Story Downloaded from Open Scrolls Archive (https://www.openscrolls.net)

Title: A Man In Full (#4029)
Author: Jael
Chapters: 5

Archive: Tolkien
Category: Crossovers
Description: Charles Herbert Lightoller, former Second officer of the RMS Titanic, reminisces about an enigmatic passenger and his manservant aboard the doomed ship. Drama/adventure. Characters: Thranduil; Galion; Charles H. Lightoller. Rated PG 13.
Published: 15 Apr 2009
Updated: 18 Apr 2009
Warnings:
Type: Action/adventure
Characters: Thranduil; Galion; Historical Person(s)


Chapter 1 - A Man In Full

Disclaimer: This is a work of fan fiction, done for enjoyment only. The Elves belong to JRR Tolkien. Charles Herbert Lightoller and the Titanic belong to history.

Author's Note: As you read this story, you may find yourself wondering what the devil it has to do with JRR Tolkien's Lord of the Rings. For the answer to that question and a clue to the identity of Andreas Ribeiro and his faithful manservant you might first want to read my previous story Not Fade Away.


A Man in Full


Prologue: The Channel


"O God, thy sea is so great, and my boat is so small."
Anonymous

I am an old man -- sixty-six years this past March -- and I feel every one of them in my bones when the bitter east winds blow in off the Channel. I feel it in my lungs on those nights when the fog settles in over the town, smothering sight and sound alike in a tattered yellow coverlet. Too many years of smoking my pipe I suppose, but when a man has led as hard a life as I, he deserves a few pleasures.

I may be old, but I am a goodly way from having one foot in the grave. I said as much to that impertinent fellow who rang up from the Admiralty, wanting to requisition the Sundowner and sail her to Dunkirk under a younger master. "Not bloody likely!" I told him. "She's my ship, and I'm sailing her, risk be damned!"

That earned me one of Sylvia's patented 'Charles Herbert Lightoller, behave yourself!' looks, from the big easy-chair by the fire where she sat with her knitting. Dear old girl, my Sylvia! She has put up with a great deal from me during our marriage. Long absences at sea, constant worry, and diminished expectations as her reward. The last thing she needed was an old sea-dog's salty language profaning her genteel parlour, even if I have ended my days as a chicken farmer and land speculator rather than as Master of one of the mighty passenger liners as had been my dream.

I am not in my dotage. So I know that my eyes did not play me a trick, nor did my mind that day out there on the Channel, even though my logical brain tells me that what I saw was impossible.

She was the next in line to mine as we cleared the breakwater and set out into the chop of the open Channel. Although it was the end of May, a stiff breeze chilled us and the water was cold, although nowhere near as cold as I'd once dealt with.

She was a longer slender craft, fifty-five feet to the Sundowner's sixty, with graceful lines that seemed designed to cut the water like a knife. Indeed, she seemed to handle the swells better than the surrounding boats, as if the sea itself embraced her into its cradling bosom. Her motor board identified her as the Lasgalen, out of Weymouth.

Then I saw the figure at the wheel, standing proudly tall, as if daring the Luftwaffe to take a shot. The long bright hair blowing in the wind might have fooled one into assuming a woman had been rash enough to join the flotilla, but what woman ever stood well over six feet tall? Something about that defiant posture tugged at my memory. I gave the wheel to Roger, my eldest son, and pulled out my glass to train it upon the person for a closer look. When the face came into focus, I gasped despite myself. It could not be. It simply could not be, and yet I found myself traveling back down the corridors of memory to recall the sensation of my stiff White Star Line uniform collar and the smell of fresh paint . . .

* * *


Chapter 2 - Part Two: Not Even God

Part Two: Not Even God


"Oh they built the ship Titanic to sail the ocean blue,
And they thought they'd built a ship that the water couldn't get through . . ."
American Folksong


I first saw the two of them as a pair of heads bobbing up above the crowd while our newest group of passengers embarked at Southampton. I'd seen the bustle of the docks a thousand times: the bray of auto horns and the sound of horses' feet on the cobbles as the motorcars and hansom cabs let off the departing sea voyagers. People embraced, some with smiles and laughter for those off on holiday, others tearfully for family and friends leaving the Old World forever for life in the New. Here and there, a magnificent chauffeur-driven Rolls Royce or Daimler might part the crowd as Moses did the Red Sea to deposit a first-class passenger among piles of trunks and other luggage. And overhead, our big crane swung a brand new Renault motor car into the cargo hold, bound for the garages of Mr. William Carter of Philadelphia.

Oh yes, I had seen it all before, but the sight of those two heads, one dark and one light, hatless despite the conventions of the day, sparked my curiosity. I turned to the purser. "Who is that gentleman with the bright yellow hair, Mr. McElroy? That one, just coming up the gangway?"

"I remember him from the Olympic, Mr. Lightoller," he replied, riffling through the pages of his passenger manifest. He stopped and marked with a finger. "Mr. Andreas Ribeiro and manservant, John Thomas Galwyn, of Chicago Illinois. Reason for travel: Business."

I might have been tempted to think, with such a name, that the fellow had what my forthright colleague Lowe might call a 'touch of the tar brush' in him, yet the man before me had skin as pale as any Swede.

While the valet had his hair drawn back into a neat braid, in a manner befitting a gentleman's gentleman, Ribeiro's flowed in a bright mane that reached almost to his shoulder-blades. On anyone else, that would have been effeminate. With this man, it suited him.

I had, at that time, been working the big liners for many a year and was to do so for many a year subsequent, but I confess Ribeiro intrigued me like no other passenger has done before or since. And so, I kept my eye on him as the voyage progressed.

My first memory of our short time at sea together -- a vivid one for reasons that shall soon become obvious -- was on a bright day as I left my cabin to begin a watch. I saw Ribeiro strolling the boat deck as the coast of Ireland faded into the distance, his valet in tow. I watched as his eyes ran appraisingly over the lifeboats trimmed and stowed neatly in their davits and his lips thinned into a grim line.

He turned and spied me in my officer's uniform. "Excuse me, Mr. . . .?"

"Lightoller," I informed him. "Second Officer."

"Yes, Mr. Lightoller. I wonder if you could tell me the capacity of one of these lifeboats?"

"Sixty-five persons," I replied.

"And you have sixteen of them?" he continued, counting the sets of davits along the port rail..

"Actually, that would be twenty, sir. We have four Engelhart collapsibles in addition to the ones in the davits. That is four more lifeboats than required by the British Board of Trade for a ship of Titanic's tonnage. White Star Line is very attentive to the regulations."

He gave his valet a queer look then and turned back to me. "What is the ship's capacity, Mr. Lightoller?"

"Two thousand five hundred and ninety-nine passengers," I replied, "with a further nine hundred in crew." He did not look very happy about this, so I added, "But we're not running at full capacity this trip. We've only slightly less than thirteen hundred passengers aboard."

Ribeiro furrowed his brow and turned again to his valet. "Correct me, Galwyn, if my computations are wrong, but I see a discrepancy here."

"Yes, sir," the man murmured, his expression remaining impassive. "A discrepancy."

Ribeiro flashed me a smile that did not reach his eyes. "I overheard a dockworker telling a lady passenger at Southampton that not even God could sink this ship. Surely you and the White Star line do not subscribe to that nonsense? Or are these lifeboats merely for decoration?"

How like a landsman, I thought. No understanding of the harsh realities of the ocean at all. "Of course not. No man who sails the salt seas ever believes a ship can be unsinkable." I dropped my voice, because he seemed a reasonable enough chap and able to handle candour. "In the event of a founder in mid-ocean, any true sailor knows that lifeboats merely prolong the inevitable. You drift to die of exposure or starvation, unless a squall or a rogue wave puts a quick end to you."

"You make it sound a mercy not to have a place in a lifeboat," he said. "Which some of us will not if something goes wrong."

"Nothing will go wrong, sir," I assured him. "Titanic is designed to remain afloat with any four of her forward watertight compartments completely flooded. An accident that would cause any more damage than that is extremely unlikely."

Again he turned to his valet. "Extremely unlikely. What do you think of that, Galwyn?"

"If I may be so bold, sir," the man replied, "my experience in life has taught me that if something can possibly go wrong, it will go wrong, and it is always wise to be prepared for any eventuality. But I am just a humble servant, and no one ever asks me."

Ribeiro laughed and favored me with a smile that reached his eyes this time. "Well, there you have it, Mr. Lightoller: the opinion of the common man. However, I suppose the White Star lines did not build Titanic for such folks as Mr. Galwyn here." He nodded pleasantly and the two of them continued their stroll aft.

Ribeiro had hit on the truth, although I doubt he knew it. Titanic's lifeboats hung in Welin davits, specially designed to lower their first load and then crank back to pick up another lifeboat from the deck. Harland and Wolff's designer Thomas Andrews, who was sailing with us on the maiden voyage, had originally specified extra lifeboats at each station, arrayed in stacks of three. Ultimately the owners of White Star lines had vetoed this, preferring more space on the boat deck for the first-class passengers to take the air to superfluous safety on a ship deemed to be virtually unsinkable.

From the vantage point of later experience I can only sigh at my own hubris and shake my head. And in those moments I reach for my Bible and read the wisdom of Proverbs 16:18: Pride goeth before destruction, and an haughty spirit before a fall.

It takes more than a full purse and rich clothing to make a gentleman, and in this regard, Ribeiro did not disappoint me. There hung about him an air of quiet nobility, unchanging whether he dealt with his peers or those who might have been considered his inferiors.

He was decent to Astor, I recall. John Jacob Astor was just now returning from an extended honeymoon in Europe, following an equally extended divorce. Like any man with a wife less than half his age, the chap was so absurdly proud of his new bride and her obvious impending motherhood. Ribeiro always had a smile of genuine warmth for the young woman, a distinct contrast from some of the others -- friends, no doubt, of the previous Mrs. Astor -- who treated the couple with the glacial air of icy correctness required by polite society.

Ribeiro had a seat at the Captain's table, but other than our first evening out, at which he seemed mildly ill at ease, it remained empty. Through my contacts with the stewards, I learned that he subsequently took his meals in the Café Parisienne in the company of his valet, and of Mrs. Brown, who often joined them.

I daresay the presence of a servant at table surprised some, although most were too well-bred to show it. On the first day, I am told, Ribeiro, as if sensing a subtle air of disapproval from his waiter, merely raised an eyebrow and remarked, "He's here in case I drop my napkin."

Ribeiro must have been exceedingly prone to dropping things, for it was always that way I saw him, wandering the decks, his manservant ever at his shoulder. He shunned the smoking lounge, with its ever-present aroma of pipe and cigar; where he spent his evenings, I had no idea until one morning, the third day out, I spied one of the Third Class stewards eying him sidelong with a visible air of disapproval.

I gave the man a stern look. We had no business judging our passengers, no matter how eccentric they might appear. Noticing my rebuke, he said: "It's a disgrace, Mr. Lightoller. Him, a gentleman, stooping to slumming in steerage!"

My response to this was a quiet sigh. Thomas Mullin was a young man, not yet seasoned in the ways of the world. My own experience had given me greater sophistication. I knew that there were certain pleasures to be derived in Third Class; the exchange of coin for companionship often proved beneficial to both a gentleman and a young woman looking to establish herself in a new life. Yet such a thing might develop into an embarrassment for the company if allowed to become too blatant. "Has there been a problem with any of the young ladies?"

"Oh, no, Mr. Lightoller, nothing like that," Mullin hastened to say. "The two of them have been down there the past two nights running -- him and that man of his -- drinking and playing cards with the men. He's right popular with that crowd, because he loses, mostly."

He paused then, his face taking on a faraway expression. "Last night, one of the steerage passengers had a fiddle and another had a bagpipe, and Ribeiro and his man danced."

"With the girls?"

"No, sir -- with each other, while the fiddler and the piper played a reel. I've never seen the like of it, the two of them arm in arm, swinging and kicking high they seemed to hover like hummingbirds!"

I could not help but smile at this.

"And then, Mr. Lightoller, at the end they kissed, full on the mouth. I can tell you, I saw some raised eyebrows among the Irish and the Swedes. But it garnered them some applause from the Turks."

I was still smiling while I prepared for bed that night. Scattered reports of ice and the falling temperatures could not dampen my mood. As we steamed westward, the clear sky was filled with a thousand bright stars; the sea was as calm as a millpond. The mighty ship beneath me was the pinnacle of modern technology.

As soon as my head hit the pillow, I fell into the untroubled sleep of the blissfully ignorant on this, the final night of my old world.

* * *


Chapter 3 - Part Three: The Chivalry of the Sea

Part Three: The Chivalry of the Sea

"Hold me up in mighty waters
Keep my eyes on things above --
Righteousness, divine atonement . . ."
Hymn, Autumn



I was dragged up from dreams by a hitch in the ship's familiar vibration, a sensation as gentle as the scrape of a wooden keel against the pebbled bottom of a lakeshore. For a moment, and a moment only, I drifted, lulled by the remnants of sleep. It seemed that I might well be lying in the bottom of a rowboat, rocked by the gentle waves of an English lake and staring up into a warm summer night.

Then I sat bolt upright in bed. "Hang on," I said into the darkness. "We're in the middle of the Atlantic!"

I leapt from my bed and ran, still in my pyjamas, out onto the deck. A quick glance over the portside rail revealed only calm flat sea. I sprinted round to the starboard and saw nothing there either. I thought that perhaps my eye might have spied the glint of something from the well deck, but I could not be sure.

The biting cold drove me back into the shelter of my cabin. I found myself mightily tempted to head on up to the bridge and ask Murdoch what had just happened, but I soon realized that neither my pyjamas nor my idle curiosity would earn me a warm welcome there. In the end, I decided to stay where I could easily be found. Whether lost in the woods or serving as a deck officer aboard a big liner, the best course of action is to sit tight and wait for them to come to you.

Sure enough, within ten minutes I heard a knock at the door and young Boxhall stuck his head in. One look at his face drove the last hope that our predicament was something as simple as a thrown propeller straightway from my mind.

"We've struck an iceberg," he said.

"I knew we hit something," I replied.

"The water is up to F Deck in the mail room."

I looked at him, suddenly feeling a chill in the pit of my stomach as though I had downed an entire glass of ice water without pausing to breathe. Nothing further needed to be said. He nodded and left, shutting the door behind him.

I pulled on clothing: trousers over my pyjama bottoms, a sweater on top, and a greatcoat over all of that. With water already up to F Deck, there was no time to lose making myself tidy. Outside on the Boat Deck, the bustle had begun. Seamen had hurried topside in response to the "all men on deck", and passengers had begun to wander up. I saw Ribeiro and his man still in evening dress and seeming not to feel the chill, and I gave him a brief nod as I assessed the situation. The ship was already well down at the head, and although I'd had no orders from Captain Smith I knew the first order of business was readying the lifeboats.

The roar of Titanic letting off her excess steam through all eight vents made it impossible for a man to form a cogent order much less communicate it over the din; I found myself limited to hand gestures. Nevertheless, I managed to set the men about the task of stripping the covers off the lifeboats and cranking the davits out into the lowering position.

Right around the time the Bosun's Mate indicated to me that the boats were in readiness, I spied Captain Smith just outside the wheelhouse, and I drew him into a corner. Cupping my hand to his ear in order to be heard over the roar of the steam, I yelled, "Hadn't we better get the women and children into the boats, sir?" He looked blankly at me for a moment and then gave a slow nod.

First Officer Murdoch took charge of loading the boats on the starboard side of the ship while I oversaw the port. We had quite a crowd of passengers by now: husbands and wives, women carrying small children, all in stages of dress from night attire to full evening regalia, their lifebelts over that. "Begin to load the boats, please," I shouted, although I daresay those around were able to understand me only by the movement of my lips. "Women and children only."

Ribeiro stepped out of the crowd and came toward me, trailed by his valet, who carried two lifebelts draped over his arm as casually as if they were a carriage rug in preparation for an afternoon outing. "I'm sorry, sir," I repeated. "Women and children only in the boats."

He shook his head angrily and inclined his head to bring his lips close to my ear. "I have no intention of getting into a boat. I'm offering you my assistance. The last thing you want here is a panic."

I looked him up and down. I would not have described him and his manservant as burly men -- quite the opposite -- but they were both very tall. Up close, he radiated strength and the calm of a man used to taking charge in any situation. I decided the two of them would be useful chaps to have about in a pinch. "Very well," I said, nodding to the life vests over the valet's arm. "But you should be wearing those."

Ribeiro smiled wanly and leaned in even closer. "Floating is the least of my worries. It would hamper my ability to swim in the event that I needed to distance myself from, say, a large sinking object. Can you look me in the eye, Mr. Lightoller, and promise me that I will not be swimming by the time this night is over?"

I tried then to do my duty to the White Star Line, to project the confidence needed in such a situation, but thinking on the noticeable settling of the ship by now and recalling the lost look in Captain Smith's eyes, the words stuck in my throat. Looking back on it, I think this was the first time I admitted the obvious truth to myself: Titanic was sinking. I remained silent.

"I see," Ribeiro continued. "You and I have an agreement then."

I nodded. "Yes, an agreement. You still should put on your belt, sir, if only as an example to the others."

Just then, the noise of the venting steam ceased, and my last words rang out in the ensuing silence as loudly as if I'd been an impassioned orator haranguing the crowd from a soapbox in Piccadilly Square. I hastened to moderate my tone and infuse it with the necessary confidence. "It's a precaution, merely. Do you see that ship, yonder?" I gestured toward a set of lights on the horizon, which I presumed to be those of a sizeable steamer. "She's been hailed by Marconi and Morse lamp, and I imagine she's coming to our aid as I speak."

"Just a precaution," Ribeiro repeated, with a wry look at my own midsection. "I'll wear mine, Mr. Lightoller, when you put on yours."

He had me there. With a quick nod, I turned to my duty, giving orders to fire off our distress rockets. Surely the steamer could not fail to notice. As the first of the flares burst overhead, bathing us all in a ruddy green flash, I heard a collective 'Ahhh!' rise up from some of the children among the assembled passengers, as if they were viewing a fireworks show for Guy Fawkes Day or some mid-summer extravaganza over the Thames.

At first, there were few takers for the boats. The women were reluctant to be separated from their men, and most, still believing White Star's vaunted fiction about the ship's invulnerability, preferred the illusory safety of the 'unsinkable' Titanic to the prospect of bobbing around on the dark Atlantic in a flimsy lifeboat.

We were further hampered by the fact that we had not yet had the chance -- or perhaps not thought it necessary -- to hold a boat drill. None of the passengers knew where to go or to which boat they were assigned, and all was confusion as they milled about awaiting their turns or deciding whether to go or stay.

At last I felt I had a sufficient number in the first boat -- Number 6, it was -- and I gave the order to lower away. Ribiero gained my attention with a tap on the arm and drew me aside. "Only forty? You told me the full capacity of these boats is sixty-five."

"Floating capacity," I replied, perhaps more sharply than was courteous. "Lowering capacity is quite another matter. Do you wish to see this keel snap?" The last thing I wanted was to overload the boat and drop millionaires' wives and children six stories into the freezing water.

Ribiero did not look at all happy to hear this, nor should he have, given our conversation three days earlier. He gave an angry shake of his head and stepped back, muttering to that man of his.

If only I had known then what I learned later! Harland and Wolff had indeed performed lowering tests with sand bags equaling the weight of sixty-five persons, and the boats had held up under the load. However, through the same oversight that had neglected to stock the crow's-nest with binoculars, we officers had not been informed of this. How many more lives might I have saved that night had they done so?

Mindful of the sparsely loaded boats, I directed the Bosun's Mate to take six hands down to open the port lower-deck gangway door, abreast of the No. 2 hatch, for the boats to row around and pick up extra passengers at the water level. Off they went, uncomplaining, never questioning their duty. None of them was ever seen again. Perhaps they were caught by a sudden rush of water in the corridors below, or perhaps they performed their mission and Titanic lies in her watery grave with a cargo door open, ready to discharge passengers into boats that never returned. I will never know.

Although he had a habit of asking inconvenient questions, Ribeiro proved himself invaluable, and more than once that night I found myself glad to have him around, especially as things grew more dire. By the end, when there might have been a temptation for the panicked crowd to rush the boats, I felt no worry. His very size and calm presence at my elbow seemed to forestall such an eventuality.

From time to time, I nipped away to take a peek down the long emergency staircase that ran from the boat deck down to C deck. In better times, it served as a shortcut for the crew; now it provided a benchmark for the ship's distress, as the water crept inexorably up the stairwell. I still see the eerie green glow of the submerged corridor lamps in my dreams. And each time as I returned to the task of loading, I glanced to the southwest, to the distant lights of that mystery ship and thought, 'Why does she not come?'

How things went that night on the starboard side, I have no idea. I've heard tales, and there is the telling fact of the survival of a number of male passengers, Mr. J. Bruce Ismay, President of White Star Lines among them, but my colleague Mr. Murdoch is not around to explain his reasoning. For my part, I'm proud to say that not a man entered those boats on my watch. All did their duty according to the ancient chivalry of the sea that puts the women and children first even in the face of certain death.

I've no regrets, even when it broke my heart. Partway through the loading, I found Mr. and Mrs. Isidor Strauss, the owners of Macy's Department Store in New York, standing near the deckhouse and chatting quietly to each other. "Can I take you along to the boats?" I enquired of Mrs. Strauss.

She looked to the grey-haired man at her side. "I've always stayed with my husband; why should I leave him now?"

He spoke to her with a reassuring smile, calling her by her given name and telling her to get in the boat, yet she shook her head. "Not yet."

A group of nearby friends chimed in then, Ribeiro among them. "I'm sure no one would object to an older gentleman like Mr. Straus getting in . . ."

Strauss would have none of that. "I will not go before the other men."

That sealed it. "We have been living together for many years. Where you go, I go," Mrs. Strauss replied, patting his arm, and the two of them sat down on a pair of deck chairs to await the end.

Theirs was not the only example of tragic devotion. I found a young couple, from the western states according to the twang of the girl's speech, sitting on a fan casing. "Not on your life," she told me when I offered to conduct her to a boat. "We started together, and if need be we'll finish together."

Ribeiro's face as he watched this exchange, was thin-lipped and wan in the greenish light of our last distress flare. As we turned away, his manservant bowed and gravely offered the two of them the lifebelts he carried.

Young and old, the power of love transcends the fear of death, but not all are so unencumbered. Courage comes in many forms. Husbands and fathers handed their families off to us with a brave smile and a shouted promise to be along on the next boat, the 'Daddies' boat', while their wives, with children clinging to their skirts, pretended to believe it. Their valour was no less.

At this point, Mr. Hartley, the band leader, had brought his musicians out on deck, and the partings took place to the incongruously cheery strains of ragtime and salon waltzes. With each boat I lowered, I sent away two of my deck crew to man them, and I found myself shy of White Star personnel to perform the loading. The women needed help negotiating the high railings, and not for the first time, I found myself cursing the fashion of the day, the hobble skirts and high heels that hampered them.

As the deck tilted more alarmingly, and my crew grew ever scarcer, I roped Ribeiro into service. He assisted the women up and into the boats with the same courtly air I'd seen him use to escort Mrs. Brown to her table, and only once did I see his calm slip. A rather large lady whose husband had brought her through the ever tightening ring of anxious men balked at the sight of the gap between railing and boat and clung to her man. "Please, Gwendolyn," the frantic chap begged, "you must be reasonable!" but his wife was having none of it.

Without a word, Ribeiro picked up the woman, who must have gone fourteen stone at least and chucked her over the gunwales with no more effort than if she'd been a down-filled bolster. I saw his manservant hide a smile behind his raised hand. But after that, the rest went with no backchat.

I checked the stairwell again. The water had risen up several decks, and Titanic's bow had dipped further into the sea. With little time to lose, I forgot my earlier caution and loaded the boats as fully as possible. My earlier plan had gone by the board, for the cargo doors were now underwater.

Boat Number 4 was the next to last. Ribeiro knitted his brows in pain as John Jacob Astor handed his wife into the boat and asked if he might be allowed to accompany her since she was, as he put it, in a delicate condition. I shook my head no, and with a last sad look at his young bride, the man stepped back and disappeared into the crowd.

Next came the Ryerson family: Mrs. Ryerson, the two girls and their maid. When young Jack Ryerson, a lad just into long pants, followed his mother to the rail, I put up my hand. "That boy can't go."

"Of course the boy goes with his mother," insisted Mr. Ryerson, in the same tones he no doubt used to address the employees at his steel company. "He's only thirteen!"

In my mind thirteen was man enough to stay with the others, and I began to say so, but I felt Ribeiro clasp my elbow and draw me aside. "In God's name, Mr. Lightoller," he whispered, "that is the man's posterity there. At least grant him the peace of knowing that his boy is safe as he faces what is to come."

I found myself staring directly into his face. Looking at him -- really seeing him for the first time without the artificial barrier of our different social positions -- I realized he seemed barely old enough to be more than a few years past his first acquaintance with a razor. What could he possibly know about parenthood? But something in the depths of those young-old eyes pulled me up short, and I thought of my own three sons at home safe in their beds, perhaps soon to be orphans.

"Very well," I said, motioning the lad onward. But as the boat lowered away I turned my head and muttered, "No more boys."

No. 4 was the last of our regular lifeboats. That left only the Englehardt collapsibles: Boat D stowed beside the No. 2 davits and 'B' lashed to the roof of the officers quarters. It was a stupid place for a craft that would be needed in an emergency, but like everything else that night it was the hand we were dealt.

We retrieved the falls and got 'D' ready to go. Thinking better safe than sorry, I had my remaining crew link arms in a ring, ready to let only the women through. Even then, at the very end, there was no panic. A father brought two young boys -- they could have been no older than two and four -- to the edge of the ring and stooped to whisper something into the older one's ear before handing them through. A husband brought his wife; Colonel Gracie ushered two unattended ladies through.

I stood, one foot on the railing, one foot on the gunwale, helping the ladies across. So many left aboard; so little time. We dared wait no longer; the lights of the ship had begun to glow red. As I gave the signal to lower, one of my men said, "You go with her, Lightoller."

"Not damn likely," I shouted and jumped back as she started away. The water was close now, so close. I looked up and saw Ribeiro and my trimmer, Hemming, already up on the roof of the officers quarters working at the lashings. A hand down from Ribeiro, a knee up from the manservant, Galwyn, and I found myself atop the roof there with them.

It was a hopeless tangle, or perhaps our panic made us clumsy. As I struggled, I heard the band give up its ragtime and launch into the strains of an old hymn, and I set aside a quiet corner of my mind to marvel at the complexity of the human spirit, each of us finding comfort in prosaic activities, in the performance of our duty, even at the brink of the abyss.

Then, Ribeiro had hold of a fire-axe, and he began to wield it one-handed, his muscles bunching like cords under the tight sleeves of his dinner jacket. One by one, the cords securing the boat parted with a snap. We had her free, and with a heave at the gunwales she flipped and crashed to the deck below. Agile as a cat, Ribeiro leapt down after her.

No time for me. The band fell silent. The ship gave a plunge forward then, and a great wave rolled up from the bow. Crowds of people fled from it, struggling their way back up the tilting deck. They were only prolonging the inevitable, I thought. It would be suicide to end up mixed in among that crowd.

Looking down, I saw Ribeiro and his man link arms and face the oncoming water. His lips moved in a single word -- Alberecht, it looked to me as if he said -- and then he let out a yell, not a womanish scream but a high-pitched cry like a war-whoop, and together the two of them sprang into the sea.

I had only a little time to think, 'This is it, old man. You're about to find out if the principles of self-reliance taught you by your faith will serve you in good stead.' I briefly looked back, tempted by the solidity of Titanic's still dry stern. But Ribeiro's wild war-cry still echoed in my ears and put the fire into my own blood.

"Into thy hands," I whispered, and jumped.

* * *


Chapter 4 - Part Four: For Those In Peril

Part Four: For Those in Peril

"Tears for the dead who will not come again
Homeward to any shore on any tide . . ."
Toll of the Sea, O.S. 1912


How can I begin to describe the sensation of plunging into water whose temperature is two degrees below freezing? It felt like a thousand blades slashing me on every part of my body, and it left me unable to draw breath, while robbing me of my ability to think. In my confusion, I made for the crow's nest, which was still above water. Only at the last minute did I realize what a foolish mistake this was, and I let go before it drew me under.

No sooner had I let go of the crow's nest than I felt myself sucked backwards by a great rush of water flowing down the ventilator shaft at the front of the forward funnel. There I lay, pinned like a bug, struggling for all I was worth and fearing every minute that the flimsy wire grating would give way and send me deep into the bowels of the ship. I could feel the ship settling ever deeper; my ears began to pop from the pressure, while the air in my lungs began to run out.

An eerie calm came over me then. As I prepared to meet my Maker, my thoughts turned to my dear wife. 'Oh, Sylvia, how I wish I could have seen you one more time before the end!'

It seemed then I heard her voice in my head. 'Don’t be afraid, Bertie. Remember the words of the Psalm: He shall give his angels charge over thee.' Suddenly, a great blast of hot air from some subterranean explosion came up the shaft, freeing me and blowing me upward.

The first thing I saw as I bobbed to the surface was the keel of overturned Collapsible B, which had floated around to the starboard after the forward edge of the boat deck went under. I swam for her with all my might and managed to grab onto one of the ropes strung along her side. I heard a loud groan of metal along with the reports of guy-wires snapping one by one as they tore loose from the deck. The pressure of water at the base had undermined the forward funnel, and it tilted slowly with the list of the ship, finally giving way and toppling onto the mass of people struggling in the water. It crashed down, missing me by only inches, or so it seemed to me at the time.

In the last moments, I fancied I saw the horror-stricken face of John Jacob Astor -- poor Astor who had so much to live for with his pretty young wife and new child on the way. My impression proved true when later the McKay-Bennet, the steamer sent out to the sinking site with a hold full of ice and all the embalming supplies the city of Halifax could provide, recovered his body, which they identified by the money in his pockets and the diamond ring on his finger. It was blackened with soot and crushed to a pulp.

The richest man on board the Titanic died alongside the poorest immigrants, and so he lay in death.

I shall never forget or forgive being asked later at the American Inquiry if the collapse of the funnel 'hurt anyone'. I daresay it did. I daresay.

The misfortune of those poor people, however, proved a godsend to me. The mighty wave raised up by the falling funnel lifted the collapsible, with me clinging for dear life to its side, and carried us some fifty yards. By the time it crested and passed on, we were well away from the sinking ship. I turned to look back over my shoulder, the frigid water forgotten while I paused, transfixed at the spectacle of Titanic's death throes.

The lights flickered once and then went off. I heard the anguished scream of tearing metal, and the ship tilted slowly upward until her bulk pointed up into the night sky like a black finger. There came a rumbling noise as if every object inside the ship had broken loose and plummeted toward the bow. She seemed to right herself for a moment, paused and then, picking up speed, sank beneath the waves with only a gulping noise to mark her passing.

With Titanic's disappearance there began the noise of over a thousand tortured souls struggling in the freezing water. Survivors in the lifeboats have gone on to describe it as the sound of locusts on a summer night or the roar of excited spectators at a sporting match. Up close it was a different thing entirely -- the pleading voices of men crying out to their God in a multiplicity of tongues and to their own mothers; the piteous screams of women, for yes, somehow there remained women who had not made it into the lifeboats; and the frightened wails of children . . .

To be in amongst that mass of suffering humanity and be utterly unable to do a thing to help them would break the heart and the will of even the strongest man. I have written elsewhere that it is best not to dwell on such things, but I will tell you here -- that sound will stay with me to the end of my days.

I turned my face away and clung, dazed, to the side of the collapsible until a rough voice brought me around. "Ere -- get off! Get away or you'll swamp us!" This was followed by a muffled thump as if solid wood had hit something soft.

I looked up to see a pair of arms waving an oar and an indistinct form making off through the water. That wouldn't do! "Get a grip on yourselves!" I shouted. "Are we men or beasts? We won't get through this unless we straighten up and pull together."

I hoisted myself up onto the bow of the boat, with some difficulty, since I was having trouble making my cold hands work. "Listen to the officer," I heard another voice yell.

The sight of perhaps twenty men sprawled over the collapsible keel and clinging to its sides greeted me. "Stand up," I directed. "We need to trim the boat or we'll capsize for sure."

As the men struggled carefully to their feet I heard the belch of trapped air escaping from beneath the boat, and I could well understand their wish to drive off any further comers with oars and fists. I suppose a lot of that had occurred before I became aware, but our only chance now was to behave as civilized men instead of savages. "Splendid," I said. "There's the ticket! You, there -- move a bit toward the center. And you, change places with that heavier chap beside you." From my spot on the bow, I spied young Mr. Bride, the Marconi operator, back at the stern.

"I say, Sparks, were you able to raise that ship whose light we saw off to the southwest?"

"Not a word, sir," he called back. "The closest ship to us is the Carpathia. She's on her way as we speak."

"How long, do you think, before she reaches us?"

"Four hours, her captain said."

My heart sank. I felt I could barely last another ten minutes, soaked to the skin in that bitter cold and balancing on a bobbing cork in the dark, but I pulled myself together and infused my voice with hearty cheer. "That's no time at all! Hang on, lads. It will fly by in the blink of an eye."

About this time, a man came paddling up whom I recognized as one of the assistant bakers, a Mr. Joughin. He took it with good grace when I told him the best we could offer was the opportunity to cling to the side of the boat and keep his head and shoulders partly out of the water, although I did note to myself that several of the men already atop the boat looked so poorly that there might be room quite soon. Although he later denied it, I suspect he'd had quite a lot to drink that night, for I could smell a whiff of strong spirits over the dank odor of the seawater and the ice, and he seemed quite content to tread water until his turn came.

By this time, the cries of those in the water had died down somewhat, a fact for which I was intensely grateful, but it also troubled me. The cold was taking its victims even more rapidly than expected. How long could we hope to hold out? I knew that any of the lifeboats with the courage to return would wait for awhile for fear of being swamped in the rush, but would they wait too long?

I heard a faint voice come out of the darkness. "Have you room for two more?" I looked to see a familiar pair of heads, one dark, one light, approaching, still swimming linked arm in arm. The two of them looked a bit worse for wear, and once they had come close enough for me to make out details in the starlight I saw that the manservant had a scrape on his cheek as if he'd collided with a piece of dislodged wreckage, but they were alive, and that lifted my spirits.

"Ahoy, Mr. Ribeiro," I replied. "We'll bring you aboard as soon as we've trimmed ourselves out a bit. Until then you may hold onto the side." I directed them to the side opposite the baker. "Try to get as much of your body out of the water as you can. You really should have worn your life vest, sir."

He gave me a look. "If I had, I'd be floating right properly back among the rest. I'll take my chances here, thank you."

Time behaves oddly in a crisis, stretching out and speeding up, depending, so I do not know how long those two were in the water, only that they were the last to leave it, even after we'd brought the baker aboard. Sometime during that eternity of waiting, I heard young Bride call from the stern, "I'm afraid we have another man dead back here, Mr. Lightoller."

"Lower him off, then." I turned to the two still in the water. "One of you two may come up now."

Ribeiro lost no time. "You, Galwyn."

"But sir," the man protested, letting out a little cough, "we dare not risk losing y--"

"That's an order," Ribeiro snapped, in a tone that sounded almost military. Then his voice gentled. "Go on, old friend. Up you get."

The valet looked unhappy, but he did as he was told, climbing stiffly up onto the keel, where he stood shivering and staring nervously at his companion in the water. For a man his size, his weight had shifted the boat surprisingly little. I thought it over for a moment and made my decision. "I think it would be all right if you came up too, Mr. Ribeiro, as long as you're careful while you do it."

He gave me a nod of gratitude. "I won't say no to that, Mr. Lightoller. This water is damned cold."

He came aboard, as slick as an otter slithering up a river bank and carefully stood up. Then his face broke into a rueful smile, almost on the verge of chuckling to himself. I gave him a puzzled look. He seemed utterly miserable and bedraggled, soaked to the skin, his long hair frozen into little tips of ice. I saw one of his ears poking through the wet strands, the tip of it not rounded as a normal man's but with a gentle point like that of an elm leaf. The poor chap was deformed, for all his good looks and wealth, and I thought to myself there was no such thing as perfection in this world. Surely there was nothing about our situation to provoke amusement. "What?" I asked him.

"You see, Lightoller?" he said. "Here we are in the middle of the dark Atlantic with the water a scant few inches from our shoes. Our prospects for rescue before we succumb to the cold and the sea are exceedingly slim, yet this is what men will do to prolong the inevitable. We will fight, claw our way up over our fellows, for even a few extra moments of breath. I imagine those poor beggars back there," he jerked his chin back in the direction of the mass of people in the water, which had mercifully grown quiet by now, "felt the same way about it."

"You have a point, sir," I told him, and returned the smile. It was either that or weep.

As the night progressed, the sea, which had been like glass, began to pick up into swells, along with the wind. The best I could do was keep an eye out for each approaching wave, yelling, "Lean right," and "lean left!" as they came in. Against the wind there was no protection, other than the shelter of our massed bodies. The Engelhardt had cork flotation compartments, but I greatly feared they had been damaged during the plunge from the roof of the officers' quarters, and it seemed, to me at least, she sank lower and lower until each incoming swell splashed our knees with spray.

Although subsequent history tells me that it was only about two and a half hours from the time the Titanic sank until the first fingers of dawn lit the eastern sky, to me it seemed like an eternity. The faint sliver of a new moon had risen over the horizon, and Venus, the Morning Star, hung beside it, brighter than all the others.

I saw Ribeiro look to the east and nudge his manservant, who had begun to shiver slightly, although the two of them stood close together, sharing the warmth of their bodies. "Look, old friend," he said, pointing at the silver crescent. "Don't lose hope."

Then he stiffened to attention and peered off into the dawn. "I think help is at hand."

I looked too and made out faint lights on the southeastern horizon. "It's the Carpathia -- she's here!" I feared, though, that it would be quite some time before she discovered our tiny raft. Did we have that long?

"No -- closer still," Ribeiro said. "Blow your whistle, Mr. Lightoller!"

How he picked out that dark boat against dark water in the twilight gloom, I will ever know, but I strained my eyes and saw what he did. It was Seaman Clench in Lifeboat 12. I pulled out my officer's whistle and blew for all I was worth. Soon they were at our side, and I transferred my men, just about done for, into the boat's remaining empty seats beside the women.

This left the boat dangerously overloaded, with some seventy-five people aboard, and slowly we began to make our way to the Carpathia, about four miles distant. A kind lady had lent me her cloak, which I accepted gratefully, for I was soaked to the skin and half frozen. Her young daughter sat at my feet gazing up at me in wide-eyed hero-worship that warmed my heart if not my body as I worked the tiller. In the brightening dawn it seemed that we sailed through an arctic wonderland, with the sky turning all shades of pink from mauve to salmon and the newly-revealed bergs glinting like diamonds as the rising sun struck them.

Ours was the last lifeboat to reach the Carpathia, and none too soon, for the sea picked up in earnest then, sending at least two waves crashing over our bows and threatening to swamp us. The captain swung the bow of his ship around to help us, and we moved into its lee, safe at last to be hauled up by rope ladder and bosun's chair.

I remained behind to oversee the unloading of the last survivor and watch as Captain Rostron brought Titanic's lifeboats aboard and stowed them on the deck. And so it must have been past 8:30 when I entered the dining saloon and spied Ribeiro and his manservant sitting on a bench against the wall, waiting patiently for a steward to see to their wet clothing.

Ribeiro hailed me down. "How many, Mr. Lightoller? How many saved?"

I shook my head. "We haven't taken an accurate count as yet, but Captain Rostron tells me it's slightly over seven hundred."

Just then, Mr. Ismay, ashen faced and silent, was ushered past by the Carpathia's doctor, who was muttering something about sedation. From the grim set of Ribeiro's lips, I could see the same thought had crossed his mind as troubled mine: the man whose business decisions had ensured that there were not enough lifeboats for all aboard had managed to find a seat in one himself.

"Captain Smith?"

Again, I shook my head. The Titanic's skipper had not been among the saved, nor had I expected him to be.

"What about Mr. Andrews?" he continued, referring to the Titanic's young designer, along on the maiden voyage to work out any remaining kinks.

"One of the stewards tells me he saw him last in the First Class reading room. He didn't even make a try for it. I imagine the loss of his unsinkable ship hit him hard."

"It hits us all hard when that in which we place our trust fails," he said. Just then, his valet broke out into a fit of coughing, and Ribeiro calmly removed his jacket and set it about the man's shoulders, turning back to me in just his shirtsleeves. "She was a thing of beauty, Mr. Lightoller, as are so many works of the hand. But it is a mistake to put too much faith in works of the hand, or in any kind of technology. I've seen too many fall into that trap before."

He paused and tapped his right bicep, and through the soaked linen I could make out the ghost of a strange dark mark. "Here is where you can put your trust: in the strength of human flesh and the resilience of our spirit. That is what got us through last night, not cunningly wrought metal nor Mr. Ismay's unsinkable ship. We'd all do well to remember it."

"Hear, hear," muttered his valet. "It's what's brought us this far."

One of Carpathia's stewards arrived then with blankets and most-welcome cups of coffee, and I went on about my business.

* * *

Three days later, as the Carpathia steamed into New York, a spring thunderstorm greeted us, lighting the evening sky about the Hudson with flashes of lighting and wetting the crowds waiting on the docks. The authorities, mindful of the privacy of the survivors and their waiting families, had blocked the general public from the pier.

I stood at the rail watching the passengers disembark, some to joyous reunions, others to tears and embraces in honor of those who did not walk beside them down the gangway.

I saw a pale-haired young man flanked by an equally young woman, both standing quietly but peering anxiously at the crowd of survivors. When Ribeiro and his valet started down, this woman, no more than a girl, really, broke free and ran towards him, her hat and hairpins pulling from her head and leaving her dark hair streaming out behind her in the drizzle. Ribeiro brightened at the sight of her and, leaving his man behind, dodged his way through the departing passengers with the grace of a dancer.

Much to my surprise, for I had rather assumed that Ribeiro and his manservant had a particular friendship and were neither of them the marrying sort, he and the lady met at the foot of the gangway in an embrace that lasted far longer than decorum allowed. By this time, Mr. Galwyn and the girl's pale-haired companion had caught up, and I saw the two of them greet with a hearty clap on the shoulder. Then the four of them turned and left, tall heads above the crowd, and I saw them no more.

* * *


Chapter 5 - Epilogue: Never Surrender

Epilogue: Never Surrender

"We shall go on to the end, we shall fight in France, we shall fight on the seas and oceans, we shall fight with growing confidence and growing strength in the air, we shall defend our Island, whatever the cost may be, we shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills; we shall never surrender ..."
Winston Churchill

Life changed after the loss of Titanic, and not just in the painfully obvious expedient of requiring lifeboats for all aboard a vessel. Never again would we feel quite so confident in the marvels the modern age had to offer. We had lost our innocence.

And I had lost mine. As the years passed it became all too clear that the bright career I'd had before me, my hope of becoming master of one of the great transatlantic liners, was not to be. The loyalty I'd shown the White Star lines on that fateful night in April and during the subsequent enquiries before the American Senate and the British Board of Trade, during which I told the truth but did not say much that might have been said, was not returned. At the end of twenty years' service it was, "Goodbye, good luck," and nothing more.

I never saw or heard of Andreas Ribeiro, or even thought of him, until that day out on the channel, on our way to Dunkirk. I brought my glasses to bear upon the man at the wheel of the Lasgalen, his face, framed by a mass of bright hair blowing in the easterly breeze, still unlined, his body youthfully slender. A dark-haired man-- none other than John Thomas Galwyn, unchanged since the last time I laid eyes on him -- busied himself cranking in the jib. Up at the bow, standing lookout over the sea ahead, I saw the same pale-haired chap who had met the two of them at the pier in New York City. I turned back to the helmsman. Yes, it was he. It could be no other.

I lowered my glasses and looked down at my own hands, wrinkled from years of exposure to the salt air and sun, the veins ropy, the knuckles gnarled and knotted. "Are you all right, Dad?" I heard my son Roger say. "Is anything wrong?"

I shook my head. The lash of time had fallen hard upon me, while Andreas Ribeiro had not aged a day since the last time I saw him in 1912. "It's nothing," I replied, and set my bafflement aside for the time being. I had other things to worry about.

Our little flotilla had a destroyer escort. The Germans knew what we were up to, of course, and from time to time the Luftwaffe did their best to hinder us, but the brave lads of the RAF kept them at bay. I put myself in the hands of fate and concentrated on getting us to the other side of the Channel.

We were met by what I could best describe as orderly chaos. While the Luftwaffe bombed the beach, British soldiers waited to be taken off. We boats with shallow drafts went in as close to the beach as we dared, some to ferry men out to the big warships that lay further off, some to take them on board directly.

Lines of soldiers snaked out into the surf, some standing up to their necks in the cold water, having waited for hours while waiting to be picked up. How well I could feel their plight, and my body quivered with unconscious sympathy in memory of that long ago April night. Meanwhile, the German bombs continued to fall, kicking up sand from the beach and spray from those that landed in the water.

Ribeiro took his boat in so close to the shore that I felt certain he must be scraping his keel. I watched as he turned the tiller over to his pale-haired companion and leapt into the surf to begin to toss men up into the waiting hands of his man. Such feats of strength were beyond me now. I held the Sundowner steady as Roger and Gerald Ashcroft, our Sea Scout, brought our own load of soldiers aboard. I do not know how many Ribeiro took on board his craft, but we had one hundred and thirty men as we set back towards England, and the over laden Sundowner was sluggish at the helm. I had my hands full just keeping her afloat in the swells.

In the air above, the Luftwaffe and the RAF battled like eagles over prey. The sea below seemed to wish to take me and my little boat, to reclaim what had slipped its grasp those many years ago. Right before we approached the harbor at Ramsgate the sea picked up and my top-heavy boat lurched sickeningly. I was barely aware of the Lasgalen beside me as I got her within the breakwater, just as I had reached the shelter of the Carpathia's bow almost thirty years before. We were safe.

Some of the boats were turning around after discharging their passengers, returning for a second trip. I stood on the dock feeling the sensation, known to every sailor after a long time at sea, of the solid land rolling beneath my feet, and I almost succumbed to the urge to kiss the ground. My son Roger laid a hand on my shoulder. "Dad, that's it for us. You've done enough."

I nodded. I had done my part.

I turned seaward to see the Lasgalen casting off her lines. Her helmsman favored me with a smile of recognition, first snapping me a military salute and then subtly tapping his right bicep where I knew that strange dark mark lay.

A stray breeze lifted a strand of bright hair off his ear, and suddenly a flood of memory washed over me, and again I was a child, sitting at my old Gran's knee while she spun her fanciful tales of the Fair Folk, the Sidhe, those people of wisdom and eternal youth.

'My God,' I thought. 'It's true, then!'

We live in dark times. That madman in Berlin will swallow the world if we let him. This war has already cost me dearly and may cost me even dearer before the end. There may be times when I am tempted to despair, but I will remember the words of Andreas Ribeiro, or whatever name he goes by now, about the power of the human spirit, and I shall hold onto hope.

I stood watching as the Lasgalen set out to sea with those three tall figures silhouetted against the horizon, bound back for Dunkirk, or the eastern seas, or perhaps Tír na nÓg for all I knew, and my heart swelled with joy to know that there were indeed such marvelous beings in this world.

There may come a day when the strength of men fails, when all we know is swept away and we fall to darkness. But today is not that day.

The End
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