A Duty to the Dead

I resolutely uncapped my pen and tried to distract myself with my letter. The seagull returned to keep me company.

There’s a cheeky seagull on the railing every morning. I’ve christened him Baba, for the man who sat outside our gate in Agra and examined the goods the merchants brought to the house. Afterward he’d come round to the back garden and talk Cook into giving him

The gull flew up just as there was a deafening explosion, and the ship seemed to rock on her spine. The deck lurched where I was sitting, pen and paper flying from my lap. It was all so unexpected that I was thrown out of my chair as it too went over. I struck the bulkhead with such force that I rebounded hard against the stairs just behind me. My right arm took the brunt of that, and pain shot up to my shoulder.

I cried out in alarm, trying to scramble to my feet. The explosion had left me stunned. I could hear the shouts and screams all around me, but they seemed to come from a great distance. And then I was standing upright, holding on to the stairs with my left hand. My hearing gradually returned, and I forced myself to think clearly, to remember all those drills we’d attended again and again, and sometimes laughed about over tea.

My life belt. It was in my cabin. I had forgot to bring it on deck with me.

A rating ran by, stopping every few feet to look over the railing.

“What is it?” I called to the young seaman. “What’s happened?”

He didn’t answer, his attention on the ship’s waterline. But I really didn’t need to hear it from him. A submarine had found us and torpedoed us somewhere near the bow. It was the only explanation. Was there a second torpedo already on its way?

There was no time to stand and speculate.

Still dazed, I stumbled through the nearest sea door and went toward my cabin for my life belt. The dark-haired Irish nurse, Eileen, came running toward me in the passage, crashing into me as if she hadn’t seen me at all. It jarred my arm, and I smothered a cry. I tried to steady her, but she shook her head and ran on, disoriented and badly frightened.

I came to the next set of stairs, and it struck me suddenly that all this elegance surrounding us-elegance intended for happier voyages, for travelers dancing the night away without a care in the world-might wind up at the bottom of the sea.

Like Titanic. Or for that matter, Lusitania.

No, that mustn’t happen here-this great ocean liner would survive.

As the General Alarm was being sounded, the orderlies were collecting under the Major’s sharp eye while the rest of us were hurrying to take our stations. Since I was coming from the open deck, everyone asked me for news as they passed, but I could only shake my head and tell them I knew as little as they did. Dr. Menzies stopped me and reached for my arm.

I hadn’t noticed that my arm was cut, much less that it was bleeding rather badly. His fingers ran quickly, surely, over the skin closest to the gash. I winced at his touch.

“I rather think it’s broken. Have you got something to stop the bleeding? I’ll set it for you as soon as we know what’s happening.” And he was gone.

I reached my cabin, found my life belt on its nail, and cursed Dr. Menzies as I struggled to put the vest on properly. I hadn’t had time to notice how my arm was beginning to ache until he drew my attention to it. Now, it hurt like six devils, and I felt a first inkling of nausea from the intensity of the pain. He was right, it must be broken. I wasn’t about to touch it myself and find out.

And this wasn’t the time to be a problem for others. Using my left hand and my teeth, I managed to wind a scarf around the gash to contain the bleeding.

My kit bag lay at the foot of my bunk. Holding my right arm close to my chest, I reached into it and pulled out the small oilskin packet in which I’d learned to keep my papers and money. Shoving that down the front of my shirt, I turned and hurried back into the passage.

It was eerily quiet, as if no one was left onboard but me.

“Anyone need help?” I shouted to be sure no one was lying hurt somewhere. If I’d been thrown to the deck, it was possible that others had been tossed about as well. I listened and heard only the sounds of the ship herself. I opened the nearest doors, only to find the cabins empty. Their occupants were all on deck, then, trying to see what sort of damage we’d sustained, getting to their stations in some sort of order, waiting for instructions. Time that I joined them.

As I turned to the companionway, Captain Bartlett began speaking to the ship’s company, and I tried to make out what he was saying. My ears were still full of cotton wool and I couldn’t distinguish all the words. Something about assessing damage and no need to worry. The Abandon Ship alarm hadn’t sounded, and that was reassuring. Britannic had watertight doors. Wounded she might be but certainly not doomed. Of course they’d said the same about Titanic… At least there hadn’t been a second torpedo. Yet. I didn’t want to think about what that might have done to us.

I reached the lifeboat station as someone just ahead of me remarked, “I expect we hit a small craft. A fishing boat, most likely.” There was a nervous edge to her voice. “This is probably nothing more than a precaution.”

Marilyn Johnson answered, “I wish the captain would tell us more. But then he probably doesn’t know himself, yet.”

Most of the nurses were wearing their life belts, but several still clutched them in their hands.

The crew was busy with the boats, not lowering them yet, just preparing them. And then ahead of our station, a working detail of ratings panicked, racing to get a boat launched early, and I realized with a shock that they were intending to commandeer it.

My next thought was, Had they been down below, and did they know how bad it really was?

An officer was trying to deal with them, his voice hard and calming. “There’s no need to panic. Do your duty, damn you, and your turn will come!”

I thought it was my friend Browning, but there was tension and anger in the voice as well, changing its timbre. Not encouraging, surely.

Behind me Dr. Brighton joined the queue. He was an older man, a very good doctor, and unflappable. I’d watched him in the operating theater. He noted the scarf around my arm. “What’s this?”

I saw that blood was seeping through the pretty pattern of lilacs. “A cut,” I told him, unwilling to admit to more.

He began to unwind the scarf, then saw for himself what lay beneath. Rewinding it more efficiently, he confided to me in a low voice, “I don’t think it’s a good idea to go below for something to stabilize that bone. The portholes on E and F decks are still open, worst luck, and there’s no chance of closing them now. We’ll sink fast if the watertight doors are damaged.”

“Where was the explosion?” I asked as quietly, striving to keep my arm steady as he worked. “Starboard side, I think, near the bow-not far from where I was sitting.”

“Yes. Bartlett has just sent a distress signal. Meanwhile, damage reports are still coming in. They aren’t good.”

The ship was turning now, toward Kea in the distance, but I wasn’t sure we could make it. Something didn’t feel right about Britannic-she seemed heavier. I’d sailed in her often enough to recognize a difference. I prayed it was only my imagination running away with me.

Dr. Paterson, nearer the rail, called to Dr. Brighton. “They’re using the screws to turn, not the rudder. I don’t think that’s a good sign.” Dr. Brighton finished tying up my arm and then hurried over to join him, staring down into the water.

How many of these people can swim? For that matter, could I, with this arm?

That thought flashed through my mind as I watched the crew at their work as they readied the great arms of the lifeboat launching system.

Everyone knew the drill, but no one had believed it would ever be necessary. Five voyages into the Mediterranean, with no trouble. That had given us a false sense of security.

I watched one of the younger seamen fumble the ropes, and an older rating swore at him to mind what he was about.

Browning was by my side, saying, “I don’t like the look of that arm, Miss Crawford. Ask someone to help you into a boat, if the time comes.”

I turned. “Does anyone know what happened? I’d swear Britannic seems sluggish, as