Call Me Ismay (41 page)

The two Vampires glowered at each other. For a moment both of them were poised for anything- perhaps even a vicious assault upon each other. A sudden surge of screams from the crowd nearby interrupted their rage, and forced them into a
detente.
Women were now being forcibly thrown into lifeboats by some of the officers, creating shrieks of outrage and terror from the women, and loud shouts of protest from the men.

“Women and children, women and children, women and children
, that has been the chant all night long,” Lyons whispered conspiratorially into Gidley's ear. “From this moment forward- no more women and children.”

1:48 A.M.

Langston, shaking from fear and the severe cold, had been fumbling in the shadowy light for several minutes, trying to get a single round into the .45 caliber muff pistol. He finally realized, to his great chagrin, that the weapon was already loaded. He then struggled to get the pistol's hammer cocked. The metal was stingingly cold to the touch, and his hands were almost totally unsure of what to do. He glanced back over to starboard, and saw the unmistakable form of Bartholomew Gidley at Lyons's side. It was clear even from a distance that they were engaged in dark conversation.

Langston was shocked by what he saw next. Gidley, then Lyons, blithely stepped toward to the crowd of immigrants on their side of the deck and, with almost surgical precision, they plucked two small children- boys- from their unknowing parents' sides. In a matter of seconds, they lifted them up, bashed their little heads together as if proposing a gruesome toast, and then hurled them overboard.

Langston fell to his knees. “Merciful heaven!” he cried, ducking down and crawling over the edge of the roof to talk to Lillith, who was still collapsed on the bench. “Lillith! Dear God, woman! They just killed two children and no one even saw it!”

Lillith, still incapacitated and weak, struggled to speak. “Stop- stop Them, Kerry. S-s-stop Them.”

“I'm trying!” he cried, still fighting to understand the workings of the gun. At last, the pistol's hammer fully cocked, he turned back to see that Lyons and Gidley had apparently swept themselves back into the shadows. A woman, the mother of one of the missing boys, emerged from the crowd, clearly in a state of panic over being separated from her son. Suddenly, she began to shriek, and Lyons stepped over to her. To Langston, Lyons's body language conveyed nauseating insincerity. The vampire took the woman's hand, appearing to sooth and assist her. He pulled her out of Langston's view. Langston glanced briefly toward the starboard wing bridge, and noticed that an officer was preparing to fire what would be the final distress rocket. 

When he looked back to where the woman and Lyons had been, only about twenty seconds had elapsed. He strained to see into the shadows. Then, to his horror, he saw the woman's body pitch forward, hit the railing at her stomach, fold up and over, then plunge into the sea.

“Nooooo!” Langston screamed himself hoarse. “Nooooo!” His cry, while heartfelt and loud, was not to be heard over the sounds of rushing water, women's screams, and general chaos. He then saw Bartholomew Gidley step out toward the crowd, apparently about to excise another victim.

Kerry Langston stood his ground. On the roof of a ship that was now listing about fifteen degrees down at the head, his balance also compromised by a severely injured ankle, he grasped the pistol like a professional. He aimed for Gidley's neck, about twenty yards away.

But Bartholomew Gidley had the advantage. There was no crucifix in sight. As he reached for his next victim, he was stopped cold by a stinging vibration on the nape of his neck and his eyes widened. His Vampire blood had sensed that someone had drawn a bead on him. With inhuman speed, he threw aside his cane, clutched the nearest person- in this instance, a luckless Second Class Passenger- by the neck, and whirled both he and his human shield around as the final distress rocket was launched.

The gun's explosion of smoke and orange sparks of fire was not in total syncopation with the sound of the shell's burst from overhead, but it was close. The bullet, capable of travelling several hundred feet per second, found its unfortunate target in the exposed portion of the anonymous man's neck. It created a small cloud of crimson mist as it pierced his flesh. Langston, slowly pulling the gun down in horror, saw a defiant Bartholomew Gidley make eye contact with him, shaking his fist in the air.

“Welcome to the Brotherhood of Murder, you bastard!”
Gidley hollered, as he triumphantly threw the man down face down onto the deck, another casualty gone unnoticed amidst all the panic.

Langston's thought- his only thought- was that he'd just received an invisible blow to the stomach. He looked at the smoldering weapon, and felt a hundred accusing eyes staring at him in disgust. The sad truth, however, was no one else had really seen what occurred because they were all preoccupied with saving themselves.

After a moment of horrified shock, Langston took the pistol and threw it overboard on the port side, into the dark sea. He sat on the edge of the roof, barely cognizant of the fact that the collapsible boat behind him was being rolled unceremoniously onto the starboard deck. He looked sorrowfully down at Lillith, who was still supine on the bench. The shattered look in his eyes told her everything she needed to know.

1:51 A.M.

Lyons's eyes blazed with anger, and Gidley's glittered with delight. They took a visual inventory of the crowd to determine who might be the next victim.

Pulling his eyes from the crowd for a moment, Gidley shouted to Lyons, “Seems We've got a would-be hero onboard!” He knew Lyons would hear him, even over the noise of families protesting being unwillingly separated from one another, and the laments of some passengers (mostly immigrants) who were stubbornly refused rescue by some of the ship's officers. “Some dolt that I saw about the ship earlier just tried to take a shot at Me!”

“Indeed!” Lyons hollered back, not taking his eyes off the teeming masses. “Where is he?”

“He
was
on the roof there,” pointing up at the officer's quarters with his cane, unable to see that Langston hadn't actually left the roof but was in fact sitting on the edge facing port. “I think he may have disappeared into the wheelhouse.”

“Well, go see to him if You must!” Lyons yelled urgently. “I shall create more casualties here before I unleash Ismay and attempt to find Lillith.”

“You realize, Edward, that this may be the final time We see each other in this particular incarnation.”

Lyons looked over at Gidley, temporarily somber. “Indeed. You've not been too much of a disappointment, in the form of Bartholomew Gidley, that poor old sap from Winkleigh. Perhaps it's the final encounter in these forms for both of Us, but sometimes even the inevitable fate will need a helping hand... inevitably. Until then.” He stood officiously before Gidley, who gave him a polite little bow.

“Until then. I shall see to it that Your message is delivered. '
Brothers, once more, farewell, time bids Us part. Fond memory shall long dwell around each darkened heart.'”
With that, Gidley turned and headed forward for the bridge.

Lyons turned his attention back to the crowd. From the tenor of the general panic, to the ship's ever-more-pronounced listing, he knew it would not be long until he would be sending J. Bruce Ismay on his way.

1:53 A.M.

In the gymnasium, where the screams from outside were somewhat muted and the electric lights were starting to flicker, Ismay remained on his hands and knees, completely frozen in stupefaction. Just a few feet behind him, on the other side of the gymnasium's windows, were dozens of passengers lost and confused in the tattered remains of a maiden voyage. The chairman of the company that owned the ship was unable to take accountability for his actions, or to offer any help. Without his knowledge, as he remained paralyzed on the floor in a kneeling position, he was already becoming a cipher, a useless figurehead upon which generations would project their frustrations and their hate.

1:55 A.M.

“Kerry? Kerry. Kerry, can you hear me? Can you come down to me?”

Lillith was calling out to Langston, who, disconsolate, remained seated on the roof, his hands in his lap, his eyes brimming with great tears.

“Kerry!” she pleaded in a voice that was growing stronger. “These men can never own you, never own your soul, and They know that. This ship is the end of Them, and They're going to do horrible things because They are horrible men. Can you come down to me? Please, Kerry,” she said, finding the strength to rise up on the bench. “Come to me.”

Kerry turned his head slowly and sadly glanced down at her. He reached out numbly for the kit that was resting beside him, and slowly stepped down. He prepared himself for the worst with his injured ankle, but actually found it much easier than he anticipated, due to the ship's ever-increasing tilt downward. Lillith took him consolingly in her arms.

“Actually, I'm the reason for the end of this ship,” she whispered in his ear. “This is all my fault.”

Kerry pulled his head back from her, the shock wearing off a bit by hearing her blame herself. “How? How could this possibly be your fault?”

Lillith shut her eyes tightly, choosing her next words carefully. She didn't want him to feel worse than he already did in what she knew were probably the last few minutes they would have together.

“Some of my written words came back to haunt me. Kerry- there's- there's something you should know, that I want you to know. There's something you should know about Our kind.”

“Your kind? What- what is it? Lillith, please tell me.”

“While We are capable of great cruelty, We- We are also capable... of great love...” her eyes danced across his face. “Let me show you.”

In trembling fascination, Langston gazed into her eyes, as Lillith very slowly, and obviously, started heading for his neck. She put her lips upon his skin... and kissed him. “
Love to you I keep
,” she whispered. “
I grasp your spirit in the palm of my Hand.”

Langston felt a soothing warmth like he had never known. Tears came streaming down his face but they were grateful, not painful. She lingered for a moment, again pressing her lips gently and lovingly onto his neck, then pulled back.

“I knew,” Langston's voice faltered. “I knew that I could always trust you.”

1:57 A.M.

Lyons had been moving up to the midsection of the starboard side of the
Titanic
rapidly, sizing up potential victims. Then, running parallel to the ship's railing, he dashed forward, grabbing,  punching, pushing and heaving as many screaming men, women and children as he could over the side. He found the empty davit locations where lifeboats had once been as ideal openings for hurling his victims into the sea. Those he couldn't catch- and to his frustration, there were many- were fleeing frantically, and now virtually uphill, to the aft part of the ship. Lyons ran further forward, forward, and saw that Collapsible C was about to be lowered.

1:58 A.M.

Bartholomew Gidley had made his way into the gloom of the ship's bridge unchallenged, searching for the Marconi room. It was about forty feet aft, down a corridor than ran through the officer's quarters. The only soul he encountered on the bridge was a large, wild-eyed stoker.

“A fireman. I should have thought the entire lot of you had drowned by now,” Gidley stated, matter-of-factly.

“Are there any lifebelts left?” the stoker demanded.

“I daresay the wireless operators should have a few,” Gidley replied, pointing down the corridor with his cane.

Without another word, the stoker ran down to the end of the corridor, where senior wireless officer Jack Phillips had his back to the door. To Gidley's amusement, Phillips was apparently too busy sending out distress signal calls to notice that the stoker had begun slipping the lifebelt off of his back. Just then, junior wireless operator Harold Bride stepped out of his cabin and immediately saw what was happening.

“What the bloody hell are you
doing?
” an outraged Bride screamed. In an instant, he was on the stoker's back, pulling him violently out of the radio room, and Phillips came out of his engrossed work on the wireless. The two men, overworked and unbelievably frightened, now took their frustrations out on the stoker, shoving him out of the room and into Phillips' cabin, then beating him senseless.