ordispleasure with an act that did not measure up. Tomatoes, apples, masticated wads of tobacco—all were thrown freely at the stage at one time or another. None, however, were thrown at me.
Why I was never so threatened, I can only ascribe to the peculiar effect I had upon most people, even those who could not refrain from remarking upon my size. Far from wanting to cause me harm, the audience seemed, as one, to desire to shelter me from it. This behavior was so marked, so pronounced, that some of the other acts tried to convince me to appear with them.
“C’mon, Vinnie,” the plate spinner, in particular, would beg. “I been hit with so many tomatoes lately I’m turning red! Just step out onstage with me, please? I’ll pay you, say, a dollar a week?”
I smiled but declined. I couldn’t appear in every act!
There was one person, however, who did not desire to shelter me from harm—one person, in fact, who seemed to go out of his way to cause me grief. And that was Colonel Wood.
“Move your tiny ass, Vinnie—if I catch you being late for an entrance again, I’ll boot you from here to kingdom come,” he would snarl, kicking at me with his dirty shoe. This was something he became very fond of doing, just as I became very fond of jumping nimbly aside to avoid him.
Or—“I’m sick of your uppity airs, Miss Uptight Yankee. Why don’t I just throw you in the boiler; you’re so little, I bet nobody would even notice you were missing,” he would growl, taking a swig of his jugful of whiskey. “Slap me on my own boat, in front of my own people, the hell you did.” That, of course, had been my fatal mistake; on his boat, he claimed his title of “Colonel,” placed it on his head like the gaudy hats he wore, and never let anyone forget it. Woe to anyone who challenged him—especially in front of an audience.
“Never thought I’d live to see the day when a dwarf would bethe biggest draw on my boat. God Almighty, what idiots these rubes are,” he would slobber after he was well and truly in his cups. Once drunk, he had a tendency to fall asleep in the oddest places; you never knew, in the morning, when you might stumble upon his drooling, snoring form sprawled all over a staircase or curled up among a coil of ropes on the deck—or even, more than once, leaning against the door to my stateroom.
The first time I discovered him there, bile rose in my throat until I feared I might contribute to the puddle of vomit in the hallway at his feet. I uttered a swift prayer of thanks for the presence of Sylvia in my room, and couldn’t fall asleep that night until she had moved my trunk against the door.
But the fact remained that I made the man money; knowing this, I could not completely believe that he would ever actually harm me. As the months went by, and 1858 passed into 1859 and then 1860, as the
Banjo
drifted up and down the river, its company so oddly detached from the ever-escalating political situation on both shores, my fame grew beyond what the Colonel could have predicted.
After showing him the
carte de visite
of General Tom Thumb, eventually I had persuaded Colonel Wood to have my photograph taken (by stressing the lucrative nature of such an enterprise; he sold the
cartes de visites
for twenty-five cents each, and kept all the profit himself). And over time, these postcards reached people who might otherwise have never visited a floating palace; they reached good people, respectable people. People who clamored only to see me—not anyone else.
The postcards had not, thus far, reached Mr. Barnum, as I had hoped; my fame may have been growing, but only along the Mississippi.
“Get in here, Vinnie,” Colonel Wood grumbled to me one morning as I was making my way to the dining room. As usual,Sylvia was with me; she stopped, gazing down at me with a questioning look. I nodded for her to go ahead, watching as she lumbered down the hall, her shoulders rounded so that her head did not hit the ceiling,
Why I was never so threatened, I can only ascribe to the peculiar effect I had upon most people, even those who could not refrain from remarking upon my size. Far from wanting to cause me harm, the audience seemed, as one, to desire to shelter me from it. This behavior was so marked, so pronounced, that some of the other acts tried to convince me to appear with them.
“C’mon, Vinnie,” the plate spinner, in particular, would beg. “I been hit with so many tomatoes lately I’m turning red! Just step out onstage with me, please? I’ll pay you, say, a dollar a week?”
I smiled but declined. I couldn’t appear in every act!
There was one person, however, who did not desire to shelter me from harm—one person, in fact, who seemed to go out of his way to cause me grief. And that was Colonel Wood.
“Move your tiny ass, Vinnie—if I catch you being late for an entrance again, I’ll boot you from here to kingdom come,” he would snarl, kicking at me with his dirty shoe. This was something he became very fond of doing, just as I became very fond of jumping nimbly aside to avoid him.
Or—“I’m sick of your uppity airs, Miss Uptight Yankee. Why don’t I just throw you in the boiler; you’re so little, I bet nobody would even notice you were missing,” he would growl, taking a swig of his jugful of whiskey. “Slap me on my own boat, in front of my own people, the hell you did.” That, of course, had been my fatal mistake; on his boat, he claimed his title of “Colonel,” placed it on his head like the gaudy hats he wore, and never let anyone forget it. Woe to anyone who challenged him—especially in front of an audience.
“Never thought I’d live to see the day when a dwarf would bethe biggest draw on my boat. God Almighty, what idiots these rubes are,” he would slobber after he was well and truly in his cups. Once drunk, he had a tendency to fall asleep in the oddest places; you never knew, in the morning, when you might stumble upon his drooling, snoring form sprawled all over a staircase or curled up among a coil of ropes on the deck—or even, more than once, leaning against the door to my stateroom.
The first time I discovered him there, bile rose in my throat until I feared I might contribute to the puddle of vomit in the hallway at his feet. I uttered a swift prayer of thanks for the presence of Sylvia in my room, and couldn’t fall asleep that night until she had moved my trunk against the door.
But the fact remained that I made the man money; knowing this, I could not completely believe that he would ever actually harm me. As the months went by, and 1858 passed into 1859 and then 1860, as the
Banjo
drifted up and down the river, its company so oddly detached from the ever-escalating political situation on both shores, my fame grew beyond what the Colonel could have predicted.
After showing him the
carte de visite
of General Tom Thumb, eventually I had persuaded Colonel Wood to have my photograph taken (by stressing the lucrative nature of such an enterprise; he sold the
cartes de visites
for twenty-five cents each, and kept all the profit himself). And over time, these postcards reached people who might otherwise have never visited a floating palace; they reached good people, respectable people. People who clamored only to see me—not anyone else.
The postcards had not, thus far, reached Mr. Barnum, as I had hoped; my fame may have been growing, but only along the Mississippi.
“Get in here, Vinnie,” Colonel Wood grumbled to me one morning as I was making my way to the dining room. As usual,Sylvia was with me; she stopped, gazing down at me with a questioning look. I nodded for her to go ahead, watching as she lumbered down the hall, her shoulders rounded so that her head did not hit the ceiling,
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