There was another pause, then Claire said: 'We could have flown.'
'Claire! The mother stomped out of the room.
Claire let out a long, sad sigh before reluctantly following her parents. Jimmy waited until their renewed bickering had faded, then crawled out. He rose gingerly to his feet, feeling dizzy and sick. If this was what alcohol did to you, he was never going near it again. He checked his watch. God almighty! It was after eleven in the morning! The ship and the dock would be a hive of activity! How was he going to get off undetected?
Don't think about it . . . head too sore . . . just do it.
He moved to the door and peered out. The family was just disappearing along the corridor to the right.
Jimmy turned left, and, moving as quickly as his frail condition would allow, came almost immediately to a set of elevators. He pushed the call button.
What was I thinking of? I came on board to scratch my name and teach them a lesson! And I haven't even done that! He felt in his shirt pocket. The lucky penny was still there. I should have thrown it in the sea when I had the chance!
He glanced at the lights above the doors, which showed the elevator moving steadily upwards.
Relax. What have you done that's so wrong? Snuck on to a boat and eaten some chocolate. Drunk some champagne. Ruffled a bed. Hardly the crime of the century.You've nothing to be ashamed of. Hold your head up.
And he would have held it up if he could have. He just felt so ill. The whole ship seemed to vibrate around him.
Ping.
The elevator was empty. Jimmy stepped in, pushed the button for Deck Three, then pushed himself against the back wall as it descended past the shopping mall. For extra protection he shut his eyes, as if somehow his not being able to see anything meant that no one else could see him. He was still half drunk.
Ping.
The doors slid open.
Two men stood opposite him. They wore crisp white short-sleeved shirts with fancy designs on their arms, and black baseball caps.
One was saying, 'But Captain, this is our best opportunity to . . .' but stopped as he saw Jimmy. They both stared at him in confusion.
'Who the hell are you?' the Captain demanded. He was a stout man with a neat grey beard.
Jimmy did his best. He stepped out of the lift and said, 'It's all right, I'm with the school tour.'
It was a gamble. The ship was bound to be having lots of other school tours.
'What school tour?' demanded the other one — a taller, thinner man.
'That one,' said Jimmy and pointed to his left. As the two men turned to look, Jimmy charged off to his right. A moment later they came charging after him, the Captain shouting and his companion yelling into his radio. Jimmy skidded around a corner and ran at full pelt down the corridor. It was busy with crewmen, moving back and forth, in and out of doors, carrying boxes and sacks and wheeling equipment, chatting and singing in half a dozen different languages — and luckily, none of them English. Even as his pursuers shouted after him, Jimmy dodged in and out, in and out, barely changing his pace at all.
I can do this!
I can do it!
The adrenaline was pumping through his body, banishing the headache, quelling the sickness.
Freedom!
Escape!
Jimmy crashed through the doors at the end of the corridor and out on to the deck, then turned frantically, searching for the nearest gangway on to the dock.
But there wasn't one.
For the simple reason that there was no dock.
In fact, there was no land.
The Titanic was at sea, steaming fast for America.
3
The Anxious Stowaway
Announcements were made by the Captain over the public address system, appealing for Jimmy to give himself up, telling him that he wouldn't get into trouble.
Yeah, right.
He had stowed away. There was no land in sight anywhere, in any direction. He was in BIG TROUBLE.
They followed up their appeal with a deck by deck, cabin by cabin search. But the ship was too big, and the crew was too small. Even though he only had a few hours' experience of the layout of the Titanic, he had thirteen years' experience of being chased, and he put it to good use. He was constantly one step ahead of his pursuers. And sometimes two.
Jimmy was torn between being frightened by what he'd done and hugely exhilarated by it. There was a slightly sour feeling in his stomach, and it wasn't just the after-effects of the champagne. His parents, once they got over the urgent desire to slap him around the head, would be going frantic. His granda, who had sent him on a mission to throw away the lucky penny, was probably blaming himself, convinced that Jimmy had somehow slipped and fallen into the water and drowned.
On the other hand — what a story he would have to tell when he got home! Some boys skipped off school for an afternoon and thought they were pretty cool. Even getting expelled was relatively commonplace. But running away to sea on the Titanic — now there was a tale worth telling!
The easiest thing would be just to give himself up. What was the worst they could do? Shout at him? It was the early afternoon of the first day at sea — if he surrendered now, they would almost certainly be compelled to return to Belfast to hand him over.
But what if he . . . stayed hidden?
Wouldn't they get to a point of no return — where it made more sense to continue on to America and send him home from there?
Absolutely!
The more he thought about it, the more sense it made. Avoid them for a few days — then give himself up and enjoy the rest of the cruise in style! Maybe they'd fly him home first class as well!
No problem!
***
Jimmy enjoyed a snooze in a cabin on Level Ten, then sat on the balcony enjoying a Toblerone. As the sun fell the temperature went with it and a cool wind blew up, so he retreated back inside. It was time to move — he had already decided it wasn't safe to spend too long in any one place. Besides, there was a lot more of the ship still to explore. But as he peeked out to make sure the corridor was clear, he was horrified to see two officers hurrying straight towards him. Jimmy let out a surprised yelp, then hurtled out of the room and ran as hard as he could in the opposite direction. They raced after him, shouting at him to stop, but he was too young and too fit, and even though they had radios to call in help, he was soon able to lose them.
A little later, Jimmy took the stairs down to Level Six, selected several books from the large public library there, then wandered along the corridor until he found a cabin he liked. He was completely relaxed again. They had stumbled on him by chance, and that was something you couldn't plan for. But they'd wasted their opportunity and he remained confident in his abilities to avoid them. Jimmy closed the door, switched on a bedside light, liberated another Toblerone from the mini bar, then lay back on the bed and leafed through a book about Florida. He wondered if there was any possibility of jumping ship once he arrived in Miami. He could hitchhike up to Orlando, and go to Disney, or any of the other huge parks up there. Maybe this would be his life from now on. Living wild, on his wits, on the road, a tramp, a supertramp. He could be a modern-day Robin Hood, stealing from the rich and . . . keeping it. Jimmy laughed and closed the book. It was easy to dream on this ship. The ship itself was a dream. He returned to the mini bar.