Titanic Ashes, page 9
This is too much, Miranda thinks, a secondhand opinion grasped at because, in the miasma of Mother’s brain, it happens to float into view. But switching personalities has always been one of Mother’s chief tactics; if nothing else, it keeps the enemy confused. Miranda’s face burns with anger at the slipperiness of her mother, who, she is certain, will never lose an argument.
“I had no idea, Mother, ” she says, “no idea at all that your arguments against Mr. Ismay were socialist in nature.” Miranda sees Graham wince, knows he thinks she has gone too far, but rather like Mother herself, she doesn’t quite know how to stop. “I believe you’ll find you have much in common with Mr. H. G. Wells on the subject, and Mr. George Bernard Shaw. But it’s quite a revelation that you feel that way.”
“Miranda, ” Graham chides under his breath, but loud enough for Mother to hear. Miranda feels her confidence drain and a new heat prickling under her skin. However reticent Graham has been, she’s had the belief, always, that he was on her side. This declaration proves this is not the case. And the effect of it on Mother is obvious. She seems calmer straightaway, and the imperious air begins to return.
“In acting as he did, ” she says determinedly, “in getting into a lifeboat before women and children, Ismay conceded the very ground upon which our society is founded. He threw it all to the Bolsheviks, to Mr. Wells and Mr. Shaw. He showed that the system of leadership and nobility we all adhere to is a lie.”
Mother’s point is made with such quiet conviction and to such impressive silence that it takes a moment for Miranda to notice the glaring contradiction.
“So is it a lie, Mother?”
“No! Of course not! He made it seem so.”
“I see, ” says Miranda, half-defeated. She can’t argue with them all now Graham has shown his hand. Graham merely wants peace, clearly, and will back the speaker whose victory will dampen the conflict. He’s astute enough to know that this could only be his prospective mother-in-law. Father has returned from concern to his habitual detachment. His brown eyes gaze upon his wife in a vague, relieved kind of way.
Miranda looks at Graham, willing direct eye contact, hoping for the chance to give him some hint as to the depth of his blunder. But he looks altogether too comfortable, even gives a little grin as he takes a sip of wine and glances from prospective father-in-law, to prospective mother-in-law, to Miranda—as if to convey that such disagreements among family members are rather jolly really, part of the rough and tumble, and that he looks forward to more of it. Meanwhile the feeling of having been betrayed simmers under Miranda’s skin; already, words like ‘traitor’ and ‘coward’ form on her tongue. She knows herself well enough to understand this feeling, stifled, will only grow as the seconds and minutes tick away. Graham’s ‘Miranda!’ though nothing but a small tug at the time, a slight tremor through the course of her argument with Mother, will echo louder and louder until, alone together in Graham’s flat after the meal, she will be spitting fury at him.
She feels a sweaty discomfort under her engagement ring. Hands under the table, she loosens the band, twists it off, then, lifting the purse strap from the chair behind her, makes sure that Graham, to her right, catches sight of her opening the purse and dropping the ring inside.
“Too tight?” asks Graham mildly.
“Pretty uncomfortable tonight, yes.”
“We’ll have to see about it.”
“Yes, ” she says curtly and tries to catch his eye again, but Mother, who has been off on a brief reverie of her own, captures his attention first.
“We’ve lost sight of what was important once, ” she says, her voice tragic and theatrical, her eyes seemingly deeper set than usual. “The concepts that held our world together have fallen away.”
“Honour and chivalry and all that?” says Graham. Suddenly he seems like a young pack animal, all quivering whiskers and wagging tail, trying to gain acceptance.
“And decency, yes. Dying words, I’m afraid.”
She sees Father check his watch and she feels impatient for the evening to end, feels impatient to get to Graham. Her anger frees her to take a glance beyond the palm, where she has noticed some activity. Her distaste for Mother and her disgust with Graham make her feel like switching clans, moving over once more to the enemy of her enemy. Mr. Ismay, happier and more relaxed than he has looked all evening, holds up a menu and talks to a rather morose waiter, the same one who seems to have been shadowing their table since the incident. She’s been aware of the waiter’s uniform, a blur of black and white in the corner of her eye. For a while he stood statue-like in a spot close to the Ismay table, and then she noticed him leave and come back with menus, rooting himself once more. At first she believed the Ismays were going to be asked to leave. It doesn’t seem that way now, although the waiter’s moustache twitches uncomfortably while he takes the order.
She turns to see her mother’s steadfast gaze. It burns her a little, this mini confrontation across the table, and Miranda realizes that if Graham has been disloyal to her, then no doubt in her mother’s mind, Miranda has been disloyal to Mother with her I did things I was ashamed of, yes, and its unspoken codicil, albeit one only Mother would understand. But perhaps in the world of the Grimsdens this was enough. Alluding to a past misconduct in a public setting, with the implied threat it could be made public, was as bad as an outright betrayal. All this she has learned from the woman who stares across at her. The thought causes an unbearable, suffocating feeling to swell up inside her, together with the fear that she’ll never be free because all these tactics, and codes, and subterfuges are inside her. And the battle, the constant stress of it, uses up all her energy. She could have spent her strength tonight on apologizing properly to the Ismays, on trying to put things as right as she could. But that would have been too straightforward, too open and too easy. Instead she’s wasted her time and efforts on doing battle with her mother.
She recalls the talk after the disaster, of a man being shot dead by an officer because he tried to clamber aboard a lifeboat, of older boys being hauled up from under the skirts of women and back onto the deck. She didn’t witness any of this, but it was a huge ship and she has no reason to doubt that it happened. And sometimes it’s as if, by magic, she and her mother have been caught ever since in that same repeating loop of behaviour. They, like the officers on board the Titanic, have spent their time and efforts preventing progress. Officers fired pistols, raved, and yelled to keep the ‘wrong’ people off the lifeboats—some of which left the ship less than half full; Mother and Miranda scheme and strategize against each other, defending their ground from intrusion, when specific goals are left unattained.
Mother looks away at last, stifling a little yawn that might be put on, and peruses diners at other tables. Following her gaze to a table where an elderly lady fans herself, Miranda feels a lightning rod of memory, a restless crowd, the constant moth-like movement of fans, summer in New York under the high ceiling in New York’s Natural History Museum.
Shoe heels echo along the hard floor and Miranda scampers to keep up with Mother, always a fast walker. Mother receives Miranda’s hand and they slow down and turn together to view the next exhibit.
“Doesn’t it put everything into perspective, Miranda, being here?”
Mother smiles at Miranda, squeezes her hand, and both of them look up at the shiny, dark reconstructed skeleton of a woolly mammoth. This is the day after the argument about the letter to Father, a day with just the two of them, an apology of sorts, and a warm buzz of euphoria lives in Miranda’s chest.
“Yes, Mummy.”
“To think of the cold and inhospitable climates, the savagery and the selfishness from which we have come.”
She squeezes her mother’s hand in response. She loves to hear Mother talk, though she seldom understands. There’s sparkle and poetry in her voice, a kind of romance and a kind of belief.
“And think about the way it was on that terrible night on the Atlantic. Think beyond the cowardice of people like Mr. Ismay, to the heroic captain going down with his ship, the naval architect Mr. Andrews and the many officers and passengers who set their own safety aside.”
Miranda stares through the great shadowy holes in the mammoth’s skull within which an oversized brain once pulsed with thoughts. Her hand twitches inside her mother’s as she struggles to understand the connection between the great fossil before her and the behaviour of people on board the Titanic but, nonetheless, she gratefully follows her mother’s words.
“Selflessness and sacrifice are true measures of nobility. But it takes many centuries of lessons learned and battles fought. You will learn this too, especially when you have a child of your own. Sacrifice is not always about physical danger. Father had to sacrifice us this summer. He couldn’t get away from work. I have to sacrifice, too.” She pauses and Miranda feels a weight in the silence, something about to descend. “We are his ambassadors here in America. Mr. Johnston is a delightful man and a friend of the family. He also has relatives who can help your father with his business, and so discretion is very important to us all. Do you know what discretion is, Miranda?”
“Keeping silent, ” Miranda says.
“Not speaking harm, ” Mother corrects her gently. She crouches down and takes both of Miranda’s hands. “Life is a complicated thing, Miranda.” Mother’s sweet breath, lipstick mingling with perfume, captivates Miranda; it’s the scent of adulthood, a distant promised land. “My father was not as successful as yours, even though he worked hard, terribly hard, all his life. He studied and toiled but it wasn’t enough for him. He learned that it can’t all be done in a single lifetime. It takes much longer than that, and it can’t be done without help. Your father works terribly hard too. He’s taken risks that have turned out well for him, but it’s a worry for him and a strain. Men like your father need help, but they don’t know how to ask for it. That’s my job, Miranda. One day it will be your job too.”
Miranda nods, a fresh kind of excitement in her belly. She’s always been in awe of her mother, who commands respect and devotion wherever she goes. Even though she hates Mr. Johnston always being at the hotel, she is still warmed and reassured by the sheer power of her mother, the way she exuded certainty and safety even upon the freezing lifeboat, the way she drew people to her as soon as they arrived in New York, made their lack of clothes and belongings seem like a game as they juggled gifts, and credit, and money cabled from Father.
Mother holds the magic of the future in her palm. Miranda has been admitted early into this world of confidence and daring, sees marvelous light and rather terrifying dangers. Her mother thinks she is almost ready for these, and the idea is exhilarating.
NOW, JUST MOMENTS AFTER her accusing look, Mother seems old. Disillusionment haunts her eyes as she scans the tables. Miranda can almost see the weight of the years coming down on her, loosening her skin, draining her lips of colour and life. She feels a sudden urge to apologize but knows this is as much of a trap as the desire to argue; it would be another subversion of any genuine goal. And there is nothing specific for which she can legitimately apologize, except perhaps making Mother, rather than herself, into a target for Evelyn Ismay.
The thought takes hold immediately, sending down roots and sprouting leaves which delineate shapes of possible sentences should she have the courage to broach the subject. It’s Father, rather than Graham or Mother, who makes her shy away from merely opening her mouth and talking. There is such a tradition of protecting Father, or protecting herself from his judgment; the two concerns sound like polar opposites but mysteriously merge into the same general dread of creating discomfort or embarrassment for him. She doesn’t for the moment know how to get past it.
Father catches her eye as she gazes at him and a premonition of that discomfort sweeps across his face. He sighs and glances at his watch. “You’ll have to excuse me, ladies, Graham, for a few moments. I have to go to the lobby and make a phone call.”
With a gasp at the serendipity of it, Miranda watches him as he stands, takes a little mock bow and leaves the table. She catches a movement from beyond the palm, a face, Mr. Ismay’s, watching him depart. It surprises Miranda, this interest in her father. She had imagined Mr. Ismay to be beyond noticing somehow. She holds onto the thought, as she wants to delay. Now there’s nothing between Miranda and her admission, and she sees the icy waters of danger rippling below her, daring her to dive. And this time she must.
“I must apologize to you, Mother, ” she says abruptly.
Her mother looks startled, worried, her deep-set eyes seem puffy and tired.
“I’m the reason Evelyn Grimsden came to our table.”
She feels Graham’s astonishment too, can see, without looking, his face has turned the same shade of pink it does after he’s been playing rugby.
“You see, I apologized for a letter I once wrote to her father. And it seems to have stirred it all up for her.”
“What did you do that for?” The tone in her voice, one of exasperation, suggests she might well have added you stupid girl, and probably would have done had Graham not been sitting between them.
“When?” asks Graham, always a stickler for irrelevant details.
“I wrote the letter when I was ten years old, Graham, ” she says, rather pleased that his prosaic presence lends the scene some stability, that Mother and she will have a certain obligation to remain logical and measured, if only for appearance’s sake. “And I apologized to Evelyn in the ladies’ room tonight.”
“What was in the letter?” asks Graham, and again Miranda is grateful he’s there, an interpreter between two long-warring tribes.
“A series of accusations, of cowardice and treachery, a second-hand, childish repetition of all the silliest things that had already appeared in the newspaper.” Her ears have gone numb. She looks from Mother’s rather disgusted, contemptuous face, to Graham, whose eyelids flutter in urgent embarrassment.
“You were a child, ” he says.
“An unhappy child, yes. As Mother said, the Titanic and everything about it seemed to unhinge us all, rather. I was angry then, and there was nowhere for the anger to go. So I directed it at Mr. Ismay. He seemed such an easy target. In any case, Mother, I apologize. It was I who brought on the attack tonight. Again, sorry.”
She stumbled briefly before mentioning her anger. The merest possibility existed that Graham just might ask why she was angry. But then Graham rarely asked open-ended questions. He preferred conversations which narrowed to single points of fact.
“What a luxury it must be to apologize, ” says Mother.
The comment, glibly thrown, seems at first like another of Mother’s fogging tactics; it doesn’t mean anything, she thinks, but it prevents anyone from settling into a point of view. It merges with the memory of the museum, the darkened orbs of the mammoth skeleton, the suggestion of ferocious work and sacrifice behind the evolution of the family toward present success. This time, Mother’s words really do point to a philosophical difference between Miranda and herself, and one that could only make Miranda seem terribly spoilt, a child whose privilege has been toiled for by others.
She catches a movement from beyond the palm. Mr. Ismay stands. She assumes at first the Ismays are about to leave after all. But Evelyn, as far as she can tell from beyond the leaves, remains seated. Mr. Ismay talks to his daughter for a few moments, his face smiling, his gestures casual, almost frivolous. Then he turns and strides through the dining room into the lobby, oblivious it seems of the faces that glance up from the tables, the whispering conversations left in his wake. Miranda feels a tug in her diaphragm, a sudden frustrated desire to follow. It can’t be coincidence that Mr. Ismay should go in the same direction as Father. Waves of panic and defeat move inside her, making her nauseated. She can’t begin to imagine what Mr. Ismay and her father will say to each other, or rather what they will do, as a whole new catalogue of dangers opens when men set themselves to battle each other.
She turns back to the palm. A clearing between leaves this time reveals Evelyn’s face, her expression blank and pale. Their eyes meet, unhappily. Miranda sees the trace of a nod.
chapter twelve
THREE CONNECTED TELEPHONE BOOTHS stand along the lobby wall. Two are clearly free. Through the bright glass in the middle box, Ismay sees Grimsden, his shoulders hunched, his head bowed, and eyes safely away from the glass. The blue-liveried attendant has already seen Ismay’s interest in the phones and opens wide the door to Grimsden’s right. Ismay steps inside because he can think of no other way to act. He nods belatedly as the attendant eases the door closed behind him.
He picks up the earpiece with one hand, keeping the holding device depressed with the other. Turning to the lobby he sees the attendant, square-shouldered, gloved hands behind his back, obscuring the view passing hotel staff and guests might get of him through the glass. His face burns with the furtiveness of it all. This is not at all what he envisioned when he followed Grimsden. Ismay had seen his way clear to an honest statement of fact, something to the effect that he did not appreciate Grimsden’s wife staring at him and his daughter through dinner, adding perhaps that he is proud of Evelyn’s justified challenge. What Grimsden chose to do about it would be his business. All this played out in an obligingly empty corridor without the complication of telephones or hotel staff.
He might have known it wouldn’t be this way. Some romantic impulse, brought into being by Evelyn, has given him the notion that tonight rules may be broken. Yet Evelyn herself paid a heavy price in embarrassment and shame for doing so, and Ismay knows he’s incapable of diving with such complete abandon into chaos. He doesn’t mind a simple argument with Grimsden or anyone else, but has no stomach for the crashing lack of taste that would allow a scene to play out with hotel employees as horrified witnesses, their white-gloved hands attempting to intervene. Perhaps a newspaper reporter might chance upon the disagreement, or be alerted by some passerby, and the full weight of the catastrophe would return in all its horrid hues. He and his family would see it all unravel under some new ignominious headline: Disgraced Titanic Owner in Public Brawl.
