The Girl Who Came Home - a Titanic Novel

by Hazel Gaynor

  ‘Foundered?’

  ‘Yes. We believe that she struck an iceberg two days before she was due to arrive in New York and according to the White Star Line office in Liverpool, she sank to the depths of the Atlantic ocean.’

  Séamus couldn’t believe what he was hearing. ‘But, it was such a big ship Father – all the papers spoke of it being unsinkable and being made of triple-screws or something. I remember seein’ it in the papers with my own eyes – the pictures an’ all. It can’t have sunk - surely to God it didn’t sink.’

  ‘There are reports of around seven hundred survivors, mainly women and children although we do not yet know whether those who left from this Parish are among the fortunate ones.’ He paused then, looking down at the floor, shuffling his feet as a pool of water gathered around him on the flagstones, the raindrops falling steadily from his overcoat. ‘It is a truly terrible business. A terrible business indeed. It was Peggy Madden’s sister who suggested I come and speak to you. I understand you are friendly with Maggie Murphy who was travelling with her aunt Kathleen Murphy.’

  ‘Yes, yes – I am. That’s right.’ Séamus remembered then the telegram message which had been delivered to him just a few hours earlier. ‘But, I just received a message from Maggie,’ he said, rushing over to the chair and picking up the telegram, showing it to the Priest as if he wouldn’t otherwise believe him. ‘Look. Here, see. It’s from the R.M.S Titanic. It’s franked and everything.’

  Father Mullins studied it for a moment, before placing it carefully on the table and speaking in an almost whisper. ‘Yes Séamus, I see. A very unfortunate coincidence. You see it shows us here that the message was transmitted on the night of April 14th. That was the night, we believe, the incident occurred.’

  Unable to comprehend what he was being told, Séamus leant against the kitchen table, pressing his palms hard to the cool, solid surface as if he were clinging onto it for his life. He stayed like this for some time, his mind reeling, his thoughts racing as Father Mullins relayed all the information he had himself been given. It was now a case of waiting for further confirmation and for news of any survivors. They were to prepare themselves for the worst, he warned, before leading them both in prayer.

  For seven days, Séamus and the other villagers of Ballysheen wandered around in a daze, unsure of what to think or what to believe. Rumours skirted the town about reports in the local newspapers that all of the females had been saved. Others suggested that everyone had been lost. A farm labourer reported that he had seen Maggie Murphy’s name among a list of survivors printed in The Western People which was being passed around at the market. It was impossible for Séamus to allow himself to believe anything until he heard from Maggie himself, or saw her dead body.

  There was a strange numbness about the village; people wouldn’t look each other in the eye, afraid to suggest either hope or despair, not knowing which emotion to express from among the many they were feeling.

  It was Thomas Durcan, the White Star Line agent himself, who finally arrived with the tragic news. Families watched anxiously, hidden inside the dark interior of their homes, as he walked with Father Mullins, knocking firmly on door after door to convey the news of what had become of their loved ones.

  The two men walked, ashen-faced, from home to home, the wailing and crying from within telling anyone passing what the fate of their family members was. Mothers were inconsolable, fathers wept for their lost sons and daughters, the grief and suffering was unbearable to behold.

  Everywhere he went, Séamus overheard hushed conversations and anxious whispers; secret, almost forbidden, exchanges between neighbours of how individuals had reacted to the news.

  ‘Poor Ellen Joyce’s father was sellin’ a cow at market to get back the money he’d paid for her passage,’ one woman whispered to another.

  ‘Young Michael Kelly’s grandmother can’t sleep for nightmares, thinking that the sharks have his poor, dead body,’ another said.

  It chilled his heart, and through it all he recalled his dream from the night his father died and reflected on Maggie’s telegram.

  Some families were left hoping, with names so similar to their loved ones showing on the lists of survivors, only to be rocked to their core when it was established that there had been confusion and, in fact, their relative had been lost. So far, it was known that all of the fourteen travellers had been lost, with the exception of Peggy Madden, who had survived by clinging to a capsized lifeboat.

  Séamus was at the lake, throwing stones into the water when he felt Father Mullin’s hand on his shoulder. He’d been dreading the moment the man would speak with him and he squeezed his eyes shut tight, hoping to block out the reality of the news he was about to hear. He barely heard the Priest when he spoke, the words seeming to flutter and drift around him like damsel flies.

  ‘She lives Séamus,’ was all the man said. ‘Maggie survived. She is recovering in a New York hospital.’ He tightened his grip on Séamus’s shoulder and then turned and walked away to allow Séamus to process this news in private.

  Séamus nodded and let the tears fall as he continued to sit in silence. The girl he loved with all his heart was alive; had survived the most terrible tragedy. He wished he could feel joy, elation, but those elusive emotions were stifled by the overbearing knowledge that she did not want him to be in her life anymore. Don’t wait for me, she’d said. Don’t wait for me.

  He sat watching the clouds gathering on the horizon, watched as each solitary cloud drifted lazily across the sun, casting everything into shade before moving off to let the warmth and brilliant light of the sun settle on him momentarily again. As the rhythms of nature moved constantly between light and shadow, so, it seemed, did the young man’s heart.

  The next few weeks were taken up with grieving and comforting those who had lost their loved ones. Séamus tried his best to help where he could, feeling a terrible guilt at receiving the news he had prayed for every night, while others had had their worst fears confirmed. With only a few hundred bodies of the fifteen hundred lost souls recovered, there were no funerals to be held, so it was without the body of their loved ones that the grieving families held their wakes.

  For two days and two nights, wakes took place across the Parish for those who were lost at sea. Séamus visited each home, removing his cap to approach the bed where the victim had slept just a few weeks ago, the photograph of them placed carefully on the crisp, white pillow, dozens of candles burning all around the room. In home after home he visited, the same dark scene of unimaginable grief was played out and he looked at the black and white faces staring at him from the photographs, unable to believe that these people were lost forever.

  ‘It’s the not knowing where she is that’s so hard to accept,’ one mother told him as she gripped his hands so tightly he thought she would never let go. ‘Not knowing where her little body lies and what with her being so a-feared of the dark and it will be so dark down there won’t it. I just cannot bear it, truly I cannot.’

  The rain fell steadily over the parish for those few weeks, as if the very sky itself was mourning along with those whose hearts lay broken in their chests down below.

  The last of the blossom had fallen from the two remaining trees by the time the newspapers stopped reporting the news of the Titanic and the findings of the enquiries and of the aftermath in the parish of Ballysheen.

  Séamus took some small comfort by visiting the sixth blossom tree every Wednesday. He would sit a while under the dappled shade and remember. He wondered often how different things might have been if he had travelled with Maggie on that journey as she had so wanted him to. If his father had died a few weeks earlier, what then? Perhaps he would have gone with Maggie. Perhaps he would have drowned in the Atlantic Ocean too and then what good would have come of it all.

  When he felt stronger in his mind, he gave up remembering and sat under the blossom tree planning. He would write to Maggie one last time. He would somehow find the address of the aunt
she was travelling to stay with and he would write to tell her how his heart had leapt with joy when he heard she had survived the disaster but that it had sunk again with utter despair to learn that she did not wish him to wait for her. He would tell her that he was glad that she would be able to live her life, as he knew how much she would make of this chance God had given her and that he hoped hers would be a very happy and long life – with all his heart, he wished her the best life possible, even if he could not be the one to share it with her.

  As the spring months gave way to summer and the first leaves of autumn started to fall from the trees by the lakeside, he resolved to sell his father’s house and their small plot of land and travel to England with the money to work at the cotton mills. At least there he would have no reminders of the love he had known and lost. There, he might stand a chance of putting Maggie Murphy and the horrors of the Titanic from his mind. Fate had decided his path in life and he now had to walk that path, wherever it might lead him.

  CHAPTER 33 - New York, 1912

  New York,

  19th April, 1912

  Dearest Mammy,

  It is with the deepest, deepest sadness that I write these words. I do not know if news of the awful event will have reached you yet in Ballysheen, but there was a terrible tragedy Mammy and the mighty Titanic is sunk in the Atlantic and there has been the greatest loss of life ever imaginable.

  I have been at the White Star Line offices in New York for the last week waiting for news of our beloved Katie. The steamship Carpathia, which rescued the survivors, arrived in New York yesterday evening. I waited there for hours and hours until every last person was down the gangway and the doors were closed again.

  Katie did not come to me Mammy.

  She did not walk towards me and fall into my arms in the pouring rain. I did not scream her name in delight and relief as so many others did when they saw their loved ones emerge from that black night.

  I have been to all the hospitals and anywhere where I am told that victims have been taken – still I cannot find her Mammy and I sit here with the heaviest, heaviest heart as I find that it has fallen to me, your eldest daughter, to tell you the terrible news that little Katie did not survive the disaster - she did not manage to escape on one of the few lifeboats which left Titanic.

  With fifteen hundred others, Katie was lost to the ocean.

  I think I have cried enough tears now to fill the depths of that ocean over and over and over again, because I cannot believe she is gone – cannot believe she didn’t walk off that mighty ship to the sound of ragtime bands and the sight of ticker tape and flags and the joy of seeing my face in the waiting crowds.

  I wish I could be there to comfort you all Mammy, dearly I do. I will be making arrangements to travel home on the first ship I can secure passage for but for now I am so sorry that these words are all I can send.

  I have enclosed a pair of gloves which I had bought for Katie as a birthday and welcome gift. They were bought in Macy’s department store – I think she would have loved them dearly and wish you to have them now to lay on her bed as you mourn her.

  I know there will be much mourning in Ballysheen Mammy with so many of our loved ones dead. I cannot imagine the sadness there must be there. The whole city of New York seems to be in mourning – nobody can believe such a thing could happen.

  Please forgive me for writing this terrible news and may God bless us and comfort us all at this terrible time.

  Your loving, devoted daughter,

  Catherine

  New York

  24th April, 1912

  Edgar Selznick

  Éclair Studios

  Municipal Buildings

  Main Street

  Fort Lee, New Jersey

  My dearest Edgar,

  Apologies for my recent lack of communication – as you will be aware from the many radio and press interviews I have been giving recently, I was one of the many unfortunate victims of the Titanic disaster. Really Edgar, it was the most frightful business altogether – the stuff of nightmares. Mother is overcome with grief at the tragic loss of darling Robert and the ruination of all the wedding plans. I am wracked with guilt about deserting him on the deck of the ship, but what was I to do with the Officers insisting that the women and children fill the boats first – I had to go without him, he was quite insistent and those poorly educated steerage people caused such an unnecessary panic and stampede it was almost impossible to hear ones-self think, never mind pay any heed to one’s own survival, or to one’s fiancée’s survival.

  So, I found myself in the lifeboat with little Edmund, being lowered into the Atlantic before I really had much time to think about it.

  Thank goodness for the First Class Stewards for encouraging us to dress warmly or I think I may have frozen to death in the lifeboat waiting for rescue. I actually gave one of my topcoats to a wretch of a girl who sat shivering in a thin nightdress and light cotton coat which was drenched to the waist with seawater. I can only assume she was from steerage class – she was lucky, I don’t think many of them survived.

  I suspect I will never see the coat again and I suspect it will be the nicest coat that she will ever own - it was from an exquisite little boutique in Rome. I quite liked it, but I suppose it was put to good use.

  Well Edgar, now that Robert is buried and I have had chance to grieve and rest and recover my spirits a little, I have been wondering if the studio might be considering making a movie about the Titanic disaster. It would make for great drama and I would be willing to play a lead role, showing from first-hand knowledge what really happened that night. Perhaps Mr Francis might make a suitable Captain Smith and Mr Adolfi for the part of a crewman. With all the inquests and inquiries and haranguing of poor Mr Ismay, I am sure it would be welcomed by the White Star Line and might serve to put some of the more unpleasant rumours about the incident to rest.

  In any event, I have arranged for the white silk evening gown I wore that night to be freshly laundered as I thought it might be a nice touch to wear the very same gown in the re-enactment if the studio was enthusiastic about the idea – we could perhaps print the information about the gown on the studio posters.

  I look forward to a prompt reply and perhaps we could make arrangements to talk further over lunch. I am in desperate need of some stimulating conversation and I think you may be the only person in this entire city who is capable of providing it!

  Yours affectionately,

  Vivienne Walker-Brown

  CHAPTER 34 - Chicago, 1982

  ‘You must be Mr Lockey,’ Grace asked nervously, extending her hand.

  She wasn’t used to making arrangements to meet total strangers in coffee shops, but there was something about this man’s face which reassured her. He was taller than she’d imagined and his soft, white hair had been left a little longer than most men of his age she had encountered. It made him look slightly hippyish. While he was obviously in his sixties or possibly seventies, his face was youthful and there was a wonderful sparkle in his eyes. He was smartly dressed in a collared shirt and navy blazer and a fresh scent of cologne added to the sense of good grooming and air of dignity. She immediately relaxed.

  ‘Yes, indeed. And you must be the famous Grace Butler,’ he replied, shaking her hand warmly and smiling broadly. ‘I’m delighted to meet you – I so admired your article.’

  Grace felt herself blush a little and she giggled as she spoke. ‘Well, hardly ‘the famous Grace Butler’, but yeah, that’s me.’

  They stood a little awkwardly for a few seconds, Grace twirling her long hair around her fingers as she was prone to doing when she wasn’t quite sure what to do next, before he gestured for them both to sit down at the table he had taken towards the back of the coffee shop. It was a good choice, in a relatively quiet corner where they could have a conversation without the constant interruption of coffee orders being shouted over their heads.

  ‘So,’ he began after ordering them both a flat white. ‘How
very strange is this?!’

  ‘Erm, very,’ Grace replied, laughing and reaching into her bag for her notepad and pen. ‘I wasn’t even sure you’d turn up. My mom was convinced you would be one of those wierdos who lure young women away from home. She’s sitting outside in the car y’know, waiting for me. How embarrassing!’

  He chuckled. ‘Well, hopefully you’re convinced I’m not a ‘wierdo’ – I’ve been accused of worse over the years! Aha,’ he added, motioning towards her writing materials. ‘I see your journalistic instincts follow you everywhere.’

  ‘Oh, these? Yeah! Force of habit I’m afraid. Don’t worry, I’m not planning to record our conversation. I just like to have a pen and paper handy to jot things down.’

  There was another silence then, each wondering how to broach the subject of the letters. Grace didn’t want to appear rude and demand to see them straight away, but she felt as though she would burst if he didn’t say something soon. Sensing her impatience, the man lifted a small brown paper bag onto the table.

  ‘Well, here they are anyway,’ he continued. ‘The coat and the packet of letters. Go ahead, take a look. I hope they’re what you’re looking for.’

  Grace lifted the bag carefully from the table, surprised at how much her hands were shaking, and placed it on her lap. She peered inside for a moment before lifting out a small, threadbare black overcoat and a relatively small packet of brown paper tied with a fraying piece of string. They were just as Maggie had described them to her. She could hardly believe what she was seeing. ‘Oh, wow,’ she whispered to herself, surveying the fragile packet, turning it over and over in her hands and brushing the smooth cotton of the coat with her fingertips.