S.O.S. Titanic (14 page)

"You'll be all right, missus. We'll get you there safely," the sailor at the tiller said. "Just sit back down."

They sat shivering, huddled on the hard wooden benches, their faces shriveled with cold.

"Come on, I need more women and children." Murdoch was getting impatient and angry.

A man stepped forward. A pale, thin gentleman, moving furtively as if he were ashamed.

"I asked for women and children," Murdoch said too loudly, and the pale man shrunk back.

"Jolly bad form, that," someone close to Barry muttered. "The fellow's not a gentleman."

"I'll go if my husband can go with me," a woman called out. She and her husband wore matching checked motor coats under their life jackets, and they stood close together, holding hands.

"Oh, all right." Murdoch's voice was sharp with exasperation. "I'll take some couples, but only couples. We can't wait much longer."

The thin man edged forward.

"Married couples only," Murdoch said, and he waved to the man the women and children had called good-bye to. "You, please get aboard."

Barry elbowed Mrs. Goldstein. "You and Mr. Goldstein could go now. You're a couple."

"And leave Arthur?" Mrs. Goldstein asked.

"Of course, leave me," Arthur said. "I'll be perfectly fine."

"We came together and we'll stay together," Mrs. Goldstein said. Barry thought there were tears in her eyes. "You are my dear brother," she said, "and I am not leaving you."

She gave Barry a push. "Go, Barry. They'll let you on now. They may not later. Say you're thirteen—say you're only thirteen."

Barry took a step forward, then stopped. There'd be safety of sorts in that little boat, but he'd look like a terrible fool, or a coward, or both, like the pale, thin man who was not a gentleman. And the lifeboat did seem so frail and small hanging there. He stole a glance along the sturdy, substantial deck of the
Titanic.
With two compartments flooded it would still float. Watley had said that. Everybody knew it. The ship could probably float forever. Besides, he wasn't going anywhere till he found Pegeen.

"Mr. Scollins would have a fit if I left without him," he said, "and I'm not a couple."

"Lower away," Mr. Murdoch called, and the first lifeboat began its slow creak downward. Barry counted seventeen in the boat, which was supposed to hold fifty-four. He moved back beside Watley.

"Why doesn't he fill it up?" Barry asked.

"He's in a hurry," Watley said, "and the women don't want to go. Not yet, they don't," he added, his fingers stroking the top of the green-patterned box.

The
Titanic
railings were crowded as the passengers watched the first lifeboat go, crank by crank, toward the ocean far below.

"It's like the swing boats at the fair, Dorothy," a young woman said.

"I know. Remember how dizzy I was when we went on one of those things? I was dizzy for days."

Peering down like this, Barry could see that the ocean was awash with ice that floated in flat, pale chunks like surface ice sloshing on a lake. No bergs, though. No great white mountains to bear down on the little boat and crush it beneath tons of ice.

There was a cheer when the lifeboat setded with a splash on the surface, wobbled, and righted itself. From up here the sea looked calm, but there must be a roll to it. The lifeboat tossed around.

"Oh, look at it jiggle," somebody said. "I'd be sick as a blooming dog."

The small figures in their white blurs of life jackets waved up at them.

"I bet they're freezing. Where are the gangplanks? They'll need to put gangplanks down for them to get back on board."

"Ahoy there!" someone shouted through cupped hands, but a sudden whoosh and a hiss took their attention from the boat below to the sky above. A burst of blue stars spangled across the sky.

"Fireworks." It was a small boy's voice, high with excitement.

"Twelve forty-five
A.M
." Watley said, flat and expressionless. "Twelve forty-five
A.M.
The first boat's away and the RMS
Titanic
has just fired her first distress rocket. We can now pray that there's another ship around to see it."

The first boat down on the starboard side was Number 7. Then Number 5, and it was half-empty, too. Distress flares exploded and died in the sky above them but there was still no rush to the boats. The
Titanic
felt solid as a rock and just as steady. What could be wrong with it? Why would anybody want to exchange it for a little husk of a thing way down there in the big, mysterious ocean?

Mrs. Welsh and her nurse stood close together. Every now and then the older woman would snort and say, "Preposterous. Someone's going to hear about this."

Watley had stopped a deck steward he seemed to know and had a conversation with him out of the group's hearing. Afterward he glided across to them. "Madam," he told Mrs. Welsh, "I have just been informed that the sea is knee-deep down in H Deck. Our wireless operator is sending out SOS signals. That means we're sinking, madam." Watley spoke in a monotone, with no emotion in his voice or on his face.

The nurse hid her face in her hands. "It's not possible," she whispered.

"It is not only possible, it is a feet." Watley made his little heels-together, head-bobbing bow. "May I escort you to the lifeboat?"

Mrs. Welsh poked him with the point of her stick. "This is the truth, Mr. Watley?"

"I assure you. But there is also good news. The
Carpathia,
another large vessel, is only fifty-eight miles away, and coming fast."

"There!" Mrs. Welsh beamed her triumph. "Nurse and I will simply wait for it to arrive. That will be much more comfortable."

"There will not be time to wait, madam. The
Titanic
has now no more than an hour to live. The words come from Mr. Andrews, the builder of the ship, who is on board and who has checked the damage."

In the stunned silence another rocket whistled into the sky and burst in a hundred pinpoints of light. For a few seconds the four proud funnels were etched against the horizon. The flare lighted the faces upturned to watch it, hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of faces.

A baby was crying.

A little boy ran a toy horse on wheels out along the top of the ship's railing. "Giddyup, giddyup! Go, horsie. Good boy."

And then there was the most world-shattering noise. The
Titanic
was letting off steam through her funnels. It sounded like a great herd of elephants trumpeting their rage. The roar filled the night, bounced off the water, raced to the far edge of the ocean world, then started again. It was never going to stop.

In a terrified rush of imagination Barry saw the
Titanic
the way the stars would see it. The way God would see it. Lying there big and black and helpless. A great sea creature, bellowing its death cries.

Mouths around him moved, saying soundless words, screaming soundless screams. The mouths seemed impossibly big, impossibly ugly.

Mrs. Welsh motioned with her arm, and she and her nurse moved as quickly as they could, pushing through to the lifeboat that was half-loaded. Mrs. Welsh shook her cane at the officer in charge, and he gave his directions with his hands, calling the old woman and the nurse forward, physically separating husbands from wives, mouthing the words "women and children, women and children" over and over. There was a frantic urgency now. It was as if the braying of the beast had at last opened the gates of panic.

Barry stood on an opened wooden deck chair and peered up and down the slanted deck. Still no Pegeen. He cupped his hands and shouted into the noise, "Pegeen, Pegeen Flynn!" He fumbled to get out his whistle, blasted it full force. Not a single head turned. The priest who stood next to him had the silver crucifix in his hands. His hands were closed and he was muttering words that Barry couldn't hear over the roaring steam and the chaos all around him.

The prayer, if it was a prayer, made the man in the Sherlock Holmes cap angry. He shouted something and grabbed for the crucifix, but the chain was strong and the priest's grip tight. With a disgusted glance Sherlock turned and vanished into the crowd.

Watley put his hands on Barry's shoulders and propelled him forward. "Go!" he shouted in his ear, and Barry, frightened again beyond thoughts of Pegeen, beyond thoughts of humiliation or honor, went, pushing himself to the front of the group. One hour to live. One hour to live. "Me, me," he shouted along with everyone else.

But Mr. Murdoch waved him back. There was another seaman standing at the side in the shadow of a stanchion. The gun in his hand was half-hidden in the padding of the life jacket.

"Women and children," Officer Murdoch mouthed. Easy to read his lips as he repeated the words over and over, like a prayer.

Number 3 was cranking out and down now, filled almost to overflowing.

Barry moved back, ashamed but calmer. He wasn't going to be on any of the boats. He accepted that. Acceptance made it easier. He would have to save himself. But he would. He was young, he was strong, he was a good swimmer. He wasn't going to die. He'd find Pegeen and he'd save her, too.

The roar of the steam stopped, and all other sound with it. The passengers seemed to hold their breath, waiting for what would happen next.

But nothing happened. Nothing different. Little by little, terrified conversations began. "The lifeboats, the lifeboats. Where's Alice? Put her on your shoulders." There was a pell-mell rush to where Murdoch was loading again.

"They're sending Morse light signals from the bridge in all directions," a man shouted. "Nobody's answering them."

"An officer told us there's another ship stopped in the ice. Where is it? Why aren't they signaling back? Why don't they come through the ice and get us?" The voices were on the edge of panic, shrill and hysterical.

Now Barry could plainly see the slope of the deck. The bow was dipping, the way it would in a small boat going through a storm at sea. Noticeable now. Too easy to see and understand.

Mr. Ryerson stood with his hands on his wife's padded, life-jacketed shoulders. "You must obey orders, my dear," he said calmly. "When they say 'Women and children to the boats,' you must go."

"No, no," she said, and stamped her foot. "No."

The captain had appeared on the boat deck with a loudspeaker. Barry saw an elderly man and woman go up to him.

"Please, Captain Smith," the woman begged. Tears had frozen glistening snail tracks on her face. "Please, can my husband come in a boat with me? I'll be all alone in the world if I lose him."

Captain Smith didn't seem to hear—but Barry could hear every word.

And still he hadn't seen Pegeen. He ran around to the port side.

And there was Colonel Sapp standing against the bulkhead. He was wearing a full-dress army uniform. The medals pinned on his tunic shone through his open greatcoat. He had no life jacket. The deck lights reflected on the shiny peak of his officer's cap, on the gleam of his officer's shoes.

"Colonel Sapp," Barry said.

"Mr. O'Neill." His mustache had been freshly waxed. His eyes were steady. "I have written a letter to my sister in Long Island. Her name is Mrs. John Windermere, like
Lady Windermere's Fan.
You remember it. I gave the letter to a seaman on the Number Eight lifeboat. He promised me if he made it to safety he'd mail it. If you make it, will you telephone her? Tell her I went like an English gentleman and a Guards officer."

"But, Colonel, aren't you going to try?"

"No use to fight the ocean, lad. I'd just as soon do this thing gracefully."

Barry nodded. There was such a dignity about the colonel. Barry felt humbled and sad. The colonel was a brave man. All those stories Barry had laughed at ... He held out his hand, wishing he could hug him, cry against those proud khaki shoulders, but the colonel was still the colonel.

"Good-bye," Barry said.

"Good-bye, son."

He had to find Pegeen. How much of the hour was used up now? How much? Twenty minutes? He couldn't think.

He shoved his way through the crowds clambering toward the port-side lifeboats, searching for the red hair, the long black shawl. Searching for any steerage passengers he could recognize. He saw none of them.

A man and a woman leaned across the railing. The woman's hair hung in straggles under the jaunty hat with the glowing red cherries around the brim. Howard and his wife. No time to talk to them, though. No time. He had to find Pegeen.

And then as he hurried behind them he heard the woman singing. Heard the man say, "Sh, my darling, sh," in the most tired, the most hopeless voice Barry had ever heard. He slowed, stopped, wondering if he should speak to them or not. That singing, though—that awful singing, high and mad, like a drunk on a street corner...

Mrs. Cherry Hat turned slowly, as if sensing Barry's terrified gaze—but the look she gave him had no recognition in it. There was no wave. He saw the dash of her purple lipstick, the two spots of red on her thin cheekbones, before she turned back and began the mindless singing again.

Barry edged away, his heart thumping. Poor Mrs. Cherry Hat, and her so filled, before, with life and happiness.

When he glanced fearfully back beyond the railing to the sea below, he saw it was closer now to the level of the deck. He saw the lifeboats in the ocean. They'd been rowed a good distance from the ship and lay there as if watching, waiting. They'd stay away so the ship wouldn't pull them down in its suction, just the way the swimmers in the water would be pulled down if they stayed too close.

Back to the starboard side, kicking and shoving his way through the crush, to where Watley stood alone, except for the priest, who was intoning the Lord's Prayer.

"Mr. O'Neill, have you seen Mr. Scollins?" Watley asked.

"No."

"I thought he'd be back by now. I think I should go search for him," Watley said. "Stay here, Mr. O'Neill."

Barry clutched at his arm. "Watley?"

Two people were down on their knees now, praying with the priest.

Barry shouted to make himself heard. "Watley, where are the third-class passengers? You have to tell me."