Page 37

I search the faces for Cavill, but he hasn’t come through to the à la carte restaurant yet.

Or perhaps he’s chosen to eat in the dining room instead.

I feel a sense of panic. Tomorrow night this ship will sink.

I’ve barely had a moment to speak with him, besides our brief chats when he arrived and on the deck.

I have to engineer another meeting somehow.

There’s so little time left. Shortly, I will slide back and leave him once again.

I can’t do that knowing I missed opportunities to be with him.

I curb my frustration and turn my attention to Mrs Brown, who is sitting next to me because we are five women and two men.

‘Connie, you need to take your nephew in hand,’ she says and gives the green feathers in her hair a toss in Lester’s direction.

I see he’s grinning at the young widow who Constance believes is out to steal him.

‘Isn’t that what you’re here for? You want to be careful.

This ship has eyes and ears and big mouths too! ’

‘I know. I’m not sure what to do.’ I sigh inwardly. That doesn’t sound very like Constance!

‘New York is a small town and some of its residents are here.’ She arches her eyebrows. ‘Walls have ears too,’ she adds with significance.

I’m not sure what she means. ‘Indeed?’ I question, hoping she’ll explain.

She’s only too ready to. ‘He was having a row earlier with his valet. Didn’t you hear, Connie?’

‘No, I didn’t.’

She lowers her voice. ‘As I was on my way to dinner, I passed his cabin and heard him shouting. Really, if one has to shout at one’s valet, it’s time to exchange him for a new one.’

I’m astonished. How come I didn’t hear? I must have been in the bath, perhaps. ‘I did notice he was out of sorts,’ I reply.

She sniffs. ‘Like a bear with a sore head. Well, you can count on Mrs Black Widow to soothe it!’ Her toffee-brown eyes widen in mock horror. ‘You’ve got to get a grip on him, Connie, or it’ll end badly, I tell you. Viscount or no viscount, no one approves of improper behaviour.’

She’s right, of course. Not for the first time, I wonder what Constance would do.

Dinner is delicious. There are copious helpings of caviar, and a different wine for each of the nine courses, if one so desires to eat that much food!

In my corset, I feel full almost immediately.

I drink only a small glass of wine, even though as Pixie Tate I’m more than a little partial to it and have often gone through an entire bottle on my own!

But tonight, I must remain sober and alert.

After dinner, we go to the first-class lounge for a rubber of bridge.

My mind scurries like a mouse in a maze trying to find a way out of it.

I cannot feign dizziness again, but neither can I play bridge, so what am I going to do?

I have to do something or everyone will think it extremely odd.

I know from her diary that Constance Fleet is a very good bridge player.

We find a spare table. Mrs Brown takes the chair opposite me, and Mr Gilsden and Mr Rowland seat themselves on the chairs between us.

Mr Gilsden’s moustache is so comical that for a moment I’m distracted by the urge to reach out and touch it.

The flamboyant black wings look like they’re stuck on with tape.

‘I hope you’re on form tonight, Connie,’ says Mrs Brown, eyes shining at me with their usual good humour.

‘Let’s play racing demon,’ I suggest. ‘I’m so terribly bored of bridge.’

Mrs Brown arches her eyebrows. ‘Racing demon?’ She glances at the men. ‘Now that’s a game I haven’t played in a while. What do you say, gentlemen?’

‘I think it’s a capital idea,’ Mr Rowland replies, and smiles at me appreciatively.

Mr Gilsden twiddles the wing of his moustache between his thumb and forefinger.

‘How original of you, Miss Fleet.’ And so it is.

We play a couple of games, and I win, not just once, but twice.

I might not be accomplished at the piano.

I don’t speak any language besides my own, and I’m a poor dancer, but I’m a fiend at racing demon.

I think of Ulysses then, sitting in the Walter-Wyatt drawing room, keeping me safe.

How often the two of us have played racing demon long into the night.

‘Well, I can see why you wanted to play racing demon,’ says Mr Rowland, impressed. ‘You haven’t given us much of a chance.’

‘You played like the devil, Connie,’ exclaims Mrs Brown heartily. ‘But that was the point, wasn’t it?’

I laugh with her and begin to gather up the cards for another game when my attention is diverted by Cavill, who is crossing the drawing room.

I watch him keenly. He’s making his way towards the door.

He cuts a dash with his height and quiet glamour.

I know instantly that I must seize this moment.

I might not get another chance to speak with him, at least, not when he’s alone.

I rise suddenly and the two men stand with me, which is customary when a lady leaves or arrives at the table.

‘I will only be a minute,’ I say. ‘I need to powder my nose before the next game. Shuffle the cards, Maggie.’ And I hasten across the room.

I reach Cavill in time to see him heading through the door onto the deck.

I follow after him. The cold hits me like an icy wall. I had not expected it to be this bitter. My breath mists on the air and I shiver, for I’m not wearing a coat and my dress is flimsy.

I join him at the railing. He turns to me in surprise. ‘Miss Fleet! Are you not cold?’

‘I needed air,’ I reply lamely, taking a breath. It burns my throat. ‘Forgive me. I saw you come outside and went after you. I didn’t want to be out here alone. I hope you don’t mind.’

‘Of course not.’ He takes off his tailcoat. ‘You must put this on or you will catch your death.’

‘Thank you.’ I allow him to help me into his coat. ‘Now you will freeze,’ I tell him, and it takes every ounce of self-control to resist the desire to wrap my arms around him and nuzzle into the crook of his neck.

‘When I start to go blue, we can go back inside.’

‘All right.’ I turn my face to the stars.

They’re exceptionally bright tonight, like golden flecks from a sparkler.

My throat tightens. I feel the warmth of his body in the tailcoat and the smell of him envelops me, and I can’t help but think of the precious times I basked in his embrace, in his kisses, and the tightness in my throat begins to ache.

Overwhelmed by the knowledge of what is to come, I want to cry at my helplessness.

I cannot allow him to die. I just can’t. Not when I believe I brought him here.

‘I dreamt last night that this ship sank,’ I tell him gravely.

‘You and Mrs Gilsden.’ He dismisses my fear with a chuckle.

‘What if we’re right?’ I venture.

‘Dreams are just dreams, Miss Fleet. It’s natural to be anxious in the middle of the ocean. But you have no reason to be. This ship is—’

‘Unsinkable.’ I cut in grimly. ‘I know. That’s what they all say. But there are icebergs out there and we might easily hit one.’

‘I trust our captain,’ he says. ‘Captain Smith won’t let that happen.

You should be enjoying the voyage, not worrying about things that are so unlikely to happen.

This is the most magnificent ship in the world, and the fastest. We’ll be in New York before you know it and then you’ll wish you had savoured every moment. ’

How much more can I tell him without putting the future in jeopardy? I want to save him, but I cannot tell him the truth without potentially saving everyone, and that is tampering with the past and changing the future. I can’t do that. This ship has to sink and that’s all there is to it.

‘Just look at that sky,’ he says, and gazes up at it.

His profile is silhouetted against the luminous blue and I want to trace it with my fingertips, that wide forehead, that patrician nose, that dimpled chin, those sensual lips.

The crow’s feet that fan into his temples, deeper now, are so familiar to me, I know exactly how they would feel beneath my touch.

For a moment I forget who I am. It’s just me and Cavill, two people who love each other, standing together on the deck of a ship.

But an icy breeze brushes my cheek and I drop my eyes to the black water below.

I’m hoping for the impossible. Hoping that Cavill might be able to see beyond the body of Constance Fleet standing before him and remember me. Remember us.

I think of the miles of water beneath the hull. Of the silent tomb on the seabed where in just over twenty-four hours this ship will meet its final resting place. And the feeling of dread overwhelms me.

‘I must go back inside,’ I say at length, and take off his coat.

He looks at me and smiles.

‘And you’re going blue,’ I add with a laugh. ‘So, you’d better put this back on.’

He takes the coat. I hold his gaze. He looks deeply into my eyes and then a frown furrows his brow, and he looks as if he’s about to say something.

I arch my eyebrows questioningly. There’s a sudden intimacy in the way he’s observing me.

Could it be that he’s finding something familiar there? Am I wrong to hope?

He seems to change his mind then, and the tension dissipates. ‘You had better get into the warmth, Miss Fleet,’ he says, threading his arms into the coat.

Reluctantly, I leave him there. As I return inside, I wonder what it was that he was about to say.