The Night Lives On by Walter Lord Read Free Book Online

were immensely popular with the passengers, and always willing to play any request.Tonight they played some Puccini for Mrs. Candee and a little Dvorak for Hugh Woolner.
    Colonel Gracie, who never recognized any number the band played now or later, used the concert as an opportunity to circulate among the crowded little tables that filled the room. He was an indefatigable celebrity collector, and liked to mention his Union Club membership and St. Paul’s School background. One can imagine people wincing at his approach but putting up with him anyhow, for he was kind, courtly, and certainly meant well.
    Tonight the Colonel had fewer targets than usual, for the truly big names were dining in the À la Carte Restaurant up on B Deck, where the Wideners were giving a small dinner for Captain Smith. Yet there were still plenty of attractive tables, and Gracie felt that the ladies never looked lovelier. Around 9:30 he decided to break off the evening and retire. It was still early, but it had been a long day—all that squash, swimming, and exercises in the gym—and he had reserved the squash court for another session early the following morning.
    By 11:00 the rest of the crowd in the Reception Room was breaking up too, and the band finished the evening with the “Tales of Hoffmann.” Soon the big Jacobean room was completely empty, except for one remaining table. Mrs. Candee and “our coterie” were going as strong as ever. But even they felt the emptiness of the room and decided to look for some place cozier.
    Somebody suggested the Café Parisien, all the way aft on B Deck. It was the showpiece of the ship, stylish but intimate. Certainly there ought to be some life there. But all they found was one other party, presided over by Archie Butt, President Taft’s military aide.
    And it was so cold. Mrs. Candee drew her scarf close, but it made little difference. They ordered hot drinks, and a waiter appeared with a tray of grog, steaming Scotch and lemon, and (for Bjornstrom Steffanson) a hot lemonade. Even these emergency measures didn’t help, and around 11:20 Mrs. Candee reluctantly went below, where there was at least an electric heater in her stateroom.
    Colley also drifted off and the four remaining members of “our coterie” now went up to the smoking room, just above on A Deck. This was a male sanctuary where the ship’s night owls customarily gathered and which was bound to be warm. Someone produced a pack of cards, and the foursome began to play a rather lighthearted game of bridge. There were other tables of bridge nearby, including one carefully organized by George Brayton and two of his sporting cronies. The fourth at this table was Howard Case, London Manager of the Vacuum Oil Company. Case had been selected as the sharp’s next pigeon.
    Several other groups sat around simply talking, and one lone traveler—Spencer Silverthorne of St. Louis— buried himself in a big leather chair, idly reading Owen Wister’s The Virginian. It was now nearly 11:40 P.M. , and the hum of conversation blended with the steady throb of the engines far below.
    Suddenly an interruption. As Hugh Woolner recalled it a few days later in a letter to a friend, “There came a heavy grinding sort of a shock, beginning far ahead of us in the bows and rapidly passing along the ship and away under our feet.”
    It was not severe, but enough to spill gambler Harry Romaine’s drink. Everyone sprang up, and several ofthe more curious—including Woolner and Steffanson—darted through the swinging doors aft and onto the open Promenade Deck. Steffanson’s eyes couldn’t adjust to the sudden darkness fast enough, but he heard one of the others call out, “We hit an iceberg—there it is!”

CHAPTER VI
“Everything Was Against Us”
    T HE BRIDGE WAS AS surprised as the gentlemen in the smoking room. How could the Titanic have collided with an iceberg so suddenly, so unexpectedly? Second Officer Lightoller wasn’t on the bridge at the