“No, I'm sorry, he's out, but he should return very soon. Won't he be surprised to see you?”
The two sat awkwardly for moments, of which Cora didn't entirely understand but thought Mr. Luckett was one of those people who need warming up first. After all, this was the first time she'd ever served as his hostess.
“Won't you have a chocolate?” Cora offered him a golden box. “They're Ioan's, but I sneak into them all the time. Don't tell him I said that.” She winked at him.
“Wicked girl,” Mr. Luckett chuckled, grabbing a chocolate covered almond. “I gather you're very fond of chocolate.”
“What girl can resist chocolate? Nonetheless, I do it more for the pleasure of teasing him,” Cora answered. “He thinks he hides everything so well. Then he opens the box and is left scratching his head. That's the expression I love most.”
Mr. Luckett smiled. Cora felt proud of herself as he finally relaxed in his seat. “I believe congratulations are in order,” he said. “Do you have everything you need? Is he treating you well?”
“Can I tell you a secret, Mr. Luckett?” she said. “Sometimes I wonder if I'm making the right decision in marrying him. Is that wrong of me?”
“It's perfectly normal,” Mr. Luckett said. “There isn't a couple who hasn't thought of it once before marriage. Everyone has doubts.”
“I'm not entirely sure all of Ioan came back from Titanic,” Cora replied. “I don't know how to describe it. Insanity is too harsh, but anything less wouldn't do it justice.”
“You think he's lost his nerve?”
“Yesterday, he was going on about some ghost chasing him. He swore up and down that I was in danger and that this ghost wants him at the bottom of the ocean. Who comes up with ideas like that? It's unbearable to listen to. He knows it bothers me when he thinks that way, but he truly believes it. I ask him to be open with me and share his feelings. I want to talk about it. I want him to admit he's suffering, so that I may have an excuse to cry and let it all out. He can free his guilt and move on from this ghost business, but he refuses to say anything. He claims that it's for my own good. What is that suppose to mean? I am his soldier. Every night, day, and waking hour, whether he believes it or not. It's exhausting. The doctor said it's just a phase, but it seems we'll never grow out of this.”
“I'm so selfish,” Mr. Luckett said. “I came to comfort myself without considering your torment. Forgive me. I shouldn't have come at all.”
“You're frightened. Of course, you're frightened. You expected chocolate, not a monologue, ” Cora apologized. “Now that it's said, it does feel strange to tell a man you hardly know, but there's no point stopping now. I've told you everything. I'll lend you my ear all night if it gives you peace.”
“There is something,” Mr. Luckett began. “I need only one answer, but my search led to more questions. Forgive me. When I heard someone attacked you last night, I celebrated. I even took my servants to dinner. I toasted three times, just so I'd believe it. Cora Harlow perished on Titanic until that elating moment when she was alive again. You are my last hope, Miss Harlow. You are the answer to everything lost.” Cora gazed quietly at him. He put so much faith in her. She had not the heart to turn him away. “Sir, if my memory serves me well, I will answer what I can.”
Mr. Luckett waited too long for this opportunity. “I don't know where to begin. What happened that night? Bea, did she-did she suffer or go peacefully?”
“I don't know, sir,” Cora admitted. “We were separated. I searched everywhere for her. I would've drowned if Mr. Saier hadn't found me. I had to assume she got a boat and went on without me. I later realized I was wrong. If I knew she was still there, I would have never left that ship. Titanic was our savior. We snatched our lives back and escaped the girls' school. We kept busy those four days predicting our futures. We bought a sketchbook to keep track of it all. She drew me the perfect husband. What he'd wear, how he'd talk, how he carried himself, how he smiled. She designed my wedding dress, envisioned lavender freesias, a five foot cake, and musicians in white suits. She knew good and well I could never afford musicians but insisted it'd be done. I would have the most envied wedding in Paris. She said she'd hang herself if I married the milkman, or the sad Irish boy who kept writing to me from home. She vowed to find me a rich man on board and made sure I didn't ruin her efforts. She scowled at me when I took another shot of brandy at dinner, or didn't fix my hair just right.
“I drew her a kind French man with dimples and a country house in Monte Carlo. She'd always be in good health and never lose color in her cheeks. I'd be Aunt Cora to her twelve daughters and teach them to play piano very loud and very badly in the house.” Cora smiled in private memory. “How simple and innocent life was then. We never imagined an iceberg in our sketchbook. Not a day passes without regretting I left her. I spent every day with her. I always admired her strength of character. It's shaped my own. When I panic, I hear her voice in my head telling me to man up. She'd never have given up on me, not even now.”
Mr. Luckett steered the conversation away for Cora's sake. “And Mr. Saier? No one saw him for eleven years.”
“That is the tricky part,” Cora answered. “I don't know how he did it, but he was there. At first, I blamed the liquor. I was seeing things. I wonder if it even happened the way I remember it. I was such a mess.”
Still, she remembered it in complete detail. “Since when does your father own the regional bank?” she had whispered fiercely to Beatrice.
“Well, he has money in the bank. That's good enough. Go with it, Cora. You don't want them to figure out my father booked our tickets on discount. Just follow my lead.”
“If you knew what you looked like.”
“You look like a drunken tramp. Turn your glass over. I'm not carrying you back to the suite again.”
“I handle my liquor just fine. I'll walk there myself.”
“And you, Miss Cora? What does your family do?” an estate broker questioned.
“My father is...”
“Dead,” Beatrice declared, forbidding Cora to speak. All the faces looked on Cora sympathetically. “It is a very unfortunate circumstance. Cora's father was a well respected surgeon and philanthropist who donated to many hospitals in his day. He and my father were good friends before he died of a foreign illness. They are still researching the cause. Cora has become part of our family since she mastered her first step.”
“I am sorry to hear it,” was the general agreement around the table.
Somehow, Cora found her way outside. She steadied herself against the wall. Her surroundings swayed and she blinked to clear her vision. Her head fell backwards toward the stars. It was so clear and quiet. It'd been years since she'd seen so many. She was only disappointed when she gazed at the stars in London. The trees, streetlamps, and fancy buildings were always in contest with the sky. No night was as perfect as this one. No night had ever compared. Except one, in a distant memory.
She wondered what happened to the person hiding in that memory. He'd probably inherited his fortune and married a nice upper class girl to please his father. She cringed in disgust with herself. How silly it was that she still searched for shooting stars and made wishes, then poured a glass of whiskey when that wish trailed endlessly across the sky. There is no answer in the stars. Stars are just stars.
“I beg your pardon, miss?” a steward questioned.
She didn't notice he was there. “What?” she replied in a daze.
“I said I'm sorry but you can't be on deck without an escort. Allow me to show you back to your suite.”
“Thank you for your concern. I have no escort, but that's alright with me.”
“I'm sorry, miss, but I can not leave you out here alone. I'm obligated to your safety.”
“What could go wrong on the safest ship in the world?” she replied. “If I fall over, someone will catch me or I shall just float there.”
“Are you alright, miss?” the steward eyed her curiously. “You don'
t sound it. Let me take you to the nurse.”
“I'm fine,” Cora said firmly. “I don't need any doctor.”
Ioan paused as he took a sip of his coffee. He could have sworn he heard a woman bickering on the opposite deck. He grinned in anticipation as he strode toward the fight. He could use the entertainment at this hour.
“There's no need to get upset, miss. It's just a company precaution.”
“Yes, of course. Ladies are prune to self murder under no supervision. However, lady or not, I am a passenger whose paid her dues to enjoy her view from this ship and whatever other view I may chose, whether its noon or the dead of night.”
It wasn't a fair fight. The lady couldn't win. She should certainly be arrested for insanity and public intoxication. Yet Ioan felt for her. Clearly, she'd seen better days. He figured he'd spare her the embarrassment.
“There you are,” he greeted cheerfully, appearing beside them. The lady and steward looked him over in astonishment.
“Sir?” the steward questioned.
“I've been looking everywhere for you,” Ioan told her. “I can't let you out of my sight for a moment.”
“I beg your pardon?” she declared.
“Are you acquainted?” the steward asked.
“I am her escort,” Ioan said.
“She's clearly drunk. I am obligated to see her to the hospital.”
“I will see to it that she gets there. Thank you, steward. You've done a fine job.”
“Yes...yes, thank you, sir.” The steward made his way to the dinning hall.
“Take my arm,” Ioan muttered to her. “Try not to look so surprised. You'll give yourself away.”
“Did I miss something?”
“Did you? We'll turn back this way then,” Ioan said, guiding her in the opposite direction. “I want to make sure you get your money's worth out of the night time view. As you can see, darkness, darkness, and more darkness. And if we turn back this way? Ah, yes, there it is. More darkness. Where else shall we direct this midnight tour?”
“Mock me all you like, but fresh air is hard to come by,” Cora replied.
“You're going to need a stronger remedy,” he said, offering her his cup. She stared at it. “Take it. You'll feel better.”
She carefully lifted it to her lips and drew a sip. “Coffee. Actually very good,” she complimented.
“You need it more than I do. Didn't they tell you to say when?”
“No one knows when when is.”
Ioan grinned. “Tell me more.”
“We'll need a barrel of coffee for those stories,” she answered, studying him closely.
“Are you better now?”
“I'm not sure. Life won't stop spinning. One moment I'm in a room gulping down champagne, the next I'm surrounded by darkness sharing coffee with a stranger. Have we met before?”
“I doubt it,” he answered. “I don't talk to passengers.”
“I rarely catch an officer. They bolt by like we're going to battle.”
“Time is a luxury.”
“Yet you're taken to drunken girls? ”
“A lucky find. I'm on my watch, after all,” he said.
“For girls?”
“Bergs. Quite common this time of year. Harder to spot at night. They'd gut a man before he even knows what's coming. None of them make it this far out to sea before melting, but there's always a slim chance that one might snoop through these parts. Anything's possible. It'd be massive, creeping in the darkness of the waters. It could take out a ship in just minutes and we'd all be doomed. It's quite fascinating,” he exclaimed.
“Should you really be telling me this?”
“It's all very natural.”
“What good is your watch then? It'd be too late to slow down the ship before it hits?” Cora questioned.
“Rest assured, miss. They've got it all figured out. Even if we were to hit such an iceberg, which is typically rare, the ship is designed to withstand the damage. Its lower compartments will hold water until we reach port. If it came to that. We have eyes all over these waters.”
“And if all else fails, we have twelve lifeboats,” Cora pointed out.
“Sixteen, to be exact, and four collapsibles. I doubt it would ever come to that though,” he smiled at her. “The odds are in our favor.”
Cora gazed at him.
“You still don't believe me?” he asked.
“No,” she said quietly, remembering to look away. “I just have the strangest feeling, like I've met you somewhere.”
“Those particular odds aren't in our favor,” he told her.
“No,” she agreed even quieter. “No, they weren't.”
“Have I offended you?”
“No. Forget it,” she told him. “I'm sick to my stomach.”
“Perhaps I can help you straighten it out.”
“We don't know anything about each other.”
“We won't ever see each other again. Don't be ashamed. Everyone goes through troubles. I can take a licking if it rids you the distress.”
“No, I mean I really am sick to my stomach,” Cora said.
“It's probably the waves,” Ioan said. “Maybe we should sit down.”
“No, it's not that. You just remind me of someone. Someone I used to know. It's so unlikely. I'm obsessed with the idea. I'm drunk,” she said. “See? I haven't solved anything by telling you this.”
“Was it someone you cared about?” Ioan asked.
“Yes. I suppose you could say that,” she answered softly. She listened to the waves splashing in the darkness. “He loved the ocean. He was infatuated with it. Said he wanted to sail all around it. He stole my father's boat one night and we rowed out to sea to watch the stars. That was the last time I saw him.”
Ioan halted abruptly and turned to her. He studied her eyes intently. “Cora?” he whispered.
Cora couldn't hold it in any longer. The alcohol declared war on the pasta she'd eaten. “Are you alright?” he asked. She stumbled away and threw herself over the railing. It all spewed out. Ioan grabbed her hair and held it over her shoulder. Whole pasta noodles and chicken bits exploded from her lips. He swore she hadn't even chewed. She was such a little thing. How did it all get in there? It was gruesome. He felt like puking himself. He looked away and nervously surveyed the deck. She was so loud. She was dying. They were probably on their way now to arrest him for murder. How was he to explain this to his superiors? At last she coughed and the thing ended. After her contributions to the sea, he cautiously patted her back. “Blimey,” he whispered. “Is it over?”
“I'm sorry,” she groaned. “I'm a mess. I know.”
“That's an understatement, but I don't care,” Ioan said. “By God, it is you. I mean I'm...I don't know what I am. Of all places you're here. You were off to boarding school last I heard.”
“Father thought it best I travel and see the world before I married,” Cora replied.
Ioan's smile faded. “Indeed. He is absolutely right,” he said quietly. “Come on. Let's get you to bed.” He gripped her shoulders and guided her from the rail.
“What are you doing here?” she questioned. “All grown up and in navy.”
“This is my ship,” Ioan said proudly. “Not bad, eh?”
Cora smiled. “Not too shabby. We have so much to catch up on, but odds are against us, remember?”
“Officer Saier.” Fifth Officer Lowe appeared suddenly beside them. He glanced at Cora questionably before turning to Ioan. “You are relieved. Good work. Report to the bridge at 8 am tomorrow.”
“Yes, sir,” Ioan answered.
Cora blushed as Officer Lowe marched away. “God, he's handsome.”
“He's the gaffer,” Ioan shrugged.
“Well, isn't he handsome?”
“Yes, Cora. Fetching,” Ioan replied. “As hard boiled as they come.”
“Nothing wrong with that. What woman can't appreciate a man in uniform?” she teased.
“I can take him a message if y
ou'd like,” Ioan offered. He turned back. “Officer Lo-”
“Ioan,” Cora cried, turning him back around. “I will murder you.” She looked him over. He wasn't so bad looking himself. A ship of dreams, indeed. “It is so good to see you again,”she said.
“You too, miss.”
“Can I hug you? Is that a proper thing for a passenger to do?”
“Probably not,” Ioan said, but she threw her arms around him anyway. “Just try to keep it between us then.”
She started for the second class entrance. Ioan was enchanted by her graceful composure and charm. Finishing school had done her nicely. He couldn't bring himself to let her go just yet. “Cora,” he called. She turned to him. “Yes, sir?”
He was lost for words. How could he call the woman and not know what he wanted to say? “May I call on you some time? For tea and such?” he asked. “Is that proper?”
“Probably not,” she answered.
“Only we should know about it then.”
“Your tea invitation?”
“What tea invitation?”
She smiled. “Good night, Ioan.”
“Good night, miss.”
“No fever. No vomiting. No sign of chills or sweat. Your skin has a rosy color and your eyes are the brightest I've seen. What did you say was wrong with you?” the doctor asked Cora as his hand scanned her forehead.
“Perhaps I'm mistaken in thinking it a chronic illness,” Cora answered. “You never know the difference between a hangover and a monthly cycle.”
“Dear Lord. I see,” the doctor looked terrified. With all his years of studying medicine, the female creature was still a mystery to him. “It'll pass. It's nothing serious, I'm sure,” he told her. In an attempt to redeem his creditability, he added, “I hear chocolate and a cup of chamomile tea does wonders. Perhaps a hot bath. And a psychiatrist. Yes. Uh, good day ladies.” He rapidly escaped to the door, but collided with a shrub of flowers standing in the doorway.
“I beg your pardon!” he cried at the shrub.
“Are you Miss Cora Harlow?” the shrub asked with difficulty.
“I most certainly am not!” the doctor cried.
“Delivery for Miss Cora Harlow!” the shrub showed itself in.
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