Robert Walker - Titanic 2012

At the same time that Charles Lightoller was organizing the packing off of Mrs. Catarina Krizefieldt, word reached the captain that Ransom and his two young cohorts had attacked their guards halfway up to the boat deck, and the trio had disappeared after the melee belowdecks. It was believed they were now in hiding among the second class citizens of steerage grade tickets.

“What shall we do sir?” asked Murdoch after reporting the unhappy news to Smith.

“Shall we hold the lifeboat up, sir?” asked Lightoller, who’d joined them at the bridge on learning the news. “I mean until we can apprehend the prisoners?”

“More time wasted,” Smith muttered, disgusted, his features and white beard at odds with his angry blue eyes. At this moment, he more resembled depictions of Zeus than Santa. “Damn you, Murdoch, why didn’t you see to the escort of prisoners personally, man?”

“I had no idea they were so desperate, sir; I assumed they’d be thrilled at the news we were setting ’em free on the dock here. Free to go on their way, you know—facing no prosecution for—for—”

“You told them that lie?”

“I insisted the crewmen bringing them up say so, yes, to ensure their cooperation, you see.”

“Clever, but it obviously didn’t work. Damn it all. This delays us further! Which is their aim, Mister Murdoch! You know this—delay, delay, sabotage next!”

And it did have this supposed desired effect. This had all delayed Titanic , the clock ticking away, shaving off almost two hours from her schedule already, while they had been well ahead of schedule before now. This damnable delay could cost us the transatlantic record for a ship this size!” he continued. “A record I planned on winning before retirement—to beat Britannic. Every officer and crewman’s bonuses are at stake. Bonuses White Star promised, but only if Titanic shaves time off Britannic’s record.”

“Not to mention your bonus, Captain,” said Wilde.

Smith waved this off. “Record aside, gentlemen, the sheer embarrassment of it all; the owner and architect are aboard, both J. Bruce Ismay and Thomas Andrews.” He shook his head, despondent. “Fortunately, Pierre of Harland & Wolfe and J.P. Morgan, both of whom had hoped to be aboard, were unable to make the date, what with it changing daily!”

Whether aboard or not, these men were giants of industry in a Gilded Age—in a time that heralded the greatness of mankind’s coming into the modern era; Smith mustn’t disappoint his bosses and benefactors, and at the moment, Mr. Ismay and Mr. Andrews were profoundly upset with the goings on aboard that he’d had to report already—first the Belfast intruders with their wild claims, and now this insane lunatic’s ridiculous so-called premonition of doom, and Smith had no doubt these distractions had been wired to J.P. Morgan and to Pierre.

“We’ll send a second boat with those miscreants, Mr. Lightoller,” said Smith, legs parted in a fighting stance, his finger wagging at Lightoller’s nose. “For the moment, get that ranting woman off my ship!”

Indeed, Mrs. Catarina Krizefieldt, sitting in the front of the life boat, awaiting her lowering over the side with her husband and her things, was shouting to any and all passengers who happened by—and there was a growing crowd of them—that they best come off the ship with her. “I’ve had a dream that’s altered every feeling I once held about this ship!”

“What sorta dream?” shouted someone among the crowd the woman had gathered about Lifeboat #14.

“A-A dream of death and destruction aboard. I have seen the Devil himself aboard Titanic . He has flesh fired like enamel, he does!”

Some in the crowd taunted the woman for a fool, others called her a saboteur paid by the Cunard Line. Most wanted her unpleasant face, voice, and message to simply go away, and to this end Lightoller, with shaky hands, ordered a less experienced officer to lower him and Mr. and Mrs. Krizefieldt down. The young officer snapped on the davit motor that worked the pulleys to lower the shaking lifeboat that Lightoller stood in. A crewman monitored the lowering of the boat from the deck.

For Smith, it meant Lightoller, a man at the davit, another monitoring the descent of the boat to keep it level, not to mention Murdoch and others chasing the other problem belowdecks were all engaged in time-consuming and unnecessary maneuvers. “God how I wish those Belfast thugs were on board with that woman!” Smith sighed deeply as he watched the action. “Lightoller seems be taking orders better than the more seasoned Murdoch. What do you think, Mr. Wilde?”

“Think the both of them are good officers, sir; we’re lucky to have them with us, sir.”

“Mr. Wilde, I can always count on your decorum.”

But this was not the end of annoyances for Smith, for when Officer Lightoller returned piloting the lifeboat back to Titanic , he’d gotten an earful from the crazed old hag and somehow thought it wise to address the possibility of the woman’s having some powers in the realm of the unseen, the world of the paranormal and séances for which she was sought after and well known in Surrey and Wexford, or so she claimed as she hailed from Wexford and had acquaintances in Surrey despite her German background.

“Mr. Lightoller, we’ll waste no more time on this nonsense, please!”

“I only mean, sir, that her foresight… well it turns out it’s legendary in her region of England.”

“Wexford, bah!” Captain Smith sniffed as if he smelled the place, and he went to the huge windows facing the bow and the horizon. For a long moment, he watched, silent, looking out over the broad expanse of the Atlantic ahead of them and then muttered, “Lost time… hard to make up.”

Lightoller knew the man’s every move, every twitch by now, and he understood he was to stand silent and wait on his captain’s next order. Finally, Smith turned to his junior officer and firmly said, “Mr. Lightoller you and everyone aboard who answers to me are to be silent on the rantings of that awful woman and to speak no more of it, understood?”

“Yes, sir… understood.”

“And Charles…” Smith added, a hand waving birdlike, “I will hear no gossip among the crew or the black gang at the furnaces.”

Lightoller felt a smidge emboldened since Smith used his first name, a sign the old man liked him regardless of his bumbling. “Sir, then will you hear of a missing man among the stokers?”

“A missing man? What missing man?”

“Aye, sir, Alfred Davenport.”

“Sounds like the name of a sofa,” joked Wilde, who was at Titanic ’s giant, shining wheel. The bridge was made of the most expensive mahogany paneling and all metal surfaces were gold plated, often reflecting sunlight so powerfully as to blind a man.

“We can’t have already lost a man over the side, can we?” asked Smith. “Are all the life boats and collapsibles accounted for?”

“They are, sir,” replied Lightoller, biting his lip.

“Speak your mind, Charles.”

“All accounted for sir—what few there are.” One of Lightoller’s many responsibilities included overseeing the lifeboats in the event they were needed, for which he took a terrible ribbing. He also oversaw the boarding of all supplies from the bakers’ flour to binoculars, gun stores to medical and foodstuffs along with various other supplies—at least in the loading. A chore that young, Junior Officer Boxhall was assigned as backup.

“What do you know of this missing man?” asked Captain Smith.

“The one they call Burnsey, sir?”

“No… I hear of a second missing man.”

“Oh, yes, well… the older fellow, another of the stokers.”