The ship’s horn screeched me wide awake at midnight. Was this the lifeboat drill that Grace had warned me to expect, or was this the real deal? Had the master misinterpreted Tom’s sighting after all? As I pulled on my coat and shoes, I didn’t hear any artillery fire, so this had to be a drill. Didn’t it? I dragged my life jacket out of its cupboard and threw it over my head, fastening the straps, then blundered into the hall where I met my fellow passengers milling about in chaos, shouting and fastening their life jackets while the siren continued to sound.
Gil hopped on to the first step of the staircase. ‘Listen to me, I’ve done this before!’ he shouted. He pointed to the Smits. ‘Mr Smit, get your wife and daughters up this staircase and climb the next ladder to the boat deck. There’ll be a seaman there to show you to your lifeboat.’ Smit and his family edged past Gil and hurried up the stairway. ‘Next, the women,’ Gil said. Olive and I were ready to go, but Blanche wasn’t anywhere to be seen. ‘Rouse up Mrs Bryant, for God’s sake,’ Gil said. ‘We could be blown out of the water any minute.’ Olive and I pounded on her door, screaming her name, but she didn’t answer. Her door was unlocked and when I pushed it open, her berth was empty.
I turned to Gil. ‘She’s not here!’
‘Come on, then,’ he said. ‘Up, up!’
Olive and I surged up the stairway, followed by Gil and Ronan. ‘Where do you think Blanche is?’ I shouted to Olive, trying to drown out the sound of the siren and running feet overhead. ‘Maybe in the wardroom?’ she shouted back. ‘Maybe smoking on deck? We’ll soon find out.’
The seaman waiting for us as we emerged on to the boat deck was not pleased with us. He seemed to have forgotten that he wasn’t supposed to curse around women. ‘You slackers,’ he shouted, ‘you’re bloody slow! Get to boat number six now; you should have been there five minutes ago!’
The master and Chief Popeye were waiting for us when we joined the Smits at our lifeboat. Grace waited there, too. I guess that the ‘women and children first’ rule also applied to her. ‘If this was a real call to abandon ship, half of us might have drowned by now, thanks to you,’ the master said to our woebegone little group. ‘Are you aware of the cargo we’re carrying? Enough munitions to blow us all to hell and back.’
‘I’m sorry, Master, we couldn’t find Mrs Bryant,’ Gil said.
‘Next time, don’t wait or look for anyone; just move, if you don’t want to drown down below,’ the master said.
The youngest Smit daughter, Corrie, started to cry.
The master’s fury abated a little. ‘Darlin’,’ he said to her, ‘this is for your sake. Wherever you are when you hear that siren, you head for this lifeboat. Don’t even wait for your parents or your sister – you hear me? You can meet them here.’
She nodded, sniffling back her tears while her mother calmed her, speaking to her softly in Dutch.
‘Now,’ the master said, turning to Popeye, ‘where is Mrs Bryant?’
‘Unaccounted for, sir,’ he answered.
The master became so red with rage that I worried he might have a heart attack.
‘I’m right here, sir,’ Blanche said, appearing by my side wearing her life preserver.
‘Where the hell have you been?’ the master said.
‘If you must know, I was in the head,’ Blanche answered calmly. ‘I got here as fast as I could.’
The master seemed a bit startled by her reference to the toilet. ‘You do realize that if you don’t make it to this boat in an emergency, we might have to leave you behind?’ he said to her. ‘If you’re not here on time for the next drill, I’ll be forced to maroon you in Halifax.’
‘Yes, sir, I understand. I’ll take my chances just like everyone else. You go on and abandon me if you must. I don’t have much to lose.’
Corrie started to sniffle again.
The master didn’t answer Blanche directly. Turning to the first mate, he said, ‘Stand down.’ Popeye shouted the order through a bullhorn and the seamen began to disperse. The terrible noise of the siren stopped.
Grace leaned into our group. ‘“Stand down” means return to your quarters and sleep in your life preservers,’ she whispered. Then she touched Corrie Smit’s shoulder. ‘Would you like me to bring you and your sister some hot chocolate?’
The girls nodded and their father said, ‘Yes, please.’
We trooped down to our quarters, chatting, except for Blanche, who went into her room without a word. A few minutes later, on my way to the lavatory, I saw Grace descending the stairway with a small tray holding two mugs of hot chocolate balanced between her right arm and her waist. With her left hand she grasped the handrail. Our stairway in the passenger area was much less steep than the ladders, and she skittered down it very quickly.
‘Be careful,’ I said to her. She flashed me a gay smile as she knocked on the Smits’ door.
‘Yes, ma’am,’ she said.
I found that it wasn’t difficult at all to fall asleep wearing a life preserver.