The girls in all the industries were disgusted at being paid less, of being insignificant, of not being included anywhere in the history of the Industrial Revolution, or anywhere in history at all.
There were corsets hanging all along the fence of the prison. There were girls who carried their bloomers on sticks. They all cried out for Mary’s innocence and her right to revolt.
CHAPTER 52
A Room of One’s Own
Oh, but wait. There is one more thing to tell that no one else knows. The only person who ever knew about it had died a long time before. You see, the death certificate for Louis and Hortense’s child was a fake.
In truth, the ugly baby had not died. Agatha had swaddled up the baby and brought it on the train to Montreal. She walked deep into the heart of the Squalid Mile. In the Squalid Mile there were plenty of babies who had no history. They showed up unable to tell anyone where they had come from. It was impossible to keep track of which babies lived and which babies died. Agatha knocked on the brothel door at five in the morning. It was an hour when all the prostitutes had gone to bed finally. They would be so exhausted from fucking, nothing could wake them up. The rest of the city was still sleeping.
Madame had hurried Agatha into the brothel. She accepted an envelope of money from the woman and tucked it between her breasts. She then forged a death certificate herself. The baby had such clever black eyes. The madam had seen so many babies, she swore she could look into their eyes and see the character they would have for the rest of their lives. Madame liked the look of the baby immediately. She found its ugliness endearing. She knew it would give the baby a power. It would not fall into the traps pretty girls would. She was very eager to see what a girl this ugly would do with herself. She was determined the baby would survive.
Madame had advanced theories of the benefits of breastfeeding. Madame was a woman who made deductions. She noticed that children who breastfed longer had a tendency to stay alive. She insisted prostitutes who were breastfeeding let George suckle from their breasts. They didn’t mind so much. They were less likely to get pregnant, and they weren’t opposed to picking up a younger sobbing child and shutting it up for both their benefits.
George buried her head into the breasts of all the different women. There was a different size breast every night. Each one gave her a different sensation of comfort and pleasure. By being breastfed by different women, George grew up smart and alert and strong. And despite or because of her looks, she was brimming with an unassailable confidence for a child who had grown up orphaned and in a whorehouse.
* * *
George did not have any charges brought against her. She had avoided trying to implicate herself during the trial. She had been well aware that Mary would eventually get herself into this type of predicament. She had no inclination to argue for or against her. She did not think there was any good that was coming out of the trial. It was subverting the message of their movement. She was surprised the extent to which the others wanted to be part of it. She realized they were all engaged in far more risky behavior than she was. They would take any risk to make sure they were in the limelight. They had gone mad with a desire for self-importance. Especially her old love, Sadie Arnett, who had practically demanded to be dragged to the psychiatric facility. Although Sadie was proving prolific, George had no interest in any of that nonsense. She wanted to live a long, quiet, and productive life.
George had begun to make a modest living as a journalist. She moved into a small room on the third floor of a building. It was painted white and all the moldings were a pretty pale green color. It was small, but quite a lot of light came through the window. And it was a brand-new space for her.
George was pleased with the room. She was pleased with the size. She was pleased with the bed. She was pleased with the furniture. She was pleased with a round teapot. She put it on the heater to make tea. She set out her writing implements. George didn’t know why people couldn’t be satisfied by little things in this world.
George did not think of herself as a woman, and she didn’t want to be a man either. She wanted to exist in a realm that was outside of gender. She thought there was a way to be a person. A person who wanted a better world outside of the structures that already existed and controlled people. She thought there was a way to exist as a person who cares.
She looked out the window. She saw a young woman walking briskly down the street with long red hair and dressed in a green coat. She took out a piece of blank paper and laid in on her table. She began to make footsteps in the snow of the white page.
CHAPTER 53
The Morning-After Pill
After the wave of insurgence in the city hit its high-water mark, it began to slowly sink. Everyone always thought they could maintain the fervor and zest of a revolution. But it was impossible. There was a moment when it was necessary to clean up the battlefield and bury the dead. There was a moment when it was necessary to wash the dishes and put the babies to bed. The revolution was seen as a great good. But now everyone had to nurse the wounds they had gained in the name of pursuing that which was right.
Many of the factories did indeed change. The factories could not operate again unless the women came back. And the women would not go back to work unless there were rules implemented to make children have an easier time at the factory. And so they were permitted to go to school and they were all given reduced working hours.
There were men who were union leaders who had not incited this insurgence. But they, nonetheless, took the credit for it. Their faces went in the history books and newspapers for being the architects and philosophers who had the presence of mind and intellect to find a way to protest industrialists using human beings as fodder to run their factories.
All the names of women who had participated and fought in the revolution were erased. They had been written in invisible ink. And then the history of men had been written over theirs in indelible ink. In order to see the history of the women you had to put the page up against the window and let a light shine through it. Then the history might dance like a shadow puppet against the wall.