Maiden Voyage

THREE

Edgar Deacon arrived late, at a quarter past nine, when they were already at dinner. He came straight into the mahogany-panelled dining-room in his blade clawhammer coat and kissed Catriona's hand. He bowed to Isabelle and said, "Good evening, Percy," to Mr Fearson. Then he took his seat at the far end of the table and meticulously opened out his napkin. Still red-eyed from crying, Lettice the maid ladled out tomato soup for him, although he raised his hand after two helpings to show that he only wanted a little.

"I can't say that it's really been the kind of day that whets one's appetite," he remarked, sprinkling salt over his soup before be had tasted it, and stirring it with his spoon. Too many sad duties to perform, don't you know." He turned to Catriona, and said, "I can't tell you how sorry I am, my dear. The whole business has been a frightful shock. You and your mother have the condolences of the entire company, both board and managerial. Yes, and clerical, too."

"And manual," put in Mr Fearson, breaking a bread roll.

"Well, of course," said Edgar. "Manual, too. Plenty of honest tears have been spilled down at the quayside, and in the warehouse. Your father was an exceptional man, missed by all."

Catriona managed an evanescent smile. She had never quite known what to make of Edgar Deacon, although her father had always seemed to trust him implicitly. "The very Devil when it comes to accounts," her father had always said of him, "and likes to gamble, too, although you wouldn't think it, not to look at him."

Edgar Deacon had been managing director of Keys Shipping for four years now; and for two years before that he had been works manager and chief engineer. Stanley Keys had come across him in India, on one of the first exploratory cruises he had made after the War, when Keys were busily planning for the prosperous and peaceful future. The War to end all wars was over, and Stanley Keys had envisioned a luxury shipping operation that would carry the wealthy and the curious to every country on the map, mundane or exotic, from Antwerp to Surabaja.

They had shared a tonga along English Laundry Road in Calcutta, on their way to the Bengal Club. When Stanley Keys had told Edgar who he was, and why he had come to India, Edgar had nodded in approval. "You're quite right, of course. Luxury travel is about to come into its own. I've been trying to tell that to the directors of Calcutta railway for absolutely years."

He had taken out an Indian ivory cigarette holder, and inserted a Players Perfectos No. 1 into it with the firm twist of an engineer. You should make your shipping line appear to be as elitist as possible. That's the way to reap the greatest rewards. You may carry any a of second- and steerage-class passengers, of course, to pay for your bread and butter, but make the first-class as exclusive as you possibly can. Make it almost impossible for anyone to buy a ticket, and then charge monstrous prices for it. Give your passengers the of being able to tilt their noses up into the air, and say, "I travel Keys, don't y'know."

Stanley Keys had been amused. "And where did you learn that philosophy?" he had asked, as Edgar lit his cigarette.

At the Bengal Club," Edgar had said, between clenched teeth. "I took over the running of the District Engineer's Ball three years ago. It had always been a dismal affair, or so I was told. So I trebled the price of the tickets to twenty rupees, and made it as inconvenient as I could for anyone to get hold of one; and lo and behold it became the most sought-after social event on the calendar."

That evening, on the verandah of the Bengal Club, Stanley had approached Edgar and asked him quite bluntly, "Do you want a job?"

Edgar had been standing with his hands in his pockets watching the sunset, puffing away at his cigarette holder. "You don't know the first thing about me," he had said.

"I know that you run a shipfitting business down at Diamond Harbour, and that you're very well thought of."

"By some," Edgar had said, cryptically. And then, without taking his cigarette holder out of his mouth, "Very well. I accept. I think it's time I went home, anyway."

As Stanley Keys had enlarged and built up his shipping line, he and Edgar had become closer and closer, sharing an office, and taking all of their working lunches together. They were so close, sometimes, that other directors like Percy Fearson had begun uncomfortably to feel that Keys Shipping was a two-man company. But Edgar was ferociously hard worker—punctilious, correct, and tireless, even if he could be a triffle distant with the staff, and that was probably nothing more than a hangover from India. Anyone who still salled the winter months the "cold weather" and referred to the works canteen staff as khitmutgars could hardly be expected to be chummy with anyone on the shop floor.

Edgar had never been seen with a woman; but although Mr. Thurrock insisted that he was "one of those", Mr. Fearson said that he was probably more interested in his work than in petty flirtations. Edgar lived by himself in a severe grey house in the better part of Formby and was not to be drawn on the subject.

He was thin, with black polished hair and drawn-in cheeks; rather like one of the sketches of Sherlock Holmes in The Strand Magazine. He wore half-glasses to read, and his only concession to British life was a rather shorter cigarette-holder than the one he had customarily used in Calcutta.

"I didn't really want to discuss business tonight," he remarked, cracking open his bread roll. "Unfortunately, I think that there is something with which you should be acquainted as soon as possible."

Catriona said, "I really don't know anything about business at all."

"Nonetheless, it is important that you hear what I have to say."

Catriona looked across at Percy Fearson; and Percy Fearson gave her an approving nod. She felt sophisticated enough tonight to talk about business, she supposed; and sad enough, too. Her hair was drawn tightly back from her face and tied with two strings of pearls from her mother's jewellery box. She wore a black silk dress with batwing sleeves, pinned together at the front with a clustered-pearl brooch. Her father would have considered that the gown was cut too low for an occasion as sombre as this, and in a peculiar way Catriona felt upset that she was able to wear it without being admonished.

Edgar said, "Your father was a great man, you know, Miss Keys. He was one of those few fellows who become giants in their own lifetime. When they come to write the history of the greatest ships and how they were built, your father's name will be emblazoned next to those of Ismay, and Cunard, and Ballin."

"Rather we didn't make comparisons with the Hun," put in Percy Fearson, gruffly.

Isabelle, who was struggling with her cutlet, glanced across and gave Edgar a tight little smile to show that she, too, had always believed that Stanley Keys was a hero. She rather cared for Edgar Deacon and pooh-poohed the idea that he might be susceptible to the kind of affections that dare not speak their name. "He's mysterious," she used to say; and one morning she had had a dozing dream that he had taken down her thirteen-shilling cami-knickers and smacked her bare bottom. Tony of course was terrible in bed, even when he wasn't drunk on Newcastle Brown. You could only describe Tony's as a winkle.

"I haven't yet broached this matter with your mother," said Edgar. "I feel that it might be better to leave financial matters until after the funeral."

"She's very shocked, of course," Catriona told him. "But Dr Whitby gave her some sedative tablets, and she's asleep now; although she swore that she'd never be able to."

"Sleep is the best medicine of all," said Edgar. "But how do you feel? You must be tired yourself after travelling all the way up from London."

"I'm numb, actually," said Catriona. "I don't think any of it has quite sunk in yet."

"Well, be careful when it does," Edgar cautioned her. "We're going to be needing you over the next few weeks. After your mother, you are, of course, the sole heiress to Keys Shipping, and your father's death has already entitled you to quite an inheritance of voting stock."

Catriona's eyes widened over the rim of her lifted wineglass. Then carefully she set the glass down on the table again. Although she said nothing, it was quite clear from her expression that she expected Edgar to explain exactly how he would need her and why.

Edgar meticulously took a last spoonful of soup and then sat up very straight. "We had an ad hoc meeting of directors today," he said, steadily. "We talked about a difficulty which has been besetting us for some time, but a difficulty with which we could cope as long as Stanley was still alive. Now, tragically and prematurely, he has passed from amongst us. And the problem is that we have lost not only a dear friend and colleague, and a man whom we respected and loved, but the single most creditworthy asset which Keys Shipping ever owned."

"Surely you're not trying to suggest that the company can't continue without Stanley?

"The problem is almost as serious as that," Edgar nodded. "The whole point, in plain English, without any Hobson-Jobson, is that Keys Shipping should never have attempted to build the Arcadia at all."

"What on earth does that mean?" asked Catriona. "Why not? She's a beautiful ship."

"Beautiful, yes," said Edgar. "But paid for, no."

"You mean the company's in debt?"

"Not just the company, my dear. Your whole family fortune, too. The Keys Shipping Line is so financially overstretched that we could be declared bankrupt at any moment. Your father, you see, gave personal guarantees for all of the company's debts. While he was alive, the banks considered these to be quite acceptable. But, now that he's gone..."

Catriona frowned quickly at Percy Fearson, but all Percy could do was nod and say, "It's true, I'm afraid."

"But we own so many ships," Catriona protested. "How could we possibly be bankrupt? And the Arcadia is the most luxurious passenger liner in the world. I don't understand."

Edgar remained silent while Lettice came in to take his soup bowl away and serve him with his lamb cutlet. Then, when she had gone, he said in that precise voice of his, "Keys Shipping is paying the same penalty that White Star is paying -namely, the penalty of having been one of the first shipping companies to build a grand ocean cruising fleet. Before the War, of course, Keys was one of the most vigorous fleets on the Atlantic. But our ships are growing older now, and less fashionable, and as you know for yourself, the oceangoing public is notoriously fickle about which ships are pukkah and which aren't. That was the principal reason your father wanted to lay down the Arcadia—to own a liner that could challenge the Aquitania and the Berengaria and the Majestic. "A gleaming ferryboat for the rich and titled", that's what he called her; a ship that would be glamorous and fabled in her own right and would also lend lustre to the rest of the fleet. But, she has cost us nearly four million pounds to build and to fit out, and this expense has come at a time when we have been losing money steadily on the greater part of the rest of our fleet. We have been systematically refitting the older ships, of course. You wait until you see the magnificent job that John Brown's have done on the Iliad. But refitting has been vastly expensive, too; and we've run out of credit, as simple as that. The bank won't underwrite us for any more for another six months, and the Government have told us quite bluntly that they won't lend us any money unless we consider a merger with Cunard."

"I was not aware of any of this," said Catriona.

"Well, you wouldn't have been, would you, living away from your family?" put in Isabelle sharply. She didn't quite have the vinegar to say "in sin" but the intimation was there.

Edgar cut the meat from his cutlet and began to chew. "We used to have a lamb cutlet every Thursday night at Peliti's Restaurant in Calcutta, don't y'know, myself and all the other chaps from my chummery. Lamb cutlet and mint sauce, every Thursday. Always think it's Thursday when I eat lamb; can't shake it off."

Catriona said, "What are we going to do?"

"Do?"

About the debts? How are we going to pay them off?"

"Well, we have a choice," said Edgar. He helped himself to a small sip of wine. "We can hope that the Arcadia puts up such a stunning performance on her maiden voyage that the banks can be persuaded to change their minds, although I have to be truthful and say that the chances of that happening are pretty remote. We'd have to take the Blue Riband for the fastest Atlantic crossing first go; and apart from that we'd have to show firm bookings that were up by at least twenty per cent, if not more. That can happen, of course. After the Kronprinzessin Cecilie took the Blue Riband, sales of North German Lloyd tickets went up twenty-six per cent. But it takes so long for ticket sales to be realised as profit that the banks may not wish to cooperate."

"What else can we do?" asked Isabelle. "Are there any alternatives?"

"Oh, yes. Several. We could dismantle the Keys fleet and sell it off piecemeal; but that, of course, would mean that we would sacrifice the job of every men who works for us, two thousand seven hundred men in all, not counting casual labour. We would ruin this entire community overnight, no doubt at all, and after everything that Stanley has done for it, I hardly think that we should consider any step as drastic as that."

"I'm against it, for one," said Percy Fearson.

"Then... we have had some preliminary approaches from International Mercantile Marine, in America. Their foreign business manager, George Welterman, has been in London for the past three weeks, and will be sailing back to New York on the maiden voyage. He was talking to your father on the telephone last week about buying up the Keys fleet. Of course, your father refused; but this afternoon George Welterman called again, and suggested that we might care to reconsider his offer."

"Which is?" asked Catriona.

"Better than most, as far as I can see," said Edgar. "Eighteen million in gold for the entire Keys Shipping line; and a guarantee that it will be kept intact, and that all existing employment agreements will be honoured for three years."

"But that means we'll lose the shipping line entirely," said Catriona.

Edgar chewed, and nodded. "It will pass under the control of International Mercantile Marine lock, stock, and barrel. Or rather, it will pass under the control of a British board of directors who are directly answerable to IMM, since no British ship can be sold to a foreigner."

Catriona said, "Eighteen million in gold—how far will that stretch?"

"It will pay off our debts, and the interest on our debts, and it will probably leave us with slightly less than a million pounds. Enough to invest in something afresh, if you have a mind to."

"But the end of the Keys fleet as a Keys family business?"

"Unless Mr. Welterman decides to appoint you or your mother as chairman," said Edgar. The tone of his voice was quite flat, but Catriona was alert enough to recognise the sarcasm in what he was saying. All that was left of the Keys family after her father's death was her mother, dithery and self-indulgent; Isabella and Tony, neither of whom had the very first due about business; and herself, a twenty-one-year-old flapper with no experience and a naughty reputation.

"You mentioned several alternatives," said Catriona, as coldly as she could. "What were the others?"

Lettice, freshly red-eyed, came in to collect up the plates. She did it very noisily and managed to drop a lot of knives and forks, and then pick them up again, and then drop them again in the doorway. "There's only cheese," she said, miserably.

Catriona said, "Don't worry, Lettice. We'll help ourselves. Aunt Isabelle, would you mind awfully getting the water biscuits from the sideboard?"

Isabelle, bustling a little, fetched the crackers. Percy Fearson poured the port. They spooned ripe blue-veined Stilton on to their plates and ate it with olives and fresh celery.

Edgar Deacon said, "We could go into voluntary liquidation. That's always a possibility."

"Not one that I'd consider," said Percy Fearson.

"Well, it may be forced on us," replied Edgar. He brushed crumbs from the side of his mouth with a prissy gesture of his napkin. "It may also be one way of surviving. We could buy back the ships we wanted from the receiver, and start up again under a different flag."

"I won't hear of it," said Percy Fearson. "It took Stanley years to build up the reputation of Keys Shipping as honest, and upright, and that kind of financial jiggery-pokery just won't do."

"I was asked for alternatives," said Edgar.

"Honorable alternatives, yes," Percy Fearson retorted.

"Well, there's only one other," said Edgar. "And that is to sell the Arcadia separately."

"Would anyone be interested?" asked Isabelle.

"Stanley was visited several times by representatives of American TransAtlantic asking if he might consider selling or lending the Arcadia. But they were never offering enough money. Three million was about their best for an outright sale; and in any case, Stanley was determined not to sell, at any price. The Arcadia was Stanley's dream. He thought she would transform the entire shipping line overnight. It's true, of course, she has. She's almost broken us."

"In any case, selling the Arcadia separately wouldn't do much to solve our problems," said Percy Fearson. "We'd be left with the rest of the fleet and scarcely enough profit to pay mooring fees. And we'd have lost our most glamorous asset, present company excepted."

Catriona gave Percy a fleeting smile. She liked him when he pretended to be flirtatious. "Who runs American TransAtlantic?" she asked. "Isn't it Mark Beeney?"

"That's right. Thirty-one years old, almost implausibly handsome, and a dollar millionaire twenty times over. Well, on paper, anyway."

"I think I read about him in the Evening Standard a couple of days ago," said Catriona. "They said he was the most eligible man in the world. And he's in London, too."

"He'll be coming on the Arcadia's maiden voyage," said Percy.

"Really? I know that Douglas Fairbanks and Mary Pickford are going to be on her."

Edgar Deacon lifted his hand, and ticked off his fingers one by one. "Douglas Fairbanks, Mary Pickford, Princess Xenia of Russia, Jack Dempsey, Dame Clara Butt'—he raised his other hand and carried on counting—"Madge Bellamy, Leonore Ulrich, Charles Schwab of Bethlehem Steel, and even Senora Zelmira Paz de Gainza, with her ten maids, four motorcars, and a chambermaid."

Isabelle remarked, "It sounds like the Ark."

"Well, we do have some animals, too," said Edgar. "A 2,000-pound chow dog called Choonam Brilliantine, whom we have to feed with fresh raw eggs for his lunch every day; and Pyramid, the horse which won last year's Derby. He's going to be shipped in a special padded stable, and he's going to be taking his own blacksmith with him."

Catriona held her glass towards Percy Fearson for a little more port. Percy Fearson hesitated at first, but Edgar Deacon nodded at him to fill her glass up. "After what Mr. Thurrock told me about your young man's cocktails I'm sure a little 1911 port won't go to your head," he smiled. His smile was as thin as celluloid.

Catriona said, "This still doesn't solve the problem of how we're going to save Keys Shipping."

"We have some time left to consider the matter, of course," said Edgar. "But by the time the Arcadia docks in New York, we will have had to have made up our minds. The sheer cost of refuelling her and victualling her up for the return journey will be beyond us, unless we can be sure of a sale, or some further credit. And I would very much dislike to have her impounded in a foreign port."

"Why send her to New York at all, if we can't afford it?" asked Isabelle.

"We can't afford not to send her either," Edgar explained. "We have scores of cargo contracts to fulfil, contracts which have already been paid for; we've bought food, and drink, and fuel. How are we going to settle with all of our creditors if we don't sail, and have to refund our passenger's ticket money? Not to sail would sink us faster than sailing will. And besides, if we fail to take the Arcadia out, if we fail to show her as a fast and exciting and fashionable ship, her value on the shipping market will be seriously—disastrously—undermined."

Catriona said, "You really believe that we'll have to sell Keys Shipping?"

Edgar set down his butter knife. "I wish I could say no, but I cannot."

"And you think that George Welterman is the man to sell it to?"

"He will, after all, keep the existing company intact."

"What did father think of him?"

"Your father disliked him; but then George Welterman is not a particularly easy man to like. Nonetheless, he is probably the most powerful single man in American shipping today, apart from his masters at IMM."

How can we think of selling Keys to a man whom father disliked?"

Edgar said, "I regret, Miss Keys, that we often have to deal with people we dislike, as a matter of expediency."

"There must be another way of raising money somehow," said Catriona. "To think of selling everything that Father worked for all these years, and right at the moment of his greatest success..."

"You have to think of more than your immediate family," Edgar told her. "The families of scores of Liverpool men depend on us, too. The most important thing is to pay off what we owe and keep the company in one piece. That may not be everything that your wanted; but it will leave him with a very fitting memorial."

"Well, I just hope that I don't have to meet this George Welterman," said Catriona.

"Oh, I'm afraid that you will," said Edgar. "You're coming along on the maiden voyage, after all; and Mr. Welterman will be joining us."

"I'm coming?" asked Catriona.

"Of course. Who else is there to represent the Keys family? Your mother can't come, she's just not up to it, and somebody has to be sweet to the bankers and the food suppliers."

"Your father always talked about cajoling you into coming along," Percy Fearson smiled. "He wanted to attract the younger travellers, you see, the bright young things, so that if they got the idea it was smart to travel Keys, he'd have loyal new passengers who would travel with Keys for ever after."

"But I don't see where I come into it," said Catriona.

"He was going to publicise you as the Queen of the Atlantic," said Percy. "He was going to have you dressed by Paris designers, and buy you jewellery and furs and you name it. There's a whole file on it down at the office."

"He never told me," said Catriona. "The last time we met, we had that awful row, and he never told me."

"I think he was almost afraid you wouldn't agree to do it," said Percy.

"Afraid?" frowned Catriona. She couldn't imagine her father ever having been afraid.

"He wanted you to be the star of the whole voyage," Percy told her gently. "He loved you, you know; and I sometimes think that when he built the Arcadia he built it for you."

Isabelle stared at Catriona with an expression of such jealousy that she could have made a herring curl up. Catriona felt giddy, and the table seemed to tilt away from her. She was used to Nigel's poisonous Chicago cocktails, but not to Chateau Mouton Rothschild from her father's cellars. But perhaps it wasn't the wine at all. Perhaps it was the way in which her life had so suddenly tricked her. She had thought she was free of her father, and relieved of all involvement in the Keys family. A carefree, heel-kicking flapper. But now she had discovered that freedom is something which is granted—by a government to its people; by a parent to his child—and when death supervenes, the grant of freedom is automatically withdrawn, and has to be renewed.

"Mr. Deacon," she said, "I really don't know what to say. You'll nave to give me time to think about it."

"There isn't much time, my dear," said Mr. Fearson. "The Arcadia has to sail on Tuesday, whatever."

"You can't even delay her until father's buried?"

Edgar shook his head. "The cost of even one day's delay would be more than we could stand. And apart from that, the Arcadia must start off her active life with a reputation for reliability."

Catriona sat where she was, and then discovered that tears were sliding down her cheeks.

"Forgive me, Miss Keys," said Edgar. "I didn't intend to upset you today of all days."

"No, no. It's not your fault," said Catriona. "I'm just tired, that's all."

"Dottie has your room ready for you, if you wish to withdraw."

Percy Fearson escorted Catriona out of the dining-room; and in the dark timbered hallway he gave her over to Dottie, the upstairs maid, a ruddy-faced young girl who had come into service with the Keys family when she was fourteen. Dottie took Catriona's arm and led her a upstairs to the green-wallpapered guest bedroom at the end of the landing. Catriona's old bedroom was being redecorated, and there was a sharp smell of lead paint and wallpaper-paste around.

"The night was so warm that the diamond-leaded window which gave out on to the main sweep of the garden had been left wide open, and the full moon could be seen rising from behind the poplars. Moths pattered and battered against the green-and-white frosted bedside lamp. "I'll squirt them with Flit if you want," Dottie suggested.

Catriona stood with her arms by her sides, her eyes closed, while Dottie unhooked her black dress for her, and lifted it over her head. She wore no slip or corset; she thought her figure looked more boyish if she went without. Dottie helped her to roll down her black silk stockings and step out of her crepe-de-chine panties.

Catriona said to her, "What was the last thing my father ever said to you, Dottie? Can you remember?"

Dottie had to think about that. She was holding up Catriona's biscuit-on-cream pleated voile nightgown, and she was obviously astonished by the shortness and the airiness of it. "I don't know, miss," she said, "I think I'm still perplexed by it all."

"You can't remember anything?"

Dottie frowned. "Now, then. I remember I saw him in the hallway just before he went upstairs to bed. He said, "You won't forget to remind Cook that I want my Food of Life, will you, Dottie?" That's what he said."

Catriona sat down on the edge of the bed, and started to unpin her hair. "Food of Life," she whispered sadly, and she thought of the little nursery rhyme her father used to sing her, the one which he had invented himself.

Where the fish swim free, child,

And never bite the line;

Keep your nose in your own soup

And keep it out of mine."