by Alma Katsu
A hand gripped her shoulder. She almost dropped the baby as she spun around. It was Mark, his eyes blazing. “What are you doing? Give her to me.” He didn’t wait for Caroline to surrender Ondine, ripping her out of his wife’s hands.
Caroline stood trembling, nerves fluttering. What had just happened? The crying had stopped. Mark was across the sitting room with Ondine lying over his shoulder. The baby was cooing at him, as she always seemed to do with Mark, and he was making soothing noises in return. . . . There, there, it’s all right now. . . .
“There was something wrong with the baby,” Caroline said. Her voice sounded frightened and apologetic. “I was trying to help—”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about. She’s fine,” Mark said over his shoulder at her. Why was he keeping Ondine so far away? She wanted to hold her daughter, to reassure herself that everything was all right.
“Didn’t you hear? She was making this awful noise—”
“The only thing I heard was you,” Mark said. His voice dripped with recrimination. “You’re off your head—as usual, lately. You’ve taken more of your medicine, haven’t you, Caroline? Too much, I’d say.”
“What are you going on about?”
“It’s almost morning—do you really need to be taking that stuff at this hour?”
So, it was. Outside the porthole, the sky was lightening. She hadn’t thought about it. Taking the medicine was reflex now.
Mark nodded in her direction. “I’ve heard that some people have gotten really sick on cocaine . . . And it can make you dependent on it, like opium. You ought to take it easy—”
She slammed a hand on the dressing table. “I’m following the doctor’s instructions. . . . This is medicine.”
She waited for him to say something soothing. There, there, my poor dear, you’ve been through so much. To stroke her back, fetch her some water. But he didn’t. He turned away, still dandling the baby.
She sucked in a breath and held it. Everything felt wrong. She couldn’t be sure guilt wasn’t warping her perception. The air was chillier, the silence more ominous. But something was definitely wrong with Mark. The way he was looking at her, as though he wished she would disappear. As though he hated her. And he hadn’t asked where she’d been. Did he not care? Had he guessed? Could he smell another man on her or figure it out from the sad set of her mouth?
“I’m going to lie down with Ondine to get her to go back to sleep,” Mark said wearily, crossing to the bedroom. He closed the door behind him.
Caroline leaned over the crib, her tired gaze settling on the empty spot where her baby had been. Maybe Mark was right; maybe the medicine was to blame for what was happening to her. She seemed to be slowly losing her mind. He was right that she had been taking a lot of it lately; every time something upset her, she went for more powder. The envelope was almost empty and she was dreading going to Dr. Leader to ask for more. Maybe it was a blessing in disguise. Time to taper off.
And what of Ondine? If Mark had decided that she was dependent on this medicine, he might take the baby away from her. They were married, it would be within his legal rights. That idea put a chill down her spine. She could lose Ondine forever.
She reached into the empty space of the crib, as though she would be able to feel Ondine there still.
What was this, tucked in one of the blanket’s folds? Her hand found something hard and cold and metallic. And damp.
And she knew—it was the object she’d felt in Ondine’s throat. She had been choking. Caroline had saved her.
She pulled it from the tangle of blanket, like a ribbon laced through a grommet. What was this, lying in the crib with Ondine like a serpent in the garden?
It was a crucifix on a chain. A tiny gold crucifix.
Chapter Thirty-Six
The world came at Annie all at once with a jolt. It shook beneath her, like that time in Ballintoy when she stood on the cliff as a great wall of dirt and stone sheared off and fell into the ocean.
But the world kept shaking. Her mind scrambled to try to make sense of it. She was on a ship, the glorious Titanic. Why would it be shaking?
Her eyes finally were able to focus and she saw Violet leaning over her, jostling her, her loose hair dangling in Annie’s face. Her look of fright gave Annie a fright, too.
Violet released Annie’s shoulders. “Thank Jesus you’re awake. I was afraid there was something wrong with you. You were having a seizure, your eyes rolling in your head and lips pulled back from your teeth. I never seen anyone in such a state. I thought you might be possessed by a demon, like the priests warned us about in school.”
Annie stared up at Violet. She wished her friend was playing a joke on her, but it was plain that she wasn’t. A shudder ran through her.
“Have you ever had seizures before?” Violet asked.
Annie rubbed her face. “Never.” The last she’d heard of a seizure was the little boy—the Astors’ servant.
“Maybe you should go see the ship’s surgeon. Make sure you’re all right.”
Annie rubbed her upper arms. Cold. So, so cold. How could this ship be so cold, with its big, roaring engines and fires going all day and all night? The tiny cabin was freezing. Her cheeks were cold, as were the tips of her nose and ears. Her fingers and toes.
She heard murmurs and other noises in the cabins to her left and right. That meant the rest of the staff was rising. “No, no. I’d better get to work.” Mustering her resolve, Annie sat up in bed, sucking in breath as cold slipped over her bare head and arms like a garment. She scrambled out of bed and started dressing quickly. Her clothing was icy to the touch, as though it’d been left outdoors. Gritting her teeth, she pulled on her petticoats as quickly as her numb fingers would let her. Lastly, she splashed water sparingly on her face. It was ice-cold, like it had come straight from a frozen creek.
Violet stood watching her dress. “What happened to you, Annie?”
Annie stopped, her dress dangling in her hands. “What do you mean?”
Violet gestured to Annie’s arms, where she looked down to see bruises the size of fingers. There was a nasty one on her ankle, too, and another on her upper thigh. She had no recollection of how she might’ve gotten them. Possibly it was in the course of her duties. The ship could buck like a wild horse when the weather turned bad and you could find yourself suddenly thrown into a railing or tossed against a wall, especially if you were frequently hurrying about the narrow servants’ halls carrying heavy trays.
And then she realized they were from Madeleine Astor.
“It’s nothing. They don’t hurt,” she said, hoping to deflect Violet’s curiosity.
Violet shrugged and finished readying herself, prattling on about scuttlebutt she’d heard over breakfast that morning, the first officer warning that it was so cold there might be ice in the water. Annie only half listened as she put on her dress and shoes, trying not to let fear creep into her—fear of what William Stead had told her: that there very well might be an evil spirit on this ship. And that she could be one of its victims.
She hurried to straighten the bed and begin her day, but when she pulled at the blue and white blankets to tuck them in, she felt something silky at the tips of her fingers. Curious but slowly, as if afraid a snake might emerge, she turned down a corner of the blanket, and saw it—a flash of satiny blue with a dainty pattern.
A man’s necktie.
Heat flushed through her and she glanced over her shoulder, but Violet had already hustled out of the room, leaving her alone.
Carefully, she pulled the strange object out of the bed and held it in the light. It was definitely a man’s tie, a formal one, and she’d seen it before. Last night, the men had been dressed up for the ball, wearing ties just like this. As soon as she laid her hand over it, she knew that it belonged to Mark. A tiny gasp slipped from her lips.
Wh
at had happened last night, after the ball? She could remember it but dimly, illuminated only by flickering touches of light, as if it’d been another one of her dreams. Standing in the smoking room. Why had she been in there? Staring at the smoldering flames. Thinking of hurling herself into them. And then—he appeared. Raggedly breathing, an urgency in his eyes. She remembered flashes of it perfectly and yet it also felt distant, like it had happened to another person. The way his name had fled from her throat, the way she’d gasped, grasping his neck, wanting to be closer. It had all happened, the thing she’d dreamed of, hadn’t it?
But it was too much, and she couldn’t quite believe it. Her heart swelled with the idea that finally they both knew how the other felt. She loved Mark. It seemed it had been months, or even years, not mere days, that she’d known him—that she’d longed for him. As if they’d been souls parted in another lifetime and here they were, now, finding each other again. Beautiful stories she’d read in books, books the village priest had frowned on.
What have you done, Annie?
Her hand trembled. She felt afraid all of a sudden. Ashamed. Out of control of her own body, as if every touch of skin against skin had singed her and now here she was, a burn victim, exposed and wounded. And the memories of last night—they were waves folding over her, tasting of salt and pushing down her lungs, drowning her.
Footsteps passed her door. In a hot flush, she stuffed the tie into her pocket, where it sat nestled near the brooch.
Her first duty of the day was to help with the breakfast service, but before that, she had to prepare Ondine’s warm milk. The Fletchers would be expecting it—though the thought of being near Mark again made her knees feel as if they’d crumple beneath her. She hurried up the stairs to the kitchen, heading back where the cooks were heating up huge pots of milk to make oatmeal. They were used to her now, dipping one of the little metal pots into the cauldron for a small amount of milk, and the big cook in charge of the day’s porridge stepped out of her way so she could be about her business.
She finished her preparations in the pantry. She dropped a cozy over the pot, resting her hands momentarily on the cozy for the heat coming up through the quilted flannel. Then she slipped a hand into the pocket of her apron, where she kept Caroline Fletcher’s brooch. She liked to stroke it throughout the day: it calmed her, for some reason. Like petting a cat. She knew she should return it to Caroline, but she couldn’t make herself do it. It was so pretty. Something about it went straight to her heart, like it was meant to be hers. It was wrong to keep it, though, and for a minute she wondered if this had something to do with the evil that seemed to follow her around the ship. She had stolen it, which was bad, and didn’t bad things happen to bad people? All the more reason to give the brooch back.
She used her passkey to let herself into the Fletchers’ stateroom. Strange, the curtains were still drawn; she’d expected them to be open. The room was dark as a tomb. After depositing the tray on the table, she went to the porthole, reaching up to push the heavy curtain back to let some of the morning light in.
She nearly screamed when she saw Caroline in a chair. For one brief moment, the woman had seemed a ghost, a pale figure lying back in the chair as though in a faint. What was Caroline doing sitting by herself in the dark? And where was the baby?
Caroline bolted upright, a hand going to her throat. “Miss Hebbley! What are you doing in my cabin?” Annie realized with a sinking heart that she’d startled Caroline awake. Caroline had already developed a dislike of her, and now she’d only made matters worse.
Annie turned, hoping to slink out. “The milk, ma’am. I brought the milk.” As she reached for the doorknob, however, she caught a glint of gold in the corner of her eye. Her crucifix! Sitting on a corner of the dresser. Perhaps it had come undone one of those times she’d been in this room, fallen to the floor, and someone had found it—Miss Flatley?
She covered it with her hand as she passed and slipped it into her pocket quietly.
Caroline’s voice rang out immediately, accusing. Like an arrow into her back. “I saw what you did! You’re the thief! The one who’s been stealing jewelry.”
Annie’s stomach dropped. This was a nightmare. She turned to face Caroline, even though she feared her. “But it’s mine. I lost it a few days ago—”
“You’re lying. I only just found it. You’re a liar as well as a thief.” Why wouldn’t Caroline stop saying that? She was pointing a finger at Annie, shaking it in her face. “You were in here last night. That’s when you left your necklace. You came in last night and you left the door open when you’d gone.”
Annie’s knees trembled. What was happening? What did Caroline Fletcher think had happened? Annie had no recollection of being in this cabin last night. But there was the necktie, Mark’s necktie . . . It was in her pocket at that very moment, a mute witness.
Even with the curtain pushed back, the room was still dark. Annie reached for the switch, but there seemed to be a problem with the electric sconce (the stewards had been complaining about them on this end of the passage) so she reached into her pocket for a candle, and lit it. She lifted the candle so she could see Caroline better—and for Caroline to see her, to see how upset she was to be accused unjustly—and was shocked by what she saw. The woman’s pupils were open, her eyes as dark as licorice, her face damp with perspiration. She looked as though she’d barely slept, her dressing gown twisted oddly around her body.
Something very strange was going on.
“Where’s Ondine, Mrs. Fletcher?” Annie turned to the cradle, lifting the candle.
Empty.
Caroline rushed toward her. “You stay away from there! You leave my baby alone! You’re to have nothing to do with her ever again, do you understand—” Anne felt the hands against her ribs, pushing her back. She stumbled and fell against the wall.
The lit candle rolled across the floor, aided in that moment by the lift of the ship on the waves.
Annie could only watch in horror as the edge of Caroline’s dressing gown caught fire, a long lick of orange flame rising as quick as the blink of an eye. Caroline reared back, screaming. There was nothing at hand to put it out, no blanket. Annie backed against the door, her mind frozen, trying to think of what to do.
“Dear God, what’s going on here?” It was Mark’s voice, Mark suddenly appearing in his pajamas, his face lit up by flame. Then he was gone—and back again, the basin from the washstand in his hands. A wave hung suspended in midair, then washed over Caroline, followed by the smell of smoke.
The last thing Annie saw, as she hurried out of the room, was Mark’s face: shock, anger, disbelief. Caroline’s words ringing in her ears: “There’s something wrong with her, Mark. . . . She tried to kill me just now!”
Then Mark. Words that broke her heart. “You stay away from us, Annie Hebbley! Stay away from my family! Just leave us alone.”
Chapter Thirty-Seven
The suitcase filled with stacks of Astor’s cash hung lightly in Mark Fletcher’s hand. Just being close to so much money made Mark giddy, light-headed. But determined. He’d gone to the smoking room to retrieve the suitcase and then make the planned handoff to Williams.
The fresh light of morning stung his eyes as he made his way past a series of portholes in the first-class entrance of the grand staircase. With his free hand, he rubbed at his eyes. It had been a restless, sleepless night, the suitcase ever present in his mind, guilt and excitement like two scorpions scuttling at the edges of his vision. Had a passing steward seen him in his frenzy last night? Would someone stumble on his hiding spot while he slept?
On the other hand, there was his future ahead of him, the suitcase and its stolen fortune, the most money he’d ever had all at once. It made his blood run wild, the risk of it, the possibility. He kept imagining what he could do with so much cash. He’d heard the gambling in America was epic: riverboat casinos, gaming cars on trains
traversing the wide, lonely western plains, infamous pleasure dens in New Orleans. With this kind of money, he could go anywhere he wished, sample delights that were unheard of in England. But then: What had Annie seen last night? It had seemed eerily as though she’d been lying in wait, just to catch him in the act. And then that strange scene in the stateroom just now. Had she tried to kill Caroline, as Caroline insisted? He could not think about it now. . . . Later, after the handoff was complete and he could rest at ease, he could return to himself. But until then, he felt off-balance, and Hebbley’s big, prying eyes seemed to say she knew more than she let on. Last night, she’d been, well, not in her right mind. Gone had been the timid maid he’d met only three days ago—in her place appeared someone aggressive and distraught, desperate, determined. Familiar, somehow, too, in a way that irked him to no end, left him feeling as though he was missing something, as though he’d stepped in the middle of a play.
It had been a terrible night, terrible. He’d spent it sweating, nervous and ecstatic by turns. He felt as though he would burst out of his skin at any moment. He was angry that Caroline had disappeared on him—still furious, no doubt—but relieved, too, because it meant he didn’t have to explain why he was acting so oddly.
But now, making his way to meet up with Williams, a strange feeling came over Mark. The madness had worn off overnight and his conscience had returned in the cold light of morning. After what he’d done last night, he could no longer pretend that he wasn’t a thief. He’d done a serious thing—and he didn’t like it. He was no better than the men he’d met on his many visits to the courts. Men who’d gambled away the last of their money when they could’ve paid the rent or put food on the dinner table for their children. Men who lied to themselves about the terrible things they did, so they could continue to gamble. He despised those men, and now he was one of them.
He couldn’t keep any of this money. Not one crisp bill. If he did, it would be easier the next time—and if he kept the money, there would be a next time. Once you’d known what it was like to have money, it would become like an addiction, a right, an entitlement. He would rationalize his thieving, just like the men he’d met in jail. And he would be one of them one day; that’s how it always ended. To go from being a barrister to a convict: he didn’t think he could face the shame. It terrified him, how tantalizingly easy it all was. To slip.