The Company of the Dead (78 page)

“That was Wells, wasn’t it?” Doc said. He’d removed his necktie and collar and wore his shirt open, but still looked ill at ease. He squirmed in his chair, finding no comfort in its plush grandeur.

Kennedy said, “I’m pretty sure of it.”

“He walked straight past us.”

“What did you want me to do, Dean?” Kennedy asked. “Shove him overboard?”

They’d taken to abandoning the titles and ranks they’d been so familiar with. Morgan was still coming to grips with the false intimacy that step entailed. Standing idly by as Wells had boarded ship had been a good deal more difficult. A year’s interaction with this era had affected them all.

Their non-intervention pact, designed to avoid causing the
smallest
ripple in their contact with the world, had left them handicapped. Diminished. Left to each other’s company, they’d managed to retain strong memories of the world they’d left behind, but the price had been their friendships. Too many secrets had been shared, too much darkness revealed. Their closeness had conceived something worse than the contempt of familiarity. Looking into each other, they’d found themselves.

Morgan was still able to feel some sympathy for the man who’d brought him here. Poor Joseph. He gave Patricia and Kennedy two months at the most. After that, they’d be at each other’s throats.

“My gut told me to stab him there and then,” Doc said.

“That’s why we’re listening to our heads,” Kennedy said. “Whatever happens out here happens at sea. Whatever happens only takes place after we’re sure Wells hasn’t already acted.”

“You may be comfortable with this, Joseph,” Doc replied, “but I’m having a hard time playing it by ear. He’s not on any passenger list.”

“He isn’t the only voyager travelling under an assumed name.”

Lightholler’s absence had left a greater void than Morgan could have imagined. Without him there’d be no storming of the bridge. No attempt to subvert the
Titanic
’s course, nor deal with the actions of her senior crew. Their best course had confined them to locating Wells before he boarded ship.

They’d failed.

His trail ran cold in Nevada. The manuscript, more preoccupied with the order of his thoughts than the details of his journey, was of little use. They’d spent weeks scouring the frontier towns, their investigation stymied by the closed faces of a people wary of strangers asking too many questions.

In New York, they’d checked the hotels from Times Square to the Bowery. Combed the beaches from Brooklyn to the Jersey shore. They held vigil at Coney Island on the day Wells had devoted to memorialising Gershon and he’d passed them unseen, a ghost moving through the new century.

Morgan thought out loud. “It’s like he knew we were here. Like he was
expecting
us. From the time he arrived at the pier, he made sure there were people around him.”

“Cagey fuck,” Doc said. His task of winning Wells over was going to be a Herculean effort. He’d exchanged his Hippocratic oath for one of vengeance, taking Kennedy’s vitriol to new heights.

“Can you blame him?” Kennedy asked.

Doc’s scowl was his reply.

“He’s in first or second class,” Kennedy continued. “We know he never signed on as crew, that he ingratiated himself with the ship’s elite, and that he had the freedom of the ship. We’ll find him. We brace him right after we leave Queenstown.”

He looked over at Morgan. “You’re being quiet.”

Morgan said, “I’m thinking.”

Kennedy stood on the forecastle. The
Nomadic
and
Traffic
, two purpose-built White Star tenders, had completed their exchange. Twenty-two passengers had made the ship their cross-channel ferry. Many more had come aboard.

The tenders bobbed below, toys at the
Titanic
’s hem. He followed the pale luminescence of their wash to the darkened Normandy coast. The fortifications of Cherbourg were glittering gems set in ebony.

Couples roamed the deck, savouring a first night at sea. He watched them. The women in their gloves and long coats. Their hats trailing long scarfs, wrapped close against the cold. Their faces concealed, harem-like, from his curious eyes.

Patricia would be back at the hotel by now. Would she be sitting by the fire, reading? Perhaps by the window, looking out past the gaslights at this night?

Would she forgive him?

Up until the last minute she’d insisted on sailing with them, going so far as to purchase her own ticket. The arguments she’d offered were all sound and delivered with her usual flair for reason. He’d evaded each one of them, saying, ‘You were never here, Patricia. You told me so yourself. Stay in London. Be safe.’ Her farewell kiss had been a chill waft against his cheek, far colder than the breeze that now played upon the deck. Her face, lifted up to his, had borne the thinnest scar.

Their physical wounds had mostly healed. They needed no journals. The permanent lines that etched their bodies were the caustic reminders of crueller days. Hardas was dead. Shine was dead. Lightholler was lost to them.

A man entered the deck alone. He wore a hat over thick black hair. His skin was unusually pale, even for this climate. He wore no gloves. Kennedy nodded to him without knowing why. Wells nodded back, a cursory, veiled gesture.

What seeds had the doctor already planted?

Kill him now and dispose of the body
. Would the disaster be staunched?

Leave the body to be found
. The cruise would almost certainly be delayed, but what repercussions might follow?

There was an abrupt whirring, the clank of metal links against metal. He started at the unexpected sound. Spun suddenly, looking for the telltale tongues of flame erupting from a Dragon tank.

He felt a hand on his shoulder. “Just the windlass, friend. Just the anchor being drawn.”

For the shortest moment he believed that everything had been illusion. A last boon, granted by his dying brain in the desert. He turned with the greatest relief.

Wells said, “Are you alright?”

Kennedy nodded.

“First time out, huh?”

The man was only inches away from him. The deck, quite empty now. Kennedy nodded.

“You’ll get used to it.”

Bells pealed from the bridge, ordering steam, and three sharp whistles issued from above.

Wells was already walking away. Two crewmen, crossing past one of the capstans, momentarily obscured Kennedy’s view. By the time they’d passed, he was lost to sight.

Kennedy, astonished, reconsidered his options.

“So, how does it compare?”

Doc’s question, coolly delivered, reflected the methodical mind at work. It allowed no space for the opulence of their environs.

Morgan had led him on a brief tour. They’d explored the first-class reception and saloon; the smoking room, panelled in finest mahogany and inlaid with mother-of-pearl. They visited the lounge where they discovered a realm of green velvet and polished oak. Desiring no food, they’d bypassed the restaurant to end up in the reading room. A marble fireplace, unlit, took up the far wall. Deep soft chairs nestled in the old rose hue of the rich carpet.

Morgan said, “The truth of it is that this seems less real.”

“They used the same materials on Lightholler’s boat, though, didn’t they?”

“Except for the lower decks.”

Doc let out a hollow laugh.

A curtained window looked out to sea. They might have been in any parlour save for the view of dark ocean set against darker skies. The
Titanic
ploughed her course with steady grace.

Morgan continued. “I had a right to be on that ship.”

“You paid passage for this one,” Doc replied.

“I’m not saying that I’m not supposed to be here. Just that I don’t belong.”

Doc’s smile was rapier thin and just as deadly. “When was the last time you felt like you belonged anywhere?”

Why don’t you go ahead and tell him?

Morgan ignored the voice. A year in the company of Hardas’s spectre had made him no more comfortable with the phenomenon. So strange that while he could no longer picture the commander’s face, his voice still rang true. Hardas wouldn’t be cooling his heels in any reading room. He’d have his hands around the good doctor’s neck right about now.

“What’s so funny?”

Morgan’s grin broadened and he said, “I just can’t believe we’re here.”

Doc nodded slowly.

“We don’t need to kill him, you know,” Morgan added, after a while.

“I know that.” Doc’s reply was even. “Thing is, you didn’t need to see it, night after night. Month after month.”

“That wasn’t you. You’ve said so yourself often enough. That wasn’t your grave.”

“Saying is one thing, Darren. Believing is very much another. I don’t care to see another death, not anyone’s, but I care
less
to see this old dame go under, or the world that follows.”

There was a movement at the doorway. Two couples in evening wear swept into the room. The women took seats at a table by one of the windows, and immediately drew writing implements out of a cloth carryall. The men, positioning themselves by a vase, fell into a conversation. They looked too amicable for Morgan’s liking.

It was time to move on.

They met up with Kennedy on the first-class promenade. A wind had risen—almost a gale. It rattled lightly against the enclosing glass of the covered deck. Kennedy led them down to their cabin in silence.

They mounted the boat deck soon after breakfast. Morgan, having heard that they were entering St Georges Channel, insisted that they view the arrival. He’d boarded Lightholler’s ship at Queenstown for the centenary cruise.

Today’s dawn had been clear. The ship described a gentle arc as they approached the Daunt Light Vessel perched outside the harbour. Stopping to take on a pilot, they continued past the opening at Roches Point. It was just shy of midday. A three-master was slowly pulling past them. Riding light, it rolled dramatically in the North Atlantic swell while the
Titanic
registered the waves with only the slightest bob.

They dropped anchor two miles off the coast while two more tenders ferried over the last of the passengers. A lively tune, played on Irish pipes, travelled across the water.

Wells was nowhere to be seen.

A gentleman standing to one side of Kennedy’s group was observing the new arrivals closely. These passengers, primarily steerage, were being conducted along the third-class promenade. He said, “At least this lot speaks English.”

Kennedy produced his darkest smile and the man moved away.

Catching Morgan’s look he asked, “I’m supposed to agree with him?”

Morgan muttered, “You’re supposed to fit in.” He doffed his hat at the departing man.

“This isn’t so different from the place we left,” Kennedy growled.

“You can resume your eccentricities when we reach New York.” There was gentle laughter behind Morgan’s chastisement.

“I saw Wells last night.”

Doc and Morgan eyed him intently.

“He was out here, on the forecastle deck. As far away from me as you are now.”

“Why didn’t you say anything earlier?” Doc asked.

“I don’t know.”

“What happened?”

“Nothing, Darren.”

“Did you talk?”

“No. There were crewmen milling about.”

They fell silent. The sound of the anchor being drawn up was more indistinct from this height. It evoked no fears or memory save for Wells’ face, cloaked in shadow.

The mighty ship whistled its departure and then turned once more past Roches Point. The southern Irish coast, a postcard of low hills and verdant fields, slipped to starboard. Long years ago his ancestors had worked similar fields not too far east of here, in Wexford, until driven away by famine. He’d visited the county once, when touring the British dominions. Now as then, nothing called to him from those gentle slopes.

Someone below decks played “Erin’s Lament” on the pipes, but it was Morgan’s nudging invitation that summoned him away from the railing to lunch. The selection was varied, their choices spartan. Wells didn’t show.

“He’s keeping to his quarters,” Doc suggested at one point. “That, or going on about his work.”

“We’ll comb the ship then.”

They separated after the meal. He sent Morgan down to F deck to search the squash court, pool and Turkish baths. Doc took D, checking the first- and second-class dining saloons as well as first-class reception. Kennedy had a coffee in the Café Parisien. He cased the Grand Staircase, the first-class lounge and the smoking room, then perused a bookcase in the library and spent a brief time in the gymnasium. Mostly he kept to the deck, doing a round of the promenades.

Families sat together, the women in clusters of deckchairs with blankets drawn to their waists, or strolling arm in arm with their partners. Men stood smoking by the lifeboat davits while children played at cards or dominoes or dashed across the deck in their sport.

Truly, Wells had gone to ground.

Kennedy kept sight of the vanishing Irish shore till sunset.

They took their dinner in the saloon. Their table offered an excellent view of proceedings. At table six, Captain Smith entertained the Astors and the Wideners. Ebullient conversation rose and fell with the arrival of each sumptuous course.

Morgan searched the room, logging the attendees and their seating arrangements. There was Thomas Andrews, the ship’s builder, and there was William Stead, editor of the
Review of Reviews
. Sometime mystic and author, he’d penned a novel in 1892 titled
From the Old World to the New
. Interestingly, it described the loss of an ocean liner at sea; interestingly, she’d struck an iceberg in the North Atlantic.

He spied the Carters and the Thayers. The Strauses and Bruce Ismay, chairman of the White Star Line. Benjamin Guggenheim was in the company of a young woman who could only be Madame Aubert, his latest mistress.
Bully for him
, Morgan thought.