The Dressmaker (18 page)

Tess had her hand on the doorknob when she turned back. She had to ask. “Did anything terrible happen in your lifeboat?” she asked softly.

“Are you trying to condemn me, too?” Lucile’s voice was suddenly fierce.

“No, of course not. But—”

“Nothing happened, for heaven’s sake. Absolutely nothing. And all this talk about our boat being huge is ridiculous. It was quite small. Aside from the Darlings’ deception, there was nothing happening. Now do you feel better?”

“Yes.” But she didn’t. Lucile’s smile was too hard at the edges.

At nine o’clock, Tess made her way to the hotel’s already crowded East Room. She could hardly breathe as she pushed her way in. The room simmered under the full voltage of five huge crystal chandeliers, made all the more stifling by the hundreds of people pushing their way in, many of them—especially the ones in shabby dress—jammed up against the walls. She felt sweat building under her arms and wished she had something lighter to wear. Cosmo had slipped an envelope with her pay in American dollars for the first week under her door last night, but she could not imagine spending it on anything as frivolous as clothes. It was all she had.

A large woman slipped her ample girth into one of the last remaining seats behind Tess and leaned forward to chat. It was Margaret Brown.

“Well, hello again, my fellow oarsman, I do declare.” Her face was so round and motherly. “Your lady certainly made the news this morning, didn’t she?”

“Unfairly,” Tess said quickly.

“She didn’t give the interview?”

“Well, she did, yes.”

“Ah, too bad. Though it’s not quite fair to call their raft the ‘millionaires’ boat,’ I’d say. There were plenty of millionaires on all the boats. But getting singled out isn’t good. There might be a hard time ahead for the Duff Gordons.”

“She was just trying to tell her story.”

Mrs. Brown looked kindly at Tess. “You are a loyal young woman, I see. If she’s lucky, Lady Duff Gordon will be spared any further
attention. This very proper Senator Smith doesn’t plan to call any women to testify. He says we’re too delicate to be put through such a public trauma. Isn’t that ridiculous? Here’s what I think. These men don’t want to hear anything critical
about
us or
from
us.”

“Do you think—” Tess began. But her attention was suddenly caught by a woman in a shabby coat shouting from the back of the room. “Why do you all hate me? What did I do except save my own life?” the woman yelled.

A moan swept the room, an almost inaudible wash of sound.

“Ah, there we are,” murmured Mrs. Brown. “Some man in first class probably gave her his lifeboat seat. Everything’s still raw.”

“These hearing are beginning too soon.”

Mrs. Brown leaned close. “Honey, Neptune was exceedingly good to us,” she whispered, her eyes warm and kind. “We made it out of those waters, and now we bear witness.”

Indeed. That gave Tess momentum. She stood, pointing to the woman being elbowed against the wall. “Someone give that woman a place to sit down,” she shouted as loudly as she could. “Don’t you see, she’s one of us. Shame!”

Silence fell across the room. Tess made no move to sit down. Let the merely curious onlookers laugh or disapprove, she didn’t care; she could feel the fear and pain around her.

There was movement at the doorway. A chair was offered and the woman sat down. A sigh rolled through the room, releasing the tension. Tess took her seat again, stunned at her own fury, and now fully conscious of the stares directed her way.

“Good for you, honey,” Mrs. Brown said heartily, patting her on the back. “You stood up and hit them between the eyes.”

“I may get in trouble.”

Mrs. Brown’s eyes widened in astonishment. “Trouble? Everybody gets into trouble in America—that’s what it’s about. People don’t like being scolded with the truth, and they damn well need to be sometimes. You stood up for someone. What’s wrong with that? I’d rather hear truth being defended than all the gossip and rumors people are passing around. I’m not even sure the rumor about that amnesiac being dumped in the hold is true.”

Tess straightened up. “What amnesiac?” she asked. “Some poor soul from steerage whose brain got addled somehow. Nobody’s claimed him, they say.”

“Are you sure he was from steerage?”

Mrs. Brown looked at her curiously. “I don’t know who you were hoping it would be, dear, but no first-class passenger would be unidentified by now.”

Tess lowered her head, knowing this to be true.

“Now, here’s a story for you—you know those small boys you saved?” Mrs. Brown said, changing the subject.

“Are they all right?” Tess said quickly, her heart skipping a beat. It had been hard to say goodbye to Michel and Edmond. “Have the authorities located any family?”

“You might say so.” Mrs. Brown’s face turned sorrowful. “It turns out Mr. Hoffman’s real name was Michel Navratil. He was kidnapping his sons. Their mother is very much alive and frantic to claim them.”

“Oh, my goodness.” If that sad-faced man on the
Titanic
, who clearly loved his boys, had been stealing them, was anybody who he appeared to be?

“So many stories.” Mrs. Brown nodded in the direction of a coolly beautiful woman dressed in black sitting nearby, fanning herself with vigor. Her hair was luxuriously abundant, her face pale as a porcelain teacup.

“Now there’s Mrs. Bremerton, one of the wealthier widows. She’s undoubtedly here to figure out whom to sue. Turned me down when I asked for a donation for the Survivors Committee. Some people just want their money for themselves. Take the stuff too seriously, in my opinion.”

Tess stared at the woman Mrs. Brown had pointed out, mesmerized by her calmness. She could hardly believe it; this was Jack Bremerton’s wife. “She must be devastated,” she whispered.

“Given the fact that everybody knew he was going to divorce her, probably not.” Tess gasped, and Mrs. Brown shot her a curious glance. “Was he a friend of yours, dear?”

She was trying to think of an answer when there was a sudden
stir at the door. Grateful for the diversion, she turned to watch. The senator who had stalked the decks of the
Carpathia
was making his way down a narrow aisle. He was about in his late fifties, she guessed, with a huge mustache on a face so strongly sculpted it could grace a monument. Striding past Tess and Mrs. Brown, he made his way to the head of a table positioned against the back wall, which was already filled with members of the investigating committee. He wore a black coat with a velvet collar, which he threw off the moment he claimed his chair.

Senator Smith banged his gavel for silence in the room.

“Order, please!” The hearing was about to begin.

Pinky nodded to her photographer to move closer as she stared at Bruce Ismay, wondering why it was that rich, important men never seemed to know that it was a big mistake to look
too
rich at a public inquiry. The elusive manager of the White Star Line wore a dark-blue suit with a navy silk scarf threaded through his high collar, and everything—down to the linen handkerchief in his breast pocket—oozed privilege.

“You should’ve taken off that diamond ring, Ismay,” she murmured to herself. She signaled the photographer to shoot just as Ismay put his hand up, the huge diamond glittering in the light from the chandeliers. The flash went off with a sharp explosion.

“Get those photographers out of here!” Senator Smith roared. “You have a statement, Mr. Ismay?”

A seemingly rattled Ismay cleared his throat and tugged at his cuffs. “I would like to express my sincere grief at this terrible catastrophe,” he began. “We welcome this inquiry by the U.S. Senate and we have nothing to hide. Absolutely no money was spared in the construction of the
Titanic
.”

“So why were you urging the captain to go fast through that ice field?” shouted a man by the door.

Smith banged his gavel, repeatedly this time. Would he be able
to keep this crowd under control? Perhaps the hearing should have waited a few days. No, Ismay would have escaped the witness chair. Smith banged again, more urgently.

“What were the circumstances of your departure from the ship?” asked Smith when the room quieted down.

“The boat was there,” Ismay replied. “There were a certain number of men in the boat, and the officer called out asking if there were any more women, and there was no response, and there were no passengers left on the deck.”

A few people moved restlessly, looking at one another. No passengers left on the deck? Nonsense.

“What was the full complement of lifeboats for a ship of this size?” Smith asked.

“All I can tell you is, she had sufficient boats to obtain her passenger certificate,” Ismay said firmly. “She was fully boated, according to the requirements of the British Board of Trade.”

Smith leaned back in his chair. Fully boated? What did that mean? Ismay knew there weren’t enough boats. And he knew they weren’t filled properly, but he was never going to admit it.

The questions kept coming from Smith, and the other members of the board of inquiry, for the next two hours. The air in the room became so stifling, even Senator Smith was wiping his face with a large white handkerchief. Finally he banged his gavel to announce a recess, accepting the fact that Ismay had managed to artfully dodge every question that would impugn the White Star Line. But what Ismay hadn’t done was clear himself of the stain of his cold behavior. That cheered Smith up. The next witness, he declared to the room, would be Arthur Rostron, the captain of the
Carpathia
. An honorable man; a good contrast.

Tess made her way through the crowd to the lobby, eager for some fresh air. People began pushing one another with urgency, jostling to get out, and she suddenly felt a stab of the same panic that had gripped
them all on the
Titanic
. She started to push, to squeeze through, then forced herself to take a deep breath. This was not the deck of that doomed ship; this was a room, that was all—a crowded room. She took another deep breath; she was almost to the door. It would be a long time before she felt comfortable in a crush like this.

She spied Pinky by the elevators, looking directly at her, a small, inquiring smile on her lips as she approached, the same large bag she had carried last night slung over her shoulder. The strap was extra long, causing the bag to flop about below her waist, hitting against other people exiting the room. A few irritated glances were shot in her direction, but she seemed impervious to them. “Oops,” she said once, after stepping on a fragile toe.

“You’re getting people mad at you,” Tess said.

“Nothing new about that,” Pinky said with a shrug. She hesitated. “I’m sorry I turned my back on you last night. I made a mess of the evening.”

“No, you didn’t. You said what you had to say, and I admire that.”

“I mean, I didn’t stick around to get enough information. Will you answer a few questions now?”

Tess nodded. “If I can help, but I don’t know if I can.”

“I’m hearing Lady Duff Gordon refused to let the crew go back for survivors when it would have been easy to bring more into the boat. What do you think?”