S.O.S. Titanic (3 page)

"Irish," Barry said.

"Are you going on a visit, or are you leaving?"

"Leaving." The word came, gravelly, past the tightness in his throat. What a terrible sound it had.

"It must be hard," she said softly. He wished she wouldn't sound so gentle...

Would his mother have a voice like this? He'd seen her only three times since Father's business interests had taken them to live in China. He couldn't remember how his mother sounded. He could hardly remember how she looked.

"New York, Barry," she'd written. "A wonderful move for your father, and a civilized place to bring you up. We're going to be together. We'll be a family at last."

Howard was speaking over Barry's head, talking to Scollins.

"Did you know there's a mummy in the hold of this ship? A mummy with a curse on its head?"

"Oh, Howard." His wife was laughing again. "You are such a glum old thing. Curse, indeed. Pay no attention to him," she said, waving her fingers at Scollins and Barry as they left the railing. "Ta-ta. See you again."

Scollins sniffed. "What a silly, superstitious man."

Barry didn't answer. He was watching the coast of Ireland fading in the mist behind them, watching a seagull that glided alongside the
Titanic
, then caught the wind under its wings and wheeled back toward shore. Lucky, lucky seagull, to go where it pleased. Stay where it wanted.

In front of him a man leaned close to the railing. Hanging on brackets beside him was a large white life belt with the words RMS
Titanic
printed around its curve. The man moved, and one of his legs covered the last two letters, so it read RMS
Titan.

If I were superstitious,
Barry thought...

Barry and Mr. Scollins were late getting to the grand dining salon for dinner. First they visited the purser's office to secure Mr. Scollins's bag. Scollins insisted on a confirmation letter saying Purser McElroy had received it into his custody. Several people were waiting behind them to check their own valuables, and Barry sensed their impatience. Scollins was in no hurry. None of your property is as important as what I am carrying, his manner said.

"I'm afraid I'm going to be somewhat of an annoyance during the voyage," he told the purser. "My company wants me to check on my bag every day. It's not that they lack faith in the White Star Line and its employees, I assure you. It is a simple matter of security."

"You must do what you think best," Purser McElroy said rather stiffly. "But I assure you, there is no cause for concern."

"Nevertheless." Scollins tucked the key of the bag carefiilly in his waistcoat pocket and huffed away.

"He must be carrying the Star of India," a woman said sarcastically as they passed.

"Your servant, madam," Scollins said, and bowed.

In the dining salon the chief steward led them to their table. They were seated with a young woman, Mrs. Adair, and her small daughter, Jocelyn. There was another gentleman, Colonel Sapp. Barry thought he was the little girl's father, and he felt sorry for her. Sapp was one of the worst names he'd ever heard in his life, about equal to the name of a boy in school called Charlie Twitt. Little Jocelyn would be called Sappy. Other girls would say, "Here comes the Sapp." But at least she was a giri, not a boy. Girls were probably kinder, he decided. But hadn't Jonnie Flynn said Pegeen was just like him? A fighting Flynn like the rest of them?

The round table could have seated six, but there were just the five of them. Dining stewards hovered, unfolding their white serviettes and placing them in their laps. Barry looked about. He'd never been in a dining room this elegant. If he concentrated, he could feel the soft sway of the ship.
Rocked in the Up of luxury,
he thought, and the idea made him smile.

None of the passengers wore evening dress, and he was glad to have had the guidance of Watley, who'd laid their starched white shirts out on their beds and said smoothly, "I'm sure you know that no one dresses for dinner the first night out, gentlemen. So I've taken the liberty of putting out fresh linens, on the chance that you might like to freshen up." Smart, tactful Watley, with his unsurpassable White Star service.

The dining salon was like a club. People knew each other. Greetings were exchanged between the tables.

"Mabel, how nice to see you again. When was the last time we met?"

"The Cannes Regatta, was it?"

"Oh, no, my dear. Wasn't it spring, at the baths at Baden-Baden? Weren't you with the Cavendishes?"

Even Barry knew someone. The lady who'd worn the hat with the cherries waved cheerfully to him from two tables over. She wasn't wearing the hat now, but her gray dress had a bunch of cherries at the throat.

"I see we haven't perished yet," she called. "Howard's rather disappointed."

Howard smiled a tight-lipped smile.

"Lovely atmosphere," Colonel Sapp murmured. "Lovely. Isn't that Henry Sleeper Harper of the New York publishing family? I'm sure it is. Those are the Astors at that center table. Such a handsome couple."

"I'm afraid my friend Mr. O'Neill and I are more conversant with Dublin society," Mr. Scollins said frigidly.

"And why are you going to New York?" Colonel Sapp asked Barry, spooning up a little of his turtle soup, on which cream floated soft as snow.

"I am going to join my parents," Barry said, and hoped he wouldn't be asked more.

"I'm visiting a cousin in Philadelphia," the colonel said, and wiped his mustache on his starched serviette. "Robert lives in a rather exclusive neighborhood, I'm told. Bryn Mawr."

The woman, Mrs. Adair, sat quietly. Once, when she looked directly at him, Barry noticed that her right eye twitched at the corner. Twitched and twitched. He bent his head over his soup dish, trying not to meet her eyes again, but the twitch was like a magnet and as hard to ignore.

"The Adairs are going to be with her mother in Boston," the colonel volunteered. "And what of your husband, Mrs. Adair? You haven't mentioned him."

Flick, flick, flick. "Mr. Adair was unable to come with us," the woman said.

Barry wanted to rub his own eye in sympathy.

Little Jocelyn sat still as a statue.

Mr. Scollins told about his transfer to the new branch of his firm. Each time he related where he was going and what he was doing, his position grew more important. By now he was a top executive with Billings and Fetters Jewellers. By the time he got to New York he'd probably be a full partner. Barry noticed that Scollins never told why Barry was with him. One would have thought he was keeping an eye on this lad as a personal favor to a friend, to hear him tell it. There was no mention of the five guineas.

The stewards changed the plates so silently that it was almost a surprise to look down and find one dish removed and another in its place.

Barry listened to the well-mannered tinkling of the glasses, to the soft laughter and conversation, to the faint distant throb of the giant engines. Hard to imagine that beyond these damask-covered walls, below the double-bottomed steel hull, lay an ocean filled with creatures with teeth and tentacles who lived their lives in those dark depths. What was that hymn they used to sing in Sunday service? "O hear us when we pray to thee, for those in peril on the sea?" Of course, whoever wrote that wrote it before the
Titanic
was built. Before the imaginary
Titan,
too.

The dining stewards pushed the great serving carts laden with silver dishes and domed covers through the salon. From under the domes, platters of golden duck appeared; the ducks were doused in brandy and set alight, to the ohs and ahs of the diners. The smell reminded Barry of home. Of Grandpop sipping brandy as he sat in his big chair by the fire, the wind blowing down the chimney, filling the room with the blue smokiness of the smoldering turf.

"Those are the Ryersons," Colonel Sapp murmured, leaning across the table. "I hear they brought sixteen trunks. She is always terribly well dressed, and I expect she wants to keep it up."

"You seem to be very much in the know, Colonel," Mrs. Adair said gently. Her brown eyes flicked—flick, flick, flick.

"I like to take stock of my traveling companions," Colonel Sapp told her. "One must keep up one's standards."

"Quite," Mr. Scollins agreed.

Barry smiled across the table at little Jocelyn. He thought she was probably about seven. Her hair was long and fawn colored, like her mother's. It was tied back with a great navy blue bow that perched like a giant butterfly at the nape of her neck. He thought he'd never seen a sadder little face. Her lips drooped. She barely spoke except to answer her mother, yes or no. She ate almost nothing, not even the wonderful sweet of fresh strawberries and real Devonshire cream. The stewards fussed over her, asking if she'd fancy something different. There'd be no trouble to get it for her from the kitchens. A slice of chocolate cake, perhaps? She shook her head so feebly that the butterfly bow didn't even quiver.

Barry put a blob of Devonshire cream on his nose and made a face at her, but she didn't smile.

Instead, she screamed suddenly, "I want my daddy," and burst into a storm of tears. Everyone stared as she jumped up from her chair.

Her mother rose, too, making little soothing noises, her hands reaching toward her daughter. "Come, sweetheart. Mother—"

"Go away." Jocelyn shoved her little fists against her mother's chest. "I don't want you. I want my daddy."

Barry and Scollins and the colonel stood, too—the colonel taking a step away, perhaps to indicate that he wasn't associated with the screaming child in any way.

The Ryersons and the Astors were glancing in their direction—glancing because they were too polite to stare. The two other children in the salon, well dressed and well mannered, traveling with their parents, were very interested. One even stood on her own chair so she could see better, but her father made her get down.

Mrs. Adair's face had turned the color of the pale lace at the neck of her dress. "Please forgive us." She took the little girl firmly by the shoulders.

"Shall we bring your coffee to your cabin, madam?" the steward asked, White Star to the end. "And perhaps a hot lemonade for the little girl?"

"Nothing, thank you." Mrs. Adair pushed Jocelyn ahead of her toward the doors.

The little girl's voice, shrill as a shrike's, knifed back across the room. "You took me. You stole me from my daddy. You're mean and horrible."

In the silence that came after her outburst Barry could hear the small creaking of the giant ship, the subdued tinkle of china in the kitchens beyond, the faraway heartbeat of the engines.

"The perfect ruination of a good meal," Colonel Sapp grumbled. "I shall ask to have my table changed."

"There should be a special dining room for children," Scollins agreed, seating himself again, spreading his serviette quickly over his dark trousers.

"I understand there is one for the maids and the valets," the colonel said. "Why can't the children eat with them?" He lowered his voice. "I heard Mr. Henry Sleeper Harper brought his own dragoman. That's the way to travel."

"You Sapp," Barry said under his breath. He couldn't put Jocelyn's big, sad eyes, her mother's pale face out of his mind. What was wrong? How could a mother have stolen her child?

When he looked across at the two empty seats he saw that Jocelyn had left her serviette neatly folded on her chair. But, no, it wasn't a serviette, it was something else.

"Excuse me," he murmured, and went around the table and picked up a man's folded linen handkerchief with the initial P embroidered in one corner.

"Excuse me," he said again, without bothering to answer Scollins's quick "Where are you going?" or to worry about the colonel's "People will think we have the most undesirable table in the whole dining room."

Too bad, Sappy,
Barry thought, hurrying toward the doors.

Outside on the veranda the string orchestra was playing a Strauss waltz, one of Grandmother's favorites. Above his head the glass dome that covered the grand staircase quivered slighdy, with a sound like bells. The ornate cherub clock in its oval recess showed ten minutes to nine. Had they gone immediately to their cabin? And which cabin was it? He could keep the handkerchief till tomorrow, but he thought Jocelyn would miss it and that would make her sadder than ever.

At the bottom of the staircase he saw them. "Jocelyn," he called, "Jocelyn, you forgot something."

They stopped and Barry held up the handkerchief and ran down the remaining steps.

"Why, it's one of Peter's." Mrs. Adair's mouth tightened; her eye twitched.

Jocelyn snatched the handkerchief from Barry's hand. "My daddy's," she said, and held the handkerchief to her face.

"Oh, darling girl," Mrs. Adair whispered, and put both arms around her daughter. "I'm so sorry it had to be this way. I'm so sorry."

There was so much love and pain in her face that Barry had to look away.

"Thank you," she said to Barry. He watched them walk along the corridor, and he thought he knew how Jocelyn felt. He hadn't lost his father, but he had lost Grandmother and Grandpop. If he had one of Grandmother's handkerchiefs, he would hold it against his face, too.

Behind him he heard Scollins's voice. "What do you think you're doing, young man, dashing off like that? You heard me promise your grandmother that I'd keep an eye on you."

"I'm not going to jump ship," Barry said. "Believe me, you're not going to lose me."
Unless Jonnie Flynn finds me,
he thought.

Scollins's face was the strange gray-white of blotting paper and there was a sheen on it as if he'd just shined it up with a soft duster.

"Suppose ... suppose..." Scollins seemed to be having trouble keeping his thoughts together. "Does it seem rather warm in here?" he asked.

"No," Barry said. "It seems just right."

"I think perhaps that food was a little rich for me," Scollins said. "I must remember to be more moderate." He took out his watch, glanced at it, and said, "At any rate, we should turn in. It has been rather a long day." He eased a finger inside his starched collar."Do you fancy a breath of sea air first?"