Every Man for Himself - Beryl Bainbridge [59]
Melchett, Hopper and I played bridge later on, Ginsberg making up a fourth. We were mostly abstemious because Astor was sitting at the next table with Archie Butt, military aide to President Taft. I sat very straight in my chair; beyond a glass of hot lemonade I drank nothing and hoped it was noted. Butt was trying to find out from Colonel Astor, who had apparently recently been skiing in St Moritz, what the ‘Cresta’ had been like this year. He was having a hard time of it getting Astor to respond, he being his usual gloomy self and looking as though he’d just come from a funeral. Eventually Astor said he hadn’t the faintest idea, his bride having persuaded him from the run for fear he broke a leg. He wasn’t such a stuffed shirt as I make him out. He’d invented a brake for bicycles and even written a book. Sissy had actually read it; it had something to do with melting the Arctic to put the world on an even keel. He became more animated when the name Kitty was mentioned. I pricked up my ears, as they say, but the Kitty in question turned out to have four legs; she was an Airedale belonging to Astor, off her food and tied up aft of F deck.
Butt and he left at half-past eleven. I know that because Butt took out his watch and expressed surprise at the lateness of the hour. I guess he was desperate to get to his bed. They had been gone no more than ten minutes – Ginsberg had ordered a whisky and Charlie and I had just won three tricks in succession – when suddenly the room juddered; the lights flickered and Ginsberg’s cigarette case, which sat at his elbow, jolted to the floor. It was the sound accompanying the juddering that startled us, a long drawn-out tearing, like a vast length of calico slowly ripping apart. Melchett said, ‘We’re in collision with another ship,’ and with that we threw down our cards, ran to the doors, sprinted through the Palm Court and out on to the deck. A voice called, ‘We’ve bumped an iceberg – there it goes,’ but though I peered into the darkness I could see nothing. From somewhere forward we heard laughter, voices excitedly shouting. Coming to the starboard rail I looked down on to the well of the third class recreation area; there were chunks of ice spilling and sliding in every direction, all shapes and sizes, glittering under the light of the foremast. Steerage passengers, most in their ragged night-clothes, were chucking it at each other as though playing snowballs. Hopper raced off to go down there and join in the fun. Charlie and I found it too cold to linger and hurried back indoors. A dozen or so men had poured out of the smoke-room and were milling about the foyer, pestering the stewards for information. Astor was there, still dressed but without his tie, leaning down to shout into the ear of Seefax who had been woken from sleep in the library and now sat on the staircase with his stick raised like a weapon. Everyone had a different explanation for whatever it was that had jarred the ship; Ginsberg swore we had lost a propeller, but what did he know?
We couldn’t resume our game until Hopper returned, which he did quite soon, triumphantly carrying a lump of ice in his handkerchief. He thrust it under my nose and it smelt rank, a bit like a sliver of rotten mackerel. He dropped it into Ginsberg’s whisky when the poor devil wasn’t looking.
We must have played for another ten minutes, by which time Hopper said he’d had enough. Remembering Andrews’ injunction that I should read while others slept, I decided to spend an hour in the library. I was crossing the foyer when the man himself swept past on his way to the stairs. I didn’t think he’d seen me but he said quite distinctly, ‘Follow me. You may be needed.’
He led me up to the navigating bridge. Captain Smith was evidently expecting him because as we approached the wheelhouse the quartermaster flung open the door. I would have followed on Andrews’ heels but he shouted over his shoulder that I was to wait outside. Through the glass panels I could see Smith