smelling salts and her mother’s drops. She was bathing her mother’s head when the door banged open. Her father stood in the doorway, a beaker of dark-green liquid in his hand. Dortchen smelt the bitter scent of common rue. She stood up, her hands clenched. Rue was an old wives’ way of ridding oneself of an unwanted child.

  ‘Drink this,’ He
rr Wild told Hanne.

  She pressed herself back against the couch. ‘I won’t.’

  ‘You will,’ he said, advancing upon her.

  She closed her mouth obdurately. He seized her face, closing her nostrils with his large fingers. After a moment she had to gasp for air, and he poured the stinking liquid into her mouth. Hanne choked and spluttered, but he held her chin and nose tightly, forcing her to swallow. The next moment she vomited it up – all over her father’s frockcoat. He snapped at her, cleaning himself with his handkerchief, and went back to the stillroom to make some more.

  Hanne ran down the back stairs. Herr Wild caught her halfway across the garden and dragged her back to her room, where he locked her in, pocketing the key.

  ‘You will stay in your room, with nothing to eat or drink, until you tell me the name of your lover,’ he said through the wooden panels of the door.

  ‘I’m not hungry anyway,’ Hanne responded.

  Herr Wild turned to go and saw Dortchen and Mia watching anxiously from the stairwell. He pointed a finger at them. ‘You are not to leave this house – do you hear me?’

  They nodded their heads, feeling sick and shaken.

  Herr Wild went away, and soon Dortchen could hear the sound of sobbing. She knelt and put her mouth to the keyhole. ‘Hanne,’ she whispered.

  After a moment her sister’s voice replied shakily, ‘Yes?’

  ‘What do you want me to do? Shall I take a message to him?’

  ‘Yes, please. Wait just a moment.’ In a few minutes, a sheet of paper in her sister’s untidy scrawl was pushed under the door. Dortchen folded it up small and hid it in her bodice, then went down the back stairs, trying to think what excuse she could make to go out.

  Old Marie was up to her elbows in bread dough, looking very hot and bothered. Mozart hopped about the floor, pecking at a cockroach that scuttled by.

  ‘He’s locked all the doors and taken the keys,’ Old Marie said.

  ‘But … how am I to feed the birds? Or harvest vegetables for dinner?’

  Old Marie shook her head. ‘He said no one’s to go out, else I’ll lose my job. He says he will feed the animals himself tonight.’

  Dortchen went to the window and stared out at the garden, which basked peacefully in the bright sunshine. She leant her head against the door.

  ‘He’s very angry,’ Old Marie said.

  Dortchen went upstairs to her bedroom. Mia had taken over Lisette’s bedroom when her sister had married, so the little room with the sloping ceiling was now all her own. She opened the window wide, letting in a soft, warm breeze, then dropped her sister’s folded note into the little basket where the pegs were kept, first scribbling a note to Lotte on the outside. Dortchen then tied her green sash to the basket and pulled on the washing line till the basket was hanging outside Lotte’s window. It had been such a long time since she and Lotte had exchanged notes in this way that she could only hope her friend would notice the green sash and think to check the basket. A pang of nostalgia smote her, for the little girls she and Lotte had been.

  ‘May I take Hanne some soup?’ she asked her father that night at supper, after grace had been said and a silent meal half-consumed. ‘She will need to keep up her strength.’

  ‘She may have no food or drink till she does what she’s told,’ Herr Wild said. ‘She will drink the rue and parsley mixture, that bastard will be expelled from her womb, and she will tell me the name of the man that ruined her so I may take a horsewhip to him and drive him out of town.’

  ‘But, Father,’ Dortchen protested. ‘The baby’s your grandchild. Surely—’

  He stood up, pushing his chair back roughly, and pointed a finger at her. ‘Do not speak another word, Dortchen, I warn you.’

  She fell silent and he left the room, leaving his meal half-finished.

  ‘Do you know who her lover is?’ Rudolf demanded.

  Dortchen did not answer.

  When she and Röse and Mia had finished clearing away and washing up, she went up to her room. The basket had been returned to her side of the washing line. Hanne’s note was gone.

  The next morning, there was a knock at the front door. Dortchen could not open the door because it was locked, so she called out, ‘Who’s there?’

  ‘Would you please present my compliments to your father and tell him that Herr Fulda is here to speak to him upon a matter of great importance,’ the voice of a young man said.

  ‘Yes, sir,’ Dortchen replied, and she went with a racing pulse into the shop, where her father was serving a customer. He cast her an irritated look, so she went to the window and looked out into the street. Standing on their front doorstep was the young man in the red scarf, looking rather pale. He was accompanied by two friends, burly young men with coloured scarves about their necks and pugnacious expressions. Hanne had obviously warned him about her father’s threat to kill him.

  The customer paid Herr Wild and went out, and her father snapped, ‘What do you want, Dortchen?’

  ‘You have a visitor, Father. A young man named Herr Fulda presents you his compliments.’

  Her father’s expression darkened. ‘Stay here. I’ll be back soon.’

  He went through the doorway into the house, leaving Dortchen alone in the shop. Such a thing had never happened before. She straightened a few jars on the shelves, then sat at the desk, looking at her father’s neat ledgers. A name leapt out at her from the page. ‘Herr F. Grimm,’ the entry read in her father’s neat, precise handwriting. ‘Tincture of opium, 10 mL.’

  Looking through the pages, she saw the same entry repeated every few days. Earlier in the ledger, it appeared less often, each entry being seven or eight days apart. Where did Ferdinand get the money? she wondered.

  Shouting and a crash caught her attention. She got up and went to the door to the house, listening intently. A loud, angry voice boomed down the hallway. Her father. Then she heard quick footsteps. The front door opened and banged, and she saw Hanne’s lover hurry past, his red scarf held to a bleeding nose. Dortchen’s heart sank. She shut the ledger and returned it to its usual exact position on the desk, then sat on a stool behind the bench, trying not to wring her hands.

  Her father came into the shop, breathing heavily, his face an unpleasant eggplant colour.

  ‘No customers came,’ she said.

  Herr Wild walked to a shelf, took down a bottle of quince brandy, pulled out the cork with his teeth and drank straight from the bottle. ‘That lecher says he wants to marry Hanne. I’ll see them both fry in hell first.’

  ‘Why won’t you let them marry?’

  ‘He’s an unemployed land-loafer,’ her father replied through his teeth. ‘He has no money, no prospects. How is he to support a wife and child?’

  ‘Surely there’s something we can do to help,’ Dortchen cried.

  ‘I haven’t the money to take on another mouth to feed, or to set them up in a house of their own. If a man cannot support his family, he should not get married.’

  Dortchen thought of Wilhelm, and how he could not wear a cornflower in his buttonhole. She wondered how much money it would cost to rent a house, to furnish it, to buy all the mattresses and sheets and eiderdowns, the pillows and cushions and curtains, the rugs and towels and tea towels, the plates and bowls and cutlery, the pots and pans and skillets and ladles and knives. It would not be cheap. She tried to imagine Hanne and Herr Fulda setting up a life together without any money at all.

  ‘But if they love each other …’

  Her father scowled. ‘Sentimental rubbish. Now, go and see if your sister has come to her senses.’

  Dortchen called her sister’s name through the door. ‘Hanne, are you all right?’

  ‘I feel sick,’ her sister replied, her voice coming closer to the door. ‘And so thirsty! Will Father not let me out?’

  ‘Not until you drink his potion.’

  ‘Well, I won’t. I want this baby. And I know Johann will want it too.’

  ‘He came, Hanne
, and asked for your hand in marriage,’ Dortchen told her sister.

  ‘He what? Oh, the silly dear. What did Father do?’

  ‘Punched him.’

  ‘Oh, no! Was he hurt? Is he all right?’

  ‘He had a bloody nose, but I don’t think any lasting harm was done.’

  ‘I hope Johann punched him back.’

  Dortchen smiled. ‘No, he just went away. What are you going to do?’

  ‘Did Father give his consent?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘I didn’t think he would. Well, we cannot marry without it. Not unless we run away and go somewhere miles from here, and I say I have no father. And even then I need a legal guardian to give permission. It’s so unfair. I’m not Father’s possession, to be sold like a cow or a duck.’

  ‘It’s the law.’

  ‘The law should be changed. Bloody Napoléon talks of bloody liberty and bloody equality and bloody fraternity. Where are any bloody rights for women?’ Hanne was crying again.

  ‘Hanne, I’m going to lower you a jug of water on a string from my window. Put your head out the window and catch it.’

  Dortchen ran down to the kitchen and filled a pewter jug with water from the scullery pump, grabbed half a loaf of bread from the table, then carried them swiftly up the back stairs, hoping not to run into Röse or her father. She opened her window wide and leant out. Hanne was at the window below, her face pale, her eyes red and swollen, her flaxen hair in disarray. Dortchen tied string to the jug handle as securely as she knew how, then lowered it to her. ‘Thank you,’ Hanne mouthed.

  Dortchen showed her the bread, and she smiled gratefully. As soon as the bread had been lowered, Dortchen shut her window. She could not think of any other way to help her sister. Unless she stole her father’s keys … The very idea filled her with terror.

  That night Dortchen lay in her bed, trying to find courage. The hours passed, but she could not unlock her rigid muscles to creep downstairs to her parents’ room. At last the darkness began to lighten. Soon the quail would cry. If she was going to do it, she must do it now.

  Dortchen got up, walked barefoot across the room and went down the stairs, careful not to tread on the squeaky step. She put her hand on her parents’ doorknob and turned it very slowly. The door creaked as it opened. Dortchen froze, listening, but her father’s snoring did not falter. She slid one foot forward, then the other, her feet soundless on the thick rug, till she came to where her father’s frockcoat hung on its wooden stand by the fireplace. There was just enough light seeping past the edge of the curtain for her to see its dark shape. She put her hand in one pocket, then the other.