My Clarity

Chapter eight

In a crowd of elaborately dressed women, Rose stood out in her red gown and the fact that she wasn’t as adorned as the rest. She looked clean and winsome and appetising. Jack wanted to be alone with her, outside in the open air, his hands free to touch the paleness of her face. But he knew better than to entertain such thoughts about a respectable young woman. He watched the tense little scene involving Rose, Hockley and her mother. Although he couldn’t hear their conversation, he read their postures, the subtle way Rose leaned into her chair’s support. It was clear some kind of heated discussion had taken place. He imagined them together, in their stateroom as they took it in turns to slowly suppress and stifle the woman. It provoked him far more than he would have liked. Tamping down the surge of inappropriate curiosity, he dragged his attention away from them. As he anticipated the long, bland supper to come, the interminable courses, the mannered conversation, Jack sighed heavily. He had learned the social choreography of these situations, the rigid boundaries of propriety. At first, he had even regarded it as a game, learning the ways of these privileged strangers. But he had grown tired of hovering at the edge of their world. Most of them didn’t want him there any more than he did. But there seemed no other place for him except at the periphery. A line of waiters clads in white moved forward to attend the guests, pulling out chairs, pouring wine and water. The long table was covered by an acre of pristine white linen. Each place setting, bristling with silverware with the White Star Line painted on it, was surmounted with a hierarchy of crystal glasses in assorted sizes. Jack was expressionless until he seated next to Molly and as soon as his wine was poured, Mrs. DeWitt Bukater was counted upon to bring the gossips and served it to their ears on a silver platter.

“So, tell us of your associations, Mr. Dawson. I have heard many a tale and none quite make any sense to me.”

Whilst the others seemed to be gracious and curious of Jack’s presence, they also listened with a close ear. It was a game now, just how much to reveal of himself and how much to leave them wanting to gossip more as they filled in the voids for themselves. Oh, how he wished to smirk, to fill them with a tonne of horse shit and allow them to feast on it for themselves, but he didn’t, giving them the sincere truth, for what else could be said of his stature?

“Well, I am in charge of the most successful steel business in Boston, I have heard even the United States but who am I to know the true figures?” Jack was modest, smiling though as he watched Cal’s slight reaction, gaging the way the ends of his mouth tensed. “The true mastermind was my uncle Eric Dawson who sadly passed in the fall of 1910. I say that I am ‘in charge of’ because still it truly feels as though it will always belong truly to him, and I am merely like a babysitter of some kind.”

The table listened, sincerely.

“Before that, I am sure that you heard I was not raised amongst you fine people but by a mere couple of farmers. My mother and father were from a small town in Wisconsin.”

“I see.” Mrs. DeWitt Bukater raised her eyebrows, not as subtly as perhaps intended. “I hear that you are well travelled.”

“Yes. I was lucky enough to spend time in Europe and across America. There are other places I planned to visit before my uncle's death. I worked my way from place to place on tramp steamers and such. I find the bohemian life to have been somewhat refreshing to me in some ways. It differs from the world in which you all seem to know, and I was able to do some charity work whilst out there, too.”

“Yes, I can imagine that it would.”

“Mr. Dawson is also a fine artist; he was kind enough to show me some of his work today.”

Turning to his right, Jack found himself staring into Rose’s curious emerald eyes. They had been seated next to each other. How had he not noticed upon been seated? Pleasure unfolded inside him. Her hair shone like satin, and her eyes were bright, and her skin looked like it would taste of some dessert made with milk and sugar.