“Where you think you’re going?” Margaret asked.
“Get out of my way.”
“I told you I’d throw you overboard. Take one step closer and call my bluff.”
Hichens cursed under his breath and settled back under a blanket at the tiller, while the two boats were released from one another. Then the women took turns rowing toward the ship in the distance.
As dawn approached in the east, the stars overhead started to dim, and the outline of the steamer became visible, its single funnel leaving a trail of thick black smoke in the sky. Soon they were close enough to read the name on the bow.
Carpathia.
One by one, the lifeboats transferred their passengers safely on to the steamer. Lifeboat six patiently waited in line for their turn.
Four hours later, the rescue was complete.
After climbing the ladder on to the Carpathia, Margaret watched from the deck until the last passenger, the Titanic’s Second Officer Charles Lightoller, was brought aboard. Then she left to attend a prayer service for those who had been saved, and a funeral service for those who had perished.
Realizing many had lost everything when the Titanic went down, Margaret immediately went to work assisting survivors and asking the wealthier passengers for donations. By the time the Carpathia coasted into pier 54 in New York on Thursday evening, Margaret had raised close to ten thousand dollars to benefit the less fortunate survivors and the families of the fallen.
Despite it being a cold and rainy day, over thirty-thousand people came out to greet their arrival.
The first-class passengers were allowed to disembark first. Among them, the White Star Line’s managing director, Bruce Ismay, who somehow found a seat on a lifeboat during the confusion. By his side were two U.S. senators, William Smith from Michigan and Francis Newlands from Nevada, who had come with a subpoena requiring him to testify in a formal inquiry. Since Monday morning, Ismay had sent out numerous wireless messages from the Carpathia explaining what had happened, covering his tracks and trying to get ahead of the blame.
Newspapers ran headlines like:
Margaret stepped off the gangway into the throng of waiting families. Ahead of her was John Jacob Astor’s young wife, Madeline, who rushed by a band of reporters and disappeared into an automobile. Days later, John’s body would be pulled from the sea with twenty-five hundred dollars in his coat pocket.
Margaret stood for a moment under the pier’s bright spotlights watching the tearful reunions take place all around. Seeing she was alone, the reporters rushed over with cameras.
“There have been rumors of an infection on the ship,” one reporter said. “Can you confirm this?”
“I can’t deny it.”
“With such loss of life, how were you able to beat the odds?” a different reporter asked.
“That’s easy. Typical Brown luck,” Margaret replied. “We’re unsinkable.”
May 21, 1912
LIGHTOLLER
They had just returned from a short recess.
It was the twelfth day of testimony in the British Board of Trade’s inquiry into the disaster, the second day for Charles Lightoller, who had already answered close to a thousand questions.
The British hearings took place in the London Scottish Drill Hall, an old but spacious building with room for an audience of well over a hundred, and where every sound seemed to carry an echo. Lord Mersey was the commissioner presiding over the hearings, but it was Thomas Scanlan, representing the National Sailors’ and Firemen’s Union, who currently had the floor.
It had been over a month since the Titanic sank and the press was still hungry for answers.
Over three hundred bodies had been recovered from the sea in the days after the sinking, some still alive and moaning even though they looked dead. Word going around the newsrooms was these lingering infected had been quieted before being loaded on to one of the recovery ships, and then quickly transferred to an undisclosed military facility where they were cut open and examined—the findings of which remained classified.
Lightoller had testified in the U.S. inquiry in late April. He and many of his peers had come under scrutiny by the harsh eyes of a headstrong Senator who sought to place blame on his employers. Lightoller had kept most of his story a secret, telling only the necessary details. He would certainly not tell them the most gruesome things he had experienced, fearing they might irrationally charge him with a crime.
After his testimony concluded, he was allowed to return to his native England, where he was delighted to experience the simple comforts of home, and to see his wife and two boys. Prior to his embarking on the Titanic, Sylvia had brought forth the idea of having a third child, which Lightoller was eager to get to work on.
Settling back into normal life wouldn’t come easy though, as not a night went by that he didn’t think about the Titanic; about the many who had needlessly perished; about Murdoch and Moody and Smith; about all those that he had slayed, like Elise Brennan and the young boy. But most of all, he thought about the infant he had kept warm and safe in his arms until the Carpathia arrived, the beautiful, nameless princess, and wished as Captain Smith had, that she would live a long and healthy life.
Lightoller sat back behind the witness stand and took a sip of water from a glass vile. To his right was a large model drawing of the Titanic from the starboard side—to the right of the model, an even larger chart of the North Atlantic indicating the Titanic’s route and last known position.
Before the break, Thomas Scanlan had been drilling him on such things like the loading of the lifeboats, his knowledge of ice warnings, and the absence of binoculars in the crow’s nest. Scanlan’s scathing assault was almost as vicious as some aboard the Titanic. Lightoller thought it immoral that he wasn’t given an axe to defend himself.
Still.
He would give them what they want, play the part they assigned him, walk the high wire in their circus act, if doing so would get him beyond the Titanic and back to living.
Anything to get back to living.
SCANLAN: Can you tell us at what speed the ship was going when you left the bridge at ten o'clock?
LIGHTOLLER: About twenty-one and a half knots.
SCANLAN: The speed was taken down, I understand, in the log?
LIGHTOLLER: Yes, the scrap log.
SCANLAN: In view of the abnormal conditions, and of the fact that you were nearing ice at ten o'clock, was there not a very obvious reason for going slower?
LIGHTOLLER: Well, I can only quote you my experience throughout the last twenty-four years, and I have never seen the speed reduced.
SCANLAN: Is it not quite clear that the most obvious way to avoid ice is by reducing speed?
LIGHTOLLER: Not necessarily the most obvious. It is one way. Naturally, if you stop the ship you will not collide with anything.
SCANLAN: Am I to understand, even with the knowledge you have had coming through this disaster, at the present moment, if you were placed in the same circumstances, you would still bang on at twenty-one and a half knots an hour?
LIGHTOLLER: I do not approve of the term banging on.
SCANLAN: I mean drive ahead.
LIGHTOLLER: That looks like carelessness, you know. It looks as if we would recklessly bang on and slap her into ice regardless of anything. Undoubtedly, we should not do that.
SCANLAN: What I want to suggest to you is that it was recklessness, utter recklessness, in view of the abnormal conditions, and in view of the knowledge you had from various sources that ice was in your immediate vicinity, to proceed at twenty-one and a half knots?
LIGHTOLLER: Then all I can say is that recklessness applies to practically every commander and every ship crossing the Atlantic Ocean.
SCANLAN: But is it careful navigation in your view?
LIGHTOLLER: It is ordinary navigation, which embodies careful navigation.
SCANLAN: First Officer William Murdoch followed you on watch, did he not?
LIGHTOLLER
: Yes.
SCANLAN: Was he made aware of the conditions?
LIGHTOLLER: He was.
SCANLAN: But you’ve said before that Murdoch wasn’t on the bridge at the time the ship hit the iceberg.
LIGHTOLLER: Is that a question?
SCANLAN: Consider it as such.
LIGHTOLLER: To my knowledge, Murdoch wasn’t on the bridge. It was his watch, yes. But I believe he was still below decks with Officer Lowe.
SCANLAN: Who was on the bridge at the time of the collision?
LIGHTOLLER: I don’t know.
SCANLAN: Was the captain on the bridge?
LIGHTOLLER: Perhaps. I’d rather not speculate.
SCANLAN: You’ve said previously that the captain ordered you and three of the other officers to go search for these infected. Where was this order given?
LIGHTOLLER: To Murdoch, in the wheelhouse.
SCANLAN: About what time?
LIGHTOLLER: Maybe an hour after my watch had ended.
SCANLAN: What exactly did this order entail?
LIGHTOLLER: We were to go down and search for the infected passengers.
SCANLAN: And what were you to do with them when you found them?
LIGHTOLLER: Contain them.
SCANLAN: Contain them how?
LIGHTOLLER: That was still to be determined.
SCANLAN: But they had been contained previously?
LIGHTOLLER: Yes.
SCANLAN: How many would you say were infected with this virus at the time of the collision?
LIGHTOLLER: Impossible to say. Between twenty and fifty.
SCANLAN: Was Miss Elise Brennan one of them?
LIGHTOLLER: No, she was already deceased.
SCANLAN: How did she die?
LIGHTOLLER: Do you need to ask? The infection killed her, of course.
SCANLAN: But it didn’t kill all of them, did it?
LIGHTOLLER: I believe it did.
SCANLAN: What part did you play in the spread of the infection?
LIGHTOLLER: None. I never became infected, and therefore couldn’t spread the infection.
SCANLAN: What I meant was, were there things you did or didn’t do which, in retrospect, could have quickened the spread of the infection?
LIGHTOLLER: Not that I’m aware.
SCANLAN: Do you believe any negligence on the part of the White Star Line led to the spread of the infection?
LIGHTOLLER: No, I believe all proper safety regulations were followed.
SCANLAN: So you don’t believe they should have been able to prevent the virus from coming aboard the ship?
LIGHTOLLER: I believe if they had known about it they would have stopped it. Whether they should have known, I cannot say.
SCANLAN: But this young woman, Miss Brennan, knew she was carrying this infection when she boarded, is that right?
LIGHTOLLER: No, she did not.
SCANLAN: And how do you know that?
LIGHTOLLER: She explained in her diary.
SCANLAN: Were you the only one to have read her diary?
LIGHTOLLER: No, it was read by at least three others. Dr. O’Loughlin, Dr. Simpson, and Thomas Andrews. Of course, they all died in the sinking.
SCANLAN: Then you are the only survivor who has read the diary?
LIGHTOLLER: I should say so.
SCANLAN: And the diary did not survive?
LIGHTOLLER: It is most likely with the ship.
SCANLAN: Thus, you are the only record of what was in it?
LIGHTOLLER: I believe we’ve established that.
SCANLAN: How much of this diary would you say you can recall?
LIGHTOLLER: All of it.
SCANLAN: Every word?
LIGHTOLLER: Those that matter.
SCANLAN: Would you mind sharing those words with us? I think everyone would like to know.
LIGHTOLLER: Aye. Sure they would.
ONE
HUNDRED
YEARS
LATER
Planet Earth is dead!!!
Was that enough exclamation points? I can never tell.
You’re probably wondering who I am.
My name is James, but my grandma always called me Jimmy.
And you are...?
Well, if you’ve found this time capsule, then you must be one of the unlucky ones, meaning you’re still alive. I’m sorry about that.
I’m sure you have one hell of a story to tell.
Maybe you’re part of a group. Maybe you’re planning to rebuild. If so, I wish you luck.
Me, I’ve decided not to stay. I was always a reluctant believer, but I’m now convinced there are better places beyond this earth, and I’m ready to go.
You see up until the infection took hold, if you had asked me to tell you a story, I would have likely told you about how my great grandmother survived the sinking of the Titanic. She was only an infant at the time, saved by the captain just after the ship went down.
But that was then and, well, depending on how many years have passed since my writing of this and your reading of it, you may not know what a Titanic is anyway.
I’ve got a better story, one that may mirror your own, full of action and adventure and death.
Where to begin?
I know.
At the gun shop. Guns Unlimited.
It was February 13, 2012. A Monday, around noon. The day before Valentine’s Day, in fact. But I wasn’t shopping for my imaginary girlfriend, Julie. No, I wanted a gun for myself—needed one, just in case things got worse.
The biggest problem was I knew nothing about guns. I'd never held a gun before, let alone fired one.
Sure I'd seen plenty of guns on TV and in movies, but how much of that was manufactured magic? How many times would I have to shoot someone to make sure they stayed down?
But first I needed to know—
“Where do you put the bullets?” I said, thoroughly examining the handgun Ted called a Glock. The gun was cold and heavier than I expected.
Ted was the owner of Guns Unlimited. He was a rather large man with equally large hands. His skin was darkly tanned and he had freckles everywhere, more than I think I'd ever seen on one person. I found myself staring at them curiously, even while he did his best to ease my anxiety and answer my stupid questions.
He took the gun from me. It looked like a toy in his hands.
“See this.”
He pointed at what looked to be a button or switch of some kind on the left side of the gun, near the top of the handle.
“Push it to release the magazine.”
He demonstrated then handed me the magazine.
“And so the bullets go in here?”
He looked at me like I was an idiot.
I suppose that was fair.
“You sure you want to buy a gun? I mean, you've thought this through?”
“Yeah, sure.”
He looked at me like I was a liar.
“Okay then, hang tight.”
He turned around and walked through an archway to the rear of the store.
“I really appreciate your help.”
“It's no problem,” he said from the back storage room. “We all have to learn from someone. My dad taught me when I was young.”
“I never knew my dad.”
Ted returned to the counter with a small box of ammunition.
“I could sell you a gun even if you have no clue how to use it. I could let you shoot yourself in the face, and my hands would be clean. But that's not good enough for me. I want a clean conscience too. So I take gun safety very seriously. I really hope you're listening. I don't want to see on the news that you committed suicide. You ain't depressed or anything, right?”
“No sir. Though it might be hard to shoot myself if I can't figure out how to load it.”
“I'd say it would also be difficult to shoot someone else, assuming you must. You said you wanted the gun for protection.”
I nodded.
“Well then, since an unloaded gun is about a
s useful as a pecker on a priest, I guess you'll need a crash course. Follow me.”
He led me across the store and through a heavy wooden door to an adjacent building. The building was colder than the store and had a funny smell. Later I would know the smell as gunpowder. To say I was out of my element would be an understatement—I stuck out like a headless man in a hat store.
Ted explained to me that this was a gun range, a place for people to come and practice their marksmanship. Ten dollars for a half hour was the current rate, but freckle face was happy to let me shoot a few rounds for free.
There were six stations with a maximum shooting distance of fifty feet. Ted set my target up at fifteen.
He showed me how to load the magazine and then outfitted me with a pair of earmuffs and protective eyewear.
“Is all this really necessary?” I asked.
“Yes, it’s the law.”
“Like wearing your seatbelt?”
Ted pointed out the different parts of the gun and then took a few shots downrange to demonstrate.
Bang.
Bang.
Holy crap. I still didn’t know why I had to wear the goggles, but I was glad I had the earmuffs on.
Ted had put two holes in the paper man-shaped target right between the eyes.
Next it was my turn.
He handed me the gun. “Always keep the safety on until you’re ready to shoot. Did you pay attention to how I was holding it?”
“A little.”
He helped me into the correct position and then said, “Now go ahead and take the safety off. Then aim and pull the trigger. Try to hit the target in the chest.”
“Shouldn’t I try and hit the head like you?”
“No. Start small. The chest is a much bigger target, and just as effective.”
I took a deep breath and then pulled the trigger.
Bang.
“Not bad for your first shot,” Ted said.
I had hit the target in more of the stomach region, but at least I hit it.
“The gun almost flew out of my hands. Is that normal?”
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