The Lusitania Murders (4 page)

The reporters were thrilled to see the eccentric homespun philosopher, and Rumely didn’t bother identifying the man to me, because Hubbard’s picture had been unavoidable in the press over the years, particularly after the success of his article “A Message to Garcia.”

“Fra Albertus!” one of the reporter’s cried, invoking a painfully precious nickname the so-called author had bestowed upon himself. As far as I was concerned, self-published books and magazines, and homely little stories and supposedly wry aphorisms, didn’t an author make.

“Yes, friend?” Hubbard said, smiling beatifically at the reporter, who was one of half a dozen swarming around him like flies near something a horse had dropped. “How may I help you?”

“Aren’t you afraid of the U-boat threat, Mr. Hubbard?”

“To be torpedoed,” he said, “would be a good advertisement for my pamphlet ‘The Man Who Lifted the Lid Off Hell.’ ”

“You mean the Kaiser, don’t you?”

“I do. William Hohenzollern himself. I intend to interview Kaiser Bill, you know.”

“You can’t interview him,” another reporter put in, rather snidely, “if the
Lucy
sinks.”

Hubbard lifted his shoulders in a theatrical shrug. “If they sink the ship, I’d drown and succeed in my ambition
to get in the Hall of Fame. After all, there are only two respectable ways to die: one is of old age, the other is by accident.”

The reporters were writing down each glorious word. How I despised this middle-brow malarkey.

“I believe the drizzle has stopped,” Rumely said.

“Perhaps—but not the drivel.”

A brass band had begun to play, drowning out both Hubbard and the reporters; and even John Philip Sousa was a relief by way of contrast.

The reporters gathered around one last passenger, though with the band blaring, we couldn’t eavesdrop on the questions. I was probably too awestruck to have listened, in any event, because the passenger the reporters were clamoring around was a beautiful dark-haired, dark-eyed woman of perhaps forty, graceful, lithe, dignified, in a black dress with occasional white frills and a black bonnet with white feathers. Accompanying her was another tall, shapely woman, a little younger—in her mid-thirties, possibly—in a shirtwaist costume of tan cotton pongee with white linen collar and cuffs and, startlingly, no hat.

Rumely identified the beauty in black as Madame Marie DePage, the Special Envoy to the United States from Belgium. The wife of Antoine DePage, the Belgian Army’s Surgeon General, Madame DePage had spent several months in America raising money for her husband’s Red Cross-sponsored field hospital.

“She raised one hundred fifty thousand dollars,” Rumely reminded me.

“With that face, even I would have made a donation. . . . Who’s her friend?”

“No idea.”

Madame DePage’s female companion had high
cheekbones and dark blonde hair and pale blue eyes—a striking combination of strength and femininity. She was almost as arresting as Madame DePage herself, and I found her even more fascinating—or was that just her anonymity?

All five of my prime subjects for interviews were standing in the distinguished line, the reporters having gone off trolling for other prey, when a Western Union delivery boy seemed to materialize, and move among them. The band covered up his questions, but he was clearly seeking the recipients of the wires.

Then all five—Vanderbilt, Frohman, Kessler, Hubbard and DePage—were curiously opening up the little envelopes, probably expecting a cheery bon voyage from a friend . . . though I could not imagine the mutual friend that might have sent telegrams to these five. Of course, Western Union may have had missives from five separate senders and they were just delivered at the same time. . . .

And yet all of their reactions were the same! Frowns of disgust—even the sweet, positive-minded Sage of East Aurora, Elbert Hubbard himself, scowled. In fact, he wadded his telegram up, and hurled it to the cement.

No—wait . . . I’d been wrong: Six telegrams had been delivered. Vanderbilt’s dark-haired slender friend had also received one, and he and Vanderbilt were shaking their heads, discussing what was obviously a mutually shared distaste for what they had just read. Only Hubbard, however, had discarded his telegram, the others folding theirs and sticking them away, into suit or pants pockets.

The line was moving forward now, and I shook hands with Rumely, and gathered my single suitcase, and got into the back of the queue. No one seemed to notice me pick up the wadded telegram Hubbard had discarded.

Nor did anyone seem to notice when I unfolded it like
a crumpled flower to read: FRA HUBBARD—LUSITANIA TO BE TORPEDOED. CANCEL PASSAGE IMMEDIATELY IF YOU VALUE YOUR LIFE.

It was signed, rather melodramatically (and redundantly, I thought), MORTE.

THREE
A Self-Confident Fool

Off the coast of Scotland, the day before the
Lusitania
left port, one of the Kaiser’s submarines sent a British coal-carrying steamer to the ocean’s floor. In the Dardanelles, fierce fighting was afoot; and Britain and her allies were bombing German towns while warships attacked U-boat bases. And yet the passengers aboard the
Lusitania
—my innocent self included—seemed to feel immune from the conflict.

Even with the journalistic espionage I intended to carry out, I found myself lulled into peacetime complacency by the Big
Lucy
’s lavishness. Despite my criticism of its unlovely top-heavy exterior, I could only applaud the elegance of the ship’s internal beauty, from public rooms to accommodations; I had travelled numerous times on so-called luxury liners, but truly Cunard had set the standard with the
Lusitania
(and, presumably, with her sister,
Mauretania
).

This was obvious from the moment I boarded through
the first-class entrance on the Main Deck. The entryway area—where a flock of ship’s crew (stewards overseen by a purser’s clerk) checked names off a list, dispensed room keys and gave directions—had a light, airy feel. The floor was tile, white with black diamond shapes, the furnishings white wicker, the woodwork a blazing white with golden touches, and scarlet brocade-upholstered settees were built into the walls. Potted ferns shared space with floral arrangements; there were so many flowers aboard the ship, the sweetness in the air was almost overpowering, like the visitation area of a funeral home whose current attraction was a popular fellow indeed.

As we all waited our turn with the stewards and purser’s clerk, the only annoyance was an overabundance of children, not all of whom were well-behaved, despite the best efforts of nannies; tiny shod feet echoed off the tile floor like gunfire, shrill little voices tearing the air. Oh well—this was to be expected. Cunard’s advertising bragged of the safety the Big
Lucy
provided mothers and children.
*

“I wouldn’t worry, if I were you,” a rich alto voice almost whispered in my ear.

I looked to my left, where that tall hatless blonde female in the tan cotton pongee, Madame DePage’s friend, stood next to me. At the moment, her strong, handsome face tweaked itself with a smile, and her blue eyes had a twinkle; tendrils of her piled-high hair seemed to have a mocking life of their own. While no physical giant, I am certainly not a small man, and it was startling to look
directly into the eyes of a woman on my own level.

“Pardon me?” I said.

“The kiddies,” she said, a corner of her mouth turned up, in sweet irony. “The ship provides numerous playrooms and nurseries. . . . In the days to come, you’ll be little troubled by having them underfoot.”

I could only return the smile. “Am I really that easily read?”

She gave me a tiny shrug. “Most people’s features are a map of their inner thoughts.”

“And I’m one of those?”

“Perhaps.”

I gave her half a bow. “S.S. Van Dine, madam. Who do I have the honor of providing me with this minor humiliation?”

She gave me her hand, and my fingertips touched hers. “Philomina Vance,” she said. “May I ask what the ‘S.S.’ stands for? You don’t look terribly like a steamship.”

“That at least is a relief. It’s, uh, Samuel.”

“Is that the first ‘S’ or the second?”

“Well, uh, it’s the, uh, first, of course. The other ‘S’ is quite unimportant.”

Another shrug. “Well, I’m going to call you Van.”

“You have my consent. And I will call you Miss Vance.”

“Anything but Philomina.” She flashed another smile, no irony at all now—but the eyes still twinkled. “You know, Van, I think we’re going to be great friends.”

“Really? And why is that?”

“Any man with the nerve to wear that Kaiser Bill beard in these times is either extremely foolish or enormously self-confident. And I like self-confidence.”

“But what if I prove a fool?”

“Oh, I like a good laugh, too. Either way, I should come out swimmingly.”

Then we reached the stewards, and went our separate ways. It took her rather longer to go through the rigmarole than I, because she seemed to be doing it for Madame DePage, as well as herself—though, strangely, the lovely and mysterious Madame DePage was nowhere to be seen.

Wearing their ornate grillwork doors like family crests, a pair of elevators—that is “lifts,” this was a British ship, after all—awaited to take Saloon passengers to Decks A and B, and their accommodations.
*
Since few people travelled alone on a transatlantic voyage, most of the cabins were designed for two or more occupants; but one of the handful of single cabins had been thoughtfully booked for me by my employer, Mr. Rumely. My cabin was on B Deck, on the portside of the ship, and the lift brought me to the deck’s entrance hall, where additional elegance awaited—white woodwork, Corinthian columns, black grillwork, wall-to-wall carpeting, damask sofas, more potted plants, further flowers. Offices opposite the lift curved around a funnel shaft.

Sun was filtering in through windows and down the stairwell, as I took a left off the lift past the wide companionway (as shipboard stairways insisted on being called) and then a right down the portside corridor, which bustled with other guests finding their bearings, often
aided by bellboys in gold-braided beige uniforms. Moving past doors of various cabins on my right, and two expansive suites of rooms on my left, I found my cabin perhaps halfway down the corridor, at the juncture of a short hallway to my left, a single window at its dead end sending mote-floating sunlight my direction.

The cabin was on the corner of the corridor and the small hallway, and was a palatial cubbyhole without, unfortunately, a view onto the sea. What it did have was rather amazing, considering the limitations of space: a wrought-iron single bed, a washstand with hot and cold running water, off-white woodwork, electric lighting, a wardrobe and a bureau with mirror—better appointed, by far, than my Lexington Street apartment, and heaven compared to that boardinghouse room in the Bronx.

As there was no closet, I transferred the contents of my suitcase into the bureau drawers, and slid the empty bag under my bed. I was sitting on the bed, wondering when we’d be leaving port, when a gong clanged, making me jump—first of the “All Ashore” signals. I checked my pocket watch: half past eleven.

Even a man of sophistication can enjoy the simple pleasures of the spectacle of a great liner shoving off, so I made my way to the portside of the Boat Deck. In the corridor, the aftermath of good-bye parties coming to a close was evidenced by people hugging and kissing, those leaving expressing a wish to be going along, even as the “All Ashore” gongs continued to reverberate. The aroma of food being cooked announced in its unique way that the voyage was about to begin: The first meal was in preparation.

On deck, passengers were lining the rail, and I found a place for myself just beyond the first-class promenade
with its hanging lifeboats, toward the bow of the ship—the area called the forecastle, from which the bridge could be made out easily. So could the sight of visitors streaming down the gangways; why did the image of rats abandoning a sinking ship pop into my mind? Far too trite a thought even to have.

Deckhands who had traded in their crisp white sport jackets for turtleneck sweaters and heavy, seaworthy windbreakers, performed a thousand small tasks beyond the average passenger’s comprehension; this whirl of activity, more than anything else, announced that the great ship was coming to life.

Cargo hatches were battened, and bells rang out as officers rushed up gangways with last-minute paperwork in hand, bills of lading and cargo consignments and such. The pilot’s H flag was hoisted from the halyard of the signal bridge, and on the narrow stern of the control bridge the American flag flapped, while upright streamers of myriad other flags ran up and down the fore and aft masts, lending a gay ambience worthy of a cruise ship. Less festive, even ominous, was the black smoke belching from the fat exclamation points of the black-painted funnels.

After the floral fragrance of the public areas of the Big
Lucy,
the deck presented olfactory reminders that this was, indeed, a ship. In addition to the coal smoke, engine oil and grease smells, and the pungent whiff of tarred decking and the nastily mysterious odors emanating from scuppers and bilges, the bouquet of salty sea air provided an ever-present reminder that this was—despite the Cunard line’s best efforts—a steamer, not a luxury hotel.

On the dockside sightseers and friends seeing off passengers threw confetti, and waved hats, hankies, miniature
American flags and, when all else failed, their hands. I did not wave back: I didn’t know any of them, and Rumely had long since disappeared back into the reality of Manhattan.

“You really are a grouch,” an already familiar alto voice said, next to me.

I couldn’t suppress the smile as I turned to her, those loose tendrils flying like little blonde flags of her own in the breeze.

“Just because I don’t behave like a schoolboy,” I said, “waving at a bunch of strangers, doesn’t make me a grouch.”