Titanic Twelve Tales - A Short Story Anthology RMS Titanic (11 page)

Except from
Tomorrow Belongs to Us: Titanic Novel

by
Lynda
Dunwell

“Look!” A young woman, sitting close to Lucy, yelled. “People are throwing wreckage into the sea.”

Lucy bit down on her lip hard. The desperate situation facing those left on board played out before her. Powerless to do anything to help, she scrutinised the Boat Deck, where hundreds of tiny figures swarmed towards the liner’s stern like ants. She focused on a group of men. They were in danger of being washed into the sea at any moment. Together they fought to free a small, upturned boat stowed on the roof of the officers’ quarters. The hull was white, but the dark ocean was about to engulf the tiny boat. Silently she prayed for the men’s success. It was all she could do.

The
Titanic’s
bow awash, Lucy watched as her ster
n rose out of the water. Abo
ve the constant screams came a tremendous crashing noise, as if thousands of pieces of bone china shattered simultaneously. Lucy
shuddered. Where are they now? Her heart wept – Edwin, Sir Leyster, Marshall. Fearing for them, she struggled to keep hold of her emotions.
There will be time for tears tomorrow, I mustn’t give up hope.

Perhaps the
Titanic
could keep afloat until a rescue ship arrived? Captain Smith had said the
Carpathia
was on her way. Again she prayed, this time for a miracle.

“There are more men in the water!” the young boy cried. The seaman leaned over the side and grasped the jersey of a man clinging to the grab-line. Slowly he hauled him aboard.

“She’s done for,” the rescued man spluttered, “she’s shipping water too fast!”

Another man, pulled from the sea
, pleaded frantically in
French. Lucy’s sensitive ears
picked up his ranting. “He’s afraid he’s going to be thrown overboard and drown.” She called to the crewman in charge.

“Don’t we all, ma’am? Tell him
he’s  got
to row.” His
tone softened.
“If you’d be so kind
,
ma’am.

Lucy spoke quickly in French, and the man fell silent as another man was snatched from the water.

“Papa will be in another boat,”
Cecilly
said, “probably with Colonel Astor.
And
Hardie
and Marshall, of course.”

“They’ll be on one of the smaller boars,” Lucy said. Although unconvinced by her own words, inwardly she clung to any small straw of hope. She shivered hardly able to feel her toes in the bottom of the boat.

“She going!” a terrified voice screeched. Both girls swung around and watched the ship, now low in t
he water, blazing light across
the ocean.

“I can’t look!
All those people, why haven’
t they gone
to their boats?”
Cecilly
slumped forward, buried her head in her hands, and sobbed.

“They don’t have any,” Lucy answered under her breath, then prayed
Cecilly
hadn’t heard.

“If I don’t look, I can pretend it hasn’t happened,”
Cecilly
cried.

Lucy couldn’t look away. She had to witness and
remember it all.
If she was to have any future, she knew she had to face this disaster squarely. She fixed her eyes on the ship.
With the
Titanic
silhouetted against the sky, she made her final plea to the Almighty. “Save him, please God,” she begged. “I know it’s selfish of me, but spare him.”

A low, deep groan reverberated across the sea followed by thunderous crashing sounds which grew louder and surrounded the small lifeboat. Suddenly, the
Titanic’s
lights went out, briefly flashed on again, and died. On the lifeboat Lucy was surrounded by gasps and cries, many women burst into tears or stared blankly across the still waters.

Stranded in darkness, only the ship’s silhouette remained bathed in moonlight. A single lamp flickered from her crow’s nest.