Passage

It’s later than it was, Joanna thought anxiously, and the steward’s already gone. She looked down at the deck to see if it had a list, and it seemed like it did, but only a slight one, and when she looked up again, she saw the young woman. She was still in her nightgown, and the stout man in tweeds was still there, standing on the far side of the crowd and talking to his friend.

Joanna craned her neck to see over their heads and down the deck, looking for a glimpse of the steward’s white coat moving in and out of the deck lights, but the length of the deck was empty. “Go and find Mr. Briarley,” a man’s voice said, and there was the bearded man, talking to the steward. Joanna squeezed through the crowd, toward them.

“He’ll know what’s happening,” the bearded man said.

“Yes, sir,” the steward said and turned to go.

Joanna squeezed between the young woman and the young man in the sweater and started to edge past the stout man. “What’s happened?” he said.

“Iceberg,” his friend said. And there’s your proof that it’s the Titanic, Richard, Joanna thought, sidling past him.

“Icebergs,” the stout man said, nodding. “Well, I don’t suppose it’s anything much,” and Joanna turned and stared at him, thinking, It’s W. T. Stead, the spiritualist.

“Aren’t you going up to the Boat Deck?” his friend asked.

“No. I believe I’ll read a bit,” W. T. Stead said and walked over to one of the deck chairs. He sat down on it and opened his book.

“You ladies should go back inside where it’s warmer,” the bearded man said, and Joanna whirled, but the steward had already disappeared.

He couldn’t have. Only a few seconds had passed. He hadn’t had time to walk the length of the deck, or even to the aft staircase. Where had he gone? She ran down the deck, trying doors. The second one opened on a narrow stairwell with latticed metal steps. One of the crew stairways. She started up it, but the stairs only went up one deck and then stopped, and the door at the top was locked. She ran back down and on to the next door.

It looked just like the door to the crew stairway, but when she opened it, she was in a wide space with a carpeted floor and marble stairs. The Grand Staircase. Which led to the Promenade Deck and the library, and if Mr. Briarley wasn’t there, the Palm Court was on the same deck. But what if he wasn’t either place? He had said he was going to the post office, and she had no idea where that was.

But you do know where the library is, she thought, so check that first and then the Palm Court. She ran up the slightly tilting stairs, past the cherub, past Honour and Glory, up to the Promenade Deck and along the deck to the frosted glass doors of the library.

Mr. Briarley was there, sitting not at the desk under the window, but at a small table near the glassed-in bookcases. He was writing earnestly, the yellow-shaded lamp making a circle of golden light on the white paper of the postcard, the white cuffs of his formal shirt.

“Mr. Briar — ” she called, and saw it wasn’t him. It was the mustached man she had seen carefully dealing out cards in the lounge. She threaded her way through the gold tapestry chairs to him.

He didn’t look up as she approached. He continued to write, dipping his pen into the ink bottle, lifting it out, scrawling a word, dipping it again. Joanna looked down at his letter. It wasn’t written on a sheet of Titanic stationery. The paper was a torn sheet from an appointment book, the edge ragged along one side. He had scrawled across the middle of the page: “If saved, inform my sister Mrs. F. J. Adams of Findlay, Ohio. Lost. J. H. Rogers.”

“Mr. Rogers,” Joanna said, “there was a man in here at that desk.” She pointed at the desk. “He was writing a note to his niece. Did you see where he went?”

The man blotted the letter carefully.

“Please. It’s important. He was in here before, writing a postcard to his niece.”

He folded the note neatly in quarters and scrawled something on the outside. “Mr. Rogers,” Joanna said desperately and reached for his arm.

He shook his head. “Not Mr. Rogers,” he said, as though that was who she’d said she was looking for. “Sorry.” He slid the note in his inside coat pocket and stood up. “I’m needed on the Boat Deck,” he said. “You should get into one of the boats, miss,” and strode across the room and through the door to the Grand Staircase.

“Then can you tell me where the Palm Court is?” Joanna asked, pursuing him through the door and up the stairs, but he had already disappeared out onto the Boat Deck, and she couldn’t see which way he had gone in the darkness. The only light was from the open door of the gymnasium. Joanna looked in, but he wasn’t there, and neither was Greg Menotti. The bicycles and the rowing machine and the gullotine-like weight-lifting apparatus stood motionless on the red-and-white tile floor.