CARPE DIEM
Chapter One
I had such a headache, and the
light from the starboard side windows wasn’t helping. I almost asked the young
man across from me--Mr. Hockley, was it?--if he’d mind exchanging seats, but I
restrained myself, was subdued for much of lunch. But when my brother started
taking about the Goddamned ship again, I couldn’t help but bring my hand up to
my left temple to vainly try and stop the throbbing. Thomas Andrews, seated on
my right, noticed and leaned toward me.
"Are you all right?" he
asked quietly, and I answered that I was fine, taking my hand away from my
temple immediately, adjusting my small, dark-colored glasses, forcing a smile
to assure him that I was. The Irishman looked at me skeptically, but said
nothing more.
"She is the largest moving
object ever made by the hand of man in all history, and our master shipbuilder,
Mr. Andrews here, designed her from the keel plates up," my brother
continued from the opposite end of the table. Thomas Andrews looked up at his
name but disliked the attention that Bruce had just cast upon him.
"Well…" He looked down,
muttering. "I may have knocked her together, but the idea was Mr. Ismay’s.
He envisioned a steamer so grand in scale, and so luxurious in its
appointments, that its supremacy would never be challenged. And here she
is…" He hit the table lightly with the palm of his hand. "Willed into
reality."
"Financed into
reality," I corrected under my breath.
"Why’re ships always bein’
called she? Is it because men think half the women around have big sterns and
should be weighted in tonnage?" Molly Brown commented, eliciting hearty
laughs from Mr. Hockley and the girl beside him. Oh, God. I couldn’t think of
her name, either. I was approaching senility and I had yet to turn thirty. The
thought depressed me and I forgot to respond to the joke, though Thomas Andrews
smiled and both Mrs. DeWitt Bukater and my brother laughed appropriately,
placating the woman as she continued, "Just another example of men settin’
the rules their way." I spoke then, compelled by a passing impulse and my
inherent distaste for Molly Brown’s very American worldview.
"To a sailor, moreso than a
shipbuilder…" I met the gaze of Thomas Andrews evenly. "…or a ship
owner…" My eyes broke their tryst with Thomas Andrews slowly and I looked
at my brother over the rims of my dark glasses. "…his ship is the only
thing he has in a wide, unforgiving, icy sea, that beats him down and rips his
face and hands apart with salt and water. The ship protects him, gives him
strength." I was speaking up for the first time today, and all eyes were
turned toward me, captivated by my tone. "The sea is a cruel mistress.
Very fickle, Mrs. Brown. A sailor’s ship is his sister, his mother, his wife.
She is faithful through storm and tide. It’s a compliment that a woman’s name
should be as highly prized."
I sighed and regretted speaking
so frankly as soon as I had finished. Mr. Hockley and his lady seemed to agree,
Thomas Andrews looked at me thoughtfully, and I could not see Molly Brown’s
expression nor Mrs. DeWitt Bukater’s because I was anticipating my brother’s
sneer and turned towards it.
"What are you going on
about, Mary Catherine?" he asked without requiring a response. His
dismissal of me was neither surprising nor unprecedented, and the expression on
my face remained passive. Twenty-nine years of being Bruce Ismay’s sister would
turn even the most lively and happy soul sour. The waiter arrived to take
orders and Kate? that young girl across the table lit a cigarette. Mrs. DeWitt
Bukater looked over at her daughter.
"You know I don’t like that,
Rose."
Rose! Yes, that was it. Like a
flower, a red, red rose, like her red, red lips, overdone with lipstick. No, I
wouldn’t forget this time. Mr. Hockley responded with, "She knows,"
and then took the cigarette from Rose’s fingers, putting it out. Then he
ordered for both of them, asking her approval with some patronizing remark that
I only half listened to.
"So, you gonna cut her meat
for her, too, there, Cal?" That woman’s voice mixed with clattering
silverware and the low hum of conversation in just such a way that I couldn’t
stand it. I clenched and unclenched my fist under the table. Molly Brown turned
to my brother, changed subjects dramatically. "Hey, who came up with the
name Titanic? Was it you, Bruce?"
"Yes, actually," he
answered briskly. What he meant to say was Yes, of course, you American
half-wit, daughter of nobody knows who. I own the ship, don’t I? but my brother
was too genteel for honesty. "I wanted to convey sheer size. And size
means stability, luxury…and above all, strength."
"Do you know of Dr.
Freud?" Rose spoke up, lifted her chin with a perturbed look on her face.
Where was she going with this? She continued addressing Bruce. "His ideas
about the male preoccupation with size might be of particular interest to you,
Mr. Ismay."
Beside me, Thomas Andrews almost
choked on a breadstick as he suppressed laughter. I tipped my head slightly. I
had underestimated the little American girl. Her mother was absolutely
mortified, saying, "My God, Rose. What’s gotten into—"
But Rose had already thrown her
napkin on the table, and the men half rose in their seats as she got up.
"Excuse me," she said
shortly and stalked off. I watched her escape with mild envy as Mrs. DeWitt
Bukater apologized for her daughter.
"She’s a pistol, Cal. You
sure you can handle her?" Molly Brown mentioned from down the table. Mr.
Hockley seemed tense but shook it off, feigning unconcern.
"Well, I may have to start
minding what she reads from now on," he answered.
"Who is this Dr.
Freud?" Bruce asked, still looking after Rose, not sure if she had
insulted him or not. Thomas Andrews was about to answer him, but I placed my
hand on his arm lightly, restraining him, and spoke up first.
"He’s German, Bruce."
This elicited the snort and subsequent rant about Germans generally, their
inability to think outside tradition, their useless practicality, etc. His
generalizations made him forget Dr. Freud and dominate the conversation with a
topic he could ramble passionately about. I made my own excuses ten minutes
after Rose had left and retreated to the shaded part of the decks for the rest
of the afternoon.