Murder on the Lusitania by Conrad Allen Read Free Book Online

ship. The watching crowd cheered themselves hoarse as the narrow beam of the new vessel cut cleanly and purposefully through the dark water. An attempt to win back the Blue Riband, and the enormous kudos that went with it, was now properly under way.
    The new passengers were eager to stow their luggage in their cabins so that they could get swiftly back up on deck in order toenjoy the true, heartwarming Irish send-off they were being given. One of them, however, showed no interest in the proceedings. He was a tall, slim young man with a swarthy complexion and large brown eyes. While others had tripped excitedly up the gangplank, he had more or less slunk aboard the ship, head down and face largely covered by the peak of his cap. When he was shown to his cabin in the second-class quarter, he locked the door behind him before swinging his suitcase up onto the bed. Opening it at once, he took out a small photograph of a young woman and kissed it softly before placing it on his table.
    From inside a silver frame, Violet Rymer smiled back at him.

FOUR
    B y midafternoon, the
Lusitania
was steaming across the Atlantic Ocean with thick black smoke belching furiously from three of her funnels. Passengers on the boat deck who wondered why no smoke came from the fourth funnel were unaware of the fact that its function was purely decorative and that it had been added by the ship’s designer for reasons of symmetry. A vessel on that scale needed massive funnels, each one so large that it was possible for two cars to drive through them side by side when their individual sections had been riveted together at the shipyard. Photographic proof of this capability had been released to the press and many newspapers had startled their readers with the pictures. Other details of the ship’s construction, however, were jealously guarded. The giant was ready to display its muscles to the world, but its vital organs were kept largely secret so they could not be copied by rivals.
    It did not seem like a Sunday. Though services had been held aboard and hymns sung with Christian gusto, there were few outward signs of the Sabbath. People promenaded on the decks or made use of the various leisure facilities. Cameras were much in evidence and a few amateur artists worked on their first sketches.The busiest men aboard were the trimmers and stokers down in the engine room, the former making sure that the latter had an endless supply of highly combustible bituminous coal from the bunkers. There were almost two hundred furnaces and their appetite was voracious. In order to maintain the top cruising speed of twenty-five knots, the best part of a thousand tons of coal a day had to be shoveled into the flames. For those down below, the Sabbath was no day of rest.
    George Porter Dillman spent most of the morning familiarizing himself with the vessel and mingling with the other passengers. Some new acquaintances were made and he was on nodding terms with several other people. Though technically a member of the crew, it was important for him to be accepted as just one more first-class passenger so that he could move unseen around his territory and monitor it more effectively. Late afternoon found him taking tea in the Veranda Café with Cyril and Ada Weekes. The couple had acquired a new friend in Jeremiah Erskine, a big, ponderous man of middle years with a luxuriant black beard and a scattering of ugly warts on a high forehead. Extensive business interests in the United States made Erskine a regular transatlantic traveler but he seemed to derive no pleasure from his voyages.
    “I sense trouble ahead,” he said darkly. “Everything has gone far too smoothly so far. That is a bad omen.”
    “What do you mean, Mr. Erskine?” asked Weekes.
    “The Cunard Line is fraught with danger, sir.”
    “That is not true at all,” said Dillman defensively. “Its safety record is beyond reproach and no more stable vessel has ever been launched than