A Family for the Titanic Survivor Read online

  “Don’t you believe in curses?” Bridget asked, walking across the foyer beside him.

  “I’m not sure how to answer that.”

  “Why?”

  Karl stepped aside at the doorway so she could enter the room, but kept his hand on her back as he walked in behind her. “Because if I say yes, you’ll tell me why I shouldn’t, and if I say no, you’ll tell me why I should.”

  She held in a giggle, but knew he was right. She liked how they could tease each other, just somewhat, now and again. It was fun. And right now, he needed some fun. Needed to have a light heart to deal with what he had to do. Spinning, she looked up at him. “That’s because some curses need to be believed in, and others don’t.” Leaning closer, she whispered, “The trick is knowing the difference.”

  He caught her waist with both hands again. “How would I know the difference?”

  She gave him a secretive look. “You’d need the luck of the Irish to know that.”

  “I think I have found that.”

  Her breath stalled, and so did her heart as he leaned closer until their lips met.

  Author Note

  News of the sinking of the Titanic shocked the world. Early reports claimed there were no survivors, and other reports claimed there were no casualties. It wasn’t until the Carpathia, the ship that rushed to the site of the sinking and rescued survivors, arrived in New York that the truth was known. A little over 30 percent of the people aboard the state-of-the-art luxury liner survived. They arrived in New York with nothing but the clothes on their backs.

  Having always been someone who has wondered what happened next? I was excited when given the opportunity to create a story in the aftermath of this historic event.

  I hope you enjoy Bridget and Karl’s story!

  LAURI ROBINSON

  A Family for the

  Titanic Survivor

  A lover of fairy tales and history, Lauri Robinson can’t imagine a better profession than penning happily-ever-after stories about men and women in days gone past. Her favorite settings include World War II, the Roaring Twenties and the Old West. Lauri and her husband raised three sons in their rural Minnesota home and are now getting their just rewards by spoiling their grandchildren. Visit her at laurirobinson.blogspot.com, Facebook.com/lauri.robinson1 or Twitter.com/laurir.

  Books by Lauri Robinson

  Harlequin Historical

  Diary of a War Bride

  A Family for the Titanic Survivor

  Sisters of the Roaring Twenties

  The Flapper’s Fake Fiancé

  The Flapper’s Baby Scandal

  The Flapper’s Scandalous Elopement

  Brides of the Roaring Twenties

  Baby on His Hollywood Doorstep

  Stolen Kiss with the Hollywood Starlet

  Oak Grove

  Mail-Order Brides of Oak Grove

  “Surprise Bride for the Cowboy”

  Winning the Mail-Order Bride

  In the Sheriff’s Protection

  Visit the Author Profile page

  at Harlequin.com for more titles.

  To Ashley, who will forever believe there was plenty of room on that door for two.

  Contents

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Epilogue

  Excerpt from Lady Margaret’s Mystery Gentleman by Christine Merrill

  Chapter One

  1912

  Bridget McGowen had always known that this day would come, but now that it had arrived, a mixture of emotions as thick as a pot of stew that had simmered too long filled her stomach. America. Da had saved every penny possible for this dream to come true. To send her to America. It was the dream of nearly every Irish family—saving enough money to send a child across the ocean.

  Not to become a household servant or laborer, but to rise above, like others had, including Da’s cousin Martha.

  Martha had become a wealthy woman, a successful woman, all on her own.

  A heavy and long sigh slowly seeped out of Bridget.

  Today was so bittersweet.

  Leaving everything she’d ever known to embark upon a voyage across the sea and arrive in a new country, an entirely new world.

  It was exciting—the jubilance of so many people surrounding her, talking, cheering, giddy about their adventure, made it so. But to her, it was also sorrowful.

  Da had died last week.

  That pain was still strong, still so consuming it made her eyes sting. If anyone was to notice, they might think it was the mist from the salty sea air. A silly thought, indeed. Everyone was too busy, too excited to board the steamer, to notice she had tears in her eyes, or a broken heart in her chest.

  In Da’s last breaths, he’d told her to lift a board beneath his bed and take out the metal box hidden there. She had, and she’d cried because she’d known the significance of the money in that box. It was for her trip to America. The pennies, nickels and dimes he’d pinched, saved and hidden away for her to have this opportunity.

  I’m here, Da, in Southampton, and will soon set sail for America. I’ll make your dream come true.

  Da had made her promise that she’d do just this. Travel to America and open a boardinghouse like his cousin Martha had done in Chicago. Martha had returned to Ireland several times dressed in the latest finery and touting to friends and family that the opportunities in America were endless.

  Bridget had promised to go, but not until Da no longer needed her.

  A nudge in the center of her back urged her forward, shuffling shoulder to shoulder and toe to heel with a crowd the likes of which she’d never seen, up the angled wooden pier that creaked and swayed with the weight it upheld as people made their way aboard the Titanic. A ship so massive, so long and wide and tall, Bridget had a hard time believing it could float.

  She also had a hard time believing she was boarding it. The greatest luxury liner ever built. The greatest luxury she’d ever known was when there was a slow night at the pub and she’d slip away to enjoy a long soak in a hot tub of water, reading until the water grew cold.

  Uncle Matt had claimed the Titanic had a bathtub made of pure gold. She’d heard him say that from the kitchen of the pub, where she’d been washing the constant flow of mugs and cups used by the patrons, just as she had for as long as she could remember. Da had always said that Uncle Matt had kissed the Blarney Stone more than once; that’s why he could talk at the rate of two men. Normally the constant rattle of Uncle Matt’s voice had entered one ear and gone out the other without taking any sort of root in her mind.

  That night though, mere days after they’d put Da in the ground, the way Uncle Matt had been boasting made her step away from the wash pan and move closer to the door. She’d heard of the great ship. Of its maiden voyage. Men had been peddling tickets for the ocean liner for months. Just as they had for every ship heading for America. The Titanic had been built in Ireland, which gave Uncle Matt more to brag about.

  Disbelief had entered her when she’d heard him boast about securing a ti
cket on the ocean liner.

  For himself.

  That’s when her disbelief had turned into something more. She’d hurried up the stairway in the back room, to the living quarters she and her father had shared above the pub, and into the room that was barely large enough for her bed and chest of drawers. Upon opening the top drawer, digging past her ironed and folded aprons, anger like she’d never known had coiled into a hard knot in her stomach.

  It had been taken. The metal box. Her money.

  Back downstairs, with the room full of men—family, friends, foes and strangers—she’d demanded her money. The money that Da had saved for her and that had been in her dresser drawer until her uncle, her very own flesh and blood, had stolen it.

  It had a been a row, one that had made her squeamish, because of the shame it had brought upon her family, that her very uncle would steal from her, but she’d gotten her money back.

  Right there.

  Right then.

  Uncle Matt claimed he’d only been teasing her, testing her so that she’d put the money in a safer spot, but she knew blarney when she heard it. That night, upon closing and locking the doors of the pub, she’d packed her bag and had left early the next morning. Upon securing a ticket, she’d taken the ferry and train all the way to Southampton, and now would travel upon the Titanic across the Atlantic to start a new life. In America. Where she would make all those dreams, all those hopes Da had had for her, come true.

  Another nudge urged her forward again, although it was merely half a step up the packed walkway. The entire wharf was crowded, full of women wearing dresses and hats as fancy and frivolous as those seen in pictures, and men who looked just as dapper in their suit coats and shined shoes. There were plenty of people dressed like her, too, wearing what had to be their best clothes, homespun and home sewn serviceable clothing.

  While huge nets full of traveling trunks and suitcases were being hoisted high in the air and over the edge of the ship, the people on this pier were like her, carrying various bags and cases that held all the earthly belongings they were taking along for their journey.

  The trunks and suitcases in those overhead nets belonged to the people on the piers and stairways above her, boarding the ship in their fancy clothes and hats—first-class passengers.

  Their walkway was high overhead. Below that was the second-class pier, and below that was where she stood. On the third-class pier. The separation was designed to keep people in their rightful places. She wasn’t bitter or surprised by that; it was the way of the world. There was the upper class and lower class in everything. Cousin Martha had said things were different in America, though. Bridget was a bit concerned about that because different could mean a lot of things. In this instance, she hoped different meant everyone had the same opportunity to achieve their dreams. Humble beginnings were food for the soul, but they shouldn’t rule a person’s life.

  They shouldn’t make them want to steal from their family, either. Uncle Matt and Da came from the same place, the same womb, but they sure had been different. Da had been the salt of the earth. Honest, kind, loving. He’d taught her the importance of those things, too.

  So, although she had taken her money, that which was rightfully hers, she had also left a note for Uncle Matt, bequeathing him her share of the Green Door, her half of the pub that she’d inherited upon her father’s death. And more importantly, she forgave him. Uncle Matt was family.

  The faint shrill of a child’s scream shattered Bridget’s thoughts. There was so much noise she wasn’t sure where it had come from. There didn’t seem to be a commotion on the pier. Yet, she’d distinctly heard a child scream.

  Glancing up, she spied something tumbling through the air. Without concern or thought to the people around her, she leaped onto the piped handrail of the pier and stretched out an arm just in time to grasp ahold of a corner of the fluttering material and draw it close.

  A doll. A cherub-faced doll with bright blue eyes and pink cheeks wearing a ruffled, white eyelet dress. Memories filled her as she glanced up, saw the small arm of a little girl extended over a man’s shoulder as the man entered the doorway of the ship on the first-class pier. She’d had a similar doll, years ago, that she had loved dearly.

  Set upon entering themselves, no one on her pier seemed to have noticed her rescue, or if they had, they weren’t concerned, nor did they make room to allow her to step off the rail, to gain a spot back in the boarding line.

  A young man finally paused. Thanking him, she stepped off the rail and kept a tight hold on the doll while the ushering aboard continued, along with the inspection of boarding cards and the shouting of stewards for passengers to proceed to the D, E, F or G decks. Once inside, the sound of the crowd, the stewards shouting and the rumbling of the engines echoed between the heavy walls and vibrated in her ears. The process seemed to take hours, and by the time she finally found her berth, Bridget’s nerves were frayed.

  A crowd at the Green Door had meant two, maybe three dozen people, not thousands, and she’d already been traveling for over a day and a half.

  Opening the door, a tiny gasp caught in her throat. The cabin was small, but certainly accommodating. A set of bunk beds, complete with linens and blankets, were connected to one wall, a sink and mirror on the far wall, and two folding chairs sat along the wall across from the beds. The floor was pink, the walls painted white, and there were small white towels folded so they stood up on top of the holding tank above the sink and below the mirror.

  Closing the door, the first thing she did was examine those towels. They were truly the fanciest things she’d ever seen.

  When the time came, she would do that with towels at her boardinghouse. Fold them so they stood up, looking pretty while waiting for use.

  She set her bag and the doll on the top bunk, leaving the easier-to-access lower bed for whoever her berth mate might be, and removed her wool coat, which had caused her to grow warm during all the hustle and bustle of boarding and finding her cabin. After hanging the coat on a hook, she made sure the small, crocheted purse holding her money was still safely tucked in her skirt pocket, then picked the doll off the bed.

  The ocean liner was very large, and once she’d entered the inside of the ship, she’d taken so many turns, walked along so many hallways, that she wasn’t sure which way was north, east, south or west, but there was a little girl who was sure to be worried about her doll.

  Opening the door, she stepped into the hallway and pulled closed the door she’d been so relieved to find only moments ago. Lines of people filled the corridors at both ends of the hallway. She chose the direction from which she hadn’t trekked to arrive at her berth, hoping the steward down there would be a bit more friendly.

  The line extended the length of the corridor, and it took a long time before someone allowed her to squeeze in and start shuffling forward. Upon arriving at an intersection of corridors, she waited for her turn to speak to the young steward directing the persons in line as to which way to proceed. Left or right.

  “Excuse me,” she said, “a child from first class dropped this doll. Would you be able to see it’s delivered to her?”

  Without looking her way, he said, “No.” He glanced at the card the person behind her held over her head. “Left.”

  She held the frustration that bubbled inside her as she said, “I’m sure the child was upset and—”

  “Where’s your boarding card?” He glanced at another person’s card. “Right.”

  “In my berth,” she answered.

  “Then return there until we set sail,” he snapped, and went on shouting left and right as people showed him their boarding cards.

  Frustration filled his voice and actions. It filled the faces of those around her, as well. There was a set of steps behind the steward, so, with no other option, she turned, excused her way through the line of people proceeding that way, and once acros
s the hall, quickly climbed a different set of stairs.

  She requested help from more stewards, with the same luck as the first, and therefore continued working her way through crowds and up stairways. The higher the sets of stairs took her, the more changes she noticed. Painted white walls and doors along the corridors became solid wood doors and the pink flooring became carpet that muffled her footsteps. Higher yet, the walls of the corridors had wooden wainscoting with wallpapered walls above it, and the doors were elegantly carved with gold number plates rather than painted on numbers.

  The final set of stairs led her down a hallway that ended in a large foyer, with the grandest staircase she’d ever set eyes on. The double set of steps led to a massive landing of two open corridors and the arched windows filled the ship with sunlight, making everything sparkle and shine.

  Awed, she crossed the room to the very center, then turned a complete circle, pausing to watch people stepping in and out of the elevators before completing her turn to face the stairway again. Impressively carved woodwork surrounded an elegant clock at the top of the steps where the corridors met. It was all so gorgeous.

  Oh, Da, you wouldn’t believe this.

  “Excuse me, miss, I believe you must be lost.”

  She twisted, nodded, then shook her head. “No, no, I’m not lost.” At least she hoped she’d find her way back to her berth. “I’m in need of some assistance.”

  “There are stewards that can help you on your deck,” said the man, who was dressed in a black-and-white formal suit.

  “No, they couldn’t help me,” Bridget said, easing the hold on the doll still clutched to her chest. “I believe a child boarding on the first-class walkway dropped this doll. I need to return it to her.”

  “Very well, I will see to that.” He held out his hand.

  She was about to hand the doll over but, having encountered so many stewards who weren’t concerned about the doll, became suspicious. “How?”

  “How?”

  “Yes, how will you see the child gets her doll?”