Chapter Eight
FLORA
Mid-December 1930
International waters, East Coast Canada
Flora walked into the lounge, feeling eyes settle upon her as she surveyed the room. The faces were all familiar now – every evening she was obliged to socialize and make small talk with them at dinner, and it was always the longest three hours of the day.
She quickly found James seated at a table with Dickie Grainger and Bertie Sykes; the three men had become fast friends and met most afternoons when the wives were resting, to enjoy a gin and tonic over a game of poker. The men’s days had come to acquire a rhythm on board a ship going nowhere. Their mornings were spent furiously swimming laps in the pool before lifting weights in the gymnasium; after lunch and a constitutional walk on deck or in the covered promenade when the weather was bad (which was most days), they came to the lounge either to read or play bridge, backgammon or in the younger men’s cases, poker. After dinner, they danced to the live jazz band, drank cocktails and regaled the company with amusing anecdotes. They were all making a good fist of things.
Flora couldn’t say the same of her own days. She had no desire to make new friends and she stayed in their suite whenever she could, writing in her diary, sleeping or staring at the wall, counting down the weeks, days, hours and minutes until they could get off this ship. She tried telling herself it could still be so much worse: they could have missed the passage from Southampton altogether and that would have been it for the year, no more transatlantic crossings till the spring. But she wasn’t like Mhairi or, bless her soul, dear Molly: she had never been a convincing Pollyanna, and she could think of nothing but getting her son back.
James’s face brightened as he saw her making her way towards him – a rare outing – and he pushed his chair back, rising to greet her. Dickie and Bertie did likewise. Flora noticed the Tuckers sitting at the next table – Digby Tucker reading a book, his wife doing some needlepoint embroidery on a hoop. Lurking.
‘Flora,’ Bertie smiled as James kissed her particularly flushed, cold cheek. ‘You look refreshed. Another walk outside?’
His eyes darted to her hair and she realized she must be windswept.
‘Aye. I can’t be indoors so much.’ In truth, it made her feel like a bird in a cage. Even pacing up and down the same straight stretch of deck day after day was enough to drive her mad.
‘It’s a joy to behold a woman in touch with nature,’ Dickie sighed. ‘My dear wife catches pneumonia if I so much as crack open the window. A snake could boil to death in our bedroom.’
Mallory Tucker leaned over slightly. ‘I don’t know how you manage it, Flora. You must be as tough as old boots to survive the temperatures out there.’
Eyebrows lifted between the men at the interruption.
‘Aye, I suppose I must,’ Flora agreed. She had quickly decided on submission as the best form of defence while they were all sequestered here together; she had no desire to go into competition with the other women. She didn’t debut a new hairstyle each evening, new jewels, nor even new clothes. She emerged simply to eat and then retreated to her room again, as quickly and quietly as she could. She wanted no attention at all, and yet eyes still followed her wherever she went.
‘Darling, would you like a drink?’ James asked, pulling out a chair for her as they all resettled themselves.
She shook her head. She didn’t intend to stay. She had only wanted to see him for a few minutes. Although they shared the same grief, their ways of coping were very different: James needed to keep himself busy while she needed to keep herself small. It was different for her. He had never seen their baby boy’s face, nor held him in his arms; he didn’t know what it had felt like to walk off a ship and leave him in the arms of another woman, trying to do the right thing when it felt like the very worst...
‘See any icebergs today?’ Bertie asked, catching sight of her frozen expression.
‘Not today, no,’ she said, pulling herself back. Her sighting a few days earlier of a huge iceberg had caused a flurry of excitement on the upper decks and an unwelcome rush of company for her.
‘Any ice floes?’
She sensed he was humouring her. Did they see her as eccentric, scanning the horizon for signs of any further obstructions to their destination? ‘...I saw a small one, but it was quite a way off.’
‘But it was out to sea, yes?’ James asked. He was looking at her, reassuring her that it wasn’t the sea ice they needed to worry about. They were in another race against time, this one with the risk of being ‘locked out’ of their destination; they hadn’t banked on a quarantine situation when they’d made the desperate dash to catch the final ocean crossing of the year, and now, with every day that passed, the St Lawrence River and estuary where they were due to dock was icing over. One day very soon – today, tomorrow, next week – it was going to become impassable. They could only hope and pray that they would make it through in time.
‘Aye,’ she nodded.
‘Good. Remember, Iceberg Alley isn’t our concern just now.’ He winked at her, seeing the worry on her face.
‘Tell that to the passengers on Titanic !’ Digby Tucker quipped from behind, making them all startle.
‘...Indeed.’ James swapped looks with Bertie and Dickie.
Flora glanced over at Tucker, watching as he sank back into his book, even though it was patently clear he wasn’t reading a word. A satisfied smile sat on his lips and the ceiling lights shone down on his bald head. He had no sense of embarrassment, it seemed to her, intruding on private conversations and butting in where he wasn’t wanted. James had taken to referring to him as The Lurker, and Flora dreaded to think what Mad Annie would have made of him – she’d have given him short shrift for sure.
‘I suppose the icebergs were two-a-penny for you on your Greenland expedition, weren’t they?’ Dickie asked James, picking up the conversation again. He had a particularly laconic way of speaking, as if his words were all threaded together on a chain.
‘Yes. I would estimate we saw perhaps three hundred out there? But it’s still a remarkable spectacle every time: watching them calve, the displacement of the water, the waves...The scale is just astounding. Spring’s the time to see the action. You ought to take in a tour before heading home, seeing as you’re out here already.’
‘Mm, yes, sounds super in principle,’ Bertie murmured. He rolled his eyes. ‘Sadly I don’t fancy my chances of talking the Long-Haired General into that particular trip. Her great-aunt was actually on the Titanic .’
‘ Really? ’ Tucker piped up with blatant curiosity.
‘Oh dear,’ Dickie frowned, ignoring him.
‘Quite.’
‘There’s really nothing to fear,’ James shrugged. ‘The International Ice Patrol keeps a running tally these days on any and all icebergs that slip south of forty-eight degrees north.’
‘International Ice Patrol?’ Bertie frowned. ‘Never heard of them.’
‘It’s operated by the US Coast Guard,’ James replied. ‘But it was set up on behalf of various maritime nations after the Titanic . It’s explicitly there to safeguard ships from icebergs in the North Atlantic.’
‘Ah, well, that may change things,’ Bertie said, a little more hopefully.
Dickie cleared his throat. ‘Tell me, Cally, seeing as you’re the oracle on all things icy – what will happen if the St Lawrence ices up before we can get through? Where shall we go?’
‘I should imagine we’ll be forced to dock at St John instead,’ James replied, glancing in Flora’s direction. ‘It’s the winter shipping port for when the sea ice becomes unnavigable.’
‘Where is it?’
‘At the mouth of the St John river. New Brunswick.’
‘Ah. So quite a way south, then?’
‘...Yes.’ James didn’t look happy at having to spell out the worst case scenario in front of her, and she sensed he held back his own fears from her. He put a hand on her knee. ‘Don’t worry, darling,’ he murmured. ‘They connected it by rail to Montreal forty years back. It’s just a short hop.’
Flora looked back at him with dismay. Connected it might be, but it would be yet another diversion. Getting to Montreal was all she could think about. Montreal, then Quebec – her world was no bigger than that route. It was bad enough that they were sailing right past Quebec City to Montreal as it was. It felt like a cruelty to be within touching distance of the port where Mary and Lorna would have disembarked, but have to go another 150 miles further along. James was adamant they could drive the distance back within an afternoon, but that would mean buying a car – another thing to do! Everything was delay, delay, delay.
‘...But I’m sure it won’t come to that anyway,’ James added as reassuringly as he could.
‘What’s so urgent that you chaps have to get to QC so quickly?’ Bertie asked curiously, reaching for his drink.
James shrugged, his hand falling back. ‘No urgency. We just want to get settled before the weather closes in.’
‘Have you family there?’
James nodded, although it was another moment before he could reply. ‘Exactly, yes...’ he said, his voice suddenly choked. ‘You? What are your plans?’
Bertie took a deep slug of his gin. ‘Elinor’s got cousins in Nova Scotia, so the original plan was to spend a few weeks doing the city loop – Montreal, Ottawa and Toronto – then head over there for Christmas. Of course, it’s all been blasted to smithereens now with this dratted delay, so I dare say we’ll have to cut a dash for the wilderness straight away.’
‘Hmm, so St John might work out rather conveniently for you, then,’ James mused. ‘You chaps, Dickie? What are your plans?’
‘We’re heading straight for the border, skiing in Maine – Sugarloaf. Have you been?’
‘To Sugarloaf? No.’ James shook his head. ‘Zermatt in Switzerland for me.’
‘Yes, yes, very nice there,’ Dickie agreed. ‘I rather fancy tackling the Matterhorn one of these days.’
‘Are you an Alpinist, then?’ James asked.
‘I’ve tried once or twice. Got halfway up Mont Blanc a few winters back.’
Flora sat in distracted silence, listening to how they discussed these far-flung places with insouciance. The world was far smaller for them than it was for her.
‘I say,’ Digby Tucker interrupted, leaning forward suddenly in his chair. ‘Wouldn’t it be fun if we were all aboard for the return trip in the spring?’
There was a momentary silence as the other men turned to him, riled that he made no attempt to disguise his eavesdropping.
‘Well, I...sadly, I very much doubt we’ll be heading back from here, that’s the thing, you see,’ Bertie demurred. ‘Possibly Quebec, hard to say at the moment.’
‘I should imagine we’ll be in New York by then,’ Dickie drawled unapologetically, moving slowly as he reached for his cigarette case. He was completely unhurried by life, and Flora liked him and his wife best of them all: Dickie didn’t look at her with want, and Ginnie didn’t look at her with envy. It was a marked relief to go unscrutinized for once.
‘What a pity,’ Tucker pined. ‘Callaghan? What shall you and your lovely wife be doing come the thaw?’
‘Our plans are open-ended,’ James said smoothly. ‘It’s impossible to predict, I’m afraid. We like to be fairly spontaneous.’
‘Indeed,’ Tucker nodded, falling back with a peeved look, seeming to recognize their reluctance to embed the acquaintance. ‘Well...that is a shame.’
‘You’re travelling back from here, are you?’ Bertie enquired, unable to restrain his politeness.
‘Oh yes. Got our berth booked already. Mrs T is very particular about where she sleeps.’
Not particular enough, Flora thought to herself. She couldn’t imagine how that woman could bear to lie next to him at night. ‘Well, I think I’ll have a rest,’ she murmured; she had had quite enough small talk for one afternoon, and she had a wall to stare at and hours to count down before there was another dinner to suffer. They had another eleven days aboard before they were due to haul anchor and make their way landward.
She rose to standing, the men following suit as one.
‘See you at cocktail hour,’ Dickie said cheerily.
‘Aye,’ she smiled, ‘I’ll see you anon.’
She caught James’s eye as she turned to leave.
‘Actually...’ he said, and she turned back to find him setting down his cards, disappointed looks growing on the other men’s faces. ‘I think I’ll come with you, darling.’
‘You will?’
‘Yes. I’m feeling rather weary. A little shut-eye might be in order.’
There was a tiny pause and she felt loaded looks, as if no one believed they were going to be sleeping. She found Digby Tucker’s eyes on her again, his wife stitching by his side, oblivious. He gave a benign smile, but in the moment before his face could change, she saw something penetrating in his gaze that unsettled her – a surprising sharpness for a man widely considered a fool.
‘Forgive me, chaps, won’t you?’ James asked, pushing back his chair.
‘Not at all,’ Dickie demurred with twinkling eyes. ‘We’d be tired too if we were you,’ he added under his breath as James slipped his hand into hers and led her out.
Flora sat at the desk in the writing room, her back to the room. She came in here most days to write letters that could not yet be sent. It should have been one of the upsides of the enforced delay, as it meant she finally had the time to write to her parents and tell them everything that had happened to her in the past year, starting from the day James had landed his seaplane in Glen Bay.
But every day, although she rewrote the same letter, she tore it up and threw it into the bin. How could she ever tell this story on paper – revealing to her parents that they were grandparents, but the child was gone; that James was alive, but they were still unwed? She had lied and lied for months about her situation, and with every new twist in the tale, it felt harder to start with the truth.
Only Mhairi knew about this latest chapter of James’s return and their race to Canada. It was Mhairi who had picked up the telephone in Effie’s hotel room in Oban, when Flora had called back the night James had found her in Paris – the same night Donald had been released. The others had been downstairs in the hotel bar with Sholto, celebrating freedom, when Mhairi had come up for a shawl.
Flora had sworn her friend to secrecy that night. She was so terrified of losing track of her son in Canada, she didn’t dare risk anyone else knowing that they knew the truth, at least about Lorna and Mary’s relationship. Mhairi had been stunned, naturally, but Flora knew the secret would be safe until their return; and in the meantime, she had managed to send a telegram to her family telling them she was well and happy, without making mention of her flight from Paris.
But as she looked down at the latest iteration of the letter, she knew this was yet another one she would not send. The words, so bold in ink, might as well have been written in blood for all the horror they contained. The very least she owed her parents was to tell them this story face to face.
She heard footsteps coming into the room behind her, paying them no mind as she shuffled the sheets of longhand. But as she waited for the scrape of a chair, the rustle of a skirt, the gentle clearing of a throat before a pen began to scratch over paper...it didn’t come.
She turned.
‘Ah, Mrs Callaghan. What a pleasant surprise, finding you in here,’ Digby Tucker said.
Flora closed her eyes briefly, trying to summon her manners as well as strength. ‘Mr Tucker,’ she said with a strained smile.
He was standing by one of the other desks and she saw, to her surprise, that the few ladies who had been in here when she’d arrived had since left. She wondered when, exactly; she hadn’t heard them go, too lost in her own thoughts. ‘Have you come to write some letters too?’
‘Oh, no, no. I’m not much of a one for writing. My hand can never quite keep up with my head.’
Little could. He talked in a garrulous manner and laughed far too loudly.
Flora smiled but passed no comment; polite conversation with this man was the very last thing she needed, and she didn’t want to encourage him to stay.
‘Not a problem for you, I understand,’ he continued, undeterred by her silence. ‘My wife tells me you’re a prolific writer. She says you’re in here whenever she passes.’
‘I do enjoy the solitude,’ she said pointedly.
His fingers drummed lightly on the desk. ‘You do not enjoy cruise life?’
‘No, I do.’
‘Really? You don’t swim, play cards. You never dance...’
She wasn’t going to tell him she hadn’t the skill for the first two diversions, nor the heart for the latter. How could she enjoy herself when her baby son was out there, somewhere, without her? It was all she could do to eat, sleep, breathe , until he was back in her arms. She was living at a subsistence level, but it was none of this man’s business. ‘Oh dear,’ she sighed instead. ‘You make me sound very dour.’
‘Forgive me, that was not my intention.’ He drew a little closer, taking a seat at the nearby desk as he pulled out his cigarettes. He offered her one, which she declined. ‘No, I suppose what I’m saying is, I sense in you...a sadness.’
She swallowed. ‘Not at all. I’m deliriously happy, in fact – but thank you for your concern.’
Tucker lit the cigarette and smiled, his elbow on the desk, smoke curling into his moustache. ‘Come, we are friends, are we not? A month spent in close quarters forces us to see one another as we really are, beyond just the social niceties. There’s a melancholy to you, dear Flora – may I call you Flora?’
She stared at him. He already had.
‘I sense something is gravely wrong in your world. I see the worry in your husband’s eyes when he looks at you; I see how you scarcely leave your room except to eat; and when you do leave, you come here to sit alone.’
Is that why he had come here – to find her? ‘I never knew I attracted such scrutiny.’
He gave a guffaw. ‘Dear lady, are you quite serious? Queen Mary herself attracts less. It’s not for nothing they call you The Enigma, you know.’
She frowned. ‘Who does?’
‘All the women. It’s difficult to tell if they love or loathe you.’
Flora swallowed. ‘You’re making this up, Mr Tucker. I sincerely doubt they have any opinion on me whatsoever.’
He arched an eyebrow. ‘Flora, you are beautiful yet reclusive. They want to look upon you and learn your secrets; they want to befriend you, but you deny them on every count. You hardly leave your room, and when you do, you won’t leave your husband’s side.’
She looked away. ‘You exaggerate.’
‘There’s a palpable current of excitement whenever you enter the room,’ he continued, undeterred by her refutations. ‘Did you know every night, the women – my own wife included – do their hair and choose their gowns in the hope of outshining you? And yet they cannot.’ He smiled. ‘I think the very worst of it is that not only do you not notice, you do not even seem to care. You wear the same two dresses on rotation.’
She looked at him, picking up a pointedness to the comment. ‘Only because we decided to come on a whim,’ she murmured. ‘There was no time to pack.’
He was regarding her closely. She sensed he was enjoying this privilege of staring upon her face with no one to disturb them. ‘No valet, either.’
‘As I said, we were rushing.’ It was a glaring anomaly compared to the rest of the first-class passengers, who had come laden with trunks and staff. ‘Besides, I never knew we were being judged, or that...that it was some kind of fashion parade.’
He laughed out loud at that. ‘It’s a cruise, my dear – of course it’s a fashion parade! What else is there to do? Well...’ His eyes flashed in her direction suddenly. ‘Besides that .’
Flora startled, hardly able to believe he had said such a thing to her. She felt the mood shift in the room, his motives becoming clearer now. She had sensed his interest in her from the start, but she had never for a moment thought he would be so foolish as to attempt to act on it.
‘Excuse me,’ she said curtly, rising sharply. He shot to his feet too as she went to move past him, but it put him in her path, blocking the door, and she felt a sudden, visceral fear that he was going to trap here in here. She shoved him hard, so that he fell back against one of the desks.
‘Mrs Callaghan!’ he stammered.
‘Stay away from me!’ she cried.
‘You have misunderstood...!’ he called after her as she ran towards the door and out into the corridor. It was quiet – most people were now back in their rooms getting ready for drinks before dinner. Flora sprinted along the corridor, down the stairs, not stopping until her own suite was within sight.
James looked up from the bed as she burst in, out of breath.
‘Flora?’ he asked, dropping his book, immediately concerned. ‘What is it?’
She stared at him as he got up and came over to her. How could she tell him the fear she had felt in that moment when she had thought Tucker was going to lay his hands upon her? It had reminded her of that night in Edward Rushton’s apartment in Paris. Let him have you , Pepperly had counselled, thinking only of his money.
But Tucker hadn’t laid a finger on her. He hadn’t even said anything outright, merely implied a grubby little innuendo with his usual misplaced manner. For the first time, she checked herself. He hadn’t chased after her, nor deliberately stepped into her path to obstruct her departure...Had he risen to standing from manners, not ill intent? Had she overreacted? Were her nerves so friable she had imagined something that wasn’t there?
‘N-nothing,’ she murmured. ‘...I just felt like running.’
There was a pause as he pulled her into him. ‘My wild island girl,’ he grinned, kissing her hair. ‘I might have taken the girl out of St Kilda, but I’ll never take St Kilda out of the girl.’