The Breath Between Waves

by Charlotte Anne Hamilton

  “Penelope!”

  This time Penelope looked up and finally saw who was calling her. Shame washed over her as she saw Mr. Frank Cameron rushing to her side. He stopped in front of her, eyes wide as he asked, “What are you doing here? I thought you were getting into the boat with Victoria and the others?”

  She swallowed hard, wondering if he’d had to walk away after saying farewell to his daughter and wife for what was probably the last time, and so had missed Penelope running away like some lemming, desperate to throw herself off a cliff. “I… I had to find my parents. I couldn’t leave without knowing what happened to them…”

  “Did you find them?” he asked, his voice soft and full of concern. Her heart thudded in her chest. It was unfair that such a sweet man should be parted from his family. He didn’t know her. He didn’t need to be this kind or caring, and yet here he was.

  She nodded, trying to hold back her emotions. He had enough to deal with without Penelope adding to his burden. “I did. They’re… They didn’t wish to take up space on the boats when…” She tried to force a smile, but it came out more as a grimace.

  “That is…noble of them.” He sighed and shook his head. “Forgive me.”

  “No, I understand completely. There’s no need to apologise.”

  “I had rather hoped you would have been there with Ruby and Victoria. They both appear as if nothing concerns them, but it is more of an act than anyone knows. When things start to go wrong, their bravado disappears. I had felt relief knowing that you would have been there to comfort them. They will inevitably start to panic when they watch the ship go down, knowing that myself and their father are aboard.” He pinched the bridge of his nose. “God above, I dread to think how they must feel right now.”

  Penelope’s chest constricted, and she almost tore her lifebelt off, desperate to lose the pressure that it added around her, the extra bulk that made her feel like she was being held in an unwanted embrace.

  Everything around her swayed, and her hand darted out to grip at the railing, using it to steady herself and stay upright.

  “What did I do?” Her voice was a grating whisper to her ears as she turned to face the water. She bowed her head, unable to see the way the surface was fast approaching or look at the lifeboats that had launched, knowing that one of them had Ruby in it. “Oh God, what did I do? Why did I leave? My one shot at happiness—and I threw it away.” She shook her head and squeezed her eyes shut.

  She’d thrown it away for her parents. Her parents, who, in the end, had just wanted her to be safe and happy. As she would have been if she had got into that boat with Ruby.

  Why hadn’t she got into the boat?

  She felt Frank’s hand on her back. It was inappropriately low, but with the lifebelt on, she wouldn’t have been able to feel his touch if he had placed it higher.

  “I’m sure it’s not too late.” He stepped around her and reached for her hand, gently prising her fingers off the metal railing. “Come on. Let’s see if we can find you a lifeboat. It’s going to be okay, Penelope.”

  As they slowly turned, another familiar face appeared before them. “Miss Fletcher! You did a foolish thing, if I may say so,” Mr. Cole said.

  “Yes, Lewis, I don’t think she needs to hear that now!” Frank hissed, giving her hand a squeeze.

  Mr. Cole ducked his head, his shoulders reaching his ears as he sheepishly scratched the back of his neck. “Forgive me. I just meant…” He trailed off with a heavy sigh. “Never mind what I meant.”

  “We’ll see you aboard a boat,” Frank repeated, as Penelope continued to stare blankly ahead, still trying to get her breathing under control. She focused on the thudding of her heart, the beats reverberating in her ears.

  She felt Mr. Cole take her other hand, and together they walked her like some poor, injured animal down the right side of the Boat Deck. Her eyes took in the cranes that held the lifeboats, noticing with growing panic that they were empty.

  This was confirmed when they reached the one farthest away and the officer in charge announced, “All the lifeboats from the side have been launched. We’re working on getting the collapsible ones erected now.” His eyes flickered over Penelope. “Try the port side. I know they were still launching there the last time I heard.”

  With a solemn nod, the three of them took off. It was growing more and more difficult to keep their footing, especially now that they had to make their way to the side the ship was leaning towards. The tilt towards the front made it feel like climbing a hill with two left feet.

  Penelope’s grip on both Frank and Mr. Cole was tight, to the point she was certain she was spraining their fingers, but they didn’t seem to care. Perhaps they, too, had lost all sensation in their limbs and were just going through the motions, appearing alive when they really felt like dead men walking.

  They started from the edge closest to the front, stopping at each area where a lifeboat should have been, only to find it empty. When they glanced over the edge, they saw the boats either just reaching the water or too far down for Penelope to get to them.

  When they reached the final one, at the back of the ship, Penelope could guess the words that came out of the officer’s mouth before he even had a chance to speak.

  “Sorry, miss, you just missed it.” He smiled sadly at her. “We’re going to launch the collapsible ones now. You’re welcome to a spot on one of those.”

  Penelope felt her legs tremble, and she let Frank and Mr. Cole lead her over to a nearby bench. She buried her face in her hands, bending over as she tried to calm herself and keep her breathing even.

  “I can’t move,” she declared when she felt the men trying to persuade her back to her feet. She lowered her hands and looked wearily up at them. “I know the boat on the other side will be ready first. But I…I don’t have the energy to do another circuit. I cannot.”

  Frank and Mr. Cole shared a look before they slowly nodded their heads. “Then, I suppose we shall wait until the one on this side is ready,” Mr. Cole said.

  “It won’t be long, I gather.” Frank sat down beside Penelope as Mr. Cole continued to stand.

  His eyes kept flickering to the nearby loading area. Penelope watched him curiously—he was always pacing, always turning this way and that.

  “He can’t keep still, can he?” Frank joked quietly, causing Penelope to offer him a vague smile. It was all she could muster. “He fought in the Boers. I think that’s where it comes from, that feeling of always needing something to do. Feeling as if he has to be constantly on the lookout. It annoyed me to no end when I started courting Victoria…” At the mention of his wife, the smile on his lips froze, and his gaze grew distant. Penelope didn’t want to disturb him, so she remained quiet, instead turning her attention back to Ruby’s father.

  Mr. Cole’s thick brows were pulled into a frown. He kept his back straight and his arms clasped behind his back, looking more like he should be in a sitting room than on a sinking ship. Penelope once again wondered where the duke was—if he had been in the smoking room with Mr. Benjamin and they just hadn’t noticed each other, or if he had retreated to his room.

  She wanted to ask Mr. Cole but couldn’t find the strength.

  “Dear God,” he whispered, his eyes growing wide.

  “What is it?”

  “They’re loading one of the davits near the bow.” He turned to Penelope and reached for her, hauling her to her feet. “We must get you there now before they start to lower it.”

  But as soon as he released Penelope’s hand, she fell to the ground as pain shot through her legs. She landed with a thud, just catching herself with her hands and stopping her head from cracking against the hard wood of the deck.

  “The water has reached the Promenade Deck. It’ll only take them a couple of minutes to get the boat lowered into the water, and they’ll start rowing as soon as they do. We must h
urry,” Mr. Cole said as he knelt beside Penelope, trying to ease her back to her feet.

  “I can’t.”

  “You can. Just stand, and Frank and I will carry you.”

  “I can’t,” she tried again.

  Everything was aching.

  She wished for before, when she had been so numb she couldn’t even feel her own body.

  Anything was better than feeling the pressure in her legs, the pain from the cold water she had waded through that had since dried in the cold air. The fabric of her clothes was still icy to the touch, doing nothing to lessen the sting.

  It was as if she was made of the most delicate porcelain. She had been dropped, and now she was cracked into a million tiny pieces, and there was no way she’d be put back together in time to reach the lifeboat.

  Strong hands gripped her under her arms and lifted her to her feet. She stumbled forwards and only stopped herself from falling by gripping the railing. She nearly went over headfirst, and her breath was knocked from her lungs as the hard, cold metal rammed into her stomach.

  The ship juddered again, making Penelope realise what had happened.

  The water was flooding the body faster and causing the ship to tilt farther, both sideways and front-wise.

  Her hands ached as they gripped the railing as tightly as she could, turning to see where Frank and Mr. Cole were. They had managed to get their footing a couple of feet away from her right-hand side and were also leaning against the railing. Just as she’d begun to think that perhaps the sudden movements had settled, however, the ship lurched once more.

  Penelope watched in horror as Mr. Cole lost his footing, his knees buckling and sending him towards the railing. He wasn’t able to get a grip of the protective rail in time. He went careening over the railing and disappeared into the water.

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  “Lewis!” Frank scrambled to the railing, leaning as far over as he could.

  Penelope’s gaze was stuck on the place where Mr. Cole had gone overboard, as if she expected him to crawl up at any moment, having caught himself in some bizarre miracle.

  Yet the longer she stared, the more she realised that wasn’t going to happen. No doubt the sudden shock of the cold water had stopped his already weak heart.

  He’s gone, her mind whispered as her gaze flicked over to Frank, who was sobbing over the railing, staring down at the vast sea.

  Penelope knew she should try to help him search, to cling to that hope that he was still alive and they could save him, but she couldn’t. He’s gone, her mind whispered once again, and she felt her heart shatter into a million tiny pieces.

  No matter how hard she tried to convince herself that she needed to go and help Frank, she could only grip the railing as tightly as possible and remain where she was. As still as a statue, refusing to share Mr. Cole’s fate.

  Frank continued to scream his father-in-law’s name. He was begging Penelope to help, begging God for him to be okay.

  Each prayer went unanswered.

  As Penelope opened her mouth to try and coax Frank away from the railing, another thought entered her mind. One that asked her how she was supposed to tell Ruby that she had stood by and watched as her father had died, and that she had done nothing to help him.

  How she had chosen, instead, just to stand and watch as Frank had broken down in front of her.

  Bang. Bang.

  The shots had the exact same effect on Penelope as the earlier ones. She let out a startled scream and her grip loosened, causing her to stumble a little, sending her sliding towards the submerged front of the ship.

  Her gaze darted around the deck. She wanted to see what had happened this time, whether it had just been the same reason as before—yet she couldn’t see any sort of commotion, leading her to believe that the altercation had occurred on the other side of the ship.

  Just as her nerves started to settle, and she was preparing herself to turn and finally give some comfort to Frank, another loud bang filled the silence of the night.

  This one was unlike anything she had ever heard before. It was much louder than a gunshot, and it seemed to shake the entire ship. She felt the vibrations beneath her feet and through the metal of the railing.

  “The boilers,” Frank said. “It’s…the boilers exploding.” He sounded so lost. So dejected.

  All Penelope wanted to do was let him know how sorry she was; how awful it was that this was something he had to go through. As if saying farewell to his wife and child hadn’t been hard enough, he had just watched his wife’s father die.

  In another life, in a different time, I could have been his sister-in-law. The thought rose unbidden in her mind. She tried to banish it, as it came with images of her and Ruby, happy and content, living together, married for all intents and purposes, even if the law and the rest of the world would never see it as such.

  As she tried to expel those thoughts from her mind, a loud explosion tore another scream from her throat.

  She gripped the railing as tightly as she possibly could, closing her eyes to steel herself for any further explosions so that she wouldn’t startle and go flying down towards the water which had now fully covered the open area of the Bridge Deck. Only the large mast remained to remind her that, at one point, this had been a ship.

  When the explosions seemed to stop, Penelope opened her eyes. She found herself in total darkness.

  Without the boilers, there was nothing to give the ship power. Everything was dark.

  The only illumination came from the countless stars in the sky above. Not even the moon was there to witness the devastation.

  She watched as the water crept upwards. As the ship’s incline started to increase. As the remaining passengers came rushing up towards the back of the ship, hoping to outrun the water. She watched as several people decided to take their chances with the sea, jumping overboard instead of going down with the ship.

  Should I do that? she wondered briefly before her thoughts were captured by the chilling sound of metal grating and groaning. She had no idea what it meant, and as the passengers—God, there were so many of them—started to get closer and closer, she realised that she didn’t want to find out.

  “We need to move farther towards the back,” she said to Frank, who nodded numbly and turned.

  The two moved away from the railing, using whatever they could touch to stabilise themselves as they made their way to the stairs that would take them off the Boat Deck. Thankfully, their position meant that they didn’t have to walk far before they reached them.

  Penelope’s hands immediately latched onto the bannister and she refused to let go until they reached the Bridge Deck.

  The stairs had taken them directly to the area where the last rooms gave way to open decking, making it easier for them to get outside and start the journey to the Poop Deck at the very back of the ship. The area was familiar to her, as it was where she had spent most of her time when not in her room with Ruby or down in the lower decks, helping her watch over the children.

  Navigating the deck was going to be the hardest part, she knew, because of how steep the incline had become. It seemed that the back of the ship rose to an even more unbelievable angle with every step she took. She knew that should she misstep once or allow her grip on the railing to loosen, she would be a goner. And that was the last thing she wanted.

  What she wanted was that image that her mind had painted. A life with Ruby.

  Of course, such a thing coming true now was damn near impossible, but she wanted to at least try. She had already broken her promise to Ruby by leaving her side. She had, in a way, also broken her promise to her mother and father because they had wanted her to live, and how could she manage that now?

  At the very least, though, she could fight.

  So she kept her hands on the railing, even though the leather of her gloves caused
her grip to slide; even though her arms ached and the ship kept trying to pull her into the water below. She kept pulling, one arm in front of the other, hauling herself along the deck until they reached the back.

  Once she’d reached the very back of the Poop Deck, the groaning sound of metal came again, covering the passengers’ screams as the boat continued to pull them and their loved ones into the water.

  She saw the funnel closest to the back sway where it stood. Her eyes widened as her body began to tremble. There was no way that the funnel would break. It didn’t seem possible.

  Yet it did.

  The large yellow and black funnel swayed and then fell backwards, thankfully in the direction of the front, away from Penelope. The crack as it snapped free from its foundation caused her ears to ring.

  She knew that, should she survive, she’d never have the same hearing again, what with the funnels shrieking, the gunshots, the boilers exploding, and now the funnels collapsing. Everything was reverberating in her skull, a constant echo that spoke of lasting damage and constant hauntings.

  As the funnel crashed into the sea, a huge wave rippled outwards, and Penelope watched as it sank, dragging the ship down farther as the extra weight from the funnel hit the front decks.

  She saw those who had decided to risk the sea get sucked under with it, and she grimaced, turning her face away.

  She shared a panicked look with Frank, who was to her left, as they noticed just how quickly the water was moving now.

  It was no longer creeping towards them. Instead, it rushed. Every time she blinked, another section of the ship had disappeared below the waterline. And as it did, the incline grew steeper, until it was almost impossible for her to keep her footing.

  Several people around her lost their grip and went sliding down the deck. They collided with the walls that divided the external areas from the internal structure, or with the countless other objects that littered the area, such as the electric cranes or the benches or even the very funnels that were dragging them faster towards the water.