Chapter 3
Victoria stayed in bed at the hotel for three days after she arrived.
She called her friend Delphine the first night.
She could hardly talk, she was still so traumatized.
Delphine had read all about the sinking of the Titanic in the papers, and she promised to bring Victoria some clothes the next day.
Victoria had arrived barefoot, wearing a deckhand’s uniform and her long wool coat.
Her boots, which got wet in the lifeboat, had disappeared on the Carpathia after she took them off.
She didn’t know if someone had taken them or they got thrown away.
The one thing she had held on to was the case of her mother’s jewelry that she had put in the inside pocket of her coat.
She had kept careful track of it for the three days on the Carpathia.
She wasn’t worried about anyone stealing from her, only about it getting lost. They were all in the same tragic condition, and most of the survivors had lost someone they loved.
The crew had suffered the highest number of casualties, only a few had survived and been picked up by the lifeboats.
Most of the passengers who had been in the water until the Carpathia arrived on the scene had died.
The newspapers spoke of Mrs. Astor, the famed socialite, having survived, while her husband Jacob did not.
Her unborn child had lost its father, and she her husband.
John Jacob Astor was said to be the richest man on the boat.
He had tried to leave in the lifeboat to protect his pregnant wife, and the officer in charge hadn’t let him and he died as a result.
The sinking of the Titanic was a tragedy of epic proportions as news of it reverberated around the world.
Delphine was noticeably pregnant, as she was every year now, when she came to see Victoria, and soon to be confined in Newport with her mother-in-law, which she dreaded.
She was grateful to still be in the city so she could spend time with her friend.
She came to see Victoria every day. She had bought new underwear at Bergdorf Goodman, and shoes, since they wore the same size.
She had brought several of her dresses, and another coat since the weather was still chilly, but Victoria wasn’t going anywhere.
She didn’t have the energy or the strength to get out of bed for several days. She was deep in grief for her father.
“What are you going to do now?” Delphine asked her gently, worried about her.
“I don’t know,” Victoria said in a small voice, lying in bed and staring at the ceiling.
She couldn’t bear to look ahead to the future without her father.
They had shared such a wonderful life, and now it was over.
She had lived in a bubble for the past five years, since her presentation at court.
Protected and adored by her father, running his homes, going from London to their estate in Hampshire.
Even though she knew he was frail, and had been seriously ill the previous winter, she had somehow expected her father to live forever.
And now he was gone. She realized afterward that he had never intended to get into the lifeboats.
He had given up his place so young women and children could live.
It was so like him, and now she was totally alone.
She had no money worries, but she had no idea what to do with the rest of her life.
She realized too that her status had changed dramatically with her father’s death.
She could no longer cherish the illusion that she was a young girl living at home with her father.
She was an unmarried woman of twenty-three, five years after her first season, and considered a spinster, which was a harsh term, but appropriate to describe her situation.
It was a term she had expected would describe her once her father died in another five or ten years, but she hadn’t imagined becoming a spinster so soon, at her age. But it was the truth.
Delphine had been careful to bring her only black clothes to wear, since Victoria was in mourning for her father.
Victoria sent a telegram to their butler in London, and the housekeeper in Hampshire, to advise them that her father had died when the ship sank, and to share her sadness over Bridget and Robert.
She asked the housekeeper to express her deepest sympathy to their families.
What had been meant as a joyful trip, with friends to see, and lots of social engagements in New York, had turned into a tragedy before Victoria even arrived in the city.
The people whose invitations she and Alfred had accepted sent her flowers when she arrived, when people saw her father’s name on the official list of victims of the sinking.
She knew she would have a mountain of mail to answer in London.
At least that would keep her busy, and fill her empty evenings without him for a while.
Gone were the warm conversations, the fascinating history lessons, the stories about the mischief in his youth, the card games where he accused her of cheating while they laughed and she denied the accusation even though it was true.
Even though her father had been old and frail, they had had a good time together.
Those good times were gone now, and there was nothing to take their place.
She had had no time to prepare. They had left England on a high note, and she was returning in mourning.
She hadn’t expected something so terrible to happen.
No one could have predicted it. It was years earlier than she had expected to lose him.
Eighty-one no longer seemed old to her, because he had been so lively and youthful in his own mind.
Mentally he had never slowed down and didn’t want to.
In fact, his mind was as sharp as ever. She had no one to talk to and advise her without her father.
She still had both houses to run and a large staff in each, but she would have no one to talk to at night. She cried every time she thought of it.
She and Delphine went for long walks in Central Park once she was feeling better, but she was hardly eating.
She loved Delphine, but all she wanted to do now was go home.
She had the concierge at the hotel book her first-class passage on the RMS Cedric, which was leaving in two weeks.
She had traveled on it with her father to New York the year before, which was a sad memory now.
She had no intention of leaving her cabin for the entire trip.
She didn’t want to see anyone on the voyage home.
And she dreaded the crossing. The memories of when the ship sank were vivid.
Bert Banning dropped in to see Victoria twice a day at the hotel.
He never stayed long. He checked on her to make sure she was all right.
He didn’t want to wear her out by staying too long.
He was just keeping the promise he had made to Alfred in his last moments, to watch over her.
Victoria was touched when Bert dropped by to see her.
She knew he had a lot of meetings and people to see in New York.
Bert left New York for a few days in the middle of his trip.
He wanted to visit Vergil Jackson, who owned a large famous plantation and extensive cotton fields in Virginia.
They used to run it with enslaved people in Vergil’s grandfather’s day, and now it was just a beautiful estate, with famous gardens.
The enslaved had been emancipated. Many of them and their children still worked for Vergil, and were paid.
Bert said he loved going there, the flower beds were so vibrant, and the owner was charming and hospitable, and one of the most important cotton growers in the South.
Vergil gave a dinner party for Bert while he was there, and he thoroughly enjoyed it, although he was still shaken by his recent experience.
His host’s friends were as charming as he was.
He owned some of the biggest cotton mills in the South.
When he returned from Virginia, Bert was startled to find Victoria up and dressed after three days in bed.
She was wearing a very stylish black dress.
Her father’s bank had wired her money and she had gone to Bergdorf’s and bought clothes for the trip home, so she could give Delphine’s back to her when she left.
Bert was booked on the same ship she was for the trip back to England, and she was relieved that she would know someone on the crossing.
She would have been frightened to be on the ship alone.
She had been brave and confident when her father was alive but she was shaken to her core after the ship sank.
Victoria spent the last day of her stay in New York with Delphine.
She had to go to the White Star office to fill out some papers, and Delphine went with her.
Her father had been cremated by then, and she was taking his ashes home with her to bury in the garden in Hampshire.
Her father had told her several years before that it was what he wished, and she wanted to respect his last wishes.