Collision Course (4 page)

RMS
TITANIC
S
ATURDAY,
A
PRIL
13, 1912, 7:05
A.M.

Sleeping in the Astors’ trunk was like being laid out in a coffin when you were still alive. Paddy did not like it one little bit.

It was comfortable enough. Never again was he going to be wrapped in such luxurious fabrics. But being closed in a box made him think about dying, and that made him think about Daniel.

The whole point of setting up this trunk was so he could have a safe place to sleep. And the fact was he was hardly sleeping at all. He would toss and turn, dozing no more than a few minutes at a time. When he did finally drop off, he would awake gasping for breath and choking over the sickly sweet smell of the perfumed sachets placed among the linens.

When Alfie threw open the lid of the trunk early the next morning, Paddy felt more tired than when he’d laid down his head the night before.

“I brought you some breakfast.” The young steward pulled a fresh scone out of each pocket of his jacket. “Sorry I couldn’t make away with any tea.”

“This is fine!” Paddy ate hungrily. One thing life in Belfast had taught him: You never turned your nose up at food, even if you were too exhausted to be hungry.

Alfie was bursting with excitement. “I found him!”

“Found who?” Paddy opened his eyes wide. “Not Jack the Ripper?”

“His name is Robert Masterson,” Alfie supplied breathlessly, “and he’s staying in A-17. I checked the passenger manifest. No wife, no valet. He’s the only one in that stateroom. It’s impossible for the scrapbook to belong to anybody but him!”

Paddy chewed thoughtfully. “And you’re certain that your suspicion is true?”

“Masterson is lame in both legs. That explains why the Whitechapel murders suddenly stopped. Once he could barely walk, he was no longer able to chase down his victims on dark streets. And no wonder Jack the Ripper was never caught. Why would the police suspect a cripple?”

“You’d better be
really
sure,” Paddy said slowly. “He’s a proper first-class toff, he is. And you? You’re nobody. If you accuse him and you’re wrong, you’ll
never work on another ship. They might even clap you in irons!”

Alfie’s confidence melted away. “I know I’m right. But to say all this to the captain —”

“Perhaps it’s just too soon,” Paddy suggested. “We’ve four more days before we reach America. Stay close to the man. Befriend him. Maybe you’ll find proof positive.”

“You have no idea what you’re asking,” Alfie groaned. “He’s a horrible, nasty, unbearable person!”

“Did you expect him to be sweet and agreeable?” Paddy demanded impatiently. “He’s Jack the Ripper!”

“Even if I could tolerate his company, he hates me. All I did was help him to his cabin on the captain’s direct order. He heaped abuse upon me every step of the way. He won’t accept my friendship. He’ll send me away.”

Paddy shrugged. “You’re a steward; he’s a passenger. It’s your job to attend to him. You just have to find a way.”

Alfie returned to cabin A-17 to find Junior Steward Jules Tryhorn removing the breakfast dishes.

“Mr. Masterson is in the gymnasium,” Tryhorn told Alfie. “He always takes breakfast in his stateroom,
and then I escort him to the boat deck for his exercise session.”

Alfie was surprised. “He can exercise in his condition?”

Tryhorn sighed. “Do I look like his physician? I drop him off at nine o’clock; I retrieve him at ten. That’s all I know.”

“Would you mind if I picked him up today?”

“Oh, would you?” The steward was pathetically grateful. “He doesn’t seem to like me at all.”

“He doesn’t like me any better,” Alfie admitted. “But I’ll look after him for the present.”

The gymnasium was located on the boat deck on the starboard side. Like many features of the
Titanic
, it was considered the largest and most modern exercise facility afloat. The polished hardwood floor gleamed with reflected light from eight huge windows. The ocean view was nothing short of spectacular, but the handful of passengers seemed intent on exercise rather than sightseeing. Alfie noticed young Mrs. Astor, just a few years older than he was himself, rowing atop the mechanical camel, her long skirts covering most of the apparatus.

She wouldn’t look so carefree if she knew that a stowaway was sleeping on her fancy linens
, he
thought, unsure whether the idea made him want to laugh or cry.

Then his eyes fell on Mr. Masterson. He was stationed between parallel bars, raising and lowering his body with power and control. His legs might have been rubber, but his upper body was muscular and agile. His crutch, unneeded here, was propped against the wood-paneled bulkhead beneath a framed map of the world.

The gym instructor sidled up to Alfie. “Surprising, isn’t it? Elsewhere, he can barely get around on his own, but look at him now.”

Alfie was thinking the same thing, but with a darker twist. Suddenly, it was easy to imagine Mr. Masterson overpowering and murdering healthy women in the prime of their lives. With his hobbled legs out of the equation, he seemed more than capable of the terrible crimes of Jack the Ripper twenty-four years ago.

“He’s quite …” — the young steward hesitated — “
fit
for someone in his condition.”

The instructor nodded. “It’s said that when you lose one part of the body, the others become enhanced to compensate for it. I’ve known strongmen who didn’t have arms like that.”

Yet as Mr. Masterson lowered himself down from the bars, the transformation was immediate and dramatic. When his feet touched the deck, his shoulders sagged, and his entire body seemed to collapse in upon itself.

The instructor rushed over to take his arm, but Masterson shook him off angrily. “If I want something from you, I’ll ask for it!” With shambling steps, he limped to retrieve his crutch.

His dark, baleful eyes fell on Alfie. “What are
you
doing here?”

“Good morning, sir,” Alfie greeted him. “I’ve come to help you back to your stateroom.”

“Where’s Tryhorn?” Masterson demanded.

Alfie struggled to be polite. “I have the honor of serving you today.”

The man sighed. “Well, one dunderheaded child is as good as any other, I suppose. Come along.” Leaning heavily on his crutch, he began to thump toward the door.

Alfie hurried to support his free arm, and the two stepped out into the cold air and brilliant sunlight of the boat deck.

“Is there anywhere you’d like to go this morning, sir?” Alfie inquired.

“America,” Masterson replied simply. “And the sooner, the better.”

Alfie forced his face into a smile. “In that case, I have good news. The captain has nearly all the boilers lit, and the
Titanic
is making superb speed. We are anticipating New York on Tuesday night, rather than Wednesday morning.”

“Excellent,” the man agreed. “Only when I set foot on American soil will I be free of your pointless attempts at conversation.”

Smoldering with resentment, Alfie lowered his gaze. His eyes fell on a necklace he hadn’t noticed before — a tiny off-white carving of a church on a leather thong.

“That’s an interesting piece, sir,” Alfie ventured, tight-lipped. “May I ask, is it ivory?”

“Simpleton!” Mr. Masterson quickly slipped the necklace inside the collar of his jersey. “Don’t you recognize scrimshaw when you see it?”

“My father is a sailor,” Alfie explained in a subdued tone. “He’s brought home scrimshaw aplenty. It’s a lighter shade, the color of fresh milk —”

“And your pathetic little position on this ship makes you an expert in these matters?” Masterson snapped.

Sophie waved from a nearby deck chair. “Good morning, Alfie!” She was so tightly wrapped in blankets that she resembled a mummy, a mug of hot chocolate balanced upon many layers.

As Alfie raised his arm to return the greeting, Masterson seized his wrist with astonishing strength. “I didn’t ask you to serve me, but when you do, you’ll not acknowledge that bird-witted American wench!”

“Miss Bronson? She’s a very nice young lady!”

“Is that what you’d call the daughter of that poisonous suffragette?”

Alfie was taken aback. “I realize that not everyone supports votes for women, but —”

“It is high treason against every law of God and nature!” Mr. Masterson seethed. “There once was a time that men took action to defend the proper order of things, but no longer. We stand by while shameless women make a grab for the very essence of what makes this
our
world.”

“Sir,” Alfie reminded him, “you talk of our mothers and wives and sisters.”

“And how, pray tell, does relation make a particle of difference? Where is the sainted mother who allows you to sell your childhood to the White Star Line?”

Until that moment, Alfie had been calm. He had tolerated Masterson’s irascible manner and endured
his scorn, as a steward was required to do. But to hear him speaking ill of Sarah Huggins drew a white-hot anger from deep within Alfie, from a sensitive core he didn’t even know he had.

“You may heap your abuse upon me, sir,” Alfie exclaimed, “but you will keep your opinions to yourself on the subject of my mother! You have not met my mother! Nor would I ever want you to!”

As he stormed down the companion stairs, the weight of what he had done descended on Alfie. He had spoken rudely to a first-class passenger. Worse, he had abandoned a lame man high up on the ship’s top deck.

I’ll be dismissed — as well I should be …

He had thrown away his chance to sail with Da — his only parent. And for what? To reproach Mr. Masterson? The man had committed grisly murders! He deserved a hangman’s noose, not harsh words.

Now Captain Smith was never going to believe that Mr. Masterson was Jack the Ripper. The accusation would seem like Alfie’s attempt at revenge against the passenger who had cost him his job.

Thanks to my stupidity, a horrible killer will continue to go free
.

Nobody would have found that more tragic than Sarah Huggins herself. More than twenty years after
the Whitechapel murders, Mum had still been obsessed with the case. Alfie had been perhaps five or six at the time, but he could still remember her exact words:
I won’t sleep sound in my bed at night until that monster is off the street for good
.

He stopped in his tracks, eyes widening at the memory of Mr. Masterson’s necklace. A tiny replica of a church. A white chapel — Whitechapel!

The real reason for the darker coloration of the “scrimshaw” came crashing down on him. The piece wasn’t scrimshaw at all! It was another horrible souvenir of Jack the Ripper’s killing spree.

The necklace was carved from human bone.

RMS
TITANIC
S
ATURDAY,
A
PRIL
13, 1912, 2:35
P.M.

The coveralls were much too large and hung on Paddy as on a small child. But as he descended the ladder to the boiler rooms, he realized that no one was likely to notice. The reddish glow from twenty-seven raging furnaces overpowered what little electric light there was. If you could keep your stinging eyes open amid the clouds of dust and steam, you were probably too distracted by the crashing, roaring din of the place to concentrate on who you saw there.

He stood, choking, at the base of the ladder, wondering if he was going to suffocate. It was like trying to breathe hot volcanic ash. How did the black gang manage it? Lungs of steel, they must have had.

Paddy had explored most of the
Titanic
since stowing away, but this was his first time in the boiler rooms. Even in Belfast, with a skeleton crew on
board, this had always been a beehive of activity. Steam powered not just the enormous reciprocating engines, but also the huge dynamos that generated abundant electricity. No city in the world was as technologically advanced as the pride of the White Star Line.

He set down his water bucket, reached his hands into a coal bin, and smeared his face and neck with soot. Now he fit right in. Here, unblackened skin was a dead giveaway that you didn’t belong.

Spying the bucket, a stoker dropped his shovel and strode over. Paddy handed him the dipper, and he drank thirstily.

“Thanks, lad.” His voice was deep and gravelly from hard years spent in the bellies of many ships.

Paddy grunted his acknowledgment and moved on. It was risky to mingle with White Star employees. But only the dead could lie still in a closed box day and night. There were personal necessities that could not be shut off with a switch: eating, drinking, going to the water closet. And the most urgent need of all — to
do
something,
anything
, to keep from going barmy.

With the crew scouring the passenger areas for the stowaway, this was the place for Paddy — below the waterline, in the
Titanic
’s working guts.

More firemen gathered around, the dipper passed from mouth to mouth. They were tough, these stokers, even by Belfast standards. But their work was tougher still, shoveling quantities of coal that stretched to infinity, feeding a ship that was as insatiable as it was unsinkable. The members of the black gang were almost pathetically grateful for a draught of water and a small respite from their back-breaking labor.

As Paddy scanned his ash-covered customers, he was surprised to find a familiar face. The man was older, his eyes deeper-set, the soot of dozens of boiler rooms etched permanently into the lines of his skin. But the features were Alfie’s.

“You’re Alfie’s dad!” Paddy blurted without thinking.

At the mention of his son, John Huggins softened instantly. “You know my boy?”

“He saved my life, he did,” Paddy replied readily. It was a fact. Without Alfie, Paddy would have been thrown overboard by Gilhooley and Seamus.

John Huggins’s pride glowed right through the layers of caked-on black. “Do tell, lad.”

Paddy grew wary. The more he said, the more questions he would invite. A fugitive needed to be invisible — not the center of attention.

He hefted his bucket and banged the dipper against the side. “Water!” he barked. “Who needs a drink?”

More stokers swarmed, and Paddy was able to melt into the crowd. He worked his way aft, through the hatches that accommodated the
Titanic
’s watertight doors, and eventually found a ladder up and out.

He slumped against the bulkhead and slid down to the deck, bucket and all. What a relief to be out of that fiery place! The most luxurious ship in history, yet the biggest luxury was simply being able to breathe.

A familiar voice reached him from the far end of the passageway. “Five hundred nineteen miles! Are you certain, Joseph?”

Paddy jumped up, chagrined. In his relief at escaping the searing heat of the boiler rooms, he’d neglected to ensure that no crew members were around. He looked over to see Mr. Thomas Andrews himself, the
Titanic
’s architect, embroiled in conversation with one of the engineers.

“That was the official number, from noon Friday to Saturday,” the engineer was saying. “You’ve built us a right racehorse, sir.”

“That would make our speed” — Andrews performed the calculations in his head — “a hair better
than twenty-one knots. And with two fires yet to be lit.”

All at once, his eyes fell on Paddy. “Why, hello.”

“Sorry to disturb you, sir.” Paddy ducked his head and took a step back toward the access ladder to the boiler rooms.

“Have no fear, lad,” the designer said kindly. “I’ll not be reporting you for shirking your duty. I know the heat of the furnaces as well as any man. To take a wee break to cool off the burning of the skin — that’s no crime.”

There was a quality to Thomas Andrews that was nothing short of amazing. Here he was, the most celebrated shipbuilder in the world, a successful man with vast responsibilities. Yet he always had time for the lowliest greaser or scullery maid. Back in Belfast, he had patiently taken time to answer the questions of two ragged street urchins. He had even challenged Daniel to design a way to sink his unsinkable ship.

Through the coveralls, Paddy tapped his breast, and felt Daniel’s folded drawing there. Now was the perfect opportunity to show it to the very audience it had been created for. But then Paddy would be arrested as a stowaway. Besides, what good could it possibly do for poor Daniel, who was already dead?

Mr. Andrews peered at Paddy in sudden interest. “Have we met before?”

Paddy hurriedly lowered his eyes. “Engine crew, sir.” He held up the bucket. “I bring water to the men.”

The designer nodded, frowning. “Funny, I thought I knew you from somewhere else.” And he and the engineer disappeared around the corner on the way to other urgent business.