Titanic 2012: Curse of RMS Titanic

TWENTY TWO

They could already feel Titanic shuddering as the anchor was being weighed, and like a mammoth being, she seemed to be anxiously trying to turn toward her final destination. Ransom silently cursed their luck; he’d hoped to get aboard soon enough to stop the ship here, but there did remain Queenstown, her last stop before going to New York. As soon as the gangplank stood upright and was secured, and Lightoller felt it safe to leave things in the hands of his junior officer, Ransom, Declan, and Thomas began the long climb up the stairwells and up through each of Titanic’s nine decks when Lightoller was stopped in his tracks by another officer who appeared to be his superior, asking, “What is it you’re about, Mr. Lightoller? Aren’t you supposed to be overseeing things below? That the Cherbourg cargo is battened down? And who is seeing to directing the new first class passengers to their staterooms?”

“I think that would be Mr. Wilde, sir, when we’re at anchor.”

“But we’re not at anchor, Mr. Lightoller.”

“Yes, sir, Mr. Murdoch, sir.”

“So it’s fallen to you to be guiding the second class passengers to their staterooms is it?” asked Murdoch, a handsome ship’s officer who placed up a hand to them, holding the trio in place, “Have you your tickets in order, gentlemen?”

“These gents have requested to see Captain Smith, Mr. Murdoch.”

Murdoch studied them with more focus now.

“This is my ticket!” shouted Ransom, displaying his badge, its gold-plated surface gleaming even here in the corridor. “Deputy Constable Alastair Ransom, at your service, and these two lads are medical men, and we’re here to place a quarantine on this ship.”

First Officer Will Murdoch stared at Ransom as if he were mad. “Quarantine? But all the bills have been paid, I assure you.”

“Not a financial quarantine but a medical one, man. What is your name and rank?”

“First Officer Murdoch, sir, but there is no medical problems aboard Titanic. I think you’re misinformed, Constable.”

“We must see your captain; we must stop this ship’s voyage at once.”

“They say a murderer has boarded the ship, Will,” Lightoller said to Murdoch. “And if it’s so, it must be reported to the captain, and every crewman aboard alerted to the appearance of the miscreant so as to hunt him down, slap him in irons, and put him off with these men in Queenstown.”

“And here we are just finished boarding and are this minute weighing anchor,” began Murdoch, pacing a little, while passengers on the promenade at this level went by unaware of the danger onboard. He ended by meeting Ransom’s eye. “I can’t believe this! I saw your ship approach us in Southampton, the schooner, but we had no idea. Why didn’t you wire us?”

“Trinity has no Marconi shack—likely never will. Look at her,” he pointed to where the schooner rested alongside the pier. From the rail, each man took in Trinity’s beauty even with her sails furled. Murdoch began talking about his early days on a schooner class ship and how he missed those days. Then remembering himself, he said to Ransom, “And as for the distress flag, no one saw it in time.”

“We assumed you people ignored it.” Ransom felt a wave of panic wash over him; he hadn’t had a sip of alcohol since the day Reahall had arrested him, and he’d hoped to find drink aboard Trinity, but as it turned out, McEachern, a highly religious man, had not only sworn off drink years before, but he demanded it of every man who sailed with him, and he enforced it; as a result, not a pinch of rum or booze of any sort could be found aboard Trinity—not even in the galley for cooking. As of the day before, Alastair was entertaining the shakes as a result, and he feared himself on the verge of delirium tremens now. That would not do, not if he would to speak to the man in charge and not if he wished to be convincing.

“Do either of you officers have a flask?”

“A flask?” Lightoller was incredulous.

Murdoch handed the old constable a shiny silver flask. Ransom took a long swill from it, the brandy proving of high quality; it burned all the way down from gullet to gut. Ransom hesitantly returned the flask.

“Keep it; I have a feeling you’re going to need it,” Murdoch replied.

Lightoller frowned. “No doubt.”

“Here now,” began Murdoch, regaining himself. “You wish for us to disturb Captain Smith for an audience regarding stopping Titanic from its schedule, to disrupt our course before we’ve begun, Deputy Constable, on the basis of what evidence?”

Declan handed the autopsy photos to Murdoch, adding, “Sirs, this evidence is irrefutable and it indicates a new kind of killer—a new sort of plague unlike any seen before.”

“What sort of health plague?” challenged Dr. Murdoch. “There’re no health violations aboard this ship! No plague!”

“Contamination from a virus,” replied Thomas. “It’s serious. You must listen.”

On viewing the photos, Murdoch blanched and shoved them into Lightoller’s hands to rid himself of the unsightly things. “Murder and contamination all at once?”

“All at once, gentlemen,” Alastair addressed both officers. “Just so happens, yes, this time out.” Ransom kept up a strong voice, belying his own fears.

“Contagion indeed…” Lightoller had gone a bit white.

“But contagion we can fend off.” Murdoch acted as though manning up to it could beat any contagion. “We have the finest medical team afloat.”

“Yes, yes,” agreed Lightoller, he and Murdoch nodding at one another.

Murdoch spoke up, his voice resonating with a deep timber. “Our ship’s doctors may wish to hear of this first to assess your… your concerns.”

“Before we bother the captain with it, you see,” added Lightoller.

“You mean another petty officer?” asked Ransom. “We need to get these facts to the man in charge and now before the ship gets too far off.”

“That would be our ship’s doctor,” insisted Murdoch. “You must first see Dr. O’Laughlin.”

“Look, we haven’t time for middle men,” Declan declared.

Shakily, Ransom held a hand up to Declan. “Let me handle this, Dr. Irvin,

Dr. Coogan.”

“Awfully young to be doctors,” replied Murdoch, closely examining the Belfast interns. At the same time, Murdoch’s eyes widened to see Trinity at harbor growing smaller in the distance since Titanic had weighed anchor.

“Mr. Lightoller and half your officers look as young if not younger than Dr. Coogan and Dr. Irvin.” Ransom’s smirk spoke volumes. “How old are you, Mr. Murdoch? Twenty?”

“Thirty-four, sir,” replied Murdoch with pride.

Lightoller, a baby-faced fellow preferred to keep his age to himself, but he did say, “I’ve been sailing since a child, sir.”

“Follow me,” said Murdoch. “We’ll take the quickest route to the doctor’s clinic.”

Thomas whispered in Declan’s ear, Ransom overhearing: “Man, I hope they don’t fit us for asylum wear.”

Ransom caught up to Murdoch, clearly the man in charge at the moment. “You must take us to Captain Smith, now.”

Murdoch gritted his teeth and stood his ground. “I’ll not bring some frivolous demand over some nebulous health issue aboard to my captain when protocol to quarantine a ship must come from the man in charge of such matters—Dr. William Francis Norman O’Laughlin, Ship’s Surgeon.”

“Hold on,” said Ransom. “How many ship’s surgeons do you have?”

“I think that was one man’s name,” said Thomas. “Declan? You know so much about Titanic…”

“Yes, there’s Dr. O’Laughlin and an assistant surgeon,” replied Declan.

“That’d be Dr. Johnny Simpson,” said Lightoller, “and we have six nurses, two medical stewards and a state of the art hospital.” Lightoller watched Murdoch’s expression change to one of boredom as he spoke. He then quickly added, “But Mr. Murdoch is quite right. There exists rules and protocol aboard ship that demand you take your concerns to our ship’s doctor. He in turn, if so moved, takes all medical matters he feels beyond his control upstairs… to Captain Smith.”

Murdoch, looking starched, added, “This is just how it is done. Always has been, always will be.”

“All right, all right,” Ransom relented. “Perhaps your medical man has as much intellect as he has names! Obviously we are wasting time. Take us to your Ship’s Surgeon then, please!”

Ransom felt his patience at an end. He looked on the verge of striking the two younger men, regardless of his need for their good will. As Murdoch and Lightoller had them follow deeper into the belly of the ship, they found yet another lift. Behind the officers’ backs, Declan had slipped Ransom a small bottle taken from his bag. Ransom serendipitously took the laudanum which would help steady his nerves and calm his ire. Thomas, seeing this, asked, “Is there a chance we might have a brandy or shot of whiskey from the bar, Officer Lightoller?”

“Whiskey?” Murdoch spun on his heels. “Aren’t you two a bit young for spirits?”

“We are of age, sir,” promised Declan.

“In Belfast, everyone’s of age,” countered Lightoller with a smile which made them all laugh save Murdoch, who stepped onto the lift with Lightoller behind him.

Murdoch said to Lightoller, “I knew they were primitive but—”

“Twas but a joke, Will; ease up. How’ll you make it to New York at this rate, sir?”

“Ah, I see… I knew it was a joke.” Murdoch valiantly tried to make up for his lack of mirth.

The lift took them to D–deck and stopped, the brass filigree doors partimg from one another at the center. The lift opened onto a massive corridor through which they walked far too slowly for Ransom and the young surgeons. The ship had indeed pulled away from France for Queenstown—its final stop before going westward into the sun for New York and America.

“Funny how while on this humongous contraption that you hardly feel a thing in the way of movement,” said Ransom to the others. “But while on that damn French raft with all that cargo, we were so certain of doom below our feet.”

“It is rather like being on terra firma, isn’t it?” agreed Declan.

Although Lightoller started to reply, Murdoch grunted instead. Neither Titanic officer made any coherent comment on the subject as if they knew a secret they didn’t wish to share.

“They’re wound a bit tight,” Thomas characterized the officers in a whisper.

“Especially Murdoch,” agreed Ransom.

Arriving at the ship’s expansive twelve-bed hospital, the likes of which many a small hamlet across the Irish-English-Scottish and Wales countryside would each cherish. Declan thought of a certain village back in Wales that had so little. He half-joked,“More beds than lifeboats, eh?”

“We have an additional six-bed infectious ward, and a four-bed clinic and surgery room on C, not to mention a treatment room on the aft side of Hatch #6 right here.”

“Remarkable,” said Declan, eyes going everywhere around the hospital.

“We’ve well over two thousand people on board counting maids, crewmen, and officers,” Lightoller added.

“The doctors mostly handle seasick passengers,” added Murdoch, deflating the focus on the extensive medical facilities aboard, “but the crewmen can be careless, accidents happen. The nurses are already seeing to a few minor cases. Children with measles or sniffles, ladies with headaches, that sort of thing.”

They stood now before a row of pharmaceutical chests with an adjacent doctor’s office where a huge placard over the door read: Dr. William Francis Norman O’Laughlin.

“This is where your pill-dispenser spends all his time, eh?” asked Ransom, looking around.

On seeing their arrival, a young doctor with dark features started toward them, but Murdoch unceremoniously waved the assistant surgeon off even as Lightoller introduced him to the trio who’d boarded without tickets. “Gentlemen, this is our Assistant Surgeon, Dr. John Simpson.” He then addressed the doctor directly, “Dr. Simpson, we need Dr. O’s attention on this matter.”

Simpson nodded appreciably, replying, “Don’t let him hear ya callin’ him Dr. O, Charles! As for me, my hands’re full with the aches and pains of the rich and famous.”

Just then Dr. O’Laughlin, a tall, commanding man with sandy hair and dull brown eyes, got up from some paperwork at his desk in his windowed office, and he came out to meet Murdoch, assuming there was some medical emergency. Ransom guessed his age at mid-forties, but he moved somewhat shakily, like an older man, and he wondered if the doctor was perhaps hung over. Still the man appeared eager to be of service, introducing himself to his would-be patient or patients, rolling out all four of his names like a duke and this his realm. Once quick introductions were made, Officer Lightoller politely but firmly explained the situation, ending with the suggestion from their guests that Titanic be quarantined once they made port in Queenstown.

“Quarantine Titanic? Haw! Haw-haw.” O’Laughlin shook his head as he laughed. “Do you know what is riding on this trip? The record, man, the record! To beat Olympic’s time to New York. Lots of bets’ve been placed.”

“Of course, we know that, sir. We are officers,” replied Murdoch, his mustache twitching at the suggestion otherwise. “We know very well, Doctor, what we’re about, and rules don’t allow us to gamble, sir.”

“Oh, pity that. Stuff the rules, I say.”

“By now everyone aboard understands that, sir,” Lightoller’s tone became patronizing. “Look for a taste of your stashed rum, we can all have a seat and discuss the matter in more detail… get to the bottom of Constable Ransom’s concerns, and move on.”

“Show him the photos, Declan—the autopsy photos,” said Ransom.

“I can assure you, gentlemen,” began O’Laughlin, “There’s no sickness aboard Titanic that I’m aware of—”

“On a ship of this size? Four New York blocks long? How can you be sure. This is like… like a floating city, and every city has its underbelly.” While Ransom and the boys were amazed at what their eyes took in at every juncture of the Titanic, their mission allowed for little chance to wonder at the marvel they walked upon.

“He’s correct, Dr. O’Laughlin,” said Lightoller. “Fact is there is everything from dysentery to consumption just among the Black Gang alone. I mean they fake not having their various disorders, but there’s no signing on 900 crewmen and women that I know of that is without a good share of illness. You may as well suggest there’re no rats aboard!”

“The Black Gang?” asked Thomas. “Who would they be?”

“Stokers—the men feeding the boilers, Tommie,” said Declan.

Lightoller added, “The fellas who see to it the boilers are hot and turning those giant turbines and propellers below.”

“How else do you think we churn out 22knots,” replied O’Laughlin. “Black as coal miners they are from shovelin’ the stuff… mountains of it each day. They’ll be carrying ’em up from time to time with heat stroke, I assure you, but unlikely anything else save a case of consumption now and again.”

“I saw no one terribly disturbing come aboard.” Murdoch said of the Black Gang. “But you can bet there’re a number who’re carrying one sort of pestilence or another.”

“And some as soon slit your throat as not?” asked Ransom.

“Aye, that too.” Murdoch met Ransom’s glare.

“They seem a good bunch to me,” defended Lightoller. “Certainly know how to throw a party.”

“Are you saying they have rum, whiskey, rye?” asked Ransom.

“That and more.” The doctor laughed but it was cut short when his eyes fell on the photos Declan held out for his perusal.

Everyone fell silent. O’Laughlin with Murdoch and Lightoller looking over each shoulder studied each of eight photographs of three separate bodies, twenty-four in all.

“What do you make of it, Dr. O’Laughlin?” asked Murdoch.

“These are burn victims,” he replied and shrugged. “Hardly disease victims. What kind of hoax are you about, you men?”

“Burn victims?” shouted Thomas. “These are not!”

“That darkened skin is the result of complete, total dehydration, Dr. O’Laughlin,” insisted Declan. “Look, we are students at Queens University Medical.”

“How wonderful for you,” replied O’Laughlin, unimpressed, his eyes never leaving the photos.

“Well, I mean presently we’re doing residency at Mater Infirmorum, surely you’ve heard of it? I’ve a letter from my professor and the dean there—read them.”

“I knew this would be a waste of time!” Ransom exploded, grabbed up the photos and was about to hand them to Declan for safekeeping when suddenly a robust-looking Captain Edward Smith stepped into the doctor’s quarters, asking, “What is going on here, William?” He instantly glared eye-to-eye with Ransom. “My officers, crewmen, and passengers have been startled by you men. Do you wish to explain yourselves?”

“They’re not exactly stowaways, sir,” began Lightoller. “Sorry but they talked their way aboard. My doing entirely sir… .I mean my misjudgment.”

Murdoch did his best to cover for his junior officer. “Mr. Lightoller’s brought this to my attention, sir, and I thought it best to bring it to Dr. O’Laughlin’s before we should bother you with any of it, sir, and glad we did.”

The ship’s doctor piped in with, “T’would seem these fellows are here to pull off some sort of fraud, a dreadful, misguided hoax!”

“Ahh yes, a hoax of some sort, just the thing,” replied Captain Smith, looking Ransom and his young partners in crime up and down. “It’s the only thing hasn’t happened aboard yet. We have a lady topside shouting bloody murder about some dream she’s had—demanding she be put off the ship at Queenstown. Making a terrible row among the passengers to the point we had to lock her in her berth until we reach Queenstown. Now this!”

“Deputy Constable Ransom and his traveling companions,” began Murdock, “are claiming the ship’s being ravaged by a plague!”

“Nonsense, of course,” put in the doctor.

“Sounds to me more like a Typhoid Mary situation here, Captain,” countered Charles Lightoller. “A plague-carrier scattering it, so in a sense he’s a murderer if he is knowingly spreading it, sir.”

“I can bloody well speak for myself, Officer Lightoller,” bellowed Ransom. “Captain, we’ve no time to waste haggling over matters. This is of the utmost concern, and I assure you it is no hoax! But rather a matter of life and death, sir, and you must listen to our story and look at our documented proof.”

“Indeed…” Smith looked Ransom over once again, taking his time to size up this stranger; both men were approximately the same height, weight, and age. Both men carried themselves well. “Are you some sort of Sherlock Holmes, sir? I confess a guilty pleasure in reading accounts of the fictional Holmes but meeting a real life Holmes aboard Titanic, now that is grand indeed.”

“The photos they claim to be of diseased men, sir,” said O’Laughlin, “appear to be men burned alive if you ask my opinion.”

“On the contrary, sir,” said Declan, holding out the stack of photos, now smudged with fingerprints. “These men died a horrible, horrible death—one of them Thomas’ uncle.” He paused to pull Thomas into the circle as Thomas had shied off when Smith entered with his thick white beard and darting azure eyes. “These men died from the inside out… from the egg-sacs laid in them and the incredible hunger of this thing, sir, this… this alien creature… a monster and a killer we know far too little of; this enemy of mankind, sir.”

“I see. Well now shall we have a seat everyone about the conference table and have a closer look, Dr. O’Laughlin? Perhaps you are mistaken in your diagnosis; not easy to make judgments based on out of focus, grainy photos, really.”

“Let’s have that rum you fellows were interested in,” said Dr. O’Laughlin. “Perhaps I was hasty in my conclusions after all.” Ransom had missed the glint in each man’s eye, captain and doctor. They had been together for years and knew one another’s most subtle gesture and sarcasm, but Alastair had an ear for such nuances as well, and he began to wonder.

“Rum sounds good indeed,” began Ransom, “but Captain, these men in the photos were not seared to death by fire but by a vile organism that feeds on the entrails of a man; a parasite that we believe originated in the mines in Belfast from where the ore for your came. Crazy as it may sound, this organism has an affinity for the iron and steel, sir.”

“Ahhh… I see. Very odd indeed.”

“I know it sounds mad… crazy, sir, but we only wish to save lives.”

“Dr. O’Laughlin, are you aware of any such unseen organism that can wreak this sort of horror on a man?” Captain Smith held up the photo of Anton Fiore, his chest splayed open.

“These are burn victims undergoing autopsy; at best old reused cadavers, sir,” the ship’s surgeon declared in a tone that said ‘end of story’.

Ransom wanted to leap across the table, grab the man by the throat, and strangle him for his closed-mindedness.

Meanwhile, Smith asked O’Laughlin, “Have you seen anything in your clinic to warrant such drastic action?”

“Nothing of the kind sir.”

“Then you cannot recommend a quarantine?”

“Absolutely not, sir.”

Ransom grabbed his cane as if it might be a weapon. “Hold on, Captain, we’ve not said the word quarantine in your presence, now have we? We may be able to isolate and freeze this thing, ensuring your passengers’ safety.”

Smith looked across the table into Ransom’s steely eyes. “It’s getting round the ship, your calling for a quarantine. Fact is, a crewman overheard something of it… I suppose from you men, and it spread rapidly from there.”

“Are you trying to panic everyone aboard our ship?” asked Murdoch. “To what end?”

“You and the lads here’ll have to do better than this,” conclude Smith. “You’re surely working for our competitors, I’d say. What do you think, Murdoch? Dr. Laughlin?”

“The Cunard people?” shouted Declan. “No, Captain Smith! We are exactly who we say we are—interns from Belfast, and this man is a former Chicago Inspector now a Belfast police officer.”

Ransom added, “I assure, you, Captain, we are not frauds, sir, and neither is the disease!”

Lightoller had made himself useful, having spread out shot glasses, Waterford crystal at that, and poured like a veteran bartender, his nostrils twitching in anticipation, eyebrows bobbing.

Ransom had two shots before he finally said to the doctor and the captain, “We have it on good authority, sir, that a malignant organism has infiltrated the ship as long ago as the day you left Belfast, if not before.”

“I’ve seen no evidence of a plague, or a militant disease of any sort,” repeated O’Laughlin.

“It may well start deep below, sir, probably with the crew… maybe the Black Gang,” said Declan, his voice filled with certainty.

“Mr. Murdoch, Mr. Lightoller,” began the captain, “tell me, have you had any crewmen or others aboard going ill?”

“Or missing?” asked Declan.

“Gone missing? Why… well, yes. You recall the lad, Burne? Burnsey the other stokers call him; rather fond of the young man, they are.”

“And before that?” asked Ransom.

“One… one of the Pinkerton agents who’d booked passage from Belfast to Southampton in fact,” replied Murdoch.

“And he failed to disembark in Southampton,” added Lightoller, stroking his chin. “Chap was called on in his quarters but not there. We spent untold hours searching for him.”

“And he never surfaced?” asked Ransom.

“When I was told of it,” Captain Smith said now, “I decided we could wait no longer and waste no more time on the man.”

“And was it from Southampton to here that—”

“Is when this fellow Burne disappeared, yes?”

“Yes,” replied Lightoller as well, “so we decided he’d somehow got by us—without his trappings and his bags.”

“What of his and the agent’s bags?” pressed Ransom,

Lightoller frowned. “Abandoned… still in their respective rooms—quite odd, really. Left me with an eerie feeling, it did, Captain.”

“Yes, well… odd behavior, but we see odd behavior a great deal in this line of work,” added Smith.

“We’re Seeing it now,” said O’Laughlin with a slight snicker.

“Not so odd behavior if you are dead and thrown overboard or hidden in some storage bin or locker aboard,” replied Ransom, holding his glass out for a third shot of rum. “Do you have anything sharper?”

“It’s rum for pirates and stowaways,” Smith said with a grin that raised his white beard. He laughed and his men, along with his surgeon joined him in laughter.

“I’d prefer my rum to any drink, but we’re hardly stowaways,” Ransom replied, lying about his favorite drink.

As Lightoller located more of the doctor’s liquor, Ransom said, “Look here, Captain Smith, sir, we must convince you to stop this ship, to go passenger by passenger to determine who needs be kept in quarantine.”

“And I tell you there is far too much riding on this voyage to allow the disappearance of one or two men to interfere with it,” replied Smith. “Every great endeavor, every great feat of mankind has required sacrifices. We are engaged in breaking all maritime speed records for a ship of this tonnage, man. To beat Olympic. Don’t you want to be a part of that?”

“A record?”

“Yes, to outperform the record holder—our own sister ship and the only ship of equal or near-equal tonnage—the Olympic.”

“Then it’s not even bout your former, chief rival? The Cunard line?” asked Declan.

“I know what Titanic’s owner and her architect—both aboard—will say,” said Lightoller, downing his second rum.

“What’s that?”

“That you men are all imposters and belong in our brig.”

“Oo-hell-no!” moaned Thomas. “Not more jail time.”

Ransom put his head in his hands at Thomas’ blurting this out. “No, no, the lad means something entirely else—that we have spent hours talking to the authorities in Belfast about a number of murders there—deaths brought about by this plague.”

“The same plague we have chased from Belfast, the same as we are convinced is here, on board, now,” said Thomas, trying to gather back his words.

Dr. O’Laughlin poured Ransom a rum, and Ransom greedily drank it down, and Dr. O’Laughlin asked, “Feel better, do we?”

“Much better, yes. You have a good bedside manner, Doctor.”

“Mr. Lightoller is correct in what he says,” began Dr. O’Laughlin who now offered Ransom and the interns a cigar from a gold-plated tin. “The powers that be on board Titanic will not let what you propose happen; not under any circumstances. Don’t you agree, Captain Smith?”

“I more than agree, Doctor. Even if we were convinced of this uncanny and unlikely story, gentlemen—” He paused to light his cigar. “—it remains to convince Ismay, Andrews, and others with a vested interest. Slowing down much less stopping all engines? Sorry but the owners would have my head—white beard and all.”

“But this could mean the lives of all aboard—every man, woman, and child!” said Declan, punctuating with his unlit cigar while Thomas was coughing on his.

Dr. O’Laughlin had gone about the room to light each cigar in turn from a silver lighter and merely smiled at them. “The death of a few passengers? Not even slightly a deterrent for the likes of these men. Trust me, they will see you as clever saboteurs, anarchists, or worse, sent from Cunard’s Board of Directors to intentionally slow Titanic’s progress enough that it will be disgraced, so the headlines might read: Boondoggle Titanic Limps into New York Off Schedule.”

Captain Smith, also puffing on a cigar now, backed the doctor, spreading out a hand to indicate another headline he spoke: “Titanic Drags Tail Between Legs! Mr Ransom, gentlemen, being late to New York… now that would be the sin. Short of a bomb going off aboard, you see, or one of the boilers exploding, it’s simply not going to happen.”

Alastair took a deep breath of the aromatic cigar smoke. “Excellent leaf, Dr. O’Laughlin. A Cuban, I see.”

“You have taste, Constable.”

“Regardless of what your officers and doctor advise, Captain Smith,” said Ransom, “we lay our case before you, sir, a man who is wise enough to see our point, and brave enough to fight for caution and safety above greed. I have it on good authority that you, Captain, are such a man.”

“This ship is controlled by powerful men,” interrupted O’Laughlin. “Men with vested interest you can’t imagine.”

“Staggering amounts of capital,” choked out Lightoller while Smith remained stoic and silent, listening to every word around him.

Ransom leaned in across the table toward Smith, “Captain, your surgeon and your officers have done all in their power to dissuade you from listening to reason. However, if you continue to stand in our way, many deaths will be on your hands—possibly every person aboard Titanic. I’m sure you’ve heard of the Black Plague.”

“Of course we have,” replied Dr. O’Lauglin, but I saw no such thing in those photos! Wait a moment. Let me have another look at them.” O’Lauglin’s remarks and his going again to the photos belied his uncertainty at this point.

“Well, William Francis?” asked Smith. “Is it or isn’t it Bubonic Plague?”

“I stand by my original assessment—either these corpses are right out of the university freezer used in six months of dissection and study—which is not uncommon in a poor place like Belfast—else they are fire victims. Either way, I see no evidence of Bubonic plague! No sir! You’d cause panic and become a laughing stock should you take action based on this! It’s ridiculous. Plague ship indeed!”

“Constable Ransom has lied to you, Captain,” Declan said, “with the best of intentions—to get you to take us seriously. Dr. O’Lauglin… no one person, medical man or not, has ever seen this disease before, and so far we’ve no cure but to run from it.”

“This is something worse than Bubonic—far worse,” added Thomas. “You’ve got to listen to us, Captain, sir. It’s all true.”

“The hell,” muttered O’Laughlin, choking on his drink as he again stared at the autopsy photos. “These look to be mannequins—bloody burned up dummies, if you ask me.” Shaking his head, he added, “A sure fraud of some sort first perpetrated on 2^nd Officer Lightoller. You know how impressionable Charles can be, Captain.”

“No, Dr. O’Laughlin, Captain Smith, sirs–the disease leaves a man completely dehydrated—” countered Declan. “Not a drop of spinal fluid or marrow in the bones!”

“All fluid robbed of him in hours,” added Thomas. “Please, we have a letter from our Dean and our professor of surgery at Mater Infirmorum Hospital where these bodies—not mannequins were dissected.”

“Imagine every organ shriveled to a tenth its size, sir,” continued Declan. “All fluid down to the spinal fluid gone… bone marrow gone. Take a closer look at the photos.”

Both captain and ship’s doctor did so. “There are no… they have no eyes,” noticed Captain Smith immediately.

“Shriveled to the size of a walnuts!” said Thomas.

“Their eyes’ve sunken deep into the sockets!”

“Do you want to see this kind of thing happen aboard Titanic?” asked Ransom. “Captain, you need to make some serious—” Ransom stopped, interrupted by the subtle sensations below his feet. “The ship is moving at a higher rate of speed.”

Lightoller snatched out his watch from his vest pocket where it dangled on a fob and he glanced at the time. “Yes… right on time, and it would appear that you three are on your way to a Queenstown jail cell after you enjoy a stint in our brig below.”

“Captain, you must see our urgency.” Declan opened both hands into a beggar man’s gesture.

When this failed to move the stony captain, Ransom slammed a fist atop one of the photos. “This disease may not be aboard, but it may well be here now, feeding on your crew, your bakers, your wait staff, your maids, those stokers—picture them all dead! Imagine it. Are you officers of Titanic willing to gamble with the lives of all on board—sirs?” Ransom’s iron gaze went from Smith to O’Laughlin and back again.

Officer Lightoller, Dr. O’Lauglin, and Captain Smith all exchanged a variety of confused looks; they then huddled in one corner, muttering to one another until Lightoller stepped away from the two senior officers, to ask, “How’re your drinks? Need refreshing, gents?”

“Where’s Murdoch?” asked Ransom, realizing the other man had slipped from the room.

Even as he said it, Ransom realized the meaning of Murdoch’s disappearing act, for at the same moment, the doctor’s office door slammed open with Murdoch, holding a presumably loaded gun that Ransom recognized as the British Webley, a six-shooter. The two hefty crewmen were also armed and on either side of him.

Ransom instantly sobered up as Captain Smith announced, “All right—let’s see how smart the captain of the Titanic is indeed, gentlemen.”

Smith had given some coded word or signal to Murdoch to act, either that or he signaled for Dr. O’Laughlin to signal to Murdoch. Either way, Ransom and the young interns were now being put in chains and led away—their protests ignored as Captain Smith and Dr. O’Laughlin laughed and toasted their successful ruse.

Ransom heard part of the reason behind the hilarity over the laughter when O’Laughlin said, “And we took the three scoundrels down without firing a shot.”

“And no one harmed,” Smith added.

This as Ransom and his medical friends were shoved along toward the lift to be taken to some dog kennel below and locked up before being put off at Queenstown.