Carpathia

For the first day after the girl moved into their cabin, Abigail never heard her speak. The girl’s mouth moved, Abigail could see that. But she never spoke out loud for Abigail to hear. Instead, the girl whispered strange and secret words to the small, porcelain doll that she clutched in her hands so tightly that Abigail thought it might have been frozen to her arms in the icy waters of the sea.

“Mama,” Abigail had asked shortly after the girl arrived in their small space below the main deck. “What’s her name?”

Her mother did not look up from her needlework, only offered her daughter a sad, lost expression that Abigail only ever saw when her father became “surly.”

“Hush now,” her mother said in a low, quiet voice. The girl was on the other side of their cabin, tucked into a corner as far away from the two of them as she could possibly be. “Don’t you mind her for now.”

“She’s not very friendly,” Abigail told her mother. She tried to match the whispered tone her mother spoke with, though her voice echoed off the wooden walls of their cabin a bit louder than she had thought it would. The girl in the corner gave no sign that she had heard, however, instead continuing to clutch her face against her doll and whisper her mysteries to its porcelain ear.

Abigail’s mother gave her daughter a harsh look with her eyes. “Mind your manners, Abigail,” her mother said. “The poor child has been through quite a bit. She will talk when she is ready.”

But she’s wearing my dress! Abigail thought to say. But she held her tongue upon another look at her mother’s sad, troubled face.

The dress the girl wore was Abigail’s favorite. It was pure white, like the snow, with frilly lace that went up and down the arms and the side. And on the shoulders it bore two small, lacy flowers that perched so gently as if they were always searching for the sun, no matter how Abigail moved or ran in it. Mama had told Abigail that her father had paid a “great sum” for it, so that his daughter may be as beautiful as she deserved to be. Her father himself had only said something about the “best Jew tailors” in Brooklyn, and grumbled about being cheated out of the cost. “Damned Jews are fortunate they can sew a pretty dress,” she had heard her father say when she first got it. “Otherwise I’d not let anyone hustle me like that, let alone a Jew!”

Her mother had packed the dress so delicately before they departed. Abigail had asked to wear it on the ship, but her mother had refused. “You will be able to wear it when we arrive in Vienna,” her mother had said. “We will tour the palaces they have there, and you must look as elegant as can be. Until then, we must keep such a dress safe and secure so as to not ruffle it.”

But here was this strange, mute girl, now sharing their cabin, wearing that very dress as if she were the one bound for the great palaces of Vienna.

She’s too big! Abigail had thought. Her shoulders are too broad! She’ll rip it! Indeed, the two lacey flowers, so daintily perched and bloomed when they sat atop Abigail’s shoulders, now were bent and crumpled when forced into this strange girl’s broad frame. As if their sun had been stolen, and they were lost in the dark, dark world of the ship. And the cold waters of the ocean beyond it.

When the girl first arrived on their ship, she was only wearing her nightgown. A nightgown and a large, black coat—a grown man’s coat—that she seemed to drown in it was so big around her small body.

“Mama,” Abigail said when the strange creature in its strange dress appeared in their cabin. “Why does she get to go around in nothing but her nightgown?”

“Never you mind, child,” her mother had said.

The luxury of wearing only her nightgown out of bed was one that Abigail knew her mother would never allow for her daughter. But here was this strange girl, Abigail’s own age, who was given the freedom of such immodesty in the presence of strangers.

“Mama!” Abigail then tried. “Why does she wear a man’s coat?”

Her mother gave her a harsh look. “Must you ask so many questions?”

“It’s very queer!” Abigail said.

Her mother twisted her mouth in an ugly display of discomfort that Abigail hated to see. “There has been a tragedy,” was all her mother said. “We must do our part. It is the least we can do, for we never know when we will be on the other side of such misfortune.”

And with these mysterious words her mother unlocked their trunk and removed Abigail’s lacey, flowery dress without any word or thought. She unfolded it with no care and presented it to the young girl who wore a nightgown and a man’s coat, and who clutched a small porcelain doll as if it were her own heart.

“But mama—” she started. But her mother shot her such as look as stilled the protests in her throat. Only Abigail’s own thoughts heard her lament as her mother helped the girl out of her nightgown and into her brand-new dress.

But she is soaking wet! Abigail wailed to herself. She stinks of the sea!

*

Abigail awoke the next morning, still lying on her small makeshift bed on the floor, to the sound of her father’s angry voice echoing from the hallway.

“You act as if I do not understand the situation!” her father shouted. Abigail thought he might be quarrelling with her mother again, but she turned her sleepy eyes to the other side of the cabin and saw her mother keeping vigil over the strange, mute girl who had taken over Abigail’s bed. Her mother was shifting her eyes back and forth between the sleeping girl and the door leading to the hallway, where her father’s angry voice continued to echo.

“I understand the situation damn well!” Abigail saw her mother cringe at the oath that had come from her father’s mouth. Abigail closed her eyes to pretend that she was still sleeping and had not heard it. “All I am asking—and I do not believe this is at all unreasonable—is a clear picture as to what the new timeline for arrival is! I hardly think this is beyond the company’s capacity to provide its paying customers!”

“Please sir,” another softer voice said. The voice had a humorous English accent—Abigail had heard her mother describe it as cockney. Abigail recognized the voice as belonging to the friendly ship steward named Jenkins, who had secretly given small chocolate sweats to her and the other children in that hallway. “Please, sir, understand. This is an ‘ighly unusual situation…”

“You’re damned right it’s unusual!” her father bellowed. “You think me not compassionate? You think I don’t regard these people, or their plight? Of course I do! I’m a churchgoer! I am a Christian man! I know that the sea makes brothers of us all! We pick these poor souls out of the drink, crammed every conceivable inch of this ship with them—including the very same first-class cabins that I paid quite a hefty sum for my family and I—that is all well and good! But now I hear talk of turning around and going back to New York? While we’re already in the middle of the damned Atlantic? Halfway to Gibraltar? And all I—the man who paid for my ticket—wants to know is how much this will affect our arrival date in Fiume!”

“Sir, please understand, sir,” Jenkins said with a soft, pleading voice. In her half-sleep, Abigail somehow felt immensely sorry for him. “Our officers are working everything out ‘best they can. Our Captain’s in communication with the company, right now they’re working out the best course of action. We can guarantee that you’ll get what information comes to us as soon as we get it. But it’s an ‘ighly unusual situation—"

“Damn it man!” her father interrupted. “I know a man of your status cannot fully comprehend this, but I do have quite an important business date in Vienna the first week of May! Very important business date! I confess I am not well acquainted with life at sea, but in my line of work one does not miss appointments of this nature once they have been agreed to! Not at least without advanced notice! Now, at minimum, if I had an idea of how long it will now take us to get to Fiume, I could at the very least telegram my Austrian partners this information—”

“Please, sir, I do have to request that you keep your voice down—”

“—I could telegram them from sea and hope they are as charitable as to the plight of the shipwrecked as you demand of us paying passengers!”

Though her eyes were closed, Abigail heard her mother softly rise from her chair and open the door to the hallway.

“George,” her mother said in the soft, severe voice that she often used when her father has grown surly. “George, do please try to keep your voice down—”

“Damnit Rebecca, not now!” Her father barked no quieter than before. “I am in the middle—”

“George, do watch your language when the children are in ear range.”

“Children?” her father said. “Have we adopted that feral sea child now?”

“George!” her mother said more severely, though no louder. “I do not wish for the children to be woken up! Especially not to this!”

“Sir, ma’am,” Jenkins said in between them. “I do once more have to ask you to keep your voices down as best you can…”

With her mother out of the room, Abigail opened her eyes just a crack. Through her blurry, half-shut vision, she looked across the room at the strange girl in the opposite corner, lying in her bed and still wearing her fanciest dress.

Abigail thought that the girl was still sleeping. But, instead, her eyes seemed to be open, just a crack, as Abigail’s were. She was looking up at the ceiling, still clutching her doll, with her eyes (as far as Abigail could tell before sleep took her over once more) swaying back and forth with the same rhythm of the ship around them as it dances slowly across the ocean tides.

*

The next day Abigail decided to take the matter into her own hands. Her mother and father had gone above deck to have a “conversation” with the ship’s officers—or so her father had said. And Abigail was left alone in their small cabin with the strange girl who had been pulled from the icy sea itself.

The girl was still whispering something to her doll. Based on her expression and small hand gestures, Abigail guessed that the girl might have been telling some sort of story, much like her mother and her nurse would tell her fairy tales before sleep. Abigail left her bed and approached the girl cautiously.

“Hello,” she began. The girl gave her a side-eyed glance, but didn’t turn her head away from her doll.

“Hello,” the girl said. Her voice was soft, but had a low, rusty register, like someone years older than the girl looked. Or who had just gargled salt water.

“I’m Abigail,” Abigail said. The girl sent her a suspicious glance, as if Abigail had just threatened her with something she couldn’t see.

“I know,” the girl said. Her tone was rough and accusatory, as if Abigail was an intruder into her own personal world. “I heard your mother talking to you.”

You’re in my cabin! Abigail thought to herself. And you’re still wearing my dress!

But Abigail remembered the manners her mother had taught her over the course of so many years.

“Well, I don’t know your name yet,” Abigail said. “I’ve not heard mama say it, at least.”

The girl sent a quick glance down at the doll she still clutched to her chest, so tightly she ruffled the lace on Abigail’s pretty dress. “I didn’t tell her my name,” she said. “Though my mama may have.”

Abigail felt frustrated. If not for the strange feeling that her mother was still watching her, despite being elsewhere in the ship at that moment, Abigail might have said something that wasn’t very lady-like.

“Well, may I ask what is your name?” she said in as polite a voice as she could manage. “Or even what I should call you?”

The girl seemed to retreat farther against the wooden wall behind her, as if she was flinched from a strange danger that Abigail brought to her.

“My name is Miriam,” the girl said at last.

Abigail forced a smile. “Hello Miriam,” she said. Her mind went blank on anything else to offer.

Miriam simply nodded. “Hello,” she said. “This is a nice cabin. Your mama and papa are very kind for letting me stay here.”

Miriam’s voice had a strange accent that Abigail couldn’t quite place. Abigail, in her short life, hadn’t been around the world enough to pick out accents like her father could, but she did think that Miriam’s was from somewhere in Europe. But, more importantly, it seemed somehow lower-class, as her father would say. Some combination of lowly and foreign that her father would probably call a gypsy accent, wherever it came from. Of course, Abigail had heard her father call American, English, French, and Italian accents all gypsy accents as well, so Abigail never really learned what exactly that was supposed to mean. Except that whoever spoke in that accent was meant to be beneath them.

“Well, you’re very welcome,” Abigail said. She didn’t know why she should be welcome for this, but her mother’s manners were hard to ignore. “Can…can I ask what you’re doing here?”

The question was far more blunt than she had meant it to be. But it had been burning on her tongue ever since the girl first appeared in their cabin, whisked in under her mother’s arm and to her father’s grumbles, and with their talk already going Abigail couldn’t keep it contained.

Miriam, however, seemed to have no reaction to any rudeness, at least as far as her face and eyes showed. Instead, she cast yet another side glance down at her doll, as if looking to its porcelain eyes for guidance on what to say next.

“I’m waiting for my papa,” Miriam said.

“Your papa?” Abigail asked. Miriam has a far-off look in her eyes that Abigail hadn’t seen before. The girl nodded and drew her chin closer to her doll.

“He’s going to come get me, on this ship,” Miriam said. “But…” Her lip began to quiver, but her voice stayed steady. At least, as steady as it could be with the soft rocking of the ship catching the air flowing through her mouth.

“…but I’m afraid he doesn’t know where I am!” Miriam cried.

Abigail stayed still for a few seconds, unsure of what to do. “Well,” she began. “Is he on the ship?”

Miriam didn’t respond, only continued staring off into the distance. Abigail looked around the room. She suddenly wished very badly for her mother—or even her father—to return and deal with the girl themselves. But the cabin was empty and silent save for the creaking of the wooden panels with the rocking of the ship.

“Well,” Abigail attempted. “What does your papa look like?”

Miriam seemed to perk up at this. She drew her face from her doll and, at last, looked Abigail right in the eye.

“He’s a big, tall man,” she said. “He had a big belly that he bounces me up and down on. He has big, strong shoulders that he carries me around on. He has brown hair that’s turning gray—he says he’s so tall that his head is picking up snow, like the tops of mountains. He has a big, deep laugh and a thick walrus mustache.”

Abigail blinked. “A walrus mustache?”

“It’s a big, fat sea animal,” Miriam said. “With long, white teeth called ‘tusks’ and long whiskers, like my papa has. You’d think that they’re fish, since they live in the sea, but papa says they’re really mammals like us.”

“I know what walruses are,” Abigail said. She tried to get her voice to convey how annoyed she was. But, in truth, she was scanning her mind for the various animals her mother had shown her in their illustrated children’s encyclopedia back in their home in New York, trying to remember exactly what a ‘walrus’ looked like.”

Miriam nodded. “Papa says they’re lazy thing that like to lie on rocks and ice bergs in the colder parts of the ocean. He said we might even see one from the ship as it went to New York.”

“But,” Abigail began. “We left New York!”

Miriam shook her head. “I mean the other ship,” she said. “The one I was on with my papa and mama before I came here. We were going to New York.”

“The other ship…” Abigail said.

Miriam nodded. “Yes. The Titanic.” She looked back down at her doll, as if its porcelain mouth would whisper to her something secret. “We didn’t see any walruses, though.”

Abigail glanced back at the door of their cabin, hoping that her mother would come through with fresh clothes and comforting words and take this whole ordeal out of Abigail’s hands. Her ears perked up when she heard soft footsteps coming down the hall. But, soon after her spirits fell when she heard it coming with an off-key whistling that she recognized as coming from Jenkins the porter, who liked to whistle when he checked on all of the cabins on his deck. She turned back to Miriam.

“Well,” she tried. “What about your mama? Is she on the ship with us? Does she know where you are?”

Miriam was silent for a few seconds. Abigail saw some new kind of sadness stretch across her eyes and cheeks, though Abigail knew she had not been around the world enough to know what it meant. Finally, Miriam nodded.

“Yes, my mama’s on the ship,” she said. Her voice was low and slow, as if she wasn’t certain what she should say, or give away to this strange girl she was now sharing a cabin with. “She’s staying on the upper deck, in the dining area, with all the other people from our ship.”

Abigail looked up at the ceiling, trying to picture the ship’s grand dining hall on the upper deck. She had dined there their first night on the ship, with her mother and father, sitting at a long, large table and the fanciest plates. Her mother had let her wear her second-best dress, and all through dinner she had marveled at the beautiful crystal lights and white and silver plates. Her father, for once, was no longer acting ‘surly,’ but smiling as he smoked his pipe and joked with other men sitting at their table.

“If you think this impressive,” he said, looking down at his daughter across the table from him. “Just you wait until we arrive in Vienna.”

Abigail tried to imagine what the dining hall looked like just then, but her mind was blank.

“Does your mother know you’re here?” Abigail asked.

Miriam’s mouth wrinkled, and something dark and troubling seemed to go through her thoughts.

“…yes…I think,” she began. “Though, it’s probably best if we do not bother her.”

“What?” Abigail said. Her voice was once again louder than she had intended it to be. “Don’t you want to go see her? Or, at least let her know you are alright?”

Miriam clutched her doll even harder, so hard that Abigail thought that it’s porcelain might shatter under the girl’s strength.

“…it’s best if we do not bother her,” she repeated. “My papa said she’s…nervous. She gets like that, sometimes.”

“Oh.” Abigail has dozens of more questions, but something about the girl’s face told her that she should end that topic right there.

She had seen the main dining hall, just briefly, the other night, when the ship stopped suddenly and the porters emerged from their corridors with shouts and confusion everywhere. The fancy tables and chairs were all gone, and the vast hall was filled, every inch, with new and strange bodies, some dressed in fancy clothes, some in poor rags, many still in their sleeping gowns. All huddled together, more people than Abigail had ever seen at once, some quiet and forlorn, some crying, some laughing, all stinking of the ocean water, and the wind, and the deep, deep cold…

Without taking time to think why, Abigail slowly went over to the bed and sat down next to Miriam. The girl gave no resistance, but kept her eyes trained on her doll.

“Did your papa say he’d meet you here?” she asked.

Miriam was silent for a few seconds longer. “He said that we were going on an adventure,” she said at last. “The ship itself was an adventure. He said we’d be venturing across the Atlantic, like the great explorers of old. He said our ship is the biggest in the world. The Titanic, so big and strong that it could challenge the most dangerous edges of the ocean, and maybe sail right off the end of the world itself.”

“You were going to New York?” Abigail asked. Miriam nodded.

“Papa told us adventure waited there. A new life, with golden streets and cities brighter than the stars.”

“Well,” Abigail began. “This ship was supposed to go the somewhere called Fiume, in a land called Austro-Hungry, or something like that. But, my father told us we are now turning around and going back to New York. So, maybe you can meet your papa there?”

Miriam was silent. Abigail bit her lip.

“When did you last see your papa” she asked.

Miriam fell into deep thought. Abigail, despite her young age, knew in some sleeping instinct that the question forced the little girl to brave dark waters of pain and fear in her memory.

“It—it was in the night,” she finally said. “I was sleeping, in our little cabin. The ship was big, but we had a small cabin, smaller than this one, far below the deck. Papa, he woke me up. I was so sleepy, I didn’t really know what he was saying to me. But he said that we had a new adventure to go on, that I must be a braze girl and go with him and mama and…” The silence that fell told Abigail almost as much as words would have.

Miriam drew a finger against the doll’s hair, then continued. “I remember my papa carrying me. I remember everyone on the ship flooding out into the halls, coming from their rooms, dressed in their sleeping clothes, many of them. There were so many people all streaming out, I was afraid they were going to crush us. But papa was so big and strong, he kept me safe as he carried me. We finally made it out to the deck, and…”

“…and?” Abigail asked. She was long past remembering her manners.

“…and there were so many people there. I thought it was a celebration. There was music. And fireworks…”

“Fireworks?” Abigail asked.

Miriam nodded. “Above the ship. And there were little boats, so little, but they were putting people into them. And I thought it was a game, but mama…”

Miriam gulped. “Mama was shrieking, and crying. So many people were. But papa was strong—he laughed. He told me it was an adventure. That I had to be brave. And…”

Miriam looked across the cabin, towards the wooden wall on the other side. But Abigail thought she might be looking past it, into the night outside, and the endless expanse of the black, cold sea.

“Mama and me, we go onto one of the small ship. But, papa didn’t come with us.”

“Why not?” Abigail asked. But Miriam shook her head.

“He didn’t say. There was so much shouting, everywhere. I didn’t…But papa was still laughing. He said…he said he was going to explore the ocean. The ship was going to take him to the deepest parts of the sea, where the deepest mysteries are kept. He once read me a book—Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea—about people who explore the depths of the ocean. That’s where papa said he was going. And…and our little boat was lowered, me and mama, and everyone else there. And we fell down to the ocean. But—there was papa, standing on the deck, smiling and waving and laughing, telling me to be brave, and…”

Miriam didn’t finish. Abigail suddenly felt quite cold, colder than she had even when wandering above the deck in the icy winds of the sea the first night they had been on board the ship.

“Is that all you remember?” she asked.

Miriam pursed her lips in thought. “There’s one more thing—only, I don’t know if it might not have been a dream.”

“What was it,” Abigail asked.

“I—I remember being on that small boat, being pressed against so many people. Mama squeezing me so tight that it hurt, hearing her crying, hearing everyone crying. And, I knew that I was going to be afraid. But papa had told me that I must be brave, so I kept my eyes closed, so that I wouldn’t see anything that might make me afraid and make me break the promise I made to my papa. But—I think—I did see something, only—”

“Only what?”

“Only it was so queer, I don’t know…”

She trailed off, swallowing several times before continuing.

“I kept my eyes closed up so tight, trying not to hear the cries and shrieks around me. But then, I heard something else. It was this awful roar, like a thunder, that echoes across the ocean. And I couldn’t help but open my eyes and look. I peered over the side of our little boat, and I saw…”

She turned her face back to Abigail, as if realizes she needed to look her companion directly in the eye before divulging her secrete information.

“…I saw our ship. Our great ship, so big that it might be a city. Or even a whole world thundering across the sea. But it was standing up.”

“Standing up?” Abigail asked.

Miriam nodded. “It stood up, on its back—papa told me the back of a ship is called the ‘aft’—and it stood there, taller than any building I had ever seen, almost like it was touching the sky. And it stood there for just enough time, just enough time for me to see its great lights, bright than the stars, twinkle and flicker as if they were waving at me, and then go out. And the ship then descended, so silently, so silently you wouldn’t believe it. And then, there were no lights, or smoke, or screams anymore. Only the sea. And then I closed my eyes again…”

Abigail turned over to too-young brain for anything to say.

“Yes, that is very queer,” she said. “But, your papa did say that he was exploring the ocean. Like those brave people in the book he read you.”

Miriam nodded, but her face remained sad and elsewhere.

“But he does not know I’m on this ship!” she wailed suddenly. Abigail jumped at the sudden sound. “How can he find me?”

A tear fell down her cheek, but her chest seemed too paralyzed to cry.

Abigail, thinking of nothing else to do, moved ever so slightly towards the girl sitting next to her on the bed.

“If your papa can find the deepest mysteries of the sea, I am certain he can find you,” she said.

Miriam said nothing. Abigail glanced over at the door. It was as still and silent as ever, with only the occasional echoes of voices and footsteps coming from the hall.

She bunched her hands into fists. Her mother had instructed her to not leave the cabin. Abigail prided herself on her manners and obedience. But…

She looked back over at Miriam. The girl had tears on her cheeks, but her face remained brave. Abigail placed her hand on the girl.

“We could go look for your papa,” she said.

Miriam looked over at her. “On this ship?”

Abigail nodded. “It’s a very big ship,” she said. “But I know much of it, at least the parts my father took me to.”

“Well,” Miriam said. “It’s not that big.”

“No?” Abigail said.

Miriam offered a hint of a smile. “The Titanic was bigger. Much bigger.”

Abigail smiled back. “Well, in that case your papa should have a much easier time finding you here! We could go now before my mother and father return.”

Miriam smiled back at Abigail. The two girls rose from the bed at the same time, their hands still clutching one another’s. Without word or sound, Abigail slowly pulled their cabin’s door open, and the two slipped out into the dark and mysterious hallways of their deck, into the flickering lights and cold air and the deep and present smell of the sea.