The Titanic Murders by Max Allan Collins Page A

helm.
    Smith was like a fiction writer’s notion of a steamship captain—an unimaginative fiction writer at that, Futrelle thought, who would himself never dream of painting so clichéd a portrait: clear-eyed, stern-visaged, square jaw dusted with a perfectly trimmed snow-white beard, Smith was taller than most of his crew and as solidly built as a boiler-room stoker.
    Where Captain Smith varied from the cliché of his own somewhat forbidding appearance was an avuncular manner that included a ready smile, rather urbane manners and a soothingly pleasant, softly modulated voice.
    “Colonel Astor has every right to his rank, Mrs. Brown,” the captain pointed out to her gently. “How many men in the Colonel’s position would have traded the comfort and safety of their homes for the battlefield?”
    “Oh, I know Astor’s a patriot,” Maggie said. “And believe me, I’m relieved he’s a colonel, and not a captain…. Imagine where we’d be if he were in your shoes, Captain Smith.”
    “I’m not sure I follow, Mrs. Brown,” the captain said with his easy smile.
    “You got any idea how many times Astor here rammed his yacht into somebody else’s canoe? Of course, he won his shareof races, once the real captains started giving the Colonel a wide berth.”
    Astor was enjoying this immensely, and it did seem good-humored, but to Futrelle, Maggie Brown bordered on the overbearing. Still, in her way, she was a breath of fresh air in these stuffy quarters.
    The dinner progressed through eleven amazing courses: oysters à la russe, cream of barley soup, poached salmon with mousseline sauce and sliced cucumbers, chicken lyonnaise, filet mignon with truffle on buttery potatoes, rice-stuffed vegetable marrow, lamb with mint sauce with creamed carrots, champagne sorbet, roasted squab, asparagus-salad vinaigrette, foie gras with celery, Waldorf pudding, cheese and fruit….
    Conversation was pleasant and polite, though the food took center stage, and Maggie Brown said almost nothing, busying herself with eating everything in sight except the cut flowers in vases, stopping a waiter to ask for the occasional French translation.
    Between courses, Futrelle mentioned to Astor that he had read the millionaire’s science-fiction novel, A Journey in Other Worlds, and that he had enjoyed it, which was not a lie—such futuristic concepts as television, energy conservation and subway systems had been imaginative and fascinating, and it would have been bad form to mention to Astor how abysmal the prose itself was.
    Maggie Brown, overhearing this, chimed in to inform any who didn’t know (and this included the Futrelles) that “Astor here is quite the crackpot inventor—he holds all sorts of patents… cooked up a bicycle brake, a pneumatic road-flattenin’ contraption, turbines and batteries….”
    Futrelle was impressed, and said so.
    “I enjoy tinkering,” Astor admitted.
    Madeline said, “My husband could have given Edison a run for it, if his family’s business responsibilities hadn’t stood in the way.”
    “Money can be a curse,” Astor observed. “Actually, I think a man who has a million dollars is almost as well-off as if he were wealthy.”
    Maggie Brown’s eyes bugged out at that one; but even she couldn’t think of anything to top it.
    Between the sixth and seventh courses, Futrelle asked Andrews, “Is this a pleasure trip for you, Mr. Andrews? Enjoying the fruits of your labors?”
    “Well,” Andrews said, with the shy smile that caused so many to find him immediately endearing, “this trip is a pleasure… I’m proud of what we’ve accomplished. But I am working, I’m afraid.”
    Ismay said, “Mr. Andrews is heading up a guarantee group from Harland and Wolff.” The White Star director was referring to the shipbuilding firm that, under Andrews’s guidance, had constructed the Titanic.
    “What is a ‘guarantee group’?” May asked.
    “My assistants and I move about, hopefully undetected,”