The Dictionary of Lost Words(75)

The pigeon-holes were almost full of slips for supplementary words. They were meticulously ordered, and it didn’t take me long to find the thick pile of slips with quotations from books dating back to 1325. The word was as old as Mabel had said it was. If Dr Murray’s formula had been applied, it would certainly have been included in the thick volume behind his desk.

I looked at the top-slip. Instead of the usual information, there was a note in Dr Murray’s hand saying simply, Exclude. Obscene. Below that, someone had transcribed a series of comments, presumably from correspondence. It looked like Elsie Murray’s handwriting, but I couldn’t be sure:


‘The thing itself is not obscene!’

– James Dixon


‘A thoroughly old word with a very ancient history.’

– Robinson Ellis


‘The mere fact of its being used in a vulgar way does not ban it from the English language.’

– John Hamilton

I looked at the top-slip again; there was no definition. I put the slips back in their place and returned to my desk. On a blank slip, I wrote:





CUNT


1. Slang for vagina.

2. An insult based on the premise that a woman’s vagina is vulgar.

I gathered Mabel’s words into a small pile and pinned my definitions to it. Then I rummaged around for other slips. There was a handful, all meant for the trunk under Lizzie’s bed, but hastily hidden at one time or another, then half-forgotten. I gathered them up and put them between the pages of the novel for safekeeping.

I spent the rest of the afternoon on the proofs Elsie had given me, every now and then looking up to watch her. She moved about the Scriptorium in her diligent way, always ready to do her father’s bidding. Had they argued about the word? Or had she found it missing and then searched for reasons why? Did Dr Murray even know she’d transcribed the arguments for the word’s inclusion on his top-slip, or that she’d included it with supplementary words? No, of course not. She lived between the lines of the Dictionary as much as I did.

‘Ready to go?’ Da said.

I was surprised to realise how late it was. ‘I’d like to finish this proof,’ I said. ‘Then I’ll pop in on Lizzie. You go ahead.’



‘What on earth are you doing?’ Lizzie said, coming into her room and seeing me on the floor, bent over the trunk. ‘You look like you’re bobbing for apples.’

‘Can you smell it, Lizzie?’

‘I certainly can,’ she said. ‘I’ve often wondered if something might have crawled in and died.’

‘It doesn’t smell bad, it smells of … well, I don’t really know how to describe it.’ I bent forward again, hoping the smell would identify itself.

‘It smells like something that should’ve got a regular airing has been locked away too long,’ said Lizzie.

Then I realised. My trunk was beginning to smell like the old slips in the Scriptorium.

Lizzie removed her apron. It was splattered with roasting juices, and she was changing it for a clean one just as Mrs Ballard used to do before she took a roast to table. As if evidence of their toil was offensive. Before Lizzie could put on her clean apron, I had her in a hug.

‘You’re exactly right.’

She extracted herself and held me at arm’s length. ‘You’d think after all these years I’d understand you, Essymay, but I got no clue what you’re talking about.’

‘These words,’ I said, reaching into the trunk and pulling out a handful. ‘They weren’t given to me to hide away. They need an airing. They should be read, shared, understood. Rejected, maybe, but given a chance. Just like all the words in the Scriptorium.’

Lizzie laughed and put the clean apron over her head. ‘You thinking of making a dictionary of your own, then?’

‘That’s exactly what I’m thinking, Lizzie. A dictionary of women’s words. Words they use and words that refer to them. Words that won’t make it into Dr Murray’s dictionary. What do you think?’

Her face fell. ‘You can’t. Some of them isn’t fit.’

I couldn’t help smiling. Lizzie would be delighted if cunt disappeared from the English language.

‘You have more in common with Dr Murray than you could ever know.’

‘But what’s the point?’ she said, picking a slip out of the trunk and looking at it. ‘Half the people who say these words will never be able to read them.’

‘Maybe not,’ I said, heaving the trunk onto her bed. ‘But their words are important.’

We looked at the mess of slips inside the trunk. I remembered all the times I’d searched the volumes and the pigeon-holes for just the right word to explain what I was feeling, experiencing. So often, the words chosen by the men of the Dictionary had been inadequate.

‘Dr Murray’s dictionary leaves things out, Lizzie. Sometimes a word, sometimes a meaning. If it isn’t written down, it doesn’t even get considered.’ I placed Mabel’s first slips in a pile on the bed. ‘Wouldn’t it be good if the words these women use were treated the same as any other?’

I started sifting through slips and papers in the trunk, pulling out women’s words and putting them to one side. Some words began to pile up, with different quotations from different women. I had no idea I’d collected so many.