Murder on the Mauretania

by Conrad Allen

  “Don’t speak with your mouth full, dear,” chided her mother.

  “Why not?”

  “Because it’s not polite.”

  “Who decides what’s polite and what’s not polite?” wondered the girl.

  “We do,” said her father firmly.

  “But Christobel Wilkinson always talks with her mouth full at school and her father is a bishop.” She washed down the remnants of the toast with a drink of orange juice. “Is it different for girls whose fathers work in the church?”

  “No,” asserted Oliver Jarvis.

  “Then why does Christobel do it, Daddy?”

  “Sheer ignorance. She doesn’t know any better.”

  “But she’s ever such a polite girl most of the time. When she says her prayers, Christobel talks to God as if he’s our headmistress. She’s so respectful.”

  “Let’s drop the subject, shall we?”

  “Why?”

  “Because we don’t want to hear about Christobel Wilkinson.”

  “Don’t you like her, Daddy?”

  “I don’t want to share my breakfast with her, that’s all.”

  “Do you think the bishop talks with his mouth full?”

  “That’s immaterial.”

  “No it isn’t. Children are supposed to copy their parents, aren’t they?”

  “Yes,” agreed Vanessa Jarvis, smiling. “So why don’t you watch us and simply follow suit? In a public situation, good manners are vital.”

  “Are they?”

  “We’re on display. People are looking at us.”

  “But there’s hardly anyone else in here,” said Alexandra, glancing around. “Who’s going to see what we do?” She munched on more toast but swallowed it before speaking again. “Mr. Dillman has good manners, doesn’t he, Mummy?”

  “Yes, dear. He does.”

  “Why was Daddy so funny with him?”

  “I was nothing of the kind,” said her father testily.

  “Yes you were.”

  “Alexandra—”

  “You were so suspicious at first. What was wrong with him?”

  “He was a stranger,” explained Oliver Jarvis. “There are rules.”

  “What sort of rules?”

  “You’ll learn them in time, Alexandra,” said her mother.

  “I hope so!” sighed Jarvis.

  “But Mr. Dillman was such a lovely man,” recalled the girl. “He was even nice to Noel, and that takes a lot of doing.”

  “What do you mean?” demanded her brother, bridling.

  “Well, you just sat there and glared at him.”

  “No I didn’t, Ally!”

  “Noel is more reserved than you are, dear,” said Vanessa Jarvis. “He takes a little longer to make new friends.”

  “Only because of those spots on his face.”

  “Ally!” snarled the boy.

  “It’s true. You look as if you’ve got measles, yet Mr. Dillman pretended that he didn’t even notice them. That’s how polite he is.”

  “Shut up, will you!”

  “That’s enough!” said their mother sharply. “I won’t have language like that at the table. Do you understand?”

  “She started it,” grumbled the boy.

  “Your sister has a name, Noel. Please have the grace to use it.” She switched her gaze to Alexandra. “As for you, young lady, I think you owe an apology to your brother. What you said was very hurtful. Don’t you ever let me hear you say it again.”

  “But he does have spots,” she contended. Three angry faces surrounded her and she became repentant. “I’m sorry, Noel,” she said, twisting her napkin between her fingers. “It was only meant as a joke.”

  “A very cruel joke,” added her mother.

  “I won’t do it again, I promise.”

  “Make sure you keep that promise,” said her father, wagging an admonitory finger. “Or you’ll be sent to the cabin to spend the rest of the voyage there.”

  “Oh, no,” she protested. “I’d miss all the fun if that happened. Please don’t do that to me, Daddy. It’s not fair. I’ll be friends with Noel from now on. He can’t help being shy. I love him, really.”

  There was a long pause. Oliver Jarvis gritted his teeth as the first signs of indigestion made themselves known. His wife looked across at their daughter with a mixture of affection and exasperation, while her son, only partly mollified, spread marmalade on his toast, his head kept well down. Alexandra had the sense to say nothing. Pushing her plate away, she folded her arms and sat there with a patient smile. It was Vanessa Jarvis who eventually broke the silence.

  “Well, now,” she said, taking a sip of tea, “what are we all going to do today?”

  “Try to wake Granny up,” suggested Alexandra.

  Her mother tensed, her father sighed inwardly, and her brother sniggered.

  “That wasn’t a very kind thing to say,” scolded Vanessa Jarvis.

  “I’m sorry. Can I be excused, please?”

  “No, dear,” said her mother.

  “Perhaps it’s not such a bad idea,” decided Oliver Jarvis, overruling his wife. “At least we could eat the rest of the meal in peace.” The warning finger came back into play. “Wait outside for us, Alexandra, do you hear? Don’t wander off.”

  “I won’t, Daddy.”

  “And don’t talk to any strangers.”

  The girl nodded, set her napkin aside, then got down from her chair. Wanting to run to the exit, she instead opted for a dignified walk, knowing that her parents would be watching her all the way. When she reached the grand staircase, she was out of sight and celebrated her freedom by dashing up the first flight of carpeted steps. A familiar figure was waiting for her at the top. It was the black cat she had seen when embarking in Liverpool. Resting in an alcove, it was grooming itself absentmindedly while keeping the staircase under surveillance. Alexandra smiled and went down on one knee.

  “Hello,” she said, beckoning the animal over. “What’s your name?”

  The cat stopped grooming and studied her intently, then rose up lazily on its paws. After further appraisal of the young passenger, it put a long, quivering tail in the air and padded across to her to seal the introduction. Alexandra was delighted, stroking the fur gently and drawing a contented purr from the animal. She was so absorbed in what she was doing that she did not see the man descending the stairs toward them. The uniformed officer came to a halt and gave her a smile of congratulation.

  “Well done!” he said. “Bobo must really like you.”

  “Is that his name?” she asked.

  “Yes. Bobo is the ship’s mascot. I’m the only person on board he allows near him as a rule. You’re honored, young lady.”

  It was an exceptionally smooth crossing. At that time of year, the Irish Sea could be very choppy, but it was as calm as a millpond while the Mauretania steamed across it. When land was first sighted, several passengers were already at the rail, and hundreds more joined them as the southwestern coast of Ireland slowly appeared on the horizon. In Queenstown itself, a large crowd had been gathering since dawn to welcome the new ship and to give her a send-off worthy of her eminence. It was 9:00 A.M. on Sunday when the vessel finally pulled into her berth to receive her dockside ovation and submit herself to the waiting cameras. The Mauretania did not linger. Additional passengers were swiftly embarked along with bags of mail, and the post office ashore was deluged with a record number of cables and letters. Activity among the crew and the port officials was at its peak. Nothing was allowed to delay departure.

  A large press corps was making the historic voyage, and the correspondents’ first wireless messages to their respective newspapers and magazines were uniformly positive. Having luxuriated in the ship’s interior, sampled its excellent cuisine and enjoyed a good night’s sleep, reporters of various nationalities were profoundly impressed, none more so than Hester Littlejohn, a correspondent from a ladies’ journal that was sold in all the major cities on the eastern seaboard of Ameri
ca. A short, fair-haired, roly-poly woman in her late thirties, she gazed down from the boat deck at the seething crowd.

  “They’re certainly pleased to see us,” she said with a grin.

  “It’s a big day for them,” explained Dillman. “They’re letting us know it. We had exactly the same welcome on the Lusitania’s maiden voyage.”

  Hester’s interest was sparked. “You sailed on the Lusitania?” she asked, turning to peer at him over the top of her glasses. “That must have been a terrific experience. I begged my editor to let me make the trip, but it just wasn’t possible. She said that I could sail on the Mauretania instead. What was it like?” she pressed. “How do the two ships compare? Which do you prefer?”

  “There are no short answers to those questions.”

  “Then we must get together sometime so you can fill in the details. Some of the British reporters aboard were on the Lusitania as well, but they’re too busy blowing their own trumpets to be taken seriously. Besides,” she insisted, “I want to hear it from a passenger’s point of view—an American passenger at that—and not from someone who’s drinking his way through his newspaper’s expense account.” She removed a glove to extend her hand. “I’m Hester Littlejohn. Ladies’ Weekly Journal.”

  “George Dillman,” he replied, shaking her pudgy hand.

  “From up near Boston, by the sound of it.”

  “You’ve got a good ear, Miss Littlejohn.”

  “Mrs. Littlejohn,” she corrected, pulling the glove back on. “Unfortunately, my husband hates sailing or he’d be with me. Hal’s idea of a vacation is to go hunting with the other men from the office. That suits me fine. I like to do my hunting on assignment. Hal aims his rifle at deer. I prefer to get a good story in my sights.”

  “Then you’re in the right place.”

  “Looks to me as if I might have stumbled on the right person as well.”

  Hester gave him a toothy smile of approval. Dillman’s job on the ship allowed him free access to all sections of it, and he had come up to the boat deck partly to get a good view of Queenstown, and partly in the hope of catching a glimpse of Genevieve Masefield. The meeting with Hester Littlejohn was providential. He sensed that she might be a useful contact, not merely an agreeable companion with whom he could pass an occasional hour, but a vigilant woman who was trained to look into the nooks and crannies in search of copy. Hester might see things that neither he nor Genevieve were in a position to notice.

  “So tell me, Mr. Dillman,” she resumed, “is the Mauretania really the biggest ship in the world? That’s what all the Brits are claiming.”

  “With some justification.”

  “I thought its dimensions were identical to those of the Lusitania.”

  “Theoretically, they were,” he explained. “Both were supposed to be seven hundred and eighty-five feet in overall length, but the Mauretania’s rounded stern adds an extra five feet, giving her a slight advantage. The width of each ship is the same—eighty-seven and a half feet. Look, I hope this isn’t too technical for you.”

  “No, no. Go on. I’m fascinated.”

  “This is definitely the larger ship,” he continued. “Its gross tonnage is just under the thirty-two-thousand mark, almost five hundred tons more than that of the Lusitania.”

  “So we’re that much heavier as well, are we, Mr. Dillman?”

  “No, Mrs. Littlejohn.”

  “But you just said that we were.”

  “Gross tons is a measure of the ship’s cubic capacity, not its weight.”

  “Well, I never!” she said with a chortle. “You live and learn. None of this would have the slightest interest for my readers, I’m afraid, but I love it. You certainly know boats. Anybody would think you’d designed the vessel yourself.”

  “I come from a family that builds yachts, so I have a professional interest.”

  “Then you’re a real find, Mr. Dillman. I have a habit of bumping into people like you and it’s one I don’t intend to break. We need to sit down in a corner and have a proper conversation. If you don’t mind, that is.”

  “I’ll look forward to it.”

  “Good. Are you traveling alone?”

  “More or less.”

  “I suppose that I am as well,” she said with another grin. “More or less. What took you to England? Vacation or business?”

  “A little of both, Mrs. Littlejohn.”

  “Did you go there to sell some of your yachts?”

  “Not exactly,” he answered, “but it was my maritime interest that got me there and put me on this remarkable vessel.”

  “You, me, and all that gold bullion we’re carrying.”

  “We’re the richest ship that ever sailed. Tell that to your readers.”

  “I will, Mr. Dillman. Oh,” she said as she heard the siren, “we’re about to cast off.”

  A concerted cheer went up from the spectators at the dockside. Every vessel in the harbor added its salutation. Wrapped up in their coats, scarves and hats, the passengers gave a valedictory wave and felt another surge of pleasure. It was precisely 11:00 A.M., and they would soon be passing Daunts Rock Lighthouse, the point from which the Atlantic crossing would be measured. All over the ship, people checked their watches and made a note of the time. The race for the Blue Riband had begun. The maiden voyage was fully under way.

  Mansell Price and Glyn Bowen witnessed it all from the main deck, waving their caps at the receding crowd and forgetting, in the general euphoria, the shortcomings of third-class travel. As soon as the ship left Queenstown Harbor behind, however, they had to face up to the reality of four more nights in steerage.

  “We took on a lot of new passengers,” observed Bowen.

  “Yes,” said Price. “And it looked to me as if most of them are here for the same reason as us. Especially those poor chaps carrying bundles on their shoulders or all their worldly possessions in a battered old case. They had third class written all over them. It’s going to be more cramped down here than ever.”

  “We keep on the move, Mansell, that’s all.”

  “How can we, mun?”

  “There’s lots of places to go. Out on deck, in the dining saloon or the lounge. And what about the smoking room? It’s quite comfortable in there.”

  “Only trouble is that we can’t smoke.”

  “We would if we had enough money to buy tobacco. Maybe we could cadge a couple of smokes off someone. Yes,” he said, considering the notion. “We should have asked that Yank we met last night. Friendly sort of bloke. I bet he’d have given us a smoke or two. What did he say his name was?”

  “Can’t remember.”

  “Hilton? Was that it?”

  “No, it was Dilly or something like that.”

  Bowen snapped his fingers. “Dillman,” he recalled. “That was it. George Dillman.”

  “Where did he come from, that’s what I want to know,” muttered Price.

  “Who cares? He was no problem.”

  “Yes he was. Spoiled our fun. I was enjoying our little prowl.”

  “We’re not supposed to go into second class, Mansell.”

  “Nobody stopped us—until that Dillman bloke came along, that is.” A grin slowly spread over his face. “If we’d left in an hour or two, I reckon we could have got into first class and had the run of the place.”

  “That’d be asking for trouble.”

  “We’re entitled to a bit of fun. Tonight, maybe.”

  “No, Mansell!”

  “What’s the problem? You scared?”

  “Of course not.”

  “Go on my own, if I have to.”

  “Why go at all?”

  “Because it gets me away from the cabin and out of earshot of that bloody mouth organ. Honestly, I’d like to toss the thing over the side of the ship, then throw the old man after it.”

  “Fair play, mun. He was quiet as a mouse last night. So was his mate.”

  “Only because the pair of them were dead drunk.”

&
nbsp; “Lucky devils! Wish I could afford to go on the beer!”

  Price rallied. “Wait till we get to New York,” he asserted. “You can have all the beer you like there.”

  “If we can find ourselves a job,” said Bowen ominously. “Mr. Dillman was very honest about our prospects. It won’t be easy. According to him, there’s a crisis in the American banks. That’s why we’re taking all that gold to them.”

  “Yes, I been thinking about that.”

  “About what?”

  “The fact that we’re sitting on a king’s ransom. What about that, Glyn?” he said, eyes glistening. “Somewhere in this ship there’s almost three million pounds in gold bullion stashed away. I’ve just got to take a peep at that before we land.”

  “Whatever for, mun?”

  “Curiosity.”

  “But you’ve got no idea where it’s kept, Mansell.”

  “Then I’ll find out.”

  “No,” said Bowen, deeply troubled. “Wandering around second class in the night is one thing, but I’m not going anywhere near that gold. It’s probably guarded. They’d nab us for sure.”

  “Not if we’re careful.”

  “It’s too dangerous.”

  “I just want to see it, that’s all.” He gave a chuckle. “And touch it maybe.”

  “Mansell!”

  “Must be thousands of gold bars aboard. They wouldn’t miss one.”

  “You’re mad!”

  “Am I?” said Price, his mouth close to his friend’s ear. “Where’s your ambition? Where’s your guts? For once in your life, have the courage to dream.”

  “It’d be a nightmare!”

  “Would it?”

  “Yes, Mansell.”

  “Use your imagination,” urged the other. “Just think of how much beer and smokes we could buy with a single bar of gold.” He smacked the rail hard with the flat of his hand. “That would show the boyos back home!”

  Mindful of Dillman’s advice, Genevieve Masefield made a conscious effort to widen her social circle a little. Though she’d had to eat breakfast in the company of the gushing Susan Faulconbridge and the droll Harvey Denning, she managed to elude them for the rest of the morning. While her friends were watching the coast of Ireland gradually fade away, Genevieve adjourned to the first-class lounge, choosing a seat in the corner in order to read the book she had borrowed from the ship’s library. As she expected, it was not long before she had company.