3. The Baby

I stare down at the water below, and then a nervous woman in a filmy nightdress pulls me back with a flutter and moans that I am rocking the lifeboat and that I really shouldn't do that. She has an American accent and is paying and I liked Americans (not so demanding as English) and am being paid (or at least I hope) so I might as well do what she wants. It seems to be the smart thing to do and she is awfully pale.

The lifeboat is finally full – very few night suits, mainly nightgowns and robes – and it begins creaking down towards the inky black sea with a rather ominous noise. I catch glimpses of gilding on the crests of small waves from the light of the ship. We hardly descend any bit, though, when someone leans over the side – I surely can't see his face, the glare from behind is too great – and says, "Here, Miss Jessop, look after this baby," drops a bundle on my lap, and turns away from the side. I shriek when I realize it is squirming, but I don't suppose I can really do much about it as it's a baby and I haven't got the faintest idea whose baby it is, after all.

I hug it – her; she's got a little bit of dress sticking out from below the rather shoddy quilt – to my lifebelt and stare in the round windows as we go past. By now there's no one inside, and I see more and more people up on deck. Other lifeboats are lowered, but I can only stare in the windows. Here, there's a fine evening suit and a discarded lavender dress. I remember the dinner tonight and try to remember a lavender dress but I can't and I wonder if the couple has made it off alright but I know they probably haven't. This next window is into a dark room, and all I can see is a stack of books next to the bed, scattered over the floor. Then a room with doll and a frilly white baby basinet – was this my little baby's room? No, this baby isn't from first class.

This is like a dream, where I am a magical fairy taking the changeling away from the city, staring in the windows as she passes. This must be a dream.

We hit the water with a sickening lurch, and the nervous woman shrieks. The baby is quiet, though, and stares at me with big, round blue eyes. The boat begins moving away from the Titanic and I almost cry but don't not wanting anyone to see my tears. Water sloshes in the bottom of our boat, chilling my feet and making me shiver again.

The baby sucks her thumb and I stare at the ship, counting the decks by the rows of dotted lights from the window. One, two, three, four, five six. It is beautiful, like sparkling candlelight on Christmas trees at Christmastime. One, two, three, four, five.

I pause.

Only five? I must have miscounted. I count again: One, two, three, four, five. One two three four five. Onetwothreefourfive.

I choke back a sob – the Titanic is sinking. It's true. Our boat pulls further out and I count – one, two, three, four – and I the hear the nervous woman whimper, and then cry out. People are jumping from the deck. It is tilting and leaning, like a great, dying whale. More splashes, people cry out. Lights begin to go out and another row of window-lights disappear, twinkling for a split second under the waves – or is it a reflection?

Over the wide stretch of water that separates the small boat and the gigantic boat, faint strains of music play. I hold the baby to my chest and turn away – I do not want to see the final moments of thousands of lives. I do not want my eyes to hold their last sight.