The Glass Ocean

by Beatriz Williams

  Slowly, she walked to her bedroom and got dressed for bed, then lay awake for a long time waiting to hear Gilbert return. She tossed and turned, words like vultures picking at her brain as she remembered what Robert had told her. He told me that he loves you more than I ever could.

  She turned to her other side, desperate to find a way to escape her thoughts. When she finally fell asleep, she dreamed she was running through fog so thick she couldn’t see her hand in front of her, nor had she any knowledge as to from what or to whom she was running.

  Chapter 24

  Tess

  At Sea

  Friday, May 7, 1915

  Tess didn’t run. She walked. Quickly.

  Down the corridor, up a flight of stairs, down another corridor, not going anywhere in particular, just away. Away before Robert could find her. On deck, the fog was thick enough to lose herself, but the cold drove her back inside, searching for a place to hide. She knew she couldn’t hide for long, not even on a ship the size of the Lusitania. She needed a respite, that was all. Time to think. Time to plan.

  While Robert was otherwise occupied with Caroline Hochstetter.

  Tess pushed aside the image of Caroline Hochstetter, all rubies and disdain. Tess should be grateful to her, for giving Tess a breather. She could make this right somehow, she knew she could. But only if she wasn’t locked up tight in Robert Langford’s cabin.

  Whatever Robert might think, Ginny wasn’t the problem. Well, maybe she was, but she was Tess’s problem, not Robert’s. The real danger wasn’t Ginny; it was whoever Ginny was working for, whoever it was who was making Ginny glance over her shoulder and start at shadows.

  A day and a half still until Liverpool, Tess reminded herself. And, more important, Ginny didn’t have the manuscript yet. These people Ginny was working with, they wouldn’t do anything until they had their prize in their hands. Ginny should be safe . . . for now.

  It was late, late enough that the saloons had gone quiet, the concert over, the whist drive done. Tess found an abandoned deck chair and plopped down in it, trying to make her brain slow down and concentrate, to work out the problem as if it were one of her drawings, line by line, each unremarkable on its own, but adding up to a coherent picture. The Germans in the brig might have been part of it in the beginning—who knew how many agents were planted on the ship?—but, in retrospect, they couldn’t be Ginny’s contact. Not with Ginny jumping like a cat on a train track every time someone came up to her.

  Tess gnawed on one knuckle, ignoring the chill that crept through her clothes, straight down to her bones. It had to be someone who wasn’t stuck behind bars, someone who had the run of the ship, with access to passengers and, more important, the Marconi machine.

  “Miss Fairweather?”

  Once she’d got her breathing under control, Tess recognized the Irish voice. “Patrick,” she said. “I didn’t see you there.”

  It felt strange to be calling him by his first name, as Robert did, as if she were a lady and he her servant, but she realized she didn’t know his last name. He was always just Patrick.

  Patrick, who was always there.

  Patrick, who could go anywhere he liked.

  Patrick, who had access to everything. Who had Robert’s trust.

  In the fog, his face seemed distorted, uncanny. Sinister. Slowly, Tess said, “You’re working late tonight.”

  “There’s always a lot to do in the last days,” said the steward. Was it Tess’s imagination, or was there a double meaning to that? “You shouldn’t be out here, miss. You’ll catch your death.”

  “We don’t catch death, death catches us. Wouldn’t you say, Patrick?”

  “I wouldn’t know, miss.” A sudden grin lighted his tired face. “Although my missus has made me promise that if there’s some time before the next voyage, I’ll learn how to swim. She doesn’t want the sea catching me. I’ve told her the ship’s safe as houses, but . . .”

  Tess wrapped her arms about her chest. “Houses burn. And ships sink. What do you think, Patrick? Everyone’s talking about U-boats. Are we safe?”

  “I think, miss,” said Patrick carefully, “that right now you’re in more danger from the night air than the Germans. Shall I escort you back to your cabin?”

  There was nothing in his face to give any clue to his emotions, or his intentions. Three days ago, Tess might have assumed it was a kindness, but not now. Be careful who you trust, she had told Caroline Hochstetter.

  Flippantly, she said, “Don’t you have other duties? You shouldn’t be wasting your time on lowly second-class passengers.”

  “Every passenger is my duty, miss.”

  That, Tess knew, wasn’t the least bit true. Did Robert send you after me? she wanted to ask. Are you working with Robert or against him?

  True blue, Robert had called Patrick, but what did he know about him, really? Just that Patrick remembered how he took his tea and could be trusted to pass on a package. Robert might be that trusting, but Tess knew better. Who better than a steward to have access to information others didn’t? He could go anywhere, talk to anyone on the boat, and no one would think anything of it.

  He could steam open telegrams, with no one the wiser.

  Or she could just be going slowly mad, spinning conspiracies out of the mist.

  “All right,” Tess said, rising jerkily from the chair. “It’s your shoe leather. I’m on E-deck.”

  “I know, miss.”

  Tess narrowed her eyes at him through the fog. “Do you know everything about everyone?”

  Patrick paused for a moment, and then said, “Mr. Langford has been a good friend to me, miss. I’m happy to be of service to his friends.”

  Which said absolutely nothing.

  Tess’s nails dug into her palms as the steward led the way to the second-class stairs. At least, she thought, with gallows humor, they seemed to be going in the right direction. He hadn’t dumped her over the rail. Not that he would. If he were working with Robert, Robert would need her alive to identify Ginny. And if he were working with the gang driving Ginny . . . Well, then. They would want her as a goad.

  It was some slight reassurance to know that, for the moment at least, she was probably more use alive than dead.

  Or Patrick might be exactly what he seemed: a steward who had been well tipped by Robert Langford over successive voyages, trying to see one of Robert’s acquaintances right.

  “How long have you worked for Cunard?” asked Tess craftily.

  “Going on five years now,” said Patrick. “It’s steady work and it pays well, although being away from the family is hard. My wife is expecting our sixth.”

  “Goodness,” said Tess. “I mean—congratulations. You must miss them.”

  The steward’s Adam’s apple bobbed up and down. “I do. If I had the money—but what’s that they say? If wishes were horses, beggars would ride. Here’s your berth, miss.”

  E-22. He had led her unerringly to her door. Despite the fact that a first-class steward had no business knowing the location of second-class passengers. Unless he had a reason to know. Robert might have had him discover the location of her cabin after she’d gone missing. Or Patrick might have known all along.

  Patrick held open the door for her. “Good night, miss. If you need anything, I’ll make sure someone is near the door.”

  “How very kind,” said Tess weakly.

  Patrick bowed his head. “Just doing my job, miss. Good night.”

  “Good night. I hope you get to see your family soon,” said Tess, and shut the door behind her, wondering if this was how a mouse in a cage felt.

  From the bunk on the left, Mary Kate’s head popped up around the curtain screening the bed. She wore curlers with her nightdress. “A first-class steward taking care of you! You must have grand friends.”

  Unbuttoning her boots, Tess looked up at Mary Kate. “How do you know he’s a first-class steward?”

  The curtain dropped back into place. Mary Kate’s voice, sligh
tly muffled, emerged from behind the fabric. “I told you my Liam knew one of the stewards, didn’t I?”

  “Would you be quiet?” Nellie’s voice rose sharply from the bottom bunk. “Some of us would like to sleep. The foghorn is bad enough without you chattering on.”

  “Sorry!” caroled Mary Kate.

  Silently, Tess unbuttoned her jacket in the dark, but she didn’t undress. Just in case. Still in her skirt and waist, she climbed up to her bunk and swung in, pulling the covers up over her head to blot out the sounds of the foghorn and Mary Kate’s apologies.

  She would only rest for a minute. . . . Just for a minute . . .

  Through the thickness of the pillow, the horn sounded again and again, a mournful sound, like a dirge for the dead.

  * * *

  When Tess woke, the cabin was empty.

  According to the clock on the mantel, it was nearly one; she’d slept half the day away, and it felt like longer, like she was one of those princesses in a tale who awakens to find the whole kingdom buried beneath briars.

  A cautious foray outside revealed that Patrick’s words had been an empty threat. Or an empty promise, depending on how one looked at it. There was no one stationed outside the door. No one she could see, at any rate.

  Ducking back into the room, Tess washed and dressed as quickly as she could, determined to grab Ginny while the others were at lunch. She could guess and speculate all she liked, but it was about as much use as trying to paint a landscape in a blindfold. There was only one person who knew what was going on: Ginny.

  Don’t find me, Ginny had said. I’ll find you. But it was too late for that. They needed to have it out now, before the boat docked in Liverpool.

  If the boat docked in Liverpool.

  Tess ran up the stairs, slipping out onto the deck. The world outside seemed to have been born new while she slept. Golden sunlight poured down on the decks. Children ran about, savoring their last day of freedom, playing jump rope and hopscotch. Behind them, like a shadow, Tess felt as though she could still see the fog of the night before, the cloth stretched tight over the windows to block the light. In her imagination, she could hear the foghorn echoing, marking the minutes, blasting a warning.

  The phantom sound lent urgency to her steps as she hurried past the Regal Suite occupied by the Hochstetters to the room reserved for their maid.

  The corridors were quiet; the first-class passengers were all at lunch. Most of them, at any rate. Tess came to an abrupt stop as Margery Schuyler’s strident tones emerged from the door of Ginny’s cabin.

  “Well? Do you have it?”

  Cautiously, Tess peeked around the edge of the door. Electric light blared off blindingly white woodwork, revealing a small but well-appointed room. A chunk of soap clung to the corner of the washstand, one of the few signs of habitation. In the middle of the room stood Margery Schuyler, resplendent in a Liberty silk dress in a pattern that clashed with her complexion.

  Sitting on the bed, in a dark frock, her hair scraped back, Ginny folded her arms across her chest. “Not yet.”

  Margery paced the width of the cabin, her draperies fluttering around her. “We’re only a day out! I thought you said this forger of yours was reliable.”

  Tess felt as though she’d been hit in the head. Forger? She’d assumed Caroline Hochstetter had loaned her maid out to Margery for the pressing of a dress. But . . . Margery Schuyler? Forger?

  Maybe Ginny was setting up another job on the sly. An art heist. But then, wouldn’t she have told Tess? They were done, that was what Ginny had said.

  “He is.” The male pronoun stung like salt. Maybe that was what Ginny meant when she’d said she didn’t need Tess anymore. She’d replaced her. “Some jobs take longer than others.”

  Margery glowered at Ginny as though she were a waiter who had delivered the wrong soup. “Well, we don’t have that kind of time. I thought I made that quite clear when I hired you.”

  “You can’t rush good work,” said Ginny. “This is the forger who copied Mr. Frick’s Jan van Eyck Virgin and Child. I can’t tell you where the original is—but let’s just say Mr. Frick has no idea he has a copy. My man is that good.”

  My man. Tess could remember painting that, the feel of the brush, the smell of the paint, the celestial blue sky through dark arches as the Virgin and child, flanked by saints, accepted the homage of a kneeling worshipper in white.

  Ginny hadn’t replaced her. She was protecting her.

  Which meant—Ginny hadn’t told any of the others who Tess was. If Patrick had been guarding her last night, it had been on behalf of Robert Langford, not Ginny’s mysterious colleagues. No wonder Ginny had been so adamant that Tess stay out of the way, away from her. She wasn’t keeping her in the dark; she was shielding her. As she had done, as best she could, from the time they were little.

  “We don’t need good work,” said Margery in exasperation, “we just need the waltz!”

  “I told you,” said Ginny. “You can have the waltz, all nine pages of it. But if you want the tenth . . .”

  “This is extortion.”

  “You want it, you pay for it.” Pausing, Ginny looked up at Margery Schuyler with an expression Tess couldn’t read. “What is this thing, anyway?”

  Margery raised her sagging chin, lifting her draperies like wings. Liberty on the Battlements, if Liberty had a slightly supercilious air and a conspicuous cold sore. “Why should I tell you? Let’s just say that it’s a device capable of deciding this conflict once and for all. Think of it. All these military entanglements that are sapping the artistic energy of the German people ended! In one blow. The world under German rule, finally, finally, freed from their bourgeois shackles, appreciating the higher things, appreciating art . . .” Shaking herself out of it, she said crossly, “So I would very much appreciate if you would stop wasting our time. Bad enough that our man in the War Office is starting to get cold feet . . . I mean . . . Never mind. You don’t need to know any of that. You just need to get me that tenth page.”

  “And how do I know you’ll keep your end of the bargain?”

  Margery drew herself up. “Would you doubt the word of a Schuyler?”

  Under the circumstances, Tess would have said yes.

  Ginny eyed the other woman speculatively. “You can tell your people I’ll have the tenth page for them when we disembark. Not before.”

  “They won’t like that. How do I know you’ll keep your end of the bargain?”

  Ginny smiled, baring her teeth. “Would you doubt the word of a German patriot?”

  It was pure bluff. Tess could tell even if Margery couldn’t. “All right, then. But the moment we disembark. Or I won’t be responsible for the consequences.”

  And Tess had just enough time to duck behind the door before Margery swept out in a flurry of conflicting patterns.

  “I’m sure you won’t,” Ginny muttered. “Crazy bat.”

  Peering around, Tess saw Ginny dive beneath the bed, emerging with her old leather portmanteau. Philadelphia, Delaware, New York. Tess had seen that same portmanteau on so many beds in so many cities, hauled down so many platforms, tossed onto so many trains. Moving with controlled haste, Ginny flung the contents of the dresser into the bag. Combinations, two skirts, two waists, a set of battered brushes. Two wigs: one blond, one brown.

  Ginny flung open the wardrobe, ignoring the three identical black dresses. Another skin sloughed off, another costume discarded. From behind them, she grabbed a sheaf of papers tightly furled in a roll, tied with string. Hiking her skirt, she stuffed them inside her garter.

  The Strauss waltz.

  Ginny paused to take a quick look around the room. Muttering something to herself, she yanked open a drawer and grabbed a pristine life belt. Hooking her portmanteau over her arm, she strode from the room, kicking the door shut behind her, before hurrying down the hall to the Regal Suite. She didn’t bother going through the parlor. She went straight to the door on the side that led to Caroline Hochstette
r’s bedroom.

  Recovering from her paralysis, Tess hurried in her wake. From the Hochstetter suite came the sound of doors opening and closing, clothing rustling.

  Tess didn’t bother to knock. She pushed open the door, catching her sister by surprise. Ginny froze, Caroline Hochstetter’s fox stole dangling from one hand. The rubies at her ears and neck glimmered like blood. Her portmanteau lay on Caroline’s bed, a bit of beading betraying the evening dress stuffed inside.

  “Dammit, Tess!” hissed Ginny. “You aren’t meant to be here.”

  Tess stood, one hand on the doorknob. “What are you doing?”

  “Taking my wages.” Ginny’s face twisted into a simper, her voice taking on an exaggerated drawl. “Oh, Jones, what a treasure you are. Oh, Jones, I don’t know what I would do without you. . . . Yes, ma’am; no, ma’am; tell me if I can go, ma’am. Scraping and bowing to her highness, hiding her little affairs. It makes me sick.” Ginny’s hand went to the rubies at her throat. “I’ve earned every penny of this.”

  That was Ginny, truth and lies mixed all together. That wasn’t why she was running and they both knew it. “But—there’s still a day before we land. They’ll search the ship for you!”

  A satisfied smile spread across Ginny’s face. She tapped a finger against a folded piece of paper. “Oh, I don’t think so. Not once Mr. Hochstetter reads this. Mrs. High and Mighty will be too busy explaining herself to worry about a few lost jewels. And neither of them will want me to go public.”

  Tess could have shaken her sister. “I wasn’t talking about the Hochstetters, Ginny! I thought you had bigger plans than a few jewels.”

  “Oh, I’ve got those, too. I said I’d manage it without you, didn’t I?” A wary expression crossed Ginny’s face. “Is that what this is? Now that I’ve got it all in hand, you want in?”