id="u53c8f85b-1cb9-5638-b0af-6ff9cf60c956">
THE PALACE OF CURIOSITIES
ROSIE GARLAND
For everyone who believed
I would get here,
even when I didn’t
CONTENTS
ABEL: London, February–March 1858
EVE: London, November 1858 and onwards
EVE
London, November 1831
Before I am born, my mother goes to the circus.
She has smelled sweat before: she knows the stink of mouldy cloth, meat left too long, the mess kicked into drains. But tonight, the world is perfumed with fairy tales. She gulps down its promise and a rope tightens across her stomach, causing her to stumble against Bert.
He doesn’t notice. He pulls her up the theatre steps, head turned away, hair sleek black ink. She feels like a princess, even if she is being dragged headlong to the ball. She’s no idiot: she won’t let go of this charming prince come midnight.
Bert pays for them both as if sixpences are a trifle, and bustles her through the crowded foyer so fast the gilded plaster and frosted glass are a blur. She grips his arm above the elbow and he doesn’t push her off. He is a good one: a stopper, a stayer-in. How he will love her! He flings his arm round her shoulders and squeezes her into his buttoned-up jacket.
‘Now, girl,’ he rumbles. ‘Mind how you go.’
He will ask her that very night, she knows: will ask the question she’s been working up to for three months now. She is seized with such a fierce certainty that it makes her dizzy. She does not realise it, but this commotion bubbling through her veins is all in preparation for me. The velvet drumbeat of her heart and the fanfare of her gasps are heralding my arrival. I have never kept an audience waiting.
Bert pushes them to the front row of benches. They are full, so he flaps his hand and the people already seated there shuffle up a little, but not enough. He curls his hand into a fist: they shrink away, and he and Mama sit down.
‘This is the best place,’ he says loudly, although no-one seems about to disagree. ‘I would not sit in the galleries. No, I would not.’
He pauses and stares at my mother.
‘You are right, Bert,’ she says, for an answer is needed.
She gazes up at the tiers of seats climbing the walls towards a roof she can barely pick out in the darkness.
‘Batty’s Amphitheatre is far grander,’ he continues. ‘There is a chandelier with a thousand crystals.’
He is so close she can feel the feather of his breath stir the down on her cheek.
‘Oh?’ she whispers, and it takes a moment for her to realise he is still waiting for a response – a good one. ‘This is marvellous, Bert. All I could want.’
The sun comes out in his face when he smiles. He is as tall as a statue in a park, and certainly as good-looking. But there is no more time to adore her new idol, for a gentleman appears in the circle before them, eyes ringed with black, lips and cheeks rouged.
‘Gentleman!’ he cries. ‘And ladies!’
This creates a swell of merriment, and Mama thinks it best to smile also.
‘Tonight we have mirth!’
A cheer bursts out.
‘Wit!’
Another whoop.
‘And jollity!’
Mama joins in the cheering, and for once no-one tells her to be quiet. The Master of Ceremonies strides about the arena, brandishing his hands.
‘You have come on a very special evening!’ He grins, eyes gleaming. ‘How happy I am to welcome you to this Palace of Delights on such an auspicious occasion! What Luck! What Serendipity! What Felicitous Providence!’
There is a hum of appreciation. Mama wonders why he is stretching his words out so, pulling at them so hard they are in danger of breaking.
‘We humbly offer, for your discernment, Wonders Unparalleled! Incredible Feats of Daring! Please welcome the Italian Fairy, lately arrived from Milan, the Empress of the Air! Signorina Chiarini!’
A storm of clapping breaks over their heads. From the muddy dark of the carved ceiling a rope uncoils, lowering a hoop studded with rubies and emeralds more precious than those kept in the Tower. Balanced there is a magical creature who sparkles even more brightly, thighs bulging with diamond garters, beautiful as a fairy. She waves at my mother, winking at how clever she is to have such a handsome young man on her arm. Mama leans into Bert’s shoulder. My hero, she thinks.
The