The Dollmaker Read online

  Also by Nina Allan

  The Rift

  The Race

  The Harlequin

  Spin

  The Silver Wind

  Microcosmos: Stories

  A Thread of Truth: Stories

  First published in Great Britain in 2019 by riverrun

  An imprint of Quercus Editions Limited, Carmelite House, 50 Victoria Embankment, London EC4Y 0DZ

  An Hachette UK company

  Copyright © 2019 Nina Allan

  Illustrations © 2019 Helen Crawford-White

  Production editor: Yvonne E. Cárdenas

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without written permission from Other Press LLC, except in the case of brief quotations in reviews for inclusion in a magazine, newspaper, or broadcast. For information write to Other Press LLC, 267 Fifth Avenue, 6th Floor, New York, NY 10016. Or visit our Web site: www.otherpress.com

  The Library of Congress has cataloged the printed edition as follows:

  Names: Allan, Nina, author.

  Title: The dollmaker / Nina Allan.

  Description: New York : Other Press, [2019]

  Identifiers: LCCN 2019002160 (print) | LCCN 2019005003 (ebook) | ISBN 9781590519943 (ebook) | ISBN 9781590519936 (paperback)

  Subjects: | BISAC: FICTION / Romance / Gothic. | FICTION / Psychological. | FICTION / Literary. | GSAFD: Love stories.

  Classification: LCC PR6101.L4538 (ebook) | LCC PR6101.L4538 D65 2019 (print) | DDC 823/.92—dc23

  LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2019002160

  Ebook ISBN 9781590519943

  Publisher’s Note

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  v5.4

  a

  To Lindsey Hughes (1949–2007)

  With love and thanks

  Der Zwerg

  Im trüben Licht verschwinden schon die Berge,

  Es schwebt das Schiff auf glatten Meereswogen,

  Worauf die Königin mit ihrem Zwerge.

  Sie schaut empor zum hochgewölbten Bogen,

  Hinauf zur lichtdurchwirkten blauen Ferne;

  Die mit der Milch des Himmels blau durchzogen.

  “Nie, nie habt ihr mir gelogen noch, ihr Sterne,”

  So ruft sie aus, “bald werd’ ich nun entschwinden,

  Ihr sagt es mir, doch sterb’ ich wahrlich gerne.”

  Da tritt der Zwerg zur Königin, mag binden

  Um ihren Hals die Schnur von roter Seide,

  Und weint, als wollt’ er schnell vor Gram erblinden.

  Er spricht: “Du selbst bist schuld an diesem Leide

  Weil um den König du mich hast verlassen,

  Jetzt weckt dein Sterben einzig mir noch Freude.

  “Zwar werd’ ich ewiglich mich selber haßen,

  Der dir mit dieser Hand den Tod gegeben,

  Doch mußt zum frühen Grab du nun erblassen.”

  Sie legt die Hand aufs Herz voll jungem Leben,

  Und aus dem Aug’ die schweren Tränen rinnen,

  Das sie zum Himmel betend will erheben.

  “Mögst du nicht Schmerz durch meinen Tod gewinnen!”

  Sie sagt’s; da küßt der Zwerg die bleichen Wangen,

  D’rauf alsobald vergehen ihr die Sinnen.

  Der Zwerg schaut an die Frau, von Tod befangen,

  Er senkt sie tief ins Meer mit eig’nen Händen,

  Ihm brennt nach ihr das Herz so voll Verlangen,

  An keiner Küste wird er je mehr landen.

  Matthäus von Collin

  The Dwarf

  The mountains fade into the grayish light

  As the queen and her dwarf set sail

  Their ship swaying upon the polished ocean waves

  She gazes up into the dome of the sky

  Into the shimmering blue distance

  Shot through with milky threads of cloud

  “You stars have never lied to me,”

  She cries. “You tell me I am soon

  To die, yet I cannot deny I’m glad to go.”

  And then the dwarf falls upon the queen

  Weeping, blinded by agony

  He binds a red silk cord about her throat

  “This hell is of your own making,” he says.

  “You left me for the king. The only thing

  That can bring me joy now is your death.

  “I’ll loathe myself forever for your murder

  But I can’t help myself. I’ll send you, pale ghost

  To an early grave.”

  She clasps her breast, so full of young life

  As bitter tears rain down her face

  She lifts her eyes to heaven, praying

  “I don’t want my death to cause you pain,”

  She says. The dwarf kisses her pale cheeks

  As in that same moment she slips away

  The dwarf gazes upon the woman, fixed in death

  He commits her body to the waves

  And yet the longing in his heart will not be still

  He is doomed to roam the seas for evermore

  Matthäus von Collin (translation by Nina Allan)

  VI: Death, Funeral and Burial of Dolls

  Sometimes these are quite isolated from each other and from sickness, and sometimes all follow in due course. Of all the returns available under this rubric, 90 children mentioned burial, their average age being nine; 80 mentioned funerals, 73 imagined their dolls dead, 30 dug up dolls after burial to see if they had gone to Heaven, or simply to get them back. Of these 11 dug them up the same day. Only 9 speak of them as dying naturally of definite diseases. 15 put them under sofa, in drawers, attics or gave them away, calling this death; 30 express positive belief in future life of dolls, 8 mentioned future life for them without revealing their own convictions, 3 buried dolls with pets and left them, 3 bad or dirty dolls went to the bad place, 14 to Heaven; 17 children were especially fond of funerals. 12 dolls came to death by accidental bumps or fractures, 1 burst, 1 died of a melted face, 2 were drowned (1 a paper doll), 1 died because her crying apparatus was broken, 1 doll murdered another, was tried and hung. Dolls of which children tire often die. 30 children had never imagined dolls dead. This parents often forbid. 1 boy killed his sister’s doll with a toy cannon, 3 resurrected dolls and got new names, 5 out of 7 preachers at dolls’ funerals were boys, 1 was the doctor; 3 doll undertakers are described. 22 cases report grief that seems to be very real and deep; in 23 cases this seemed feigned. The mourning is sometimes real black and sometimes pretended. 19 put flowers on dolls’ graves, 1 “all that week”; 28 expressly say that dolls have no souls, are not alive, and have no future life. In 21 cases there was death but no burial; in 10, funerals but no burials; in 8, funerals but no death.

  From “A Study of Dolls” by A. Caswell, Ellis and

  G. Stanley Hall, Journal of Genetic Psychology Vol. 4,

  Granville Stanley Hall, Carl Allanmore Murchison

  Journal Press, 1897

  A Knyght ther was, and that a worthy man

  That fro the tyme that he first bigan

  To riden out, he loved chivalrie,

  Trouthe and honour, fredom and curteisie.

  Geoffrey Chaucer, Pr
ologue,

  The Canterbury Tales

  Contents

  Cover

  Also by Nina Allan

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Der Zwerg The Dwarf

  VI: Death, Funeral and Burial of Dolls

  Epigraph

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  I.

  MY FATHER DIDN’T WANT me to have her but in the end he gave in. My mother managed to persuade him he was overreacting. One evening, long after I was supposed to be in bed, I sat in the dark at the top of the stairs and listened to them arguing about her.

  “I won’t have it in the house,” said my father. “You don’t want to encourage him, do you? That’s exactly how these things start.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous,” my mother countered. “He’s only seven. He’ll have forgotten all about it in a week.”

  I understood that my father was angry, but I didn’t know why. I had never heard my mother call my father ridiculous before, and the idea that I was the source of conflict between my parents was unnerving but strangely thrilling. Not that I dwelled on the matter for long. What mattered to me was not the argument, but who would win it.

  * * *

  —

  HER NAME WAS MARINA BLUE and I loved her on sight. In a world that was confusing and occasionally frightening, she gave my heart a focus. In a shop full of bisque-headed mannequins, it was she who brought the others to life.

  In reality she was nothing special. Dolls like Marina Blue roll off the production lines in their thousands and are of little value to the collector. Yet there was something, even so, that set her apart from such generalities. She drew the eye, as all things born of sentient creativity are bound to draw the eye. She had presence. More than that, she had dignity. I knew from the moment I saw her that she would change my life.

  * * *

  —

  THE TOWN I GREW up in was small, not much more than a village. There were three pubs and a small hotel, one main shopping street and the old cinema, which had recently been converted into an indoor antiques market. There were two parks. One was at the top of the town close to the Rivermead housing estate and had infamously been the site of an abduction. The other, whose official, unsuitable title was the Heathfield Pleasure Gardens, was frequented by drug users and petty criminals through the hours of darkness and turned instantly to quagmire whenever it rained. I was not allowed to play in either of the parks. I was not allowed to go into town at all unless my mother was with me.

  The school I attended was called Martens. I used to believe it had acquired its name from the dozens of house martins that nested beneath the eaves, though when I was older I discovered it was named after its founder, a Pieter Martens who came to Britain from Copenhagen to study at Oxford. At the time I was there, the school still had outside toilets and that species of enormous, green-painted radiator that dated from before the war. There were around fifty pupils. My ordeal did not properly begin until I graduated to St. Merriat’s, the upper school, but there were intimations of trouble, even so. My classmates were growing quickly. In spite of their apple cheeks and choirboys’ voices, they had started to mutate into men. I was a moon-faced, pot-bellied, grub-shaped boy with wet-looking hair and glasses. Still less than four feet tall, I was too weak to kick a football, too small to scramble a fence. Boys who had happily included me in their games just the summer before began to take note of these differences, and draw away.

  The school day ended at three. My mother collected me at the gate and afterwards we would go shopping. Not the serious, fortnightly shopping that required a car but small, pleasurable errands such as buying sewing thread or fruit cake or the Radio Times. My favorite shop was Prendergast’s, the stationer’s, where my mother bought her writing paper and envelopes, and which doubled as a toy shop. I was allowed to browse the shelves while she completed her purchases. I soon learned that if I mentioned any particular toy often enough, I would usually be given it eventually. On the day I first saw Marina Blue sitting in Prendergast’s window, there were still a full three months to go before my eighth birthday. I immediately became convinced that someone would buy the doll before then, that I would never see her again. It never entered my head that there was more than one Marina Blue, that in all probability there was an entire warehouse stacked with them. Her eyes were a deep sapphire, her glossy, waist-length hair the perfect shade of chestnut brown. Her head, hands and feet were made of unglazed bisque porcelain, her body of cotton twill stuffed with kapok. She wore baggy, bell-bottomed trousers and a red hooded top. Her square-heeled, lace-up ankle boots were sewn from real leather. I felt weak and slightly nauseous at the sight of her, as if I were about to faint.

  “Come along Andrew, don’t dawdle. We need to get to the bakery before it closes.” My mother grabbed me by the hand and tried to pull me away from the window, but I resisted her. For perhaps the first time in my life I was torn between my usual habit of compliance and the dark and delicate thrust of my own desires.

  “I want to go inside,” I wheedled. “I want to see the little girl in red.”

  “That’s a doll,” said my mother. She glanced quickly towards the window display and then away again. “Dolls are for girls.”

  I felt close to tears. “It’s nearly my birthday,” I said. “That’s what I want.”

  “You’ll change your mind long before that. You know what you’re like.”

  In fact this was untrue and both of us knew it. I had always been a child who loved certainty. I gazed at my mother in despair, then allowed myself to be led away in the direction of the bakery. In the weeks that followed, I made sure to mention Marina Blue every day, speaking with the studied nonchalance I had previously employed in pursuit of other treasures I had coveted: the miniature kaleidoscope, the magnetic dragonflies, the pewter monkey. In its early stages, my gambit met with a seeming indifference that was easily the equal of my own. Then, with less than a fortnight to go before the day itself, I overheard my mother and father having their argument. This was the endgame and I knew it. When I finally sneaked off to bed that night it was in the expectation and fevered hope that the victory was mine.

  * * *

  —

  SHE CAME IN A cardboard box, nestled in yellow crêpe.

  “It could be valuable one day,” my father said. “You know what they say about antiques of the future.” He rubbed his hands together as if he were cold.

  “I hope this is still what you want,” my mother added.

  I felt as if something was expected of me – a particular turn of phrase in expression of gratitude – but I was too marvelously overwhelmed to say anything at all. I briefly fingered Marina Blue’s red jacket then put the lid back on her box. I took exaggerated pleasure in the other gifts I had been given: a mint-green anorak, a pack of playing cards on the theme of capital cities, a carton of sugar mice. I blew out the candles on my birthday cake and afterwards the three of us played charades. It wasn’t until later, alone in my bedroom, that I felt able to hold her. She felt heavy in my arms and wonderfully real. Her hair smelled of pinewood. When I laid her on her back, her eyes slid closed.

  I placed her box gently on the chair beside my bed. Even with the lid on, I found I could remember her in every detail.

  * * *

  —

  A GREAT DEAL HAS been written on dolls. There are volumes on the history of dolls, the provenance of dolls, the value of doll
s, heavy catalogues filled with lavish illustrations, images that quicken the blood and stimulate desire. I have read that the doll is a surrogate: for friendship or for family, for love. Most children grow out of dolls eventually, but not the collector. The true collector, like the poet or the idiot, remains prey to the intensified sensibilities of childhood until the day they die.

  In the introduction to her memoir, A Brief History of Wonderland, Doris Schaefer, the renowned doll collector and curator of the Museum of Childhood in Bad Homburg describes the moment when she first saw an Ernst Siegler “Gabi” doll at an auction in Frankfurt. Schaefer was thirty years old at the time, a partner at law with a flourishing practice, but her encounter with the doll was an epiphany. She gave up the law the following year and devoted her life to the creation of the museum.

  * * *

  —

  I AM FOUR FEET nine inches tall. Most of the puppy fat fell away in time, but because of my restricted height I still appeared round. In addition to that I wore heavy National Health spectacles, which seemed to accentuate both my shortness of stature and my pudgy physique. For my sixteenth birthday my parents gave me a pair of glasses with tinted rectangular lenses and narrow black frames. The new glasses streamlined my moon face, at least a little, but did not stop me resembling a diminutive schoolmaster, which is what everyone assumed I would become.

  Most of my classmates called me the Dwarf, though there were other names, too. I knew from an early age there was no point in my even trying to belong, that aspiring to be like them would, in some mysterious way, increase their contempt. Rather I regarded my schoolfellows as members of another tribe, whose customs were mysterious and filled with savagery.

  My intelligence I took for granted. I enjoyed all my school subjects, but my true interests already lay elsewhere. The school library had little to offer me, but the public library in Welton was surprisingly well stocked. There was also Ponchinella, a monthly magazine filled with articles on all aspects of dolls and doll collecting. I saved my pocket money so I could buy it the day it came out. I read each new issue from cover to cover and then read it again.