I have given my message for Séamus to Harry. He says he’ll make sure it gets sent today. He reckons on it reaching Séamus within a week – imagine what he’ll think – a message from a ship in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean! It’ll be the talk of Ballysheen without a doubt.
Hearing the unmistakable voices of Peggy and Katie chatting enthusiastically as they came towards the cabin, she put her pen down and closed the book. Her few moments of solitude were over.
CHAPTER 19 - New York, 14th April, 1912
It had been a hard day’s work for Catherine Kenny and her plans to head to Macy’s to buy a birthday gift for her sister Katie now seemed thoroughly unappealing.
Her employer, Emily Walker-Brown, was in full flow preparing for the home-coming of her daughter Vivienne and her fiancé Robert after their vacation in southern Italy for the past two months. Robert was a film financier Vivienne had met through the studio and after filming on her latest movie wrapped at the end of January, Robert had proposed and they’d taken themselves off to enjoy a little winter sunshine on the continent, the Italian Riviera seeming to be the perfect spot for a young, well-connected American couple.
As Catherine was well aware, having overheard many a conversation in the Walker-Brown household, Vivienne was greatly interested in anything European, finding the ladies so elegant and the countries so interesting. ‘New York may boast the highest buildings and the finest jewellery store and department store in the world,’ she’d heard Vivienne proclaim over tea one afternoon, ‘but that is nothing compared to the beautiful, cobbled streets of a mediaeval Italian town or the frescoes on the Sistine chapel. So much more culture. So much more elegance than this stinking hell hole.’
Vivienne was a well-travelled, well-connected young lady who had educated herself in European culture and prided herself on the fact. She found most of New York’s other society ladies dully misinformed and tired easily of their endless talk of millinery and couture. These things interested Vivienne as a passing amusement, but they didn’t engage her for long. When the chance of a winter in Italy came along, she grasped the opportunity with both hands and literally dragged her fiancée to the docks to board their steam liner.
According to Mrs Walker-Brown, whose conversations Catherine also frequently overheard as she went about her business in the house, the studio had contacted Vivienne by telegram recently, stating that they required her back in America to start filming her next movie as soon as possible. With her holiday cut short, Vivienne was preparing herself to be mildly annoyed when the opportunity arose to travel back to New York on the White Star Line’s new ship, Titanic, and on her maiden voyage nonetheless. This was an opportunity to mingle among America’s richest and most influential businessmen and was not to be missed.
Robert had booked their first class tickets immediately; they would travel from Cherbourg in France along with their colleagues the Astors and the Guggenheims who had also been vacationing on the continent. They had sent a telegram home immediately informing Mrs Walker-Brown of their plans to return home and boasting of their having secured tickets for Titanic, nonetheless.
‘Imagine it,’ Mrs Walker-Brown declared as she’d recounted the story to one of her luncheon friends. ‘They will be the first to ever sail on Titanic, and amid such luxury! They say her bedrooms are finer than the Waldorf-Astoria and that she has the finest of modern conveniences with electric ovens and a heated bathing pool and six course dinners every evening. The ladies are even permitted exclusive use of the gymnasium for several hours a day; I fear Vivienne may have cause to visit the gymnasium if she is dining so well for seven days at sea!’
Anyone who was anyone in New York society was talking about Titanic that week. With so many influential businessmen and so much wealth sailing aboard, it was very much a case of feeling distinctly envious if you were not among it and distinctly delighted if you were.
For herself, Mrs Walker-Brown was enjoying the opportunity to boast of her daughter’s participation in Titanic’s maiden voyage, making reference to it at every possible opportunity; while lunching with the ladies, while having her hair styled, while paying for her groceries and while informing her domestics of their duties for the day. Catherine Kenny had heard so much about this magnificent ship, relayed through Vivienne’s telegrams to her mother and, in turn, through her mother’s incessant gossiping; had heard all about its fancy trimmings and its important passengers that she almost felt she was sailing on it as a first class passenger herself. She had ventured to tell Mrs Walker-Brown that, as far as she was aware, her own sister Katie was also travelling on the ship, along with thirteen others from her home town in Ireland.