Lightoller reached Boat B and found Bride crawling from under the boat. “Glad to see you, Bride,” Lightoller said as he took charge, “we need to get atop the boat and out of this freezing water. Make haste.”
Bride and Lightoller climbed aboard the hull. They pulled a Titanic cook, baker, steward, and engine trimmer to the hull with them. Lightoller looked all around, “Do you see Murdoch? Where is Wilde? Where is the Captain?”
Jefferies, from third class, climbed aboard, “My lifebelt was falling apart, it was and Mr. Murdoch, there in the water, took off his own and snapped it about me. He saved my life, he did.”
“Murdoch,” Lightoller yelled. With the water so cold, a person would go numb and not be able to swim; Murdoch would have had less than five minutes before he drown. Lightoller took a precious second to think of his fellow officer with fondness and regret. “And Wilde?”
The next man shed some light on the whereabouts of the First Officer, “I saw Mr. Wilde swimming, but he wasn’t getting far, and he was muttering about how cold he was. I heard a gunshot, Sir; I did not look, and I do not know. If he used his gun, I would not call him a coward, Sir, but only say that he took a faster pathway to Heaven than the rest of the poor bastards in the water have.”
They pulled several more aboard, all classes. When they had more than thirty-five, Lightoller, with sad eyes and a disconsolate manner, said softly that they could take no more unless it was the Murdoch, Wilde, or the Captain. “We’ve no choice. If we take more aboard, we will all die.” It was his job to save as many men as possible. He would give his own life for the men.
“It won’t be Captain Smith, Sir. I watched him standing proudly in the bridge, and there he remained, like a true captain. He almost went down with her, Sir, but dove into the cold water at the last second.”
Lightoller, a man not prone to emotional outbursts, nevertheless, had to wipe his eyes. He ordered the men to paddle, using their hands, for if the swimmers all grabbed onto the over turned boat, they would fall into the water and die.
All around them, men begged for help. It hurt Lightoller’s soul not to help them.
“I am sorry. We cannot take on any more. We will find another boat and send them to help,” Lightoller said.
A man, freezing in the water, called back, “I understand. Godspeed, boy and God bless.”
Lightoller had a sudden vision that the man who had just spoken was Captain Smith.
“Captain? Captain Smith?”
“Godspeed.” The voice was farther away.
Lightoller knew it had been his Captain. He stood on the over turned boat and wept.
Mr. Gracie cried unashamedly. His father was a brigadier general with the Confederate States Army and fought in the Battle of Chickamauga. He died in The War in Virginia, and Mr. Gracie had just finished writing a book about his father and the bloody battle. As a treat, he left his family at home and did a grand tour of Europe and was headed back to his home in Alabama when tragedy struck the ship.
That night he escorted single ladies to the lifeboats, helped Lightoller hold off men who wanted to take over the boats, convinced Lightoller to allow a thirteen-year-old boy to get into a lifeboat, cut the ropes holding the collapsible boats, and more.
When the ship sank, he held on to a ladder and was drawn down deep. His ears ached with the water pressure. He let go, grasping his ears, popped to the surface, and found a crate that he clung to until he reached the overturned boat. He didn’t know how he had survived so far, and the pain was so exquisite; he wondered if it were what he wanted.
“Bride, was QED sent? Did anyone answer?”
“Yessir, Mr. Lightoller. It was sent as ordered. We had many responses, Sir. The Carpathia is closest and will be here in about four hours.”
“Four?” Lightoller almost wept again with despair. How could he rally these men to hang on that long?
Forcing himself to concentrate on the situation, he designed a plan so that everyone faced the bow and lined up in two columns. They were told to counteract the swells and waves, using their legs in unison. “We may not be dry, but we will survive.”
“Concentrate, like Mr. Lightoller said,” Gracie encouraged.
Jack Thayer, only eighteen, was relieved to be on the lifeboat, as he had not expected to survive when he stood on the deck with over a thousand people, listening to the band play a waltz.
For the most part, people had been calm. First class passengers sat calmly on the deck chairs, second class gathered in small groups, and third class walked about aimlessly, dazed. A priest was surrounded by about a hundred who listened as he gave last rites.
Jack visited with friends he had made, and finally he and a friend decided to jump into the water and swim so as not to be sucked down when the Titanic went down. He had not imagined the pain of the ice water.
He was shocked when the ship split apart but glad he was not on the bow that plunged first. He was then glad he wasn’t on the stern when it tilted at a seventy-degree angle and everyone slid several hundred feet to the water and broke bones. When he saw Boat B, he was hopeful for the first time since he had discovered the ship was sinking.
“Mr. Lightoller, does that look right to you?”
“Eh?”
“That there. Afore and port, Sir. See that?”
Lightoller strained to make out what he was seeing. Familiar with the sea and its life, he thought it looked to be a dorsal fin, followed by a caudal fin, but the distance was wrong. The measurements were wrong, unless it was a whale that had appeared. How curious to see a whale at the shipwreck.
“It is eating those men,” Harold Bride moaned, “Mr. Lightoller? Why is it doing that? Do whales eat people? They do not, do they?”
Lightoller was about to snap back that it was not eating anyone, but as he watched, the fish ate another. The megaladon swam around, scooping up men like tiny morsels and sometimes biting them before swallowing, but other times just ingesting them whole.
When the leviathan turned and came towards them, he breached the surface, showing off his tooth-filled mouth.
“Holy Mother of God, Mr. Lightoller, that ain’t a whale,” Bride shouted.
“It’s a giant shark, men. Stay alert, and keep using your legs to keep us afloat. So far, he is just after the dead and dying and not looking at us. If he does notice us, he may be only curious. Do not panic and falter, men.” Lightoller’s voice was even and calm, as always, and he rallied all the men.
Those men, about to panic, took pause, relaxing under Lightoller’s orders.
The wake from a wave, caused by the giant beast, caused them to struggle. Jefferies lost his footing and slid off the overturned boat.
“Swim, Sir, and we shall get you back aboard,” Gracie called.
Before the man could get more than a yard, the devilish fish swam by and gulped him down, biting first so that blood stained the water red-black against the regular black of the sea.
Several men cried out, and a few prayed loudly.
“Damned fish,” Lightoller cursed, “is playing games. Stay alert, I say. Don’t lose your head.”
One of the few women they had rescued watched the fin circling; instead of concentrating, she lost her balance, and she fell, taking a steward with her as she flailed her arms, “No, oh, help me.”
Lightoller, Bride, and Gracie prepared to yank both to safety, but again, the shark found them first, swallowing them whole. Lightoller would have sworn under oath the shark grinned maliciously at him. “Ye son of a bitch. Ye fecking coward, face me when I have a harpoon, and let us see who makes it out alive.”