“Actually, sir, it’s entitled What Nietzsche Taught. . and much in your tradition, I seek only to guide the general reader to a better understanding of an important philosopher’s much-maligned, much-misunderstood writings.”
He dabbed a napkin at himself, cleansing his mouth and mustache of beer foam. “There are those who say Nietzsche is to blame, in some degree, for this war-that he was the Prophet of the Iron Fist and the Teutonic Superman. . the enemy of common, decent people.”
“Which is why my book is so important, Mr. McClure. Nietzsche wasn’t interested in the acquisition of land for the state, or glory for the Kaiser. . but in each man’s ability to find within himself strength, confidence, exuberance and affirmation in life. . a life intensified to its highest degree, charged with beauty, power, enthusiasm. . ”
I didn’t realize it, but I was sitting forward now, my voice raised somewhat, and what seemed at first an awkward silence followed. . until McClure’s grim countenance broke into an unexpected grin.
“I like the sound of that,” he admitted. “And I like your spirit. . and your mastery of the English language.” He gathered his coat and hat, stood and offered me his hand, which I shook. He shook hands with his publisher, and then pressed through the bustle of waiters and patrons, on his way to see D.W. Griffith’s eighteen thousand actors and three thousand horses.
We didn’t even have time to rise, and Rumely smiled on one side of his rumpled face, rumpling it further, saying, “He’s a rather brusque fellow, our McClure.”
“Yes,” I said. “But I do admire his frankness.”
“Shall we have the Luchow’s fabled sliced pancakes?”
“Certainly.”
And we did. While we ate them, my squat companion pointed out a sort of celebrity to me-a stocky, square-jawed man in his sixties, wearing an unprepossessing black suit with string tie and a bowler hat which he left on while he ate at his solitary table.
“That’s the captain of the Lusitania,” Rumely said. “Bowler Bill himself.”
“That’s this Anderson I’m to check in with?”
“No. Turner’s the captain, the top man, but his second in command, Staff Captain Anderson, really runs the ship. Turner’s an old salt some say is past his prime. . bit of a martinet, a taciturn type who dislikes socializing with the passengers.”
“But doesn’t that come with the job?”
“It does, and you’ll see him from time to time-but Anderson will be your contact. The Cunard people themselves recommended we deal with him.”
“We have their full cooperation?”
“Oh yes,” Rumely said, and there was something sly in that smile into which he was currently shoveling pancakes, and a twinkle in his eyes that wasn’t fairy-like. “We have their full cooperation for a fine set of articles-pure puffery about their famous passengers.”
I was willing to write such tripe, particularly under a pseudonym. One’s pride takes second place to the need for nutrition. In recent months I had, for the first time, lowered myself to the hackwork of popular fiction writing, churning out made-to-order adventure stories for pulp magazines. I had even “novelized” (what an abhorrent word) a putrid play, The Eternal Magdalene, into a passably literate work.
After the pancakes came snifters of Courvoisier. The sweetness of the dessert didn’t really suit this follow-up, but I could never resist that particular cognac, even when ill-advisedly served.
“Who else besides the estimable Hubbard will feel the feathery brunt of my pen?” I inquired.
“Well, you’ll be rubbing shoulders with some interesting passengers, there in Saloon.”
“Saloon Class” was the Cunard line’s designation for first class. . ah, first class. . if one were to be a prostitute, let it be on a soft mattress between sweetly-scented sheets. .
“After Hubbard,” Rumely said, “your prime candidate will be Alfred Vanderbilt. . probably the richest man on earth.”
“I’ll offer to take his suits to the ship’s cleaner for him,” I said. “Perhaps a million or two will turn up in his pockets.”
The owner of the restaurant, August “Augy” Luchow-a robust gentleman whose considerable girth was matched only by his bonhomie and perhaps his handlebar mustache-was making a fuss over Captain Turner.
Rumely said, “This Madame DePage-have you read of her?”
I sipped my snifter, tasted the cognac, let its warmth roll down my gullet. “The Belgium relief fund woman? She’s been too conspicuous in the press to miss, even for an apolitical lout like myself. Is she travelling the Lusitania?”
“Yes, she and the one hundred fifty thousand dollars in war relief cash that she’s raised in recent weeks. Her motives seem sincere-she could rate a good human-interest piece.”
“Anyone else?”
“Frohman’ll be aboard. He’s always good for a story. People love show business, you know.”
Charles Frohman was the leading theatrical producer of the day-the man who brought Peter Pan to the stage, and Maude Adams to Peter Pan.
Rumely handed me a manila envelope. “There are your tickets and other materials-using the pseudonym you requested. Is the ‘S.S.’ a reference to steamship, or to Mr. S.S. McClure, your benefactor?”
“Both,” I said. “As for Van Dine, I believe it suggests in an elegant manner the less than elegant need for nourishment.”
The bulldog smiled. “Another Courvoisier?”
“Certainly. And is there anything else we need to discuss, where business is concerned?”
Rumely seemed almost taken aback. “Why, certainly-you don’t think I sought you out to merely do the conventional bidding of my editor.”
“Well, I-”
The publisher held up a stubby hand. “We’ll have another round of cognacs, and then I’ll tell you.”
“Tell me what?”
He chuckled. “Why, the real reason you’re boarding the Lusitania tomorrow, of course. . Waiter!”
TWO
Before we get on with the tale at hand, in order to illuminate the nature of various deeds (dastardly and daring), some background seems advisable, regarding the Cunard steamship line’s unusual partnership with the British government.
By the time the nineteenth century dragged itself reluctantly into the twentieth, German liners had become the standard for speed and luxury, which offended the sensibilities of Great Britain, that self-proclaimed “greatest seafaring nation on earth.” Further, collusion between J.P. Morgan (whose White Star Line was Cunard’s greatest rival) and various non-British lines (including Holland-Amerika) set the stage for domination of North Atlantic tourist trade by the upstart American line and its foreign business allies.
Lord Inverclyde, chairman of Cunard, invoked patriotic pride to convince the British government to lend the line better than two and a half million pounds for the building of a pair of new ships designed to restore Cunard-in terms of both speed and luxury-to a position of pre-eminence in the North Atlantic. Those ships, the sisters Mauretania and Lusitania, were in effect co-owned by the British government.
For this reason, the Lusitania was designed-its sister, too-for a dual purpose: Decks bore gun emplacements, coal bunkers ran along the sides of the hull to protect boilers from shells and deep storage spaces were fashioned for easy conversion into magazines. In effect, the Lusitania was a luxury liner ready to metamorphose into a battleship.*
This blurring, between commerce and combat, must be understood for the Lusitania’s tale to make any sense at all. . if such is possible.
Sailing day for the Lusitania was the first of May, 1915, a drab, drizzly Saturday. All sailing days were bustling affairs, what with the processing of hundreds of passengers, and thousands of pieces of luggage to be lugged aboard and stored. But any time the Lusitania set sail (if that phrase could be loosely applied to a mighty turbine-powered ship), a throng could be expected dockside, though she had tied up there more than a hundred times, and was a familiar sight at the foot of Eleventh Street. New Yorkers had embraced the Big Lucy ever since that day, eight years before, when she had docked here upon completion of her maiden voyage; even the stench of the nearby meatpacking district couldn’t keep them away.