Wink sticks up his thumb.
“Six?” Jamie says.
Wink’s thumb stays up.
“Seven?”
I guess Bo is taking odds and Jamie is taking evens.
“Eight?” Jamie blows into my face.
I push him away. “Have you such little faith in me, Brother? Try two pounds and four shillings.”
Bo coughs and I give him a wink. “Sorry, Wagtail. Looks like you bet on the wrong team.” I turn back to Jamie. “Now if you don’t mind, I need to see a man about an elephant.”
His jaw clicks. “The day’s not done yet.”
With that, he sweeps out of the room.
* * *
Dinnertime approaches, and the lifts are busy. So the Merry Widow removes her coat and slowly climbs the tidal-wave staircase in her blasted pumps.
Without the mass of my hair, the toque sits lower—fortunately, hiding my shorn locks. My head should feel lighter, but heavy thoughts bow my neck.
Jamie still thinks he can outdo me. I shouldn’t have been so eager to brag about my win. If you catch a big fish, carry it home in a sack, or don’t be surprised if a bird carries it off. The lights-out bugle isn’t until 10:30 p.m., so there is yet time. But Jamie won’t be able to surpass me by fixing deck chairs. White Star Line would never pay that much for “off the record” labor. If he thinks to copy me with a trick, the fine members of the upper classes will all be tucked away in their libraries, lounges, or smoking rooms after dinner, places that are off-limits to the third class.
With my magnificent dress on display, stares and murmurs of approval follow me as I ascend. I am a one-woman show. A particularly bold lady even reaches out a gloved hand, as if to touch my beaded crane. I favor her with an elegant nod like the royals do. The adoration is intoxicating, like the liquor-filled chocolate balls Ba once brought home. One makes you hungry for more.
I reach B-Deck and cross the Entrance Hall to the Cabbage Patch, eager to free my feet from their torture racks. Near the felt doors, a news bulletin tacked onto a corkboard mounted on the bulkhead catches my attention.
THE ATLANTIC DAILY BULLETIN
The official newspaper of the RMS Titanic
APRIL 11
Weather: High 50s. Sunny and clear with moderate breeze. Expect cooling through the weekend. Possible ice.
Thousands of workers return to coal mines with end of miners’ strike. New minimum wage proposed.
“Like the pineapple was glued to his head,” I hear a voice say behind me.
My ears perk up. A few paces to my left, a tall man and an older lady in a mink coat drift closer to me. I stare at the news bulletin.
“Really. He wasn’t hired by White Star. I would know.” The man must be six feet and some change, with an impeccably tailored wool suit that looks like it would never even dream of wrinkling. Close-set eyes interrupt a long forehead crinkled in consternation. A luxurious mustache droops from his upper lip like two squirrels’ tails sewn together.
“Of course you would, Mr. Ismay. It’s your operation.”
So that’s him, the grouchy White Star director. The top flag on this pole, the man to whom Captain Smith owes his position. He doesn’t look pleased to have learned of a busker on the loose. He drains his wineglass, and a steward refills it even before Mr. Ismay holds it out for filling. “I will take it up with the captain. We don’t tolerate troublemakers here.”
Before he catches sight of this troublemaker, I hasten toward the door, plowing right into a young woman.
“Oh!” She catches me by the shoulders as if to steady us both.
The striking visage of April Hart stares back at me. An evening gown of violet silk somehow makes her skin look as luminous as moonlight. Her dark hair lies as sleek as a raven’s feathers.
“I’ve got you, madam.” Her eyelashes are so long, I feel a breeze when she winks. “Meet me back in your room in fifteen minutes,” she whispers.
“April! Are you all right?” The woman in the fur coat bustles over, Mr. Ismay close behind.
“Just fine, Mother. We must have hit a swell.”
“I’d say so.” April’s mother shines her own amber eyes at me, which fall to my crane dress. She spreads her short fingers as if waiting for an introduction to fall into her hands.
Mr. Ismay’s eyes sharpen. “Madam, I don’t think we’ve met. I’m—”
“Mr. Ismay, I have heard a rumor that you have quite a selection of cigars aboard.” April wraps a hand around his arm. “How is a lady to get her hands on one?”
That’s my cue. My heart skips ahead of my feet, and I make for the felt doors before the one-woman show gets booted from the stage.
15
I lock the door to my suite and put my back against it. But hearing no pursuers banging on the other side, I begin to feel slightly ridiculous. I hang my hat and coat, and unbuckle my pumps. I’ll have to keep a sharp eye out for Mr. Ismay and hope he doesn’t do the same for me.
The bed has been tucked and fluffed. A basket of fruit has been placed on a side table, including two perfect oranges, Ba’s favorite fruit. Wouldn’t he have been alit with glee to see me here? I imagine him pointing out the White Star logo embroidered on the napkins to Mum. “Look at that stitching, Penny. That’s silk thread. Really fancies up the linens.” He’d stretch the napkin between his veiny hands, the wheels turning. “We could embroider monograms. People love to see their initials.”
Mum would take the napkin from him, her generous smile receding. “No one would use monogrammed napkins. They’d not want to dirty them.”
But eventually, Ba would win her over.
They never would have thought Jamie and I would be guests on the maiden voyage of the Buckingham Palace of the Atlantic. I sink into a chair. Somehow being on the finest ship in the world makes our quarrel even worse. Part of me wants to find Jamie, throw a leash around his goat-y neck, and pull him to saner pastures, never mind that I’m the one frolicking about in first class. The chances of him finding his way on his own seem to grow slimmer with each day.
I peel an orange, reveling in the small triumph of getting the rind off in one continuous strip. The zesty scent perks my spirits, and the meat calms the gnawing in my stomach. I place the second orange in the wall tidy as an offering to Mum and Ba.
Ba raised us to care for our ancestors. We made regular offerings of cakes and rice wine on his teakwood altar and said prayers of remembrance to comfort them in their ancestral homes. Mum, who raised us Anglican, never joined in, but neither did she complain about it. I imagine she believed that when she married Ba, she’d married all of him, not just the parts she agreed with.