Titanic

{Chapter Five}

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Rose looked at the drawing in its tray of water, confronting herself across a span of eighty-four years. Until they could figure out the best way to preserve it, it had to be kept immersed. It swayed and rippled...almost as if alive.

Rose's ancient eyes gazed at the drawing.

In her mind's eye, she saw a man's hand, holding a conte crayon, deftly creating a shoulder and the shape of her hair with two, efficient lines.

She looked at the woman's face in the drawing, dancing under the water.

Once again, her memories focused on the man's eyes, just visible over the top of a sketching pad. They looked up suddenly, right at her. Soft eyes, but fiercely direct.

Rose smiled, remembering. Brock had the reference photo of the necklace in his hand.

"Louis the Sixteenth wore a fabulous stone, called The Blue Diamond of the Crown, which disappeared in 1792; about the same time old Louis lost everything from the neck up. The theory goes that the crown diamond was chopped too...recut into a heart-like shape...and it became The Heart of the Ocean. Today it would be worth more than the Hope Diamond."

Rose shook her head. "It was a dreadful, heavy thing." She pointed at the drawing. "I only wore it this once."

Lizzy looked at the woman in the picture. "You actually believe this is you, Nana?"

"It is me, dear. Wasn't I a dish?"

The people around them chuckled lightly before Brock interrupted. "I tracked it down through insurance records...an old claim that was settled under terms of absolute secrecy. Do you know who the claimant was, Rose?"

"Someone named Hockley, I should imagine."

"Nathan Hockley, that's right. Pittsburg steel tycoon. For a diamond necklace his son, Caledon, bought in France for his fiancee...you...a week before he sailed on Titanic. And the claim was filed right after the sinking. So the diamond had to have gone down with the ship." He turned to Lizzy. "See the date?"

Lizzy leaned forward, looking closely. "April 14, 1912."

Bodine broke in. "Which means, if your grandmother is who she says she is, she was wearing the diamond the day the Titanic sank."

Brock turned to Rose, smiling widely. "And that makes you my new best friend." He went to a table across the room. "Over here are some things we've recovered from your staterooms."

Laid out on a worktable were fifty or so objects, from mundane to valuable. Rose, shrunken in her chair, could barely see over the tabletop. With a trembling hand, she lifted a tortoiseshell hand mirror, inlaid with mother of pearl. She caressed it wonderingly.

"This was mine. How extraordinary! And it looks the same as it did the last time I saw it!" She turned the mirror over and looked at her ancient face in the cracked glass. "The reflection has changed a bit."

Rose let out a slight gasp as she picked up an ornate, art-nouveau, hair comb. A jade butterfly took flight on the ebony handle of the comb. She turned it slowly, remembering. Rose was experiencing a rush of images and emotions that had lain dormant for eight decades, as she handled the butterfly comb.

Lovett spoke. "Are you ready to go back to Titanic?"

. . . . .

Bodine started a computer-animated graphic on screen, which paralleled his rapid-fire narration.

"She hits the iceberg on the starboard side and bumps along...punching holes like Morse code...dit dit dit...along the side, below the water line; then the forward compartments start to flood. Now, as the water level rises, it spills over the watertight bulkheads, which unfortunately don't go any higher than E Deck. As the bow goes down, the stern rises up... slow at first...then faster and faster until she's got her whole ass sticking up in the air, and that's a big ass...we're talking twenty or thirty thousand tons! Now, the hull isn't designed to deal with that kind of pressure...so what happens? Skrrt! She splits...right down to the keel, and the stern falls back-level. Then as the bow sinks, it pulls the stern up vertical, and finally detaches, heading for the bottom. The stern just kinda bobs in the water like a cork for a couple of minutes, floods, then finally goes under at about 2:20 am. Two hours and forty minutes after the collision."

The animation then followed the bow section as it sank. Rose watched this clinical dissection of the disaster stoically, showing little sign of the emotions within her.

Bodine continued. "The bow pulls out of its dive and planes away, landing almost half a mile away, going maybe twelve knots before it hits the ocean floor. Kaboom!"

The bow impacted, digging deeply into the bottom. The animation then followed the stern.

Bodine, delighted with his handiwork, grinned. "Pretty cool, huh?"

Rose just looked at him. "Thank you for that fine, forensic analysis, Mr. Bodine." Bodine actually had the grace to look sheepish. "Of course, the experience of it was...somewhat different."

Brock pulled out a tape recorder. "Will you share it with us, Rose?"

Her eyes went back to the screens, showing the ruins far below them. The image of the First Class Dining Saloon appeared on one of the monitors, and Rose looked at it, seeing in her mind's eye a steward opening the door for her, as well-dressed people walked about the inside of the brightly lit room. Remembering, she could almost hear the soft waltz.

Abruptly, she snapped back to the present. The doors were covered with rust, enshrouded in darkness. Rose put her hands over her face, gasping against other memories that flooded her mind. Lizzy rushed up to her.

"I'm taking her to rest." She tried to escort Rose away.

"No." Rose's protest was almost feeble.

"Come on, Nana."

"No!" The feeble, old lady was gone, replaced by a woman with eyes of steel. She sat down next to Lovett.

"Tell us, Rose."

Rose closed her eyes for a moment, then began. "It's been eighty-four years -"

Lovett interrupted her. "That's all right. Just try to remember anything, anything at all."

"Do you want to hear this or not, Mr. Lovett?" Lovett looked at her in consternation. "It's been eighty-four years...and I can still smell the fresh paint. The china had never been used. The sheets had never been slept in. Titanic was called 'The Ship of Dreams.' And it was. It really was..."

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This is going to be the last chapter I release until the summer.  I just want to say thanks for all of the support you guys are giving me so far.  It really means a lot that you put things on hold to read my stories.  All of the feedback you have been giving me so far is amazing and I honestly could not be more grateful.  

I hope you all have been enjoying the story so far and are excited for what is to come (*cough*...Jack Dawson...*cough*)!

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