Unsinkable by Gordon Korman Read Free Book Online

admitted lying about my age!
Spying Alfie, the boy spun around and began marching quickly in the opposite direction.
“Hello,” Alfie called tentatively.
The steward broke into a run and disappeared up the companion stairs at the end of the passageway.
Alfie frowned. Had the boy overheard the confession? In truth, the lad seemed even younger than Alfie, but appearances were often deceiving.
Nervously, Alfie reentered the compartment, scanning the racks of uniforms for the steward’s hiding place. He noticed the hatch leading to the deserted laundry. Had the boy come from there? Maybe he’d heard nothing at all….
Alfie’s eyes fell on a bundle of clothing concealed by a row of trench coats. A jacket, shirt, and trousers, worn and ragged and — he sniffed — plenty pungent, too.
It came to him like the pieces of a jigsaw puzzleassembling in his brain. The young “steward” — a stowaway? A street boy who had exchanged his rags for a crew uniform in order to pose as a White Star employee?
I must tell an officer at once!
A moment later, rational thought returned. Until April 10, Alfie himself had no business being on board. And if the word got out that he was underage, he would be put off the ship.
Better not to call attention to himself.
What about the old clothes? Should he just leave them here? That would alert everyone to the fact that there was a stowaway.
If the crew began sweeping the entire ship to determine who belonged and who didn’t …
No, he had to get rid of them. But where? The trash? They’d be noticed there as well.
The image came to mind of the Titanic’s 15-foot-high boilers, his father and his mates stoking fires hot enough to produce the steam to move the largest ocean liner in the world.
How long could a bundle of rags last in an inferno like that?

CHAPTER NINE
SOUTHAMPTON
W EDNESDAY, A PRIL 10, 1912, 11:35 A.M.
The hustle and bustle on the dock was approaching hysterical proportions. The rush to board more than two thousand passengers and new crew members created nothing less than a mob scene. That was compounded by the relatives and friends who had come to see their loved ones off, and spectators anxious to catch a glimpse of the start of the famous maiden voyage.
The first-class boat train had arrived, and the cream of American and British society poured across the wharf toward the dream ship that would carry them to New York. These titans of the civilized world had to vie for dock space with their own baggage — thousands of crates, steamer trunks, and pieces of hand-tooled leather luggage of every conceivable size and shape. The crane loaded cargo containers that held everything from sacks of mail to a jeweled copyof The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam, bound for an American museum.
Farther aft, at the third-class gangway, steerage passengers swarmed. Most of them were emigrants, carrying all their earthly belongings in carpetbags and cord-wrapped parcels. White Star officials pored over their identification documents and steamer tickets.
No one bothered first class with such trifles. No sooner had Juliana and her parents stepped aboard than they were whisked to their staterooms by waiting stewards and made as comfortable as the wealthy were accustomed to.
Stateroom B-56 was as sumptuous as any chamber in Glamford Hall, the family’s country estate outside London. Juliana could not have been more excited. The suite provided bedrooms for her and her father, as well as accommodations for the maid and the valet. It was a glorious place to be spending the next several days, and she looked forward to the voyage as well as to seeing New York. There was one strangely puzzling development: Why was her mother weeping so?
Elizabeth, Countess of Glamford, clung to her daughter as if she expected never to see her again.
“Please calm down, Mama,” Juliana soothed. “It’s only a short stay. We’ll be home in two months!”
Her reply was only to sob harder. “My darling girl!” she managed.
Her