Women and Children First (19 page)

When Reg opened his eyes, he was momentarily confused to find himself on a lower bunk instead of the top one above a sleeping John. He was close enough to a porthole to see that it was broad daylight outside, but which day? And then it all came back to him in a great rush: the horror of struggling for his life in the water; the stricken look on Annie’s face when he told her he hadn’t managed to save her son; the absence of John. Missing, almost certainly dead. It was unbearable. His heart was thumping so hard he felt as though he might die any second, but he couldn’t open his mouth to call for help. He was slicked with sweat, breathing hard, totally consumed by panic.

What am I going to do?
he thought.
What on earth am I going to do now? How will I carry on?

‘Are you OK?’ someone asked. ‘Are you in pain? It’s just that you were moaning.’

Reg raised his head and saw it was a steward from second class, whose name he didn’t know. ‘I’m OK,’ he managed to say. ‘What day is it?’

‘Tuesday. They say we moor in New York on Thursday night, then we’re being loaded straight onto another ship, the
Cedric
, for the journey home. Have you ever sailed on the
Cedric
? Any idea what she’s like?’

Reg was filled with horror at the idea. He wanted to run down the gangplank on arrival in New York, plant his feet on solid ground and stay there. Another transatlantic voyage straight away would be more than he could bear. What if the
Cedric
hit an iceberg and the whole thing happened again? He realised he hadn’t answered the question, so he said ‘No.’

‘Talkative one, aren’t you?’

Reg turned his face to the wall. He knew he couldn’t face another ocean crossing. After tomorrow evening, he never wanted to set foot on a ship again. In fact, he wanted to get as far from water as he possibly could. He felt numb, but his brain was racing, trying to think of a way he could manage on his own if he left White Star Line. He had his wages for this voyage – minus the cost of the breakages – and he had Mrs Grayling’s five pounds, but would that be enough to rent a room somewhere and tide him over until he found a job? America was supposed to be the land of opportunity. If he made a fresh start there, he wouldn’t ever have to go back on a ship. That was his overriding concern.

There was a loud clatter in the corridor outside and Reg dived under the bedclothes, trembling with fear.

‘It was only a tray,’ the steward in the next bunk told him. ‘Someone dropped a tray. You’re in a bad way, ain’t ya? Come on, let’s go and find some grub. I’m starving.’

‘No, thanks.’ He couldn’t face eating. His stomach was twisted up in knots so it didn’t feel as if there would be any space for food.

‘Suit yourself,’ the steward said. ‘I’m off.’

How could anyone eat with the cries of all those dying men still ringing in their ears? It seemed disrespectful. Reg wanted to stay in bed with the covers pulled over his head. That way he wouldn’t risk bumping into Annie again. Her kindness was almost more than he could take. He didn’t want to see Mr Grayling either, or the Howsons, or anyone really – apart from John, and it didn’t seem that was going to happen.
Don’t think about John. It hurts too much.

He forced himself to consider what kind of job he might be able to get in New York. Perhaps he could be a waiter in a top-notch restaurant. He’d read about some very smart places, all of them in the area around Fifth Avenue and Central Park, but he would need a reference to get a position there. If only his record at White Star Line didn’t have those blemishes on it: breaking crockery, eating a passenger’s leftovers, and then that accusation of theft from the previous year. It didn’t occur to Reg to wonder whether Latimer had already recorded his recent misdemeanours, and if so whether the record – and Latimer himself – had survived.

He wasn’t thinking logically. Instead, he felt an overwhelming sense of doom. He would starve on the streets of New York, unable to work to pay for food and shelter because of that bad report. No one would want him. He didn’t know anyone in the city he could turn to. Back in Southampton, he could have asked neighbours to help him get a job with the town council, or begged them to let him serve tea and scones at the Seaview Café, but here he was on his own. Yet he couldn’t go back to Southampton because it would mean crossing the ocean and he knew he simply wasn’t capable.

What would John advise? John was smart. John always had an answer for everything. If he were there on the
Carpathia
, what would he do? Surely he wouldn’t be able to get straight on another ship as if nothing had happened, as if he hadn’t narrowly survived while dozens of people died in the water around him, as if he couldn’t still hear the sound of their groans ringing in his head?

If John was still alive, they could have stayed in New York together. John had a squeaky clean record with White Star so he could have got work in an élite restaurant while Reg could have found something less lofty, and maybe one day they would have started their own business together. Their wives could have been friends, their children could have gone to the same schools, they could have lived in the same street, perhaps started a football team.

Stop it! Stop! You’re torturing yourself
. These things could never be and it was Reg’s fault. If only he had found John at the end and they’d stuck together. If only he had rescued Finbarr and emerged from this a hero of sorts, maybe White Star would have overlooked his misdemeanours. But he had failed and as a result a boy had died.

For most of the day, Reg lay in the unfamiliar bunk turning over the problems in his head but without finding a solution. It was as though his brain was encased in fog. It felt as though the answer was somewhere nearby but he couldn’t quite reach it.

As darkness began to fall, hunger forced him to get up and ask directions to the staff mess. They were serving a stew with mashed potatoes and he let them pile his plate high. He began to eat and was surprised how much better he felt after only a couple of forkfuls. He looked around the room at the other diners and spotted the man who had been taking the roll call the day before.

I should talk to him later, give him my real name
, Reg thought. But then another idea sprang into his head, and it was so obvious he was amazed he hadn’t thought of it before. He was already on the survivors list as John … so why not continue to be John? On arrival in New York, he could use John’s name when he looked for work, and when the restaurant manager called White Star for a reference, he would be told that John’s record was spotless. It was a perfect plan.

The idea made him feel close to John again, as if they were still linked after death.

Of course, he would need to write to his mum and Florence to explain. They would try to persuade him to come back, but he’d have to make them understand that he simply couldn’t cross the ocean again. Maybe in a year or so he’d feel differently, but for now he had no choice.

He would have to write to John’s family as well. He should tell them he was using John’s name. It would be a tricky letter to write but surely they wouldn’t mind when he explained his reasons? It was just for the sake of getting on his feet. He felt sure John wouldn’t have minded.

‘Course you can use my name, man,’ he imagined him saying in his Geordie accent. ‘Happy to be of service!’

Mildred persuaded Annie to share her first-class suite, which had two separate bedrooms, while her husband slept in an armchair in the first-class lounge. Annie argued against the plan but she didn’t have the energy to resist when Mildred tucked Roisin under the counterpane of her soft four-poster bed and invited Patrick to have a soak in their
en suite
bathroom. The children had taken to Mildred, and they clung to her, seeking a sense of security they were unable to get from their distraught mother.

When Annie awoke the next morning, more than twenty-four hours had passed since Finbarr disappeared. The sun shone outside, there were sounds from the corridor of passengers heading to the saloon for breakfast, and the baby was squawking for a feed. Life would go on – cruelly, relentlessly – whether she wanted it to or not.

‘Patrick’s been asking me what happened to Finbarr,’ Mildred told her quietly. ‘I said he is with God now, but I think he would like to know more. He feels it is his fault, because he let go of Finbarr’s hand. Are you able to talk to him about it?’

‘Of course. I must do that.’ She buried her face in her hands, trying to think of what she should say. It seemed she had to deal with one difficult thing after another and she didn’t have the energy for any of it. In the end, she took Patrick for a walk on deck after breakfast and told him the truth.

‘When Finbarr’s hand slipped out of yours on the way up the stairs, he heard someone say there was flooding down below and you know how curious he always was. There was nothing for it but he had to go and have a look. He couldn’t help himself. Then he got lost down there and by the time the steward, Reg, found him it was too late to get on a lifeboat. If it was anyone’s fault, it was his own. He couldn’t resist sticking his nose in.’

‘Where has he gone, Ma? Will I ever see him again?’

‘One day you will, but not for a long time. We’ll all go to heaven when we die and Finbarr will be there waiting for us.’

‘I wish I could go to heaven now,’ Patrick whispered, and Annie pulled him to her. Whoever said that children’s emotions weren’t as powerful as those of adults? Behind his quiet demeanour, Patrick was missing his brother just as much as Annie was missing her son.

‘You have to be brave and strong. Finbarr would want you to build a specially happy life for yourself to make up for the fact that he can’t. Just think about what he would want you to do, and I’ll do the same, and we’ll be strong for each other. That’s how we’ll get through this.’

If only it were that simple, Annie thought afterwards. She was dreading the moment when they stepped off the ship in New York and she would have to tell Seamus what had happened. He’d been so proud of his eldest boy. He used to pore over the schoolbooks where his teacher had written ‘excellent work’ or ‘well done’. ‘Did you see this essay he’s written, Annie?’ he’d say, or ‘Look how long this sum is, and he’s got it all right!’ That’s why Seamus had come to America to build a new life for them all.
If only he hadn’t bothered. If only they had stayed at home.

She felt sure Seamus would blame her for losing Finbarr, because she blamed herself. She shouldn’t have taken her eyes off him for a second, and she shouldn’t have got into the lifeboat without him. She said as much that afternoon when one of the Mayo party, Mary, came over to sit with her on deck.

‘No one’s to blame,’ Mary told her. ‘It was madness back there. Sheer pandemonium. It was all down to the luck of the draw who survived. Do you know how many are saved from the fourteen of us that were travelling together? Just me and my young niece Elizabeth.’

Annie was horrified. ‘But what happened to Eileen and Kathleen? They were ahead of me. Kathleen was one of the people who talked me into getting in a lifeboat. Where did she go after that?’

‘We’re not sure but we think Kathleen might have gone back to look for her brother.’ Annie clutched her face: more guilt for her to bear. ‘And Eileen decided she wasn’t leaving her man. When the officer said her Eoghan couldn’t get on board, she said she wasn’t going to either. I heard her myself. But at the time we didn’t know for sure what that would mean, did we? No one said that the ship was sinking and you’d die if you didn’t get into a lifeboat. Maybe they should have.’

Annie touched Mary’s hand. ‘To lose twelve friends all at once must be hard. Eileen and Kathleen were lovely women. You were so kind to me. I can’t tell you what a difference it made.’

There was no comfort they could give each other, no words that would make it better. They sat in silence for a while, holding hands and looking round at the other survivors, each grieving their own losses. Mildred appeared from a tour round the deck with the children and when baby Ciaran saw Annie he stretched out his arms towards her with a wail. Roisin’s eyes were bright with recent tears and she was clinging to Mildred’s leg, her thumb in her mouth.

The children are lucky to be able to cry
, Annie thought. Apart from that burst of communal grief at the religious service, most adults on board were keeping their tears in check. It was as if they couldn’t afford to let go yet. Maybe they were concerned that their own sobs would disturb others with even greater losses to bear. Once they got home to their families on shore, they could let it all out over the coming weeks and months and years.

The atmosphere in the dining saloon couldn’t have been more different from that on the
Titanic
. The lively chatter and laughter had been replaced by lowered voices and the clatter of knives and forks, or of the stewards piling dishes on top of each other. Annie at last managed to eat some small meals: bland, invalid food that was easy to chew, like scrambled eggs, or soup and bread. Mildred and her husband sat with her, helping Patrick and Roisin to cut up their meat and chatting about their life at home.

‘Did I tell you that I have a car dealership back in Milwaukee?’ Jack asked Patrick, and Annie saw her boy looking animated for the first time since the sinking as they discussed Model T Fords, the brand new Chevrolet and the various Ramblers on the market.

‘Come and visit us some time and I’ll take you out for a test drive,’ he promised.

‘Can we, Ma?’ Patrick asked Annie.

‘Maybe we’ll take you up on that,’ she agreed.

Sometimes there were moments – never as long as a minute, but fleeting windows of time – when she forgot about the terrible thing that had happened, but then it came crashing back again with all its rawness.
I’ve lost Finbarr. He’s gone for ever.

‘It will get easier,’ Mildred told her. ‘It will never leave you but the weight of your grief will become less crushing over the years.’

Annie hoped that would prove to be true, but in the meantime she still had one of the worst moments to face – telling Seamus.

Announcements were made on Thursday morning about the arrangements for disembarking. No one would have to clear US customs at Ellis Island; apart from anything else, few people still had the necessary papers with them. They were pulling into Pier 54 on New York’s North River. Each class would disembark in turn and relatives would be standing at a prearranged spot. There would be help on hand for those left destitute by the sinking. Reporters and photographers were expected to turn up but they would not be allowed inside the pier.

Annie tried to rehearse what she would say to Seamus when they walked out to meet him, but her courage kept failing her. She’d had almost four days to get used to the unbearable pain that he would soon experience for the first time. She wished there was some way to spare him. If she could have carried it alone she would have done so gladly.

They watched from the deck as the
Carpathia
passed the southern tip of Manhattan and headed up the North River. Appropriately, it was raining, with a heavy grey drizzle that blurred the tall buildings people called skyscrapers. Progress was excruciatingly slow, but they docked around nine-thirty on Thursday evening, and first-class passengers began to file off. Annie could hear cries of delight as some families were reunited but there must also be many whose dreams for the future were being cruelly snatched from them in that instant when a wife appeared but no husband, a sister but no brother. She hadn’t heard of any other cases such as her own, where a mother survived but not her child.
All the other mothers stayed with their children
, she thought bitterly.
All except me.

Mildred and Jack were remaining on the ship, which would turn round and set sail for the Mediterranean just as soon as it had been cleaned and restocked with supplies. They sat with Annie and the children until the call went out at eleven o’clock at night for third-class passengers to disembark.

Slowly, Annie picked up the baby, looped her handbag over her elbow and got Roisin to hold onto her coat on one side while Patrick held the other. Her feet dragging, they queued to shuffle step by step along the gangway. She looked over towards the area where third-class families were queuing but there were too many faces to pick Seamus from the crowd.

He found her, though. The minute they stepped off the ship and onto the pier, he vaulted a wooden fence that marked the route to the exit and rushed over to them, joy written all over his face. It was heartbreaking to watch his broad smile fade as he first of all met her eyes and read the expression on her face, then looked at Patrick, Roisin and the baby. His eyes travelled over her shoulder and he searched the area behind them then he looked at Annie again and it was as if something inside him broke in two.

‘No!’ he yelled with such anguish that people around them turned to stare.

‘I’m so sorry,’ Annie whispered.

He pulled her to him, wrapped his arms around her and buried his face in her neck. All through these long months apart she had dreamed of their reunion, their first hug on meeting, their first evening alone together, but never in her wildest imaginings could she have envisaged this: that her husband of thirteen years would be shaking with uncontrollable grief, unable to speak, as all their careful plans for the future were swept away in a devastating roll of the dice.