Women and Children First (30 page)

Reg had very mixed feelings about his flirtation with Molly. On the one hand, he enjoyed their stolen kisses in corners. It made the working day more interesting. He might be alone in the dining room, polishing cutlery, and she’d arrive with her dusters, check the coast was clear then sweep him into a passionate embrace. When he emerged from the washroom, he’d sometimes find her skulking down the corridor, and they always had their tête-à-têtes on the back step after dinner. It was fun, and arousing, and she was a pretty girl.

On the other hand, he was worried about anyone else in the house finding out. It didn’t seem appropriate. There had only been around twenty female staff on the
Titanic
but it would have been a sackable offence to get involved with any of them. Management would not have looked kindly on it, no matter the circumstances, and Reg worried that the same standards might apply in service. Also, he didn’t entirely trust Molly since finding her stealing from Mr Grayling’s wallet. If she could do that, what else was she capable of? And might she drag him into trouble with her?

Above all, Reg knew she wasn’t his type. She was fun to be with but he would never marry a girl who was quite so bold and brash. He liked girls who were quieter and more refined. Like Florence. Thinking about her caused him a physical pain. If only that transatlantic telephone line they’d speculated about were in service already and he could talk to her, just for ten minutes, he felt she would give him wise advice. He’d have given anything to hear the sound of her voice, but of course it wasn’t possible. She must hate him now. He’d promised to write and hadn’t. He’d sat down several times with pen and paper but the words simply wouldn’t come. What a cad she must think him. He couldn’t bear to think about that.

Instead, he tried to imagine what John might say about Molly. ‘
She’s a looker, in’t she? Why not go for it? You deserve a bit of fun after what you’ve been through
.’

She was only the second girl Reg had ever kissed. Most of the lads on the ship had kissed dozens – or at least they boasted they had. It’s what young men did. Why should he feel bad about it?

‘Do you have any plans, John?’ Molly asked. ‘Are you going to stay in service or do you want to go back to Sherry’s when the strike is over?’

He told her about his idea of opening a restaurant one day and straight away she said she’d like to help. ‘I could be your maître d’ and greet all the diners when they come. I’d be good at that. Everybody says I’m a friendly girl. Don’t you think I’m friendly?’

Reg agreed that she was. He didn’t tell her he was planning a small-scale venture, too humble for a maître d’, and that when he pictured it, he certainly couldn’t see Molly there.

She remained obsessed by Miss Hamilton and Mr Grayling’s behaviour on board the
Titanic
, and while they waited for her sister to report back about Lifeboat 6, she asked Reg many more questions.

‘Where was Miss Hamilton’s cabin on the ship? Was it near the Graylings’?’

Reg didn’t know, but he fetched his newspaper with the list of survivors to confirm that she had been in first class. He ran his finger down the page, but the alphabetical list leapt from Hamalainen to Hansen. He looked again in case it was out of order. ‘This is strange,’ he told Molly, and she hurried to peer over his shoulder. ‘She’s not listed here.’

‘No kidding! I guess if you are a married man’s mistress, you don’t use your real name. But who is she then?’

Reg fetched the page that listed the occupants of the lifeboats, and there in Lifeboat 5 was Mr Grayling’s name – but which one was his glamorous companion? Several women were listed as travelling alone, but some sounded German, two had obviously Jewish names and when he cross-referred between lists he found that the rest appeared to have left family behind on the ship. Perhaps, like him, Miss Hamilton hadn’t given her real name to the man doing the roll call on the
Carpathia
? Perhaps she wasn’t on any records. The full list of passengers and their cabin allocations didn’t appear to have survived so there was no way of checking.

‘I wonder if Hamilton is even her real name? Those parcels of clothes and jewels that were delivered here for her – what name did they have on them?’ Reg asked.

‘Mr Grayling’s. He paid for them. Don’t you worry, I’m going to keep an eye on her from now on,’ Molly averred. ‘I’ll figure it out if it’s the last thing I do.’

In fact, Reg was the next one to see something odd. One afternoon, he was walking down the hall outside Mr Grayling’s study. The door was ajar and he heard a noise from within. He believed Mr Grayling to be out and assumed it was Molly, but when he peeked cautiously round the edge of the door he saw Mr Grayling with his face cupped in his hands, seeming distressed. He wasn’t crying exactly but his shoulders were shaking and he was moaning. A small side drawer was open in the desk in front of him and he was staring at something inside.

As Reg watched, he sighed abruptly and pushed the drawer shut then turned a key in the lock. He placed the key inside the pages of a thick red almanac, then slid it into the bookshelf behind him. Reg stepped backwards as silently as he could, praying the floorboards wouldn’t creak.

Perhaps there had been something to do with his wife in that drawer. Perhaps he was upset about her loss after all but chose not to display it in public.
That made Reg feel a little more respect for him, although on the negative side there was still the matter of his affair with Miss Hamilton.

She was spending increasing amounts of time at the house, and was even found there sometimes when Mr Grayling was out. One blazing hot afternoon she rang the bell and asked Reg to bring her some iced lemonade in the drawing room. When he arrived with the tray he found her fanning herself in the faint breeze coming through the open window. She seemed drowsy with the heat and lay sprawled against cushions with her hair tousled and her legs spread in a quite unladylike manner.

Reg put the lemonade on a little table by her side. ‘Will that be all, miss?’

‘I was just thinking about the
Titanic
,’ she said dreamily. ‘Lots of men are ashamed to be survivors. Do you feel that way?’

‘No, not really.’

‘It’s silly, isn’t it? How could men wait until they were sure every single woman and child was rescued before getting on a lifeboat? They would all have drowned and what good would that have done?’

‘Indeed, miss.’ He guessed she was talking about Mr Grayling. This must be something he brooded about.

‘Has it changed you, John? Do you think it has made you a different person? Have your plans for the future altered?’

‘I suppose so. Yes, miss. I’ve decided to stay in America instead of going home, so that’s a change.’

She wasn’t listening to him, caught up in her own thoughts. ‘Surely it makes sense after a near-fatal accident to create the next generation so as to continue your bloodline? That would be a reasonable reaction. Do you think you will marry and have children soon?’

Reg was embarrassed by the personal line of questioning and mumbled something noncommittal.

‘Come now.’ She turned the full power of her deep blue gaze on him. ‘You are an attractive boy and must have many admirers. I’ve heard that young Molly is keen on you.’ Reg coloured. ‘Didn’t you know? Surely it can come as no surprise?’

He looked at the carpet, unsure what to say in response. How did she know about that? Who had been gossiping? Could Molly have told her? It was as if Miss Hamilton was drunk with the heat and normal barriers had broken down.

‘How long do you think one should know a woman before proposing marriage to her?’ she asked. ‘What is your opinion?’

‘I can’t rightly say, miss, seeing as I’m not married myself. I suppose some people wait a year or so?’ She made a tutting sound and he felt she wanted another answer, so he continued: ‘I heard that Lady Mason-Parker, who was on the
Titanic
, has become engaged to a gentleman she met on the
Carpathia
. The announcement was in the newspaper.’

Miss Hamilton sat up. ‘Dowdy old Juliette? Really? Who on earth is marrying her?’

Reg was surprised to hear that they knew each other. ‘A Mr Robert Graham. He’s American.’

‘Well, well.
She
didn’t waste any time.’

Emboldened by her candour, Reg asked how she knew Juliette.

‘We used to have a few friends in common.’

‘You didn’t see her on the
Titanic
? I never noticed you in the first-class dining saloon, miss.’

She gave him a sharp look. ‘I stayed in my cabin for most of the voyage. There are times when you want to escape from society … I simply wasn’t in the mood for it.’

‘I saw you one night,’ Reg volunteered. ‘I was on the way down from the bridge and I saw you throwing your fur coat overboard. I nearly came to offer assistance because it seemed such a strange thing to do.’

She was alert now, listening carefully. ‘If you must know, it was a present from an old beau and I couldn’t bear the associations. It made my flesh crawl.’ She shuddered. ‘Were you watching me for long?’

Reg coloured. ‘No, miss, I was on an errand taking tea to the bridge, so I couldn’t stop.’ He hoped he had convinced her. He didn’t want Mr Grayling to know he had seen them kissing.

She took a sip of her lemonade, leaving a red lipstick smile on the glass. ‘I suppose you have been to America several times before, John.’

‘Yes, a few times.’

‘You’ll know all about American society then. It’s a very complicated business.’

‘So I believe, miss. Is it your first visit here?’

‘No, I was at finishing school in New York for a year. Madeleine Astor and I were there at the same time. It was a ghastly place!’

‘But you like New York? Are you planning to stay?’ Reg would never have been so forward with an upper-class lady if she hadn’t introduced the conversational tone and seemed to want to chat. Suddenly her eyes narrowed, as if she felt she had given too much away.

‘That will be all,’ she said in a tone of annoyance, and gave a little wave of dismissal.

‘Thank you, miss.’ Reg bowed and left the room, dying to track down Molly and tell her what he had heard.

He found her in the kitchen. As he walked in, Alphonse was feeding her a spoonful of the sauce he was preparing for that evening. Molly jumped back when she saw Reg and it spilled down her chin.

‘You scared me, sneaking in like that!’ she exclaimed, wiping her chin with the back of her hand.

‘Guess what?’ Reg announced. ‘I’ve just been chatting with Miss Hamilton and she was quizzing me about how long I thought it should be before men proposed marriage. You must be right, Molly. She’s hoping for Mr Grayling to propose, and she’s getting impatient that it’s taking so long.’

Molly used a corner of her apron to clean her hand. ‘Why was she asking you, I wonder? What do
you
know about proposing?’ She laughed. ‘But wouldn’t it be great if they did get married? We could all go to the wedding and wait on their glamorous friends. I bet that
she
has some glamorous friends, even if he doesn’t.’

‘I expect she does. She says she went to finishing school with Madeleine Astor, here in New York.’

‘Miss Spence’s school? Well, isn’t that interesting.’

Alphonse was banging pots again. ‘You two are very bad,’ he snarled. ‘
Faux-culs.
’

Molly winked impertinently at him, made a face at Reg and mouthed ‘See you later’ then flounced off to do some housework.

‘Can I help with anything?’ Reg asked Alphonse.

‘Yes.’ He threw a bag of carrots on the table. ‘I want these
julienne
-style, very thin, so long.’ He held out his finger and thumb to show the length.

Reg peeled the carrots, aware from the crashing sounds coming from the stove that Alphonse was still in a bad mood. He began to chop the carrots into little matchsticks and Alphonse came over to supervise.

‘
Non! Idiot!
Not like that.’ In a temper he grabbed the handle of the knife to demonstrate how it should be done and the blade slid across the palm of Reg’s hand. He yelled in pain and looked down. Blood was oozing from a side-to-side cut just below the base of his fingers.

‘
Merde!
’ Alphonse exclaimed, and went to find the first aid box, but he didn’t once say sorry.