The Titanic Murders

DAY TWO


APRIL 11, 1912





FOUR


CAPTAIN’S TABLE





LIKE THEIR PREVIOUS STOP, CHERBOURG, the Irish port of Queenstown ahead was too small to accommodate the Titanic; so anchor would be dropped offshore, for the arrival of the final batch of passengers and the taking on of mail sacks (the R.M.S. in R.M.S. Titanic did, after all, stand for “Royal Mail Ship”).

From the starboard boat deck, where Jack and May Futrelle sat side by side in deck chairs, blankets wrapped about their already coat-clad bodies, the morning seemed an exceptionally lovely one, blue cloud-fleeced sky, wind rather high but the blue-green waters surprisingly calm. They were unaware of the full Atlantic swell crashing against the ship’s port side, deceived by the ship’s uncanny ability—even on the boat deck—to emulate terra firma.

Last night, in the First-Class Dining Saloon, the Futrelles and their tablemates had found themselves paying less attention to their plates of endless, wonderful food (course upon course), and more to the new crop of passengers arriving, courtesy of the Cherbourg boat train. The subtle clatter of silverware on fine china was drowned out by the nearby bustle of stewards porting luggage, table talk trumped by the buzz of conversation of new arrivals.

René and Henry would point out this luminary and that one—here John Jacob Astor, his young bride and their rambunctious friend Maggie Brown; there Benjamin Guggenheim trailing behind his mistress, the glamorous French singer Madame Pauline Aubert, as if fooling anyone that they weren’t together (an effort that would be short-lived).

But these were just glimpses of famous faces and opera-house fashions, and at the orchestral evening that followed in the lounge (selections from Tales of Hoffmann and Cavalleria Rusticana), the newcomers were nowhere to be seen. Nor did they appear in the smoking room later, where Astor and Guggenheim might be expected to drop by for a Cuban cigar and a snifter of brandy.

Of course, both millionaires had boarded with beautiful young women, and Futrelle was of the opinion that Cuban cigars and snifters of brandy came in a distinct second and third in a contest involving the late-night company of such beauties.

And none of it seemed to be happening on a ship, rather in some landlocked hotel; only those nearest the windows could have suspected that outside, on deck, a gale was blowing.

Now the gale was a memory, the morning clear, as the Irish coastline showed itself, the gray mountains of Cork bobbing above the horizon.

“There it is!” May said, pointing. “The Old Head of Kinsale!”

The rocky promontory, peaked by a lighthouse, was a familiar and comforting sight to well-seasoned transatlantic travelers like the Futrelles.

“Cork Harbor’s just around the bend,” Futrelle said.

And, as if at Futrelle’s bidding, the great ship began its long, easy turn to port.

The married couple had taken a late breakfast—pressing ten-thirty—in the exquisitely continental à la carte restaurant, nicknamed the Ritz after the Ritz-Carlton dining rooms of White Star’s German rival, the Hamburg–Amerika Line. They had spent an at times spirited, at times tranquil morning in their stateroom, doing the sort of things a healthy, loving couple on their second honeymoon tend to do.

Two miles offshore, within the shelter of twin forts guarding the harbor, the Titanic dropped anchor, as twin tenders—the Ireland and America—drew alongside her with passengers and mail. The waterfront of Queenstown—a quaint seafaring village not unlike Scituate, the Massachusetts home of the Futrelles—was lined with sightseers, tiny well-wishers whose waving could barely be made out, whose cheering could scarcely be heard.

“Good morning!”

The voice belonged to J. Bruce Ismay, standing tall and thin, a handsome Ichabod Crane in a dark blue suit with gray pinstripes and matching gray spats, and, brisk breeze or not, no topcoat or hat.

As the blanket-bundled Futrelle and May stirred, Ismay urged them, “Don’t get up, please don’t get up on my account!” Before Futrelle could make introductions, the White Star Line director bowed to May. “J. Bruce Ismay, madam—I presume you’re the lovely Mrs. Futrelle.”

“If I’m not,” she said, “the lovely Mr. Futrelle has some explaining to do.”

Ismay laughed, once—he used laughs as punctuation, having enough of a sense of humor to know where to place them, though no more. “I understand you’re an author yourself.”

“A novice compared to Jack, here, I’m afraid.”

“But published.”

“Oh yes. Several times.”

“An accomplishment I envy. May I sit?”

“Please,” Futrelle said, and Ismay pulled up a deck chair on the husband’s side.

“Would it be bad form, sir, to ask if you’ve had time to consider my proposal?”

“Not at all.” Futrelle nodded toward his wife. “I have discussed it with May. She’s favorably disposed toward doing a mystery set aboard your ship.”

He beamed so widely at her, the ends of his mustache threatened to tickle the corners of his eyes. “I’m grateful, madam. I was not at all convinced your husband would say yes.”

“I haven’t said yes,” Futrelle reminded him.

“I hope that isn’t ‘no,’” Ismay said.

“I haven’t decided, but I am leaning in your direction, sir.”

“Splendid! What can I do to aid you?”

“We’ve had a tour of the ship, thanks to your personable purser, Mr. McElroy.”

“Wonderful chap.”

“Yes he is. But we may wish to take a closer look at the Titanic, from the crow’s nest to the boiler room. As a newspaperman turned fiction writer, I find the more truth I can build my tale around, the better.”

Ismay was nodding at the good sense of that. “Well, tonight at the captain’s table, I’ll introduce you to Mr. Andrews. I’m sure he’ll take you anywhere on the ship that you wish, and he has keys to everything.”

“Thomas Andrews? The master shipbuilder responsible for this vessel?”

“Himself,” Ismay said, clearly pleased that Futrelle was this knowledgeable, though Futrelle knew only what a few articles had told him.

A small and colorful flotilla of bumboats laden with local vendors and their wares had followed in the wakes of the two tenders; the bumboats bobbed out there, voices traveling over the water, “Lace and linens!,” “Knick-knacks and fineries!”

With comical urgency, May asked Ismay if they’d be allowed to board.

“It’s White Star’s policy to let the more reputable merchants come aboard,” he said, with a tiny shrug, “as a courtesy to our passengers.”

Her eyes were bright; shopping was one of May’s passions. “Where will they be setting up, and when?”

“On the aft A-deck promenade, madam, and soon.”

May turned to her husband, and said, “Jack, I need to get my handbag in our stateroom. Why don’t you continue your chat with Mr. Ismay, and I’ll meet you down on deck in a few minutes.”

Futrelle said that was fine, stood to help his wife unbundle herself from her blanket, they exchanged pecks on the cheek, and she was gone as if fired from a rocket.

“My wife is the same,” Ismay admitted. “Someday you simply must visit my wing at Harrods.”

Futrelle chuckled; that was a pretty good jest, coming from Ismay. “Actually, Bruce…” They were on first-name terms, after all; Ismay had insisted, yesterday. “I’m pleased we have a moment in private. There’s a subject I need to broach that I’d prefer to keep from my wife.”

Ismay frowned in interest, saying, “Continue, please.”

And Futrelle told Ismay of his meeting with Crafton on the balcony of the Grand Staircase—omitting, of course, his dangling of the man over the railing.

But Ismay didn’t need to be told of the latter.

With a smile and a genuine laugh, Ismay said, “Well, that finally explains it—the rumor I heard that a man of your description had hung a smaller man upside down off the balcony.”

“Weren’t you going to bring that up, sir?”

“Why? No complaint was filed by Mr. Crafton, and my policy, my company’s policy, is to treat our honored guests with… discretion.”

“How discreet was I, hanging that bastard over the railing?”

“Not very. Frankly, if I’m not out of line, Jack, I would discourage such practice in future… though that little snake in the grass is worthy of worse.”

“I know for a fact that he’s approached a number of your other passengers; I’ve happened upon him in the act, several times.”

Ismay’s expression darkened. “That is distressing news.”

Futrelle ticked the names off on his fingers. “Major Butt, Mr. Straus, Mr. Stead, even a Second-Class passenger named Hoffman… They’ve all apparently sent him packing.”

“Good for them.”

“Of course, I have no way of knowing what sort of threat he made, in these individual cases… He clearly represents an international blackmail ring.”

“Clearly.”

“With what did he threaten you, Mr. Ismay?”

Ismay blinked; he hadn’t seen that question coming. “Pardon?”

“I saw him knock on your door, shortly after I left your suite yesterday morning… just before noon? And I saw you admit him.”

Half a smile settled in Ismay’s check, raising one end of his mustache. “You do get around, sir.”

“This is a large ship, but a small city. I’m merely more observant than the average person, because of my line of work. That’s what you get when you cross a newspaperman with a mystery writer… You’re not obligated to tell me, Bruce. I’m just curious, as a fellow Crafton-appointed ‘client.’”

Ismay shrugged. “He was simply threatening to widely circulate a certain canard about the building of this ship.”

“What canard would that be?”

“A foolish rumor that this ship was built at such a supposedly ‘frenetic pace’ that a crew of workers were trapped within her hull, and that we simply left them there… to ‘suffocate and die.’”

“Were there any deaths in the building of this ship?”

Another dismissive shrug. “From keel laying to launch, only two—quite within acceptable standards—the unwritten rule of British shipyards, you know.”

“What unwritten rule is that, Bruce?”

“ ‘One death for every one hundred pounds spent.’”

It was attitudes like that that bred unions and strikes. But at the moment Futrelle was more concerned with blackmail than politics, and said, “Crafton threatened to spread this ‘trapped crewmen’ tale in the ‘sensationalist’ press, I suppose.”

“Certainly.”

“Please tell me you didn’t pay him off, Bruce.”

“Jack, please do me the courtesy of trusting that I did the right thing.”

That was an evasive answer if ever there was one. But Futrelle didn’t press it.

He said only, “You now have aboard this vessel representatives of two of America’s richest and most powerful families—do you really want this Crafton character working his blackmail racket on Astor and Guggenheim?”

Yet another shrug from Ismay. “What could I do about it?”

Futrelle laughed humorlessly, hollowly. “You could put Crafton off this ship right now—while you still have a chance—here at Queenstown.”

Ismay had begun shaking his head halfway through Futrelle’s little speech. “I can’t do that, sir. Mr. Crafton is, however disreputable a character he may be, a paying customer of the White Star Line.”

So Ismay had paid Crafton’s fee.

“Well,” Ismay said, standing suddenly, “I certainly enjoyed meeting Mrs. Futrelle, and I look forward to seeing you at the captain’s table this evening.”

Then he strode off, heading aft in his quick, martinet’s manner. When J. Bruce Ismay decided a conversation was over, it was over.

The aft A-deck promenade had been transformed into an open-air market. This was the same area outside the Verandah Café where yesterday Futrelle and May had seen Crafton bothering Hoffman up on the Second-Class end of the boat deck. Now the relatively cramped area was thronging with First-Class passengers examining the wares of Irish vendors, men in derbies and shabby suits, women in unlikely fine lace like those they were selling from folding-leg tables.

Among the browsing passengers was a particularly striking couple—a slender handsome man in his late forties escorting a pretty, pretty young woman, who could have been father and daughter, but weren’t. They were Colonel John Jacob Astor IV and his child bride, the former Madeline Force, fresh from a honeymoon tour of Egypt.

Madeline was said to be as shapely as a showgirl, but that wasn’t evident with her navy-blue-and-white pinstriped Norfolk style suit, which even with silk velvet inlay and fancy bone buttons looked a trifle dowdy; even her oversize navy-blue-and-white striped hat was a shapeless thing. Rumors that she was “in an advanced delicate condition,” despite her relatively recent marriage, seemed wholly credible.

The lanky Astor sported a boater and a red-and-blue tie that added color and dash to a conservative dark gray suit, and an oversize, dashing mustache at odds with his somber, detached demeanor. His face long and narrow, his chin cleft and rather small, he leaned on a carved ebony walking stick as he paused at a stall, holding his chin high, looking at prospective purchases down the considerable slope of an aquiline nose, peering through small, sky-blue eyes cursed of a world-weariness known only by the impossibly wealthy and the devastatingly poor.

Between the Astors was an Airedale, dutifully keeping them company, no leash in sight; the dog seemed happier than his master, though his mistress was having the most fun.

“This is very nice,” Madeline was saying at the stall next to the one where the Futrelles were examining some miniature porcelain dolls. The young Mrs. Astor was holding up a lovely lace jacket that didn’t look like it would fit her, at least not right now.

“How much in dollars?” Astor asked the vendor, a woman wearing a lovely lace jacket herself, and bad teeth.

“A hundred, fine sir,” she said, not missing a beat.

Astor shrugged. “Eight hundred it is,” he said blandly, and withdrew a wad of bills as thick as one of Futrelle’s novels; the millionaire peeled off eight crisp one-hundreds and handed them to the amazed vendor, who did not correct Astor’s mistake, and who could blame her?

Futrelle, arching an eyebrow, exchanged incredulous glances with his wife, who later bought a similar item for twenty-five dollars, which seemed outrageous to Futrelle but May rightly pointed out the savings compared with what the Astors had paid.

Promptly at 1:30 P.M., the Titanic’s steam whistles let go three long, mournful blasts announcing departure; the vendors packed up their things and hastened back to their bumboats, and soon gangways were raised, lines cast off, the dripping starboard anchor raised. From the boat deck, the Futrelles could hear and see a passenger on the Third-Class aft promenade, a small mustached man in kilts, playing his bagpipes.

The husband and wife looked at each other, savoring the bittersweet moment: the Irish piper’s mournful “Erin’s Lament” probably represented its emigrating player’s farewell to the beloved homeland he might never see again.

The Futrelles stood at the rail in the cold afternoon, watching the green hills and fields of Ireland slip away, knowing—as the ship made its wide, majestic turn starboard, into the Atlantic’s swells—that the next land they would see would have the Statue of Liberty out in front of it.

“It’s almost two and we haven’t had lunch yet,” Futrelle noted, checking his pocket watch. He had seldom missed a meal in his thirty-seven years.

“Let’s just get something light,” May suggested. “Dinner’s not that far away, and we’ll be bombarded with one course after another.”

The Verandah Café, portside off the aft A-deck promenade, didn’t seem as overrun with children as it had yesterday, and the couple ducked in for a snack. The enclosed space conjured the illusion of an outdoor terrace, with its potted palms, white wicker tables and chairs, archway windows and ivy-flung trellises.

The only children today had also been here yesterday: golden-tressed Lorraine Allison and her baby brother Trevor, overseen by the blunt-nosed almost beauty of their nanny, Alice, again holding court at a wicker table.

But this time the parents were here, as well, seated at the adjacent table having petits fours and tea, and in the company of none other than Futrelle’s acrobatic partner, John Bertram Crafton.

They were a happy little group, smiling, even laughing, Crafton in a natty brown suit but the same gray fedora, the boyish bespectacled Hudson in conservative gray enlivened by a red tie, the sweetly pretty Bess in a lilac-and-white striped cotton day dress.

The Futrelles sat a few tables away in the sparsely populated café; the same young steward who yesterday had been so attentive to nanny Alice stopped by to take their order.

“A couple of cups of hot bouillon, please,” Futrelle said, and the handsome lad nodded and disappeared.

It wasn’t until Futrelle had spoken that Crafton noticed the couple’s presence. Seeing Futrelle, the blackmailer’s face turned as white as the wicker chairs and he swallowed thickly. His smile grew nervous and, rising, he made a hurried goodbye and scurried away, gold-tipped cane in hand, through the revolving door into the smoking room.

As Crafton left, the Allisons noticed the Futrelles, and Hudson called out, “Nice to see you again—other than that crowded corridor! Won’t you join us?”

“Thank you, yes,” Futrelle said, and he and May did.

Introductions in the hallway yesterday had been exceedingly brief and lacking in detail: the Futrelles soon learned that Hudson was an investment broker from Montreal (a partner in the firm), and the Allisons learned Jack Futrelle was the famous mystery author, Jacques. Hudson admitted he wasn’t much of a fiction reader, but Bess was an unrepentant bookworm and had read (and loved) both Jack’s The Diamond Master and May’s Secretary of Frivolous Affairs.

The latter made them instant friends: the Hudsons impressed by being in such famous company, the Futrelles flattered by Bess’s praise for their work.

At the suitable moment, Futrelle asked casually, “Your friend Mr. Crafton—how did you come to meet him?”

Hudson smiled and shrugged. “Well, sir, we met him just before we met you—in the C-deck corridor.”

“He’s very charming,” Bess said.

The Futrelles exchanged glances; they had been hoping a fan of their books would have better judgment and taste.

“He’s an investment broker himself,” Hudson said.

“Is that so?” Futrelle said.

“But that’s not why we hit it off so well. You see, we have horses in common.”

“Horses?”

“Yes.” Hudson smiled at Bess, patted her hand. “We’ve been very fortunate, of late, in business, and recently acquired a farm… the Allison Stock Farm, we’re calling it.”

“It’s always been our dream,” Bess said.

To Futrelle the young couple didn’t look old enough to “always” have had any dream.

“We built a farmhouse to our specifications,” Hudson said. “We’ll be moving in, as soon as we get back. Bess decorated it herself. She has a real eye.”

But the thread of the conversation had been lost, and Futrelle had to say, “Where do Mr. Crafton and horses come into play?”

“Oh! That’s why we were in England. On a horse-buying trip. Mr. Crafton is very interested in horses, and seems quite knowledgeable on the subject.”

Probably from the track, Futrelle thought, but only smiled politely.

The steward arrived with the cups of bouillon for the Futrelles. The nanny glanced over and the secret little look she and the steward exchanged was neither as secret nor as little as they thought.

Later, as Futrelle escorted May down a C-deck corridor, back to their stateroom, she said, “You were right about that shipboard romance.”

“I hope the lad doesn’t get into trouble for fraternizing.”

“I should think not. Alice isn’t a passenger, exactly. Did you notice the evil eye she was giving Crafton?”

“No,” Futrelle said. “Are you sure it wasn’t just her natural expression?”

“Now, Jack, she’d be quite an attractive young woman if she hadn’t…”

“Run into a door?”

“You’re terrible. What time is your appointment?”

Futrelle was signed up for the full treatment at the Turkish Bath, which was for women mornings, men afternoons.

“In about fifteen minutes. What do you have on for this afternoon?”

“I intend to take a good old-fashioned American bath, in the tub we’ve been provided thanks to the generous auspices of J. Bruce Ismay. We’re sitting at the captain’s table this evening, and surely you don’t expect me to be ready in a flash.”

“No. But I do think that with the several hours at your disposal, you’ll be able to make yourself presentable.”

She slapped his arm, and kissed his mouth, and—as they had now arrived at their stateroom—allowed her husband to unlock the door for her, before he went off to partake of the Titanic’s most arcane ritual.

The Turkish Bath—with its willingly hot steam room followed by male attendants providing full-body massage, exfoliation and shampoo—was an outlandish excess even for this ship. The cooling room was a Moorish fantasy of carved Cairo curtains (disguising portholes), blue-and-green tiled walls, gilded beams, crimson ceiling, hanging bronze lamps, blue-and-white mosaic floor, inlaid Damascus coffee tables, and low-slung couches and chairs with Moroccan-motif upholstery.

It was in this bizarrely exotic chamber that Futrelle again came upon the omnipresent Crafton, this time towel-draped, reclining on a couch next to a similarly lounging and towel-wrapped John Jacob Astor. Whether Crafton was attempting blackmail—as he had with Futrelle—or simply cozying up to the millionaire—as he had with the Allisons—was not clear.

The reason for the uncertainty was Astor himself: his expression remained lifeless, his sky-blue eyes joyless, even bored, blinking only when steam room sweat found its way into them. And as the fast-talking Crafton continued his spiel—telling Astor about the benefits of becoming a Crafton “client,” perhaps—Astor remained as mute as the Sphinx he had so recently visited.

Once again, Crafton noticed Futrelle, turned white as his towel, and fled into the adjacent room, where the saltwater swimming bath represented the final step of the Turkish treatment.

Futrelle, pleasantly exhausted from his massage, skin flecked with beads of perspiration, reclining in his own towel on his own Moroccan couch, considered striking up a conversation with Astor. But never having met this man, whose station was so above his own, Futrelle felt uncomfortable doing so, and didn’t.

And by the time Futrelle entered the room Crafton had fled into, where the swimming bath—thirty feet long and half again as wide—took up almost the entire space, the little blackmailer had vanished.

At dinner in the First-Class Dining Saloon, the distance between Astor and Futrelle lessened in a number of ways.

First of all, they were seated across from each other at the captain’s table, which was at the forward end of the center section of the vast dining room with its white walls and warm oak furnishings.

Second, Astor proved to be a devotee of Futrelle’s fiction, and twinkling life found its way into the millionaire’s somber eyes when he learned the creator of the Thinking Machine was sitting next to him.

“You combine mystery and scientific thinking in a unique manner, sir,” Astor said, in a clipped, oddly metallic voice.

“Thank you, Mr. Astor.”

“Please, Jacques,” he said, and something like warmth came over the cold features. “Call me Colonel.”

Futrelle almost laughed, then realized the man wasn’t joking.

“Thank you, Colonel. And I’m not Jacques, to my friends, but Jack.”

“Mother-of-pearl, Astor,” a raucous female voice asked, “are you tellin’ me you’re so far around the bend you think ‘Colonel’ is your first name?”

Eyes turned toward a slightly heavyset, pleasant-looking woman in her mid-forties with beautiful sky-blue eyes almost identical in color to Astor’s. She wore a burgundy silk-satin ball dress with glass beading and a feathered hat about the size and shape of a garbage-can lid a milk wagon rolled over. Her name was Maggie Brown, more formally Margaret, more formally still Mrs. James Joseph Brown of Denver, in honor of the gold-mining tycoon husband who cheerfully funded her travels in absentia.

Astor looked momentarily taken aback, then roared with laughter. “Where would I be without you to put me in my place, Maggie?”

And this seemed to be Maggie Brown’s function in Astor’s life; Futrelle would soon learn that the social-climbing matron who’d traded Denver for Newport had been rejected by much of society, but Astor had adopted her as a sort of mascot, perhaps because the Four Hundred had turned up their noses at him and his young bride.

“Where would you be without me as your guide, Astor? Tryin’ to figure out a way to walk with both feet in your mouth, I’d reckon.”

Astor laughed heartily, and the attractive young Mrs. Astor, seated beside him, laughed, too—politely. Madeline wore a black silk-net beaded overdress designed not to draw attention to that “delicate condition” of hers.

The others seated at the captain’s table included May, on Futrelle’s other side, decked out in a pink silk-satin evening gown, white pearls nestling at the hollow of her slender neck. Next to May was Maggie Brown, and across the table, next to the Astors, was the shipbuilder Thomas Andrews, a soft-spoken gentleman with the rugged build of an athlete and the sensitive features of an artist.

At the far end of the table sat Ismay, playing host, while at the head of the table, of course, in a formal blue uniform bedecked with medals, sat the captain—Edward J. Smith, the beloved E. J., the so-called millionaire’s captain, a favorite of wealthy, socially prominent frequent transatlantic passengers, many of whom wouldn’t think of crossing the ocean with anyone else at the helm.

Smith was like a fiction writer’s notion of a steamship captain—an unimaginative fiction writer at that, Futrelle thought, who would himself never dream of painting so clichéd a portrait: clear-eyed, stern-visaged, square jaw dusted with a perfectly trimmed snow-white beard, Smith was taller than most of his crew and as solidly built as a boiler-room stoker.

Where Captain Smith varied from the cliché of his own somewhat forbidding appearance was an avuncular manner that included a ready smile, rather urbane manners and a soothingly pleasant, softly modulated voice.

“Colonel Astor has every right to his rank, Mrs. Brown,” the captain pointed out to her gently. “How many men in the Colonel’s position would have traded the comfort and safety of their homes for the battlefield?”

“Oh, I know Astor’s a patriot,” Maggie said. “And believe me, I’m relieved he’s a colonel, and not a captain…. Imagine where we’d be if he were in your shoes, Captain Smith.”

“I’m not sure I follow, Mrs. Brown,” the captain said with his easy smile.

“You got any idea how many times Astor here rammed his yacht into somebody else’s canoe? Of course, he won his share of races, once the real captains started giving the Colonel a wide berth.”

Astor was enjoying this immensely, and it did seem good-humored, but to Futrelle, Maggie Brown bordered on the overbearing. Still, in her way, she was a breath of fresh air in these stuffy quarters.

The dinner progressed through eleven amazing courses: oysters à la russe, cream of barley soup, poached salmon with mousseline sauce and sliced cucumbers, chicken lyonnaise, filet mignon with truffle on buttery potatoes, rice-stuffed vegetable marrow, lamb with mint sauce with creamed carrots, champagne sorbet, roasted squab, asparagus-salad vinaigrette, foie gras with celery, Waldorf pudding, cheese and fruit….

Conversation was pleasant and polite, though the food took center stage, and Maggie Brown said almost nothing, busying herself with eating everything in sight except the cut flowers in vases, stopping a waiter to ask for the occasional French translation.

Between courses, Futrelle mentioned to Astor that he had read the millionaire’s science-fiction novel, A Journey in Other Worlds, and that he had enjoyed it, which was not a lie—such futuristic concepts as television, energy conservation and subway systems had been imaginative and fascinating, and it would have been bad form to mention to Astor how abysmal the prose itself was.

Maggie Brown, overhearing this, chimed in to inform any who didn’t know (and this included the Futrelles) that “Astor here is quite the crackpot inventor—he holds all sorts of patents… cooked up a bicycle brake, a pneumatic road-flattenin’ contraption, turbines and batteries….”

Futrelle was impressed, and said so.

“I enjoy tinkering,” Astor admitted.

Madeline said, “My husband could have given Edison a run for it, if his family’s business responsibilities hadn’t stood in the way.”

“Money can be a curse,” Astor observed. “Actually, I think a man who has a million dollars is almost as well-off as if he were wealthy.”

Maggie Brown’s eyes bugged out at that one; but even she couldn’t think of anything to top it.

Between the sixth and seventh courses, Futrelle asked Andrews, “Is this a pleasure trip for you, Mr. Andrews? Enjoying the fruits of your labors?”

“Well,” Andrews said, with the shy smile that caused so many to find him immediately endearing, “this trip is a pleasure… I’m proud of what we’ve accomplished. But I am working, I’m afraid.”

Ismay said, “Mr. Andrews is heading up a guarantee group from Harland and Wolff.” The White Star director was referring to the shipbuilding firm that, under Andrews’s guidance, had constructed the Titanic.

“What is a ‘guarantee group’?” May asked.

“My assistants and I move about, hopefully undetected,” Andrews explained, “tracking down the inevitable snags, flaws and breakdowns that bedevil every new ship.”

Maggie Brown asked, “Is there anything to be worried about, Mr. Andrews? We’re not guinea pigs, are we? ’Cause if so, we’re paying a pretty penny for the privilege.”

“Actually, Mrs. Brown,” Andrews said, lightly, “we’re talking about such major problems as a plugged-up kitchen drain, or a malfunctioning ice machine.”

“This ship is a marvel,” Ismay said, at once dismissive and boastful. “And Mr. Andrews, God bless him, is a professional fussbudget… Earlier he told me he’d uncovered a troubling flaw in the ship.”

All eyes turned to Ismay for this dire news.

“The coat hooks in the staterooms employ too many screws,” Ismay said.

As his tablemates laughed good-naturedly, Andrews damn near blushed, touching a napkin to his lips, saying only in his defense, “The devil’s in the details, Mr. Ismay.”

“Well, you’ve given us a lovely ship, sir,” Madeline Astor said. “Please accept our thanks, and our compliments.”

Wineglasses were raised in an informal toast and Andrews finally went the entire distance, blushing like a rose. Captain Smith raised a water glass, however, as he was not drinking alcohol.

After dessert, Ismay spoke up. “I regret to inform you that this is Captain Smith’s final crossing.”

Astor asked, “Is that right, Captain?”

A smile emerged from the trim white beard. “Yes it is. I’ll be sixty soon. Forty-five years at sea, thirty-two of them with White Star… I think it’s time to turn the helm over to younger men.”

Futrelle asked, “Do you like these big ships, Captain? Like the Olympic, and the Titanic?”

He nodded, but there was a graveness about it. “Modern shipbuilding has come a long way.”

That wasn’t quite an answer to his question, but Futrelle let it pass. He knew that Smith—whose career had been otherwise spotless—had had his first real accident earlier this year, with the Titanic’s sister ship, the Olympic, of which he was the captain at the time of a collision with a Royal Navy cruiser. Futrelle suspected, after the performance with the New York, that Captain Smith had not mastered the finer points of seamanship needed to navigate the White Star’s new “wonder ships.”

“You should come back to command all the maiden voyages,” Astor said. “It wouldn’t be a White Star first crossing without you.”

“I’ll second that,” Andrews said, raising his wineglass.

“And I,” Ismay added.

The entire table raised their glasses to the captain, who smiled and nodded, then said, “I appreciate the sentiment, but at the end of this crossing, I’ll have logged two million miles aboard White Star ships… and I think I’ve earned some time ashore.”

The captain thanked the group for its “splendid company,” and invited the men to join him in the smoking room for a cigar and brandy, while the women stayed at the table for conversation and aperitifs.

The First-Class Smoking Room, on A deck, was a bastion of male supremacy, an exclusive men’s club at sea where shipping magnates, rail and oil barons and millionaire industrialists could mingle in an atmosphere of free-flowing liquor, high-stakes card playing, and of course cigar smoke that was almost as rich as they were. The Georgian-style mahogany paneling, inlaid with mother-of-pearl, inset with stained-glass windows and etched mirrors, had the feel of a stately, prosperous Protestant church, an impression undercut by the green leather-upholstered armchairs and marble-topped tables, each with a raised edge around it to catch a sliding drink in rough weather.

The little group of men from the captain’s table—Smith, Astor, Andrews, Ismay and Futrelle—stood near the jutting corner whose walls with backlighted stained-glass images of Art Nouveau nymphs and sailing ships gracefully disguised and enclosed the casing of the ship’s immense rear funnel.

Again, the captain declined to drink, but he clearly relished a Cuban cigar so seductively fragrant that confirmed cigarette smoker Futrelle began to question his own tastes.

“With the exception of the sea, and Mrs. Smith,” Ismay said, “the captain’s greatest love is a good cigar.”

Smith raised an eyebrow, nodding his agreement as he held the Cuban before him, regarding it as if it were a treasure map. “Once I’ve retired, gentlemen, should you enter a room where I’m indulging in a fine Cuban such as this, I beg you keep still, so the blue cloud around my head not be disturbed.”

That prompted some gentle laughter, and as Astor began a discussion of yachting with the captain, Futrelle turned away to take in the room.

Seated about the smoke-draped chamber were such luminaries as publisher Henry Harper, railroad magnate Charles M. Hays, Senator William B. Allison of Iowa, and military historian Colonel Archibald Gracie.

And so was at least one considerably less illustrious individual, a certain John Bertram Crafton.

Crafton was seated at a table for four, but only one other seat was taken, by a slender, respectable-looking clean-shaven reddish-haired man, perhaps forty years of age, in formal evening attire, indicating he—like the captain’s party—had earlier supped in the First-Class Dining Saloon. Crafton still wore this afternoon’s brown suit.

The blackmailer was leaning forward conspiratorially and his distinguished-looking companion was frowning in the manner so common to prospective Crafton “clients.”

Noticing Major Butt and his friend Francis Millet seated near the fireplace, Futrelle excused himself and wandered over and sat between them.

“Gentlemen,” he said. “I notice our old friend is spreading his typical good cheer.”

Broad-shouldered Archie had a cigar in one hand and a brandy snifter in the other; his sneer sent his mustache askew. Gray-haired Millet sat across from the major, hands folded, his own brandy untouched.

“Somebody should toss that bastard overboard,” Archie snorted. “Do I take it you’ve had the pleasure of Mr. Crafton’s company, Jack? Are you now a fellow ‘client’?”

“Oh yes—he dredged up my ‘nervous breakdown’ and I told him to stuff himself.”

“Is that right?” Archie shook his head. “He’s come after me with the same sort of rubbish… only there wasn’t much dredging that needed doing. This, uh… papal visit is something of a camouflage. I’ve been recently hospitalized.”

“I’m sorry to hear that, Archie—but you look well, now.”

“Jack, I’m sure you can imagine the personal and professional pressure I’ve been under, with my loyalties divided between Teddy and Bill.”

The major meant by that Theodore Roosevelt and William Howard Taft, two presidents whose loyalty he’d pledged who were now facing off against each other politically. Being pulled between two such powerful individuals could strain anyone, even someone as strong as Major Archie Butt.

Millet said, “Archie was briefly in an English sanitarium… just to get away, to calm his jangled nerves, his… depression.”

Futrelle nodded toward Crafton, who was still quietly speaking to the distinguished stranger. “And he threatened to go to the yellow press with the story, I suppose.”

Archie nodded. His eyes betrayed the depressed state in which he was still, to some degree, caught up.

“Did you pay him off, Archie?”

“Certainly not!”

“Forgive me for asking… Who is that Crafton’s sitting with?”

“That’s Hugh Rood,” Archie said. “I’m told he’s a London merchant of some kind; import, export. Very well-off.”

And barely had Archie’s description of the man ended when Rood sprang to his feet and grasped Crafton by the lapels of his suit and dragged him halfway across the marble-topped table, spilling drinks, glass shattering on the fancy linoleum, every eye in the room turning toward the two men.

“Approach me again at your own risk,” Rood shouted, his voice low-pitched, harsh.

And he backhanded the little blackmailer, viciously, the slap ringing in the room like a gunshot.

Crafton tumbled from his chair onto the floor, and the sound was like somebody dropping a bundle of kindling.

Captain Smith stepped forward, Ismay took a step back, but before anyone could do or say anything else, Rood strode from the room, his face burning.

Crafton, ever resilient, rose from the linoleum, shrugged, licked the blood from the corner of his mouth and smiled feebly, straightening his clothing. With surprising dignity, he said, “Mr. Rood has an unfortunate temper… Captain, as a good Christian, I prefer not to press charges.”

Then the ferrety little man took a halfhearted bow, and made a hasty exit, as conversation in the Smoking Room rose to a boisterous din of amazement, confusion and amusement.