Harry nodded.
"What if I tell Mr. Beeney that you've hidden a present in his car?"
"No, you mustn't do that. This is supposed to be a surprise."
"But what if I do?"
"Then I'll put you over my knee and spank you."
Lucille laughed brightly. "You'll have to catch me first!"
She ran round behind a large green Daimler. Harry dodged after her, around the other way. But she guessed what he was doing, and skipped across to the next row of cars. It was only because he quickly doubled back on himself and crept the length of a beige Pierce-Arrow, his head bent so that she wouldn't see him coming, that he was able to creep up behind her and catch her. "Got you!" he grinned.
He held her with his one free hand. She didn't try enough to struggle, but instead raised her own hand so that it rested gently on his. She said, in a soft and reflective voice, "Sometimes I have dreams that it's the end of the world."
"What do you mean by that?" He could hear the ticking of the clock, with less than two hours to run.
She smiled. "I don't know. I suppose I'm being silly."
Then she suddenly pulled free from him, and danced away him the cars, laughing a clear bell-like laugh. Harry tried to chase her, but he collided with the rear wing of a Rolls-Royce, and his timing clock was knocked from his hand and onto the metal-plated deck.
He picked the clock up, terrified that it might have stopped. But when he put it to his ear, the ticking was as strong as before.
"You haven't broken it?" asked Lucille.
"No, it's still going."
You really would have been embarrassed if you'd given it to him, and it didn't even go!"
"Yes," said Harry. Then, "Yes, I guess I would."
"Are you coming up for elevenses?" asked Lucille.
"Yes. Just give me a minute or two. I'll see you by the Palm Court."
"All right. And just remember I love you!"
Harry stood where he was, beside the Rolls-Royce, his timing clock in his hand, as Lucille danced away across the automobile hold, and waved to him at the door. When she had gone, he looked down at the clock and it said twenty after ten. Just remember I love you, she had said. A little girl who was already richer than he could ever dream of being. Just remember I love you.
He walked back to Mark Beeney's Marmon, and knelt down beside the open trunk. Quickly, expressionlessly, he wired up the timing clock and tucked it back into the trunk beside the sticks of dynamite.
He closed the trunk, and then he wedged the end of the screwdriver into the lock so that it would be almost impossible to open, even if somebody did come down here before twelve and attempt to check over the car.
Then he walked quickly back to the door of the hold, closed it, and locked it. The Arcadia is doomed, he thought. Nothing can save her now. In a few hours, she'll be down where she belongs, beside the Titanic. And that's the way all of these vainglorious barges should go, until the capitalists stop building them, and give their wealth away to the people who really deserve it.
FIFTY-TWO
The excitement on the upper promenade decks which Harry had failed to notice as he descended to the automobile hold was caused by a frantic report that a first-class passenger, a lady, had been seen to leap off the rail of the boat deck into the sea.
She had been spotted by only two passengers, a retired brigadier and his wife who never took breakfast because they believed it was bad for the liver. They had seen her climb up on to the rail, her white negligee flapping in the Atlantic breeze, and then dive with arms outstretched, a seagull, a flying crucifixion, into the boiling foam of the ship's wake. They had immediately rushed to the bridge, and announced, "Lady overboard!"
All the time that Harry had been working on his timing clock, although he hadn't realised it, the Arcadia had been turning in a fast 180-degree turn, while passengers crowded the rails in an attempt to catch sight of the lady's body in the water. The rumour went flying around that it was a high-society suicide, and newspaper reporters scoured the passenger lists and drank even more whisky and water than usual as they tried frantically to guess who it could be.
Sir Peregrine was informed of what was happening, but he only said, "I see. Perhaps you'd better tell Mother."
Edgar went immediately to the wheelhouse, where he was joined after a few minutes by Catriona and Mark Beeney.
"What's happening?" asked Catriona. "I heard that somebody's gone overboard."
Rudyard Philips said, "It's not confirmed yet. But Brigadier Repson says he saw her jump off the rail of the boat deck."
"Did he have any idea who it was?" asked Mark.
Edgar shook his head. "'He can't see too well, at a distance. But it was a lady, he said, in a white nightgown."
"Can't you assemble the passengers for a roll call?" asked Mark.
"We will later, if we can't find her and we have to call off the search. But just at the moment, I'd prefer it if every single passenger was keeping a lookout for her. It's surprising what some people can see. Things that even a trained sailor might miss."
Mark said, "It couldn't have been that French opera-singer lady, could it? She tried to commit suicide right at the beginning of the voyage."
Rudyard, without turning around, said, "That thought did occur to me, too, Mr. Beeney, but I called her and checked. It appears that she's much happier now, and that she's lost all of her suicidal tendencies."
"Well, nothing like the love of a good man," remarked Edgar obliquely.
Rudyard answered this comment with a small, sour smile.
There was nothing more they could do in the wheelhouse, so Mark and Catriona went outside and joined the other passengers who were craning and bobbing their heads around for a first sight of the lost lady in white. Their chances of seeing her, however, were millions to one. There was a strong current running, and a fresh midmorning wind was getting up. If the seventy-five foot drop to the ocean from the rail of the boat deck hadn't concussed the lady and drowned her, she would probably have gone under from tiredness and exposure by now. At any time of the year, the North Atlantic has never been recommended for its swimming conditions.
"I hope to God it's only a mistake," said Catriona.
"Whatever it is," Mark told her, "I just pray that they get a move on. I've got a large bet riding on today's mileage."
Catriona was shocked. "Some poor woman's life is at risk, and all you can think about is your stupid bet?"
"You're not going to succeed in making me feel guilty about it," said Mark. "Anybody who dives off the boat deck does it because they want to kill themselves. If that's the case, why don't we all just go on our merry way and leave the poor woman alone? If you're really set on suicide, which she must have been, then the last thing that you want to happen is for someone to come and rescue you."
Just then, with the perfect timing of true fate, a steward handed Mark a sheet of writing paper on a silver tray. "Only received this a minute ago, sir, from the ship's post office." Mark tipped him a half-crown, and then tore open the letter with his thumb. It read:
"My darling Mark, as you read this I shall already be looking down on you from Heaven, if there is such a place! I haven't always been very sensible. I know that, and I haven't always been good to you and to other people. But I hope that you will forgive me for having loved you so dearly, and for losing heart at last when it became quite clear that you would never be completely mine. You mustn't feel guilty for what I have decided to do. It is my own choice entirely, and it is the way that I prefer to seek my oblivion, rather than pining for the rest of my life like the old lady in the Listerine mouthwash advertisement who still cannot work out why her fiance cancelled their wedding, all those years ago. You see? I still have a sense of humour, my darling. And a sense of proportion, too, for I know that you will never really love me, although I cannot for the life of me think why. Just promise me this: that you will think of me now and again, and perhaps drop a wreath into the Atlantic at this spot whenever you cross it. Yours hopelessly, Marcia."