Max Collins: The Titanic Murders

She was easily ninety years of age, but her voice had the no-nonsense quality of a businesswoman, tempered by the musicality of a former professional singer.

“I’d be delighted,” she said. “I adored my father, and it’s a pity his memory, his work, has been so neglected.”

“I couldn’t agree more.”

Her next remark seemed intended to set the tone for our meeting to come: “It will be nice to talk to someone more interested in my father than the tragedy that took his life.”

I asked where we might meet, wondering to myself if it would be a nursing home of some kind, although the fact that her number had been listed should have told me she was in her own home or anyway an apartment.

“It’s beautiful here this time of year,” she said.

It was April.

“And,” she continued, “you should have the pleasure of enjoying our lovely harbor. So-I believe I’ll let you take me out to lunch, young man.”

It was nice being called “young man,” even if I had to hang out with women in their nineties for that to happen. My wife accompanied me on the drive down Massachusetts State Route 3A, which was mostly inland and not terribly scenic.

But Scituate itself provided all the scenery landlubbing midwesterners like us could drink in, even on a cool overcast afternoon. Nestling on four cliffs, looking down on a gentle curve of coastline, Scituate was a small, quaint community whose antique Cape Cods and Colonial homes had us immediately discussing relocating.

Virginia (on the phone she had made it clear she was “Virginia,” not “Mrs. Raymond”) had suggested the restaurant-Chester’s at the Mill Wharf-which was on Front Street, on the town’s picturesque sheltered harbor, overseen by a nineteenth-century lighthouse. We were early, and sat in the rustic, nautically themed restaurant at a table by the window looking out on the busy harbor-bobbing with pleasure craft and a working fishing fleet-and an ocean so smooth and gunmetal gray it nearly blended with the overcast gunmetal sky.

When the daughter of Jacques Futrelle entered, there was no mistaking her. I had seen Futrelle’s photograph-he had a John Candy-like, round, boyish face, with dark wide-open eyes behind wire-frame glasses, and seemed at once alert and childlike, scholarly and cherubic, and was apparently rather thickset though by no means obese.

Based upon the one known photo of Futrelle aboard the Titanic, a full-figure shot of him on deck in a three-piece suit, his hair ruffled by wind, the author appeared to be fairly stocky, even short.

But Virginia Raymond was tall, close to six foot, with the big-boned frame of her father and a handsome face that echoed his, as well; at ninety, she still cut a commanding figure. She wore a dignified suit-a lavender pattern on top, with a solid lavender skirt (which my wife later described as “very Chanel”)-and she used a cane, though she strode otherwise unaided through the mostly empty restaurant. (We had chosen to dine mid-afternoon, when we would have the place mostly to ourselves.)

We rose, and I introduced my wife and myself, mentioning that both of us were writers.

“Ah, like my parents,” Virginia said, allowing me to help with her chair. “You didn’t know Mother was a writer, too? She and Papa collaborated only once, on a short story that frankly wasn’t very good. Well, of course, they collaborated on my brother and me, too.”

We laughed at that, as I took my seat right across from Virginia. Soon we ordered soft drinks, and chatted about the drive down, and this lovely scenic little city, and explained that we were in Boston making appearances at several bookstores, promoting my latest historical detective novel and an anthology my wife had coedited.

“Look how smooth it is today,” Virginia said, gazing out at the calm gray ocean. “That’s how they say it was, you know. My mother said the ocean was like a millpond, that Sunday night.”

I said nothing, exchanging nervous glances with my wife; we’d agreed to avoid the Titanic in conversation, as on the phone Virginia had made such a point of her willingness to spend time with a Futrelle fan, as opposed to a Titanic buff.

“You know, it’s close to that time of year, isn’t it?” Virginia asked.

Again, I said nothing, just smiled a little-I knew damn well the anniversary of the sinking was days away.

“Each year, on April 14, for as long as she was able, my mother held a private memorial service to my father, and the others who lost their lives that night. She would stand alone on Third Cliff here in Scituate, looking out over the open sea, a fresh bouquet of flowers in her hands… and she would sprinkle the flowers with her tears, and then would toss them, into the water.”

“That’s lovely,” my wife said.

The handsome, deeply grooved features formed an embarrassed smile. “Well, my mother did have a terrible streak of melodrama, I’m afraid. But she loved Papa; I don’t think she ever really fully accepted his death. She and I didn’t really get along very well, you know….”

This private piece of information coming along so early in our conversation was startling; but I managed to say, brilliantly, “Really?”

Virginia sipped her coffee, which she was drinking black, and nodded, saying, “She favored Jack, my brother… she had quite an ego, Mother did. When she lost Papa, she lost the one person in the world she loved more than herself.”

A waiter came over and we ordered lunch; wood-grilled fresh fish of every variety-not exactly midwestern fare. Then when the waiter had gone, Virginia turned toward the gray, gently rippling landscape and spoke again.

“I wasn’t on the ship,” she said. “I was in school-I went to private school, up north-yet memories of the Titanic sinking have been with me most of my life. Mother relived the sheer terror of that experience, from time to time, nightmares mostly, and sudden stabs of memory. She lived to be ninety-one… I intend to outdo her, on that score.”

Thinking of my anonymous phone caller, I said, “You seemed to have a positive opinion of Dr. Ballard’s expedition, uh… when you were interviewed. But what do you think of these later expeditions, recovering-”

She interrupted sharply: “Ghoulish. Simply ghoulish. I’ve always thought of the Titanic as my father’s grave. I hope they’ll let her be-she’s at rest, a memorial in herself.”

“Oh, I agree with you,” my wife said. “This awful talk about trying to ‘raise’ the ship…”

Her brown eyes, which were lovely, pressed shut. “I pray nightly that the ship will be allowed to remain where she lies. Anything else is exploitation. It seems only… honorable, respectful, to leave the ship and its victims in their final resting place as was God’s will.”

I thought of those two canvas bags, sewn shut, in the cold cargo hold.

But then we spoke of her father, and she told anecdotes about him, warm funny stories of his playful practical jokes, such as the time her mother had “gussied herself up” for a party that her father wanted to skip. May Futrelle had approached her husband, who was tarrying with yard work, watering the lawn, and prodded him to come inside and put on his evening wear-he had instead hosed her down, in all her finery, and after her fury turned to laughter, they’d spent a quiet romantic evening together.

“They were a love story, Mama and Papa,” she said rather wistfully. “A real-life love story.”

“You know, I’d really like to see your father’s work get back into print,” I said. “Maybe if I could interview you, in depth, I could put a biographical piece together that would spark some interest.”

I was putting a toe in the water, because my real intention was to seek her cooperation in writing a book-length biography of her father.