My name is Jenny Forester. I was christened Jennifer but after my mother died, it was always just Jenny. Jenny do the washing. Jenny scrub the floor. Jenny, make your sister stop crying.
It’s no excuse, but it's why I ran away to work in the dance halls the day I turned sixteen.
You’d never know to see me now, but for ten months I performed in the Tivoli Music Hall wearing a borrowed ballet costume. I even danced outside in the back where I could get a little crowd to pay.
Once a toff had me join a tableau vivant at the Palace Theater. I and the other girls wore a nude body stocking and it would have been a shock to my dead mother, I can tell you. When the proprietary of the Tivoli found out, he fired me.
I guess it was a mixed blessing when I got a job as a maid for the Worcesters on Plum Lane. It's a big house set back from the road and beyond the sound of passing carriages. I got the job on a faked reference but nobody seemed to care. I suspect a lot of girls didn’t like to work for the Madam because she has a bad temper. I always allow for her moods because she is plagued with sick headaches.
I have to send for the doctor and he gives her laudanum, and she is good as gold after that, poor madam. So I work from sun to sun, as they say, but I have my Sundays off and usually I visit Eaglesfield Park and sit on this bench, and take along some knitting for my sister’s baby or a book of poems. Madam doesn’t like me reading in the house, not even by candlelight after dinner. But I can sneak a book from the library sometimes, as Armstrong the butler doesn’t mind and will cover for me. I sneak him the best bits from the kitchen and we have our little chats about books. He fancies himself a writer.
My baby sister is married now and a mother of a baby of her own. Her husband Jimmy is high up and a proper merchant with a tobacco shop in the Strand. Very high up. I can’t step foot in the door. I have to use the back entrance, but that’s not because I’m a maid. It’s what I did before.
My nephew is such a dear boy, and deserves the sweater I’m knitting him in the warmest shade of gold to match his curls. I’ve never married, sad to say.
I sometimes wonder what happened to the toff who pulled me into the Palace. He was a handsome devil named Hawks. I’m very respectable now with my hair up in braids and a dress up to my neckline. I dream he may see me on a Sunday and think me much changed.
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Comments: 58
As for the prim and proper look hiding a multitude of unexpected secrets, the same might be said of me. Glad you liked it!
My grandfather was the oldest of a large family and at the age of 15 he ran away from home and joined the circus. He ended up lying about his age and getting into the navy. So maybe I thought of that while writing.
Actually in the history I was studying there was actually a courtesan lane of sorts working the dance halls. So who knows how many girls got nabbed in that game.
So many things are trademark Stirling, here - but the most striking quality is the simplicity and directness of telling that sink effortlessly into one's heart and stay there long after the reading is over. This quality of yours runs like a shimmering leitmotif through all your writing - maybe you should patent it?
And that little louche bit - about the tableau vivant - was a striking moment of brilliance, like a solitary sunray piercing an overcast day... Thanks for sharing a piece overflowing with such soul, mon cher ami! Loved it, and want more!
((((((((((((((((((((((((Scintillating StirFried!)))))))))))))))))
Not to mention that it instantly lends a very human touch to what could very easily become a straightforward, even calculated give and take between poster and commenter! How I love this! Thankee, fair lass! heheheh
And Stirly, your character ... she doesn't just have a voice , she has timbre , she has color, she has shades. In a strange way, she is like you, my dear friend, for one look into those serene, deep yet bottomless eyes of yours instantly fills one with this sensation of having known you even before I met you...and I'm sure you affect others here the same way.
There's an easy, natural intimacy to your being that reaches out to every hungry soul and says "Hello, my friend... don't be afraid, for I'm you and you are me!" In that sense , you are the living embodiment of the Indian greeting, "Namaste", whose true meaning (from Sanskrit) is " The Divine in me greets the Divine in you."
It is this beautiful intimacy and warmth that you have infused your Jenny with, and carried it off with all the sensitivity, grace, and effortless elegance of a maestro. It is what makes this piece memorable... even as you wrote of jenny, you were laying your soul bare for us all. I love this beautiful quality in your writings.
((((((((((((((((((((Whirlygig Stirly!)))))))))))))))))))))))))
the braids are so me :)
And you have done such a great job with Jenny, she is full of character, almost like a gypsy.
I will prolly be last to post this time, my girl is far more prim and proper, and I am having such a hard time relating to someone in a hat.... hahaha - she must be a quiet one, though, she isn't speaking to me at all :(
I put this girl on my desktop and stared at her for hours at a time - several different times
mum's the word!
This was such an excellent piece. In a few paragraphs, you created a wonderful, believable, rich character. No wonder others want to know more about her. That's one of the signs of a great writer, Stirling. I have always been amazed by writers who say that they don't develop characters, they 'get to know them better' as they write. I feel you are one of those writers - that somewhere a Jenny really does exist in another universe and you are simply getting to know her better.
And who would not want to? Such a brave, intelligent woman. Thank you for introducing us.