The Dressmaker (28 page)

The guards pushed open the doors to the Caucus Room with effort, and Smith saw to his chagrin that hundreds of people had jammed into the huge room, including—right up front—that irritating woman from the
Times
. And right next to her was that clamorous Mrs. Brown. This most definitely would not be an easy day.

“Quiet, please!” Smith banged his gavel repeatedly, exasperated at how difficult it was proving even to get the hearing under way. He was already hoarse. “Our first witness will be Fourth Officer Joseph Boxhall, a principal navigator on the
Titanic
,” he announced.

A small man with black hair and a mouth that worked nervously was guided to the witness chair. Pinky glanced over at the door he
had come through. With no official witness list, did Smith have all the crew members waiting back there? Getting interviews with them might be hard.

Smith began the questioning. Boxhall took obvious pride in his navigational abilities. He had also been in charge of collecting all warnings of icebergs from other ships, and then charting the
Titanic
’s course. And who gave those warnings to him? The captain of the ship, of course. Had he gotten any warning of ice in the
Titanic
’s path? No. What was the weather like? Clear and calm.

Another member of the panel cleared his throat. “How do you account for the fact that you could not see the icebergs, if the night was so clear?”

Boxhall screwed up his face and shook his head. He couldn’t—sorry.

“Are they more difficult to see at night?”

“Not always. But the water that night was in an oily calm. One little ripple on the water, we would’ve had a very good chance of seeing that iceberg in time to miss it.”

An “oily calm”: strange expression. But a time-waster to explore. Instead, Smith decided to show off some of his new knowledge, pointing out—with Boxhall nodding eagerly—the differences between the smaller chunks of low-lying ice known as growlers and large expanses of surface ice known as field ice.

“These formations are more frequent in the latitude of the Grand Banks, I understand. And is it customary to be particularly careful in that vicinity?”

“Oh yes, sir.”

“Well,” pressed Smith, “how did it happen that in that identical vicinity it was not thought necessary to increase the lookout?”

Boxhall paused. “I do not know.”

Enough. Smith banged his gavel and declared a recess.

Speed and stupidity, that’s what did it, Pinky told herself as she elbowed her way through the crowd to the door. Same old story—she’d heard it dozens of times. It was all politics in the end. She was hungry for fresh air.

She escaped the crowd—no one seemed to want to stray too far from the vicinity out of fear of losing a place—and made her way down the marble corridor to the entrance hall. And there, on a corner bench, she spied Mrs. Brown, talking with great enthusiasm to a sailor. Pinky moved closer and saw that it was Jim Bonney.

“Pinky, come over here,” Mrs. Brown called. “Look at this man’s work!”

Jim looked up, his face breaking into a slow grin when he recognized her. He looked tired and rumpled but somehow at ease. He was holding a small, curved knife and a piece of wood in his hands—large hands, Pinky noted for the first time, with strong, slender fingers.

Mrs. Brown scooped the wood from him and held it aloft. “Look at the detail,” she marveled. It was a carving of the U.S. Capitol, done with impressive intricacy and skill.

“I’ve seen your work,” Pinky said to Jim with a smile. “You’re good.”

Jim reached for the carving. “I’m not done, actually. Nothing much else to do around here until they call me to testify.” His eyes flickered up to Pinky’s with a question. What could she say? Tess had sent no message.

“Well, I’m enormously impressed,” Mrs. Brown said. She looked at Jim shrewdly. “I’ve got a job for you if you want it, young man. Can you make a replica of that unfortunate ship we were on?”

“The
Titanic
? Sure, I can.”

“With all the details on it—you know, ladders, ropings, crow’s nest, that sort of thing?”

He paused, his brow furrowing. “I’d do better with a set of the plans,” he said. “And I don’t know if I have the time.”

“I can get the plans for you,” Mrs. Brown said with a wave of her hand. “You aren’t planning on sitting around like a vegetable after you’ve testified, are you?”

A smile pulled at the corners of Jim’s mouth. “No, ma’am, I’ll find a job.”

“You have one,” she said with elaborate patience. “I am commissioning this carving of the ship. Which means I will pay you very generously.

You, sir, are very talented, and now you are in my hands. I’ll bring you business; I’m good at that. And, in case you don’t know it, I’m very rich.” She sighed. “Mines in Colorado—that sort of thing.”

Pinky watched Jim’s face change. He seemed stunned at first. Then he looked down at his hands, as if seeing them for the first time.

“It’s a deal,” he said.

NEW YORK CITY
MONDAY NIGHT, APRIL 22

Tess wandered aimlessly around her hotel room, giddy with the knowledge that tomorrow she would be freed of the glances of curiosity from hotel staff and guests; the whispers in the wake of moving through the grand lobby to this small cubicle of privacy. Tomorrow she would be in her own place.

She sat down on the bed, enjoying the silence at first. Then a twist of loneliness. What was happening in Washington? Pinky would have a story tomorrow, surely. Had she seen Jim, talked to him? Was he all right?

Slowly she prepared for bed. There was no use pretending to herself that she didn’t miss him. She closed her eyes, conjuring up his face, the easy lope of his walk as they had made their way back to the hotel from the magical Central Park. Only two days ago.

She pulled back the covers and sank into the silky percale sheets. This was no time for foolish meanderings. She had managed to repair the dress, but tomorrow would be a hard and challenging day.

She drifted off to sleep, fingers curled tight around the comforting presence of the metal keys clutched in her fist.

WALDORF-ASTORIA
NEW YORK CITY
TUESDAY MORNING, APRIL 23

D
id you see the funeral notice in the paper?” Elinor said as she pulled back the heavy drapes, letting in the morning light.

“Yes, of course I did.” A hovering dust, exposed by the light, hung in the air. Lucile coughed, then moaned, clutching a handkerchief to her face.

“Oh stop it, Lucy,” Elinor said impatiently. “You’ve played the victim long enough.”

“How can you talk to me that way?”

“Because I know you, and you’re too good at indignation and self-pity—that’s why. What’s done is done, and the sooner we can get you out of here and back to England the better.”

“My note to Jean Darling had no self-pity in it, grant me that.”

“It was fine. The best you could do under the circumstances.” Elinor reached for her cigarette holder and began to insert a cigarette.

“Must you? I’m so tired of the smell of your cigarettes.”

“Worse than the tea and the tarts?” Elinor lit the cigarette and inhaled, staring out the open window. “You called them ‘abominable’ last night.”

“Please, I’m trying.”

Her sister’s expression softened. “All right.” She pinched the cigarette out and dropped it into an ashtray.

“I know you’re cross with me, and clearly Cosmo is. Jordan Darling’s suicide was dreadful, and I wish I had never opened my mouth to those reporters. But it is grossly unfair to blame me for what he did. He survived, why couldn’t he leave it at that? What is wrong with being a survivor?”

“Quite a lot, perhaps.”

Lucile compressed her lips, annoyed. “You’re going to say something deep and complicated, and I’m going to want to run out of this room.”

“Well, this time I’ve got you cornered.” Elinor’s voice was casual. “Aren’t we the pair?”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Look at the two of us. I’ve been writing stories since I was fifteen. You, my dear sister, put your head down to the needle and sewed your way out of a miserable marriage. Then you came up with the idea of draping clothes over live models and voilà! Success. Helped along, of course, by marrying a title. Now, don’t you agree that we’re quite the pair?”

“You’re setting the scene for something more, I know you.”

“Of course. Maybe we’re too used to making our own rules.”

“And what does that have to do with being a survivor?”

“We’re not particularly nice people, Lucy. We’re both a bit careless, wouldn’t you agree?”

“I’m not interested in playing your games.” She didn’t have to listen to this—it was just the same old teasing that Elinor enjoyed so much.

“And self-absorbed?”

“That’s what Cosmo says.”

“Well, putting your dear husband aside for the moment—and, by the way, he was quite clumsy with his generosity on that lifeboat of yours. Well, you’ve got your answer.”

Lucile lifted an eyebrow. “What is it, dear sister?”

“It’s simple. The careless and self-absorbed manage to survive. Aren’t we lucky?”

A silence fell over them both. Only after a long moment spent staring at the teapot on its silver tray sitting before her did Lucile respond.

“I thought you came here to comfort me.”

“And to wake you up, Lucy.” Elinor’s voice was calm. “We’re self-made women; there aren’t many like us, wouldn’t you say? But we can’t afford to believe the fantasies we build about ourselves. Now a question—I hear that sailor who claims you stopped him from rescuing survivors is testifying. What are you doing about it?”

“I don’t know what we can do. Deny it, of course.”

“I can imagine how that will go.”

“It will go fine, I’m sure. And as far as believing in my own ‘fantasies,’ as you put it, all I have ever wanted is to be successful at what I do best, which is designing. I have done that, and I intend to enjoy it.”

“It can evaporate in a minute, you know.”

“Well, if either of us had stayed focused on that we’d never have got anywhere.”

“Probably not even out of childhood.”

“Mother was impossible.”

“Oh say it, Lucy. She was mean as dirt.”

They sat in silence for a moment.

“We managed,” Lucile said in a different voice. “Together.”

“Dear Lucy, you took the brunt of it.”

“But I mastered the skill of throwing a phenomenally good tantrum.”

“Which you continue to perfect,” murmured Elinor, eyes dancing.

“Well, of course.”

Again, silence between them—a more comfortable one this time. Lucile nibbled at a tart and sipped her tea. “Surely these terrible newspaper stories will soon wind down. I can’t stand another day of hiding out in this place,” she said finally. “I’m their scapegoat, but they’ll get bored with me; they always do. They’ll hunt for fresh ones, don’t you think? I’ve heard of some awful behavior, particularly by the more excitable people in steerage.”

“Don’t count on it. You have too good a career and too high a reputation for them to leave you alone.”

Lucile leaned back and closed her eyes. “I have to get back to my shop. It’s my life and I don’t want anyone else in charge, and certainly not Tess, who has no competence for business.” Her eyes flew open; she frowned. “She was a bit vague on how things went yesterday. Did you talk to her? Is she holding something back?”