THE EDUCATION OF ROSE DAWSON: PART
II
Chapter Five
Correlation
“How long have the two of you been
living in New York?” asked Rose after they left Katz’s Deli and began to slowly
walk west without an apparent destination in mind.
“Both of us spent our first twenty-five
or so years here before we moved to California. We moved back less than ten
years ago,” said Amsterdam.
Rose became inquisitive. “That is
interesting. I have never been to California, but I would love to visit the place.
Since you have been back in New York for almost ten years, perhaps you know
about a big steamship accident that occurred here eight years ago.”
Amsterdam and Jenny stopped walking.
“Yes, we remember that,” said Jenny as she looked at Amsterdam. “It happened
right after we returned to New York. How did you hear about it, Rose?”
“My interviewer mentioned it. He said he
lost his best assistant in that accident. I interviewed for her position, which
had been filled six times since she passed away. My interviewer became so upset
talking about her that he had to cut short the interview.”
“Yer interviewer was referring to the General
Slocum disaster,” interjected Amsterdam. “And it was hardly an
accident.”
“The General Slocum?”
“That was a paddle steamer named after a Civil War general from New York. It was cursed from the day it launched, so the disaster was waiting to happen. It was taking some picnickers up the East River when a fire started on board, which spread so fast they couldn’t put it out. People panicked and jumped overboard, but most didn’t know how to swim, so they drowned. Those who stayed on board died from the smoke or burned to death.”
Rose cringed at the mention of such
horrific deaths, but her perverse curiosity got the better of her again. “Do
you know how many people were on the steamer?”
(L) General Slocum
before the disaster; (R) General Slocum
after the disaster
“About fourteen hundred, I think, with
over one thousand dead – many of them women and children.” Amsterdam wiped his brow,
as if struck by guilt. “I hadn’t seen so many dead since…the war. Not only
that. The disaster destroyed an entire neighborhood.” He pointed a finger
across Houston Street. “Most of the dead lived just to the north of Houston in Kleindeutschland, or Little Germany.”
Rose used Amsterdam’s casualty figures
to perform some quick calculations in her head. A thousand dead out of fourteen hundred means a death rate of over
seventy percent. That would be comparable to the death rate for the Titanic if sixteen hundred out of twenty-two
hundred perished. “Did you witness the fire?” she asked, her interest in
the disaster piquing in spite of its parallels with Titanic.
“Part of it. Actually, Jenny saw it
first. We was on Ward’s Island to pay our respects to some friends long gone.
Then we walked along the waterfront looking across at Blackwell’s Island,
remarking on how little it had changed since I was there, when Jenny saw some
black smoke coming out of a ship traveling up the river. We saw people jumping off
who didn’t know how to swim, so we rushed down to the shore to help. I wanted
to jump in to save one life, if that was all I could save, but once we saw
those who couldn’t swim grab onto those who could so that both ended up
drowning, I gave up that idea and decided to not go past waist-deep water to
grab anyone headed in my direction. Jenny joined me in the water, so I told her
to only help anyone smaller than herself or they’d pull her under. I screamed
at anyone close enough to hear to stop thrashing in the water, lie flat with
their noses pointed upwards, and let the tide bring them to shore. I knew most
of them wouldn’t listen, and they drowned,” he said with a tinge of
frustration. “But a few did and they either made it ashore on their own or I
met them with a small branch I’d broken off a tree.”
“How many people
did the two of you save?”
“Five in all,” said Jenny, “but two of
them were especially challenging – a woman Ammie rescued and a little girl I
rescued. The girl probably had some swimming lessons before. She was very
scared, but calmer than the woman.”
“That’s right,” said Amsterdam. “The
woman was driven mad by the water and grabbed my hair when I reached her. She’d
been fighting in the arms of a man who tried to swim to shore while keeping her
in his grip, and they got to about twenty feet of the shore when the man went
under and didn’t come back up. Obviously, she didn’t know how to swim, and he
was why she made it so close to shore in the first place, or she’d be dead. So
I shirked my own rule of not going past waist-deep water and swam out to
fifteen feet. I had to be very careful not to let her drown me because she was
really terrified by then. So I manhandled her and used all my strength to bring
us both to safety. Even in three feet of water, when our feet could touch the
bottom, she continued to claw at me, as if she didn’t want to be saved. So I
shook and slapped some sense into her.”
“I told Ammie to give her to me after
she calmed down,” said Jenny. “Later we found out she lost her baby in the
sinking. She had jumped into the water with the baby, but lost her grip on it.
She kept screaming the child’s name for hours.”
Amsterdam’s admittance to treating a
female victim of the sinking so roughly disturbed Rose, and more so because
this one had lost her child. She showed her disapproval with a stern glare.
“Yes, that wasn’t very noble of me,
Rose, but it was no time to be a gentleman,” explained Amsterdam. “I could save
a few people by being rough or save no one by being gentle…and maybe get myself
killed in the process.”
It took a few seconds for Rose to
realize that Amsterdam was right. After all, she faced similar situations on
board Titanic when she was in a
relatively safe position and had to decide if she would remain that way or risk
it by trying to save another person. Her record, like Amsterdam’s, was mixed.
Her most obvious success was when she abandoned a guaranteed space on a
lifeboat to descend into the bowels of the ship to save Jack, but she failed a
couple of times, too. The first was when she and Jack tried to save a little
boy in steerage after being chased back down there by Cal. But then the boy’s
father found his son, and he angrily pushed Jack away and rushed off in a
direction that meant certain doom despite Jack’s pleas for them to not head
that way. As more of the ship went under, order and altruism followed it. After
Jack pulled Rose over the stern railing as Titanic
went vertical, she saw Helga Dahl frantically hanging onto it right below her.
She could only stare in paralyzed fear and exhaustion as gravity soon asserted
itself and claimed Helga. That shamed her deeply.
“I am sorry, Amsterdam. I cannot judge
your actions because I was not there. Even if I were, I doubt I could have done
better.” And I did not.
Amsterdam nodded to acknowledge Rose’s
repentance. “Believe me, Rose, there’s no perfect decision in these situations.
I felt awful hitting her. Her husband left her before the baby was born, and
she lost the will to live after losing the baby. She’d have killed herself if a
male passenger who also survived hadn’t fallen in love with her. I heard they
married, had another child, and then left Little Germany for good. Lord knows
where they are today.”
The woman’s story reminded Rose of
losing Jack and Mrs. Abbott’s loss of her two sons, as well as her own thoughts
of suicide before she met Jack. I am not
alone in my bereavement, so why do I still feel like I am?
“Everything that could go wrong with the
Slocum went wrong,” Amsterdam went
on. “In some ways it was worse than the Titanic
sinking last week. The firefighting equipment didn’t work. Most victims
couldn’t swim. Their life preservers couldn’t float. The lifeboats was stuck to
the ship. And they died within sight of land. The captain’s decision not to
beach his craft at the first sign of fire was the worst of all. As I said, it
was hardly an accident.”
The mention of Titanic chilled Rose even more and the words, “within sight of land,”
sounded eerily familiar. Then she remembered that Angus recounted to her and
Jack of being in a similar situation during his unfortunate journey on the Sultana during their dinner on board Titanic: “Over fifteen hundred of us died that night…I don’t think we’ll ever
have as terrible a tragedy as Sultana
again.”
Sorry,
Mr. McKenzie. But it is clear that people still have not learned.
“The bastard had fifty years of
experience and was about to retire,” snarled Amsterdam. “Fifty years to his
name…for nothing.”
Captain Smith was about to retire, too. He received an
iceberg warning and ignored it.
“But I must say I actually felt a little
sorry for him,” confessed Amsterdam. “He went to prison, while his bosses and
those crooked government inspectors got off the hook, as usual.”
In a gesture of sorrow, Rose bowed her
head and painfully shook it, staring at the ground for a few seconds. Suddenly,
the scrumptious meal she had at Katz’s was not going down so well.
“Something
wrong, Rose?” asked Jenny.
Rose looked back
up. “I feel as if I were there, too.” And
I was.
“It’s a good thing you wasn’t,” said
Amsterdam. “Both of us saw how the neighborhood died. The survivors found the
memories so painful they just abandoned it. Little Germany no longer exists
today.”
So
that was why Mr. Anielewicz became so emotional. Rose felt her
eyes well up, but managed to keep the tears from falling. How many neighborhoods on both sides of the Atlantic will grieve
because of the Titanic’s sinking?
Jenny took her aside. “It’s all right,
Rose. You don’t know anyone who died, so why feel so guilty about it?”
Actually,
I do – but on another ship. A part of me died with them. “You are right,
Jenny, but I was reminded of my husband. I still mourn his passing.”
“Oh, that’s right. I’m sorry, Rose. I
forgot about that.”
“Don’t be sorry. The world does not
stand still for me. I have to go on, too,” as
I promised.
Amsterdam, however, wisely decided to conclude
his story. “I’m sorry to have brought this up, what with the Titanic last week.” He noticed that Rose
bowed her head again. “Do you need to go back to the shelter?” he asked.
“No, I am fine,” answered Rose
emphatically. She composed herself to reassure Amsterdam and Jenny. “Really, I
am.” I hope.
“Then where are you headed?”
“Since I do not have another interview
scheduled, I would like to continue exploring the city while I still have time.
How about you?”
“We may be on our way home.”
“Where exactly do you live?”
“Not too far from here. We grew up in
the Five Points and live not too far from there.”
Five
Points. The name sounded familiar to Rose. Angus had brought it up during
their dinner conversation on Titanic.
“I have heard of the Five Points only once. Where is it located?”
“Do you know where Broadway is?” asked
Amsterdam.
“Yes.”
“Do you know where The Bowery is?”
“I have heard of it, but have never
walked down there.”
“I don’t blame you. It’s not the most
pleasant place in New York. The Five Points lie between Broadway and The
Bowery.” Amsterdam paused to reflect on his native district. “Cross, Little
Water, Mulberry, Orange, and Worth Streets[1][*] – those names are etched into my memory. Some changed
their names and some just disappeared, but it’s still the Five Points to me…”
He looked at Jenny. “…to us.”
“Can you show this area to me?” asked Rose eagerly.
Amsterdam and Jenny gave her a perplexed
look. Then they looked at each other. “You
want to see the Five Points, Rose? It’s really nothing special,” said Jenny dissuasively.
“If you still remember it as the Five
Points, then it must be something special. By all means share it with me,” Rose
replied as she gently nudged the two along. “Now show the way!” she commanded
with a playful grin.
The three headed west on Houston Street.