Every Man for Himself - Beryl Bainbridge [17]
‘Eliza,’ said the purser. ‘After her mother.’
Remembering I hadn’t a receipt for the luggage transported by Melchett’s chauffeur, I enquired if it was to hand. After much rifling through the compartments of his desk the purser produced the relevant docket. ‘One medium sized trunk,’ he read, ‘and a consignment of theatrical manuscripts in the name of J. Pierpont Morgan.’
We were about to leave when Ginsberg said, ‘I noticed when looking out of the saloon windows that while the sea and the skyline were evident on my left, only the sky was visible to starboard. From which I gained the impression we’ve a distinct list to port.’
‘Very well observed, sir,’ exclaimed the purser. ‘It’s no doubt due to more coal being consumed from the starboard bunkers than from the port side.’
‘Which is occasioned, no doubt,’ said Ginsberg, ‘by the fire blazing in the stokehold of Number 10 bunker.’
The purser looked shaken. ‘A fire, sir? What do you mean?’
‘Come now. We both know what I’m talking about.’
‘A fire?’ I reiterated, stupidly enough. ‘What sort of fire?’
‘The sort that burns,’ retorted Ginsberg.
‘If what you imply was true, sir,’ the purser said, ‘the Board of Trade inspector would never have signed the clearance certificate for us to leave Southampton.’
‘Well then,’ cried Ginsberg, ‘we have nothing to worry about, have we?’
‘What was all that about?’ I asked, when we were in the corridor. He replied that he was a cautious man, which struck me as absurd, and that he had always found it inadvisable to take anything on trust.
I didn’t return with him to the smoke-room; his know-all attitude irritated me. Sissy has constantly warned that my intolerance will land me in hot water. I’ve always felt that if a man tries to adopt attitudes which are not innate then sooner or later he will discover Nature cannot be forced. We are what we are, and it’s no good dissembling.
Pleading lack of sleep and a mild queasiness of stomach, I loitered outside the Palm Court and listened to the band. A vocalist was singing Put your arms around me honey, hold me tight. Peering through the glass panels of the doors I caught sight of Rosenfelder, coat-tails flying as he strutted Molly Dodge across the floor. There was no sign of Wallis Ellery.
Before retiring I went out on to the boat deck. There was a breeze but the air was far from cold. An elderly couple sat on steamer chairs, hands folded on their laps. From somewhere ahead came the squeal of bagpipes; walking astern I joined a group of passengers who stood at the rails looking on to the steerage space beneath. They were dancing down there, a kind of skirl, the men whooping as they swept the women in figures of eight about the deck. Someone next to me murmured, ‘They know how to enjoy themselves,’ and another said, ‘How steady the ship is,’ to which her companion replied, as though quoting from the brochures, ‘We’re on a floating palace, my dear.’
Standing there, watching a woman who stood with her back to the crowd, shawl draped about her head and shoulders, I fancied I half remembered my own steerage passage to the New World, though indeed I didn’t, having only learnt of it from my aunt. She said I’d been put in the care of an Irish girl who reported I ate enough for three and was never sick. It was not meanness, I was assured, that had governed the decision to transport me so cheaply across the Atlantic, rather that it was felt more exalted accommodation, bearing in mind the circumstances of my early years, would have caused almost as much embarrassment to myself as to others. Sissy, of course, says it was because my aunt did not want people to know of our connection, but then, as she has never been abandoned, Sissy can afford to be critical.
The figure in the shawl turned and, circling the dancers, came to the metal gate barring the way to the second class area. She stood leaning against it, peering upwards, and with the light full on her face I recognised who she was. I