On a Cold Dark Sea(84)

“Yes, that sounds perfect,” said Charlotte. Reg had always fancied himself a bit of a Robin Hood; he’d have enjoyed knowing that the money he’d stolen from rich fools would go to deserving children. “I’ll write to her, shall I?”

“I could introduce you, if you like.”

“Well, I can’t stay long today . . .”

“Another time?”

It was an invitation, offered with a tentative hand.

“Very well,” Charlotte said. Then, because she hadn’t gotten where she was by avoiding difficult questions, “Perhaps I could also meet Mrs. Healy?”

Edmund raised his shoulders in a faint attempt at a shrug. “She’s at her mother’s in Liverpool.”

Charlotte granted him the silence to explain, if he chose to.

“Sailors don’t make good husbands, as a rule,” Edmund said. His voice was quiet and tinged with disappointment. “My wife wasn’t born into that life as my mother and grandmother were. It was hard on her, with me gone a month at a time. And even when I was home, I wasn’t much for talking. I’d grown accustomed to being on my own.

“We didn’t have children, which might have helped. I don’t feel the lack of them, myself, but it would have made her less lonely. In any case—she has sisters and nieces and nephews in Liverpool. She’s happy there. So that’s the arrangement we’ve come to.”

Should Charlotte feel sorry for him? She couldn’t tell if he was upset by the state of his marriage or relieved to have his wife out of the way. Perhaps it was a bit of both. If Edmund and his wife had been actors or singers, they’d have been divorced long ago and well into their second or third marriages. But Charlotte knew divorce was still unthinkable for people like the Healys. Though they led separate lives, their marriage—on paper—would endure.

“When do you sail next?” Charlotte asked, a social kindness to shift the conversation back to safer ground.

“A week tomorrow. It’s usually three weeks on, one week off. I’ll be back at the end of May.”

“So we might schedule a visit with Mrs. Tipton then?”

“I’ll call her later today. She’ll be very grateful for your kindness.”

Charlotte could feel the momentum gathering toward an ending. Very good, thank you. It’s been a pleasure. She should be standing up and gathering her things. But she didn’t want to leave. And from the way Edmund was sitting—relaxed against the back of his chair, the teacup perched on one knee—she sensed his grateful ease. He didn’t want her to go, either. Thoughts welled up into words, unleashed by his tolerant understanding.

“What I said before, about putting the Titanic behind me. I had—or rather, I thought I had. I never spoke of it, tried never to think of it. But it turns out the memories were still there. Preserved.”

Had Lady Upton’s letter set all this in motion? Charlie Van Hausen’s death? Perhaps it was simply the march of time. The older Charlotte got, the more she longed for her past self. The woman she’d been with Reg, who’d never shied away from adventure. A woman with endless possibilities ahead of her.

“Does it ever seem as if time bends around, as you grow older?” Charlotte asked. “I can barely remember who I lunched with last week, yet scenes from that night are so clear in my memory, I practically shiver. I can see all their faces—Anna and Esme and that dreadful Mr. Wells . . .”

Edmund managed a chuckle. “Blowing his smoke in Mrs. McBride’s face!”

Charlotte imitated the woman’s strident bark. “I will not be treated in this manner!”

“Yes, it’s as you said. All perfectly clear.”

“I never thanked you properly, for saving our lives.”

Edmund looked uncomfortable, as she’d expected he would. “I hardly deserve that.”

“You were following orders. We might well have been swamped if we’d rowed back, and I’m very sorry for the way I spoke to you. I’ve been meaning to apologize for a very long time.”

“No need,” Edmund said stiffly.

“All those inquiries and awful stories in the papers . . . they could never explain what it was really like, could they? Having to make a decision of life and death when you’re freezing and knackered and afraid you’re about to die. Things happen so quickly, and you haven’t time to think. And later, when you’re called to account for what you’ve done, how can you possibly make anyone else understand?”

“We should have saved him.”

How calmly he said it! Yet Charlotte could hear the chill of self-accusation. “The man in the water?” she asked.

“I still think of him. Do you?”

“I try not to.” The heartless truth.

“What makes it worse was that I knew him.”

“You did?” Charlotte remembered how sure she’d been that it was Reg. How she’d talked herself out of believing it.

“He turned his face, when I held up the lantern. I didn’t know his name, but I’d seen him in the canteen. He was a steward. He had a mother and a sweetheart, and he’d say, ‘When I get back to my ladies . . . ,’ and the others would say, ‘Oh, go on, then,’ and he’d keep smiling and boast that they were the finest examples of womanhood ever seen. Always cheerful, always smiling.